Differences between Schopenhauer and Buddhism

The #philosophy developed by Arthur #schopenhauer (1788-1860) takes some ethical ideas from Buddhism, but those don’t affect the theory of the will (“life force”), which constitutes the essence of Schopenhauer’s work. #buddhism was created by Buddha (Siddhartha Gautama) in the sixth century before our era. Buddha was born into a Nepalese royal family, grew disillusioned with his aristocratic lifestyle, and began to search for the meaning of life. Some of his ethical views were taken over by Schopenhauer twenty-five centuries later. At age twenty-nine, Buddha embraced an #ascetic lifestyle in which meditation and poverty played the central role. Buddha thought that asceticism would lead him to enlightenment. Buddhist tradition tells us that, after six years of asceticism, Buddha attained enlightenment, that is, he figured out that the best way to live is to pursue liberation from suffering. In the ensuing years, Buddha travelled through India to preach his ideas. He emphasised empathy and compassion, which are the two virtues taken over by Schopenhauer in his philosophy. He gave great weight to those virtues in his books “The world as will and representation” (1818) and “Two fundamental problems of ethics” (1843). Despite a partial ethical overlap, Schopenhauer’s goal is different from the goal pursued by Buddha. Schopenhauer was recommending #empathy and compassion as means of escaping or minimising the impact of the will. He argued that, if you do not adopt countermeasures, the will is going to take control of your life and drive you into destructive action. For Buddha, the philosophical #purpose was to eliminate as much as possible suffering. Thus, he advised his disciples to refrain from dwelling in the past or dreaming about the future, so that they would concentrate on the present moment. Here is the link to the original article: https://johnvespasian.com/differences-between-schopenhauer-and-buddhism/

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