Schopenhauer’s Initial Encounter With Indian Thought

8/12/2019 Schopenhauers Initial Encounter With Indian Thought

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Schopenhauers Initial Encounter

with Indian Thought

by U rs App (Kyoto)

Compari son vs. H istori cal inquir y: A Word about Method

C omparisons of Schopenhauers thought w ith I ndian philosophy may involveideas or movements that Schopenhauer was not at all acquainted with, for exam-ple Yogcra, or philosophies which he only knew through questionable or pos-

sibly misleading sources, for example old Latin translations of t he U panishads orof Vedanta texts. C omparisons of ideas can, but do not have to be, bound byhistorical considerations; thus a comparison of, say, Schopenhauers and G an-dhis attitude to animals, or of Schopenhauers thought and 20th-century Indianphilosophy, would be perfectly in order.

H ow ever, such comparisons oft en involve claims about possible influence ofIndian tho ught on Schopenhauer. Max H ecker, one of the pioneers in the fieldof Schopenhauer and India studies, claimed for example:

Schopenhauerian philosophy, which from the outset bore the seal of Indian spiriton its front, w as not directly influenced by it. [ ] O nly later on, when [Schopen-hauer] acquainted himself with the fruits of Indian speculation, did he establish adirect connection between Indian thought and his own.

1

U nlike authors o f o ther comparative studies, H ecker w as quite open about hisagenda and way of proceeding: he had noticed a remarkable inner kinship

2

between Schopenhauer and Ind ian thought and set o ut t o demonstrate only thefundamental congruence

3 which for him was a fact from the very outset.

4

Numerous Indologists have since attempted the exact opposite, namely, toprove that their modern or post-modern understanding of Indian philosophyis correct while Schopenhauers is different and thus flawed and inadequate.

1 M. F. H ecker, Schopenhauer und di e indi sche Phi losophie, Kln 1897: pp. 56. U nless otherw ise

not ed all translations fro m G erman, French, and Japanese into English are by t he author.2Ibid., p. 8.3H eckers term is fundamentale bereinstimmung (ibid., p. 253).

4Ib id., p. 10. Hecker calls this a Tatsache .


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An exotic but typical example is found in a recent Japanese book about

Schopenhauer and Indian philosophy:

If one investigates the matter thoroughly one finds that Schopenhauers under-standing of Indian philosophy is for the most part not accurate. This is what Iprove in this book. H e had no correct notion o f t he U panishads saying Tat tvamasi. H is interpretation of the Bhagavadgt and Sankhya-karika is wro ng. H e hasnot grasped the meaning of Brahman.

5

In the present contribution I will conduct an inquiry that is fundamentally differ-ent from such comparative undertakings, and it is important to clearly mark thedifference. Schopenhauers encounter with Indian thought is a historical sequenceof events; what we are after is thus historical evidence, not philosophical specula-tion. Many examples of voluntary or involuntary mix-up between these two ap-

proaches prove how important it is t o make a f irm distinction betw een speculativecomparison and historical inquiry.6Q uestions of encounter, acquaintance, or in-fluence ought to be historical inquiries, and any answers to such questions need tobe based on scientific evidence rather than speculation. This means, among otherthings, that any argument w hich bases itself on a modern U panishad translation ora modern view of Indian religion unknown to Schopenhauer falls into t he realm ofcomparison. I n the case of the U panishads, for example, a historical inquiry oughtto rely o n the Latin O upnekhat and, depending on the period in Schopenhauerslife and topic, on other translations he was familiar with. It goes without sayingthat Schopenhauers own, richly annotated copy of the O upnekhat should be amainstay of such research. With regard to Buddhism, arguments t o t he effect thatSchopenhauer only knew Buddhism in its degenerated form as it reigns in Nepal,

Tibet, and C hina

7

reflect, besides being incorrect,

8

a late 19

th

century view of

5Yutaka Yuda , Schopenhauto I ndo- tetsugaku

(Schopen-

hauer and I ndian P hilosophy), Kyoto : Kyshoten, 1996: pp. 211212. For another recentexample see Johann G . G estering, Schopenhauer und Indien, in: Schirmacher, Wolfgang, Ethik undVernunft. Schopenhauer in unserer Z eit, Wien: P assagen Verlag, 1995: pp. 5360.6The most ext reme case in recent t imes is D ouglas Bergers The Veil of M aya: Schopenhauer s Systemtheory of falsifi cati on: t he key to Schopenhauer s appropriati on of pre-systematic I ndi an phi losophicalthought, Ann Arbor, Michigan: U MI D issertat ion Services, 2000. This dissertation purport s to be astudy of Indian influences on the genesis of Schopenhauers system but exhibits ignorance of eventhe most basic historical fact s and sources concerning Schopenhauers early sources about India. F orexample, Berger asserts that in his ethnography notes Schopenhauer mentions nothing about India(p. 38) and igno res that Schopenhauer borrow ed D as Asiati sche Magazinin 1813 (p. 39).7

