A student of philosophy may disagree with this title. But it is true philosophy whether ancient, medieval or modern is nothing but confession of some famous crackpots. Yes, life cannot be understood by some theories; it can be understood only by living. And what else philosophers do their whole life except generating theories about life. Philosophers generally think so much about life that they forget to live it actually. Let me analyse some of the famous philosophers( crackpots ) :
Plato:- He kept on repeating his entire life what Socrates said. And the basis of these repeatitions he was considered highly intelligent in his time. But he forgot Socrates himself said that I know only one thing that I know nothing.
Aristotle:- He wrote in his major work that since women are inferior to men in every sense so in a woman's jaw there are only 18 teeth. Although he had three wives. He could have counted himself.
Francis Bacon:- An utterly corrupt man, Francis Bacon, was sentenced to prison for taking bribes being a lord Chancellor. Later he was pardoned by the queen. Out of his guilt he moved towards philosophy and his major work Novum Organum came out of this guilt. He wanted to prove the world that he is not corrupt but highly intelligent.
Immanuel Kant:- I am reminded of one of kant's anecdote. One has to decide after reading the anecdote what was Kant; intelligent or stupid. Once kant was proposed by a beautiful lady for marriage. But as he used to claim himself, critique of pure reason( one of his major work), he asked the lady for some time. so that, he can find out the reason for getting married or not. He took almost three year, debating with himself for and against marriage. Finally he decided to get married. But, the lady did not waited for three years and she married someone else when kant was busy in debating.
Friedrich Nietzsche:- Through out his life nietzsche kept talking about superman but he himself ended in a mental asylum.
Ludwig Wittgenstein:- Wittgenstein suffered the whole of his life with the idea of suicide but never attempted. He himself accepts that he was not courageous enough.
Arthur Schopenhauer:- He writes in his major work The world as will and idea that philosophy should not be made into business. This feeling came in him when he was thrown out of university and his contemprory Hegel was getting name and fame.
Kahlil Gibran:- I am most sorrowful for this man. Being an author of one of the greatest work of all time The Prophet, he should'nt have missed the fruits and essence of life. He was alcoholic and died of liver failure.
Bertrand Russell:- He himself used to say that consistency is the symbol of stupidity but he remained atheist for whole of his life. Is sticking to atheism for whole life not consistency.
There are many in the list:- Bergson, William James, Hegel, Hume, Spinoza and many other but it would be a waste of time if I put a light on them also. What my point is getting an idea of how these missed life by just thinking about it.
But one should keep in mind I dont consider some peoples as philosophers namely:- Jesus, Socrates, Diogenes, Pythagoras, Heraclitus, Gautam Buddha, Mahavira, Al Hillaz Mansoor, Farid, Rabiya, Mohammed, Bayzeed, Lao-tse, Rinzhai, Hakuin, Ikku, Lin-chi, Chuang-tse, Boko-tse, Bodhidharma, Nanak, Kabir, Rahim, Meera, Krishna, Gorakh, Gurdjieff, J. Krishnamurthy, Osho Rajneesh, Maharshi Raman, Ramkrishna Paramhansa and many others.
Instead of calling them philosophers, I like to call them poets. They wrote their own poetry in their own way. They made their life itself into a song, a poetry, a dance. They never thought about life but they actually lived it.
No comments:
Post a Comment