Eastern philosophy

Eastern philosophy is a term that encompasses the many philosophical currents originating outside Europe, including China, India, Japan, Persia and other regions. They have their own timelines, regions and philosophers. Major traditions include:

• African philosophy and Ethiopian philosophy
• Ancient Egyptian philosophy and Babylonian literature
• Indian philosophy, Jain philosophy and Hindu philosophy
• Iranian philosophy
• East Asian Neo-Confucianism and Buddhist philosophy, Japanese philosophy and Korean philosophy
• Persian Zoroastrianism
• Middle Eastern Islamic philosophy
• European Jewish philosophy and Christian philosophy
• Mesoamerican Aztec philosophy

Some Western thinkers claim that philosophy as such is only characteristic of Western cultures. Martin Heidegger is even reported to have said that only Greek and German languages are suitable for philosophizing. On the other hand, Arab and Jewish philosophy, which have been in dialogue with the Greek tradition and, in the case of leading Islamic philosophers such as Ibn Sina or Ibn Rushd, rely heavily on it, are not specifically Eastern philosophies at all. It is still commonplace in Western universities to teach only Western philosophy and to ignore Asian philosophy altogether, or consider only newer Western-influenced Asian thought properly "philosophy". Carine Defoort, herself a specialist in Chinese thought, has offered support for such a "family" view of philosophy, while Rein Raud has presented an argument against it and offered a more flexible definition of philosophy that would include both Western and Asian thought on equal terms. In response, OuYang Min argues that philosophy proper is a Western cultural practice and essentially different from zhexue, which is what the Chinese have, even though zhexue (originally tetsugaku) is actually a neologism coined in 1873 by Nishi Amane for describing Western philosophy as opposed to traditional Asian thought.