Max F. H ecker, Schopenhauer und di e indi sche Phi losophie, Kln 1897, p. 14. This is one of theendlessly repeated f alsities; see fo r example the striking ly similar verdict in Arthur H bscher, D enkergegen den Strom . Schopenhauer: G estern H eute Morgen, Bonn: B ouvier Verlag Hermann G rund-mann, 1973, p. 50.


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Buddhism heavily influenced by European theology. They thus belong to the fas-

cinating world of comparison and ought to be treated like the fictional counter-argument t hat the Indians knew C hristianity not in its original H ebrew purity butonly in the degenerated Syrian, Roman C atholic, and Lutheran forms. The ques-tion is not what Schopenhauer should have known but w hat he actually did know .

It is thus only through historical inquiry that can we hope to find cogent an-swers to questions such as: Exactly when did Schopenhauer first encounter In-dian thought? From whomdid he learn about it, and what sourcesdid he consult?What kindof Indian philosophy did he first discover? Many other questions ofinterest, for example regarding the influence of this initial encounter, will barelybe touched at this time; here we must first try to nail down a number of basicfacts and to establish their historical sequence. We thus have to keep the eyefirmly on all the historical evidence that we can muster up. For a start let usbriefly examine Schopenhauers earliest Ind ia-related not es.

Schopenhauers I ndi a-Related Ethnography Notes from 1811

In the Winter semester o f 1810/11 Prof. G . E. Schulze, Schopenhauers firstprofessor of philosophy, remarked that South Sea islanders are enfeebled becauseof their vegetarian diet in a warm climate. Schopenhauer wrote this down in hisnotebook and added his question: What about t he H indus?

9 H e obviously

thought that Indians are not mentally or physically impaired because of theirparticular diet. H ad Schopenhauer read about I ndia? In t he G tt ingen universitylibrary records there is no indication that he had borrowed Asia-related books.

10

At any rate, in the first decades of the 19 th century G erman intellectuals had abroad interest in India which was in part fueled, as we will see, by the romanticsearch for origins. In 1811 Schopenhauer to ok a course by P rof . H eeren, a notedauthority in G ermanys nascent f ield of Asia-related studies.

11 H is ethnography

course of 1811 covered the entire expanse of Asia, from Turkey and Arabiathrough P ersia, Inner Asia, India, Southeast Asia, C hina, Tibet, N ort h Asia, and

8See Urs App, Schopenhauers Begegnung mit d em Buddhismus, Schopenhauer-Jahrbuch79, 1998:

pp. 3556.9 Arthur H bscher (ed.), Ar thur Schopenhauer: D er handschri ftl i che N achlass in fnf Bnden, Mn-

chen: D eutscher Taschenbuch Verlag, 1985, vol. 2: p. 14. I n the fo llowing referred to b y H N andvolume number.10

U rs App, N otiz en Schopenhauers zu O st-, No rd- und Sdostasien vom Sommersemester 1811,Schopenhauer-Jahrbuch84, 2003: p. 14 (no te 6).11

App, op. cit., pp. 1415.


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Korea to Japan.12

Schopenhauers attendance record and detailed notes suggest

that he harbored a certain interest in such matters from the time he began tostudy philosophy. But did he note down anything of interest about Indian phi-losophy and religion?

Schopenhauers 1811 ethnography course notes related to India comprise tendensely handwritten pages.

13Almost all of the notes concern the geography and

history of the subcontinent and its adjacent regions, and only a few passages arerelevant for our theme. The first is about the holy city of Benares:

Benares ist die heilige Stadt der Indusenthlt die Schulen der Braminen, die heili-ge Sanskrit Sprache wird gelehrt, u. dieheiligen Bcher erklrt: es werden Wall-fart hen hingethan um im G anges sich zu

baden. 14

Benares is the holy city of the Indians[and] contains the schools of the Brah-mins, the holy Sanskrit language is taughtand the sacred books explained; it is thegoal of pilgrimages in order to bathe one-

self in the G anges.

The second consists of Schopenhauers not es from H eerens description o f theBrahmin caste:

D ie erste Kaste ist die der Braminen, beyihnen ist alle Religion u. Wissenschaft. Siesind weier, enthalten sich aller thierischenNahrung, zeichnen sich durch eine brauneselbstgeflochtene Schnur aus, drfen in kei-ne andre Kaste heyrathen. Bey den Brami-nen selbst sind groe Abstufungen. Ihre Be-schftigungen sind nicht allein der Kultur

sondern alle G elehrsamk[ei]t. Sie sind Aerz-te Richter u.s.w. D ie angesehenste Klassehat die Erklrung der Vehdams od: heiligenBcher zum G eschft u. versteht d ie Sansk-ritsprache die sie aber keinem aus einerandern Kaste lehren drfen.

15

The first caste is that of the Brahmins; allreligion and science is with them. They arewhiter, refrain from all animal food, andare marked by a brown self-braided thread;they must not marry into any other caste.Among the Brahmins there are large grada-tions. Their activities are not just culturalbut comprise all learning. They are do cto rs,

judges etc. The most respected caste is incharge of the explication of the Vedas orsacred books and understands the Sanskritlanguage, though they must not teach it toanyone from anot her caste.

12See the list with page references to Schopenhauers original notebook in App, op. cit., pp. 1718;

remarks on P rof. H eeren and his special interest in I ndia on pp. 1516.13

Schopenhauer Archiv, case III, p. 83 to p. 92.14

Schopenhauer Archiv, case III , p. 87. The left column is alway s my transcription of the st ill unpub-

lished Schopenhauer manuscript notes. It exactly replicates the original spelling, abbreviations, etc.The right column cont ains my English translation. See the complete transcription and E nglish trans-lation o f t hese India-related not es in this number of t he Schopenhauer-Jahrbuch.15

Ib id., p. 91.


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The fift h no te concerns religious practices:

D ie Religionsbungen sind grt entheilsBungen, werden besonders von denFakirs getrieben.

19

Religious practices consist mostly of pe-nances; they are especially performed bythe fakirs.

Finally, the sixth relevant note is about Indian law and philosophy:

Ih re G esezbcher sind durch die Englnderbekannt. U eber ihre Philosophie, die auchspekulativ getrieben ist, finden man imSpiegel des Akmar die beste N achricht.

20

Their books of law are known through theEnglish. About their philosophy, which isalso done speculatively, one finds the bestaccount in the Mirror of Akmar [Akbar].

These notes show t hat t he ethnography course by P rof. H eeren concentrated on

geography, history, and commerce and assuming that Schopenhauers notes arefaithful that H eeren furnished little information about Indian philosophy andreligion. The fact that Schopenhauer missed few lectures and took extensivenotes shows his keenness to know the world; and that he underlined certainwords indicates that he had some interest in Asian philosophy and religion.

21

Whatever its extent, such interest seems to have been poorly served in theselectures. H eeren provided some references to sources, but neither Schopen-hauers lecture notes nor his other notes from the period exhibit any trace of anencounter with Asian thought. This encounter only happened after two moreyears of study in Berlin (1811-13) and the redaction of the doctoral thesis inRudolstadt, w hen the young doctor of philosophy returned for half a year to hismothers residence in Weimar.

Schopenhauer s Account of his I ntroduction to I ndi an Anti qui ty

In a letter from the year 1851 Schopenhauer included the following informationabout this 1813/14 winter in Weimar:

1813 bereitete ich mich zur Promotion inBerlin vor, wurde aber durch den Kriegverdrngt, befand mich im H erbst in Th-

In 1813 I prepared myself for [P h.D .]promotion in Berlin, but displaced by thewar I found myself in autumn in Thuringia.

Preisschrift ber die Grundl age der M oral, first edition, 19; critical edition p. 241, Zrich editionvol. 6, p. 281.19

Ibid., p. 92. Emphasis by Schopenhauer.20

Schopenhauer-Archiv, case III, p. 92. Emphasis by Schopenhauer.21

Apart fro m tw o underlined island names, t he underlined words in passages five and six are the onlynouns emphasized in this way by Schopenhauer on t he entire ten pages of not es.


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ringen, konnte nicht zurck und sah mich

genthigt mit meiner Abhandlung berden Satz vom G runde in Jena zu promovi-ren. D arauf brachte ich den Winter inWeimar zu, wo ich G thes nhern U m-gang geno, der so vertraut wurde, wie esein Altersunterschied vo n 39 Jahren irgendzulie, und wohlthtig auf mich gewirkthat. Zugleich fhrte, unaufgefordert, derO rientalist Friedrich Majer mich in dasIndische Alterthum ein, welches von we-sentlichem Einflu auf mich gewesen ist.

22

U nable to return, I was forced to get the

doctorate in Jena with my dissertation onthe principle of sufficient reason. Subse-quently I spent the winter in Weimar whe-re I enjoyed close association w ith G oethe,which got as familiar as an age difference of39 years could possibly allow it, and whichexerted a beneficial effect on me. At thesame time, the orientalist Friedrich Majerintroduced me, without solicitation, toIndian antiquity, and this had an essentialinfluence on me.

O ne should note that in this statement t here is no word of an introduction toIndian philosophy or to the Oupnekhat. Schopenhauer simply says that Majerintroduced him to Indian antiquity.

H ow ever, tant alized by the sparseness of informat ion, researchers soon be-gan to fantasize. Ludwig Alsdorf, for example, had a vision of young Schopen-hauer sitting fo r half a year at the feet of guruMajer:

Schopenhauers first encounter with India leads us back to the beginning of ourpath: it was a student and heir of H erder who introd uced him to I ndian antiquity:the Romantic and Private U niversity Instructor [P rivatdoz ent] in Jena, FriedrichMajer (1772-1818) w ho, tho ugh ignorant of Sanskrit like H erder, occupied him-self with India with more insistence than his mentor. From November 1813 toMay of 1814, Schopenhauer sat at Majers feet in Weimar. In the following years,while he wrote his major work The Wor ld as Wi ll and Representati on, the book[O upnekhat] f ell into h is hands which he subsequently chose as his bible.

23

For Alsdorf, Schopenhauers long Indian apprenticeship had nothing to do withhis discovery of the O upnekhat; he saw the discovery of this book as a chanceevent which took place years after the six-month teach-in with guruMajer.

Rudolf Merkel, on the other hand, thought it likely that Majer had givenSchopenhauer the reference to A.-H . Anquetil-Duperrons famo us Oupnekhatso that he could borrow it from the local library:

It is probable that following a suggestion by Majer, Schopenhauer borrowed An-quetil D uperrons O upnekhat o n March 26 of 1814 from the Weimar library. H e

22

Letter t o Jo hann Eduard Erdmann of 9 April, 1851; Arth ur H bscher (ed.), Arthur Schopenhauer:Gesammelte Br iefe, Bo nn: B ouvier, 1987: p. 261 (lett er no. 251). H ereafter abbreviated as G Br.23

Ludwig Alsdorf, D eutsch-I ndi sche Geistesbeziehungen, H eidelberg: Kurt Vowinckel Verlag, 1942:p. 73.


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returned the boo k on May 18 because in the meantime he probably had taken pos-

session of his own copy.

24

We can infer that Merkel situated Majers introduction shortly before March 26of 1814, the date when Schopenhauer borrow ed the Oupnekhat. With t he librarypractically at his doorstep, Schopenhauer was not likely to wait for weeks ormont hs before follow ing up on an interesting lead. H owever, Merkels guess thatSchopenhauer had soon bought the O upnekhatis contradicted by evidence.

25

A similar dating of Majers introduction to Indian antiquity and a similarlink of this introduction with the O upnekhatappears in the speculation by Ar-thur H bscher:

The O rientalist Friedrich Majer, a disciple of H erder, opened up for him the tea-chings of Indian antiquity, the philosophy of Vedanta, and the mysticism of the

Vedas. The reference to the O upnekhat, the Lat in rendering of a P ersian versionof t he U panishads which Schopenhauer already w as reading in spring of 1814, islikely t o have come fro m Majer.

26

H bschers portrayal cont ains two additional unproven assertions: 1. that Majerintroduced Schopenhauer to the philosophy of the Vedanta; and 2. that he didthe same for the mysticism of the Vedas.

For H bschers wife Angelika, her husbands likely reference by Majer tothe Oupnekhat quickly congealed into a fact: D uring his stay in Weimar duringthe wint er 1813/14 he met Majer in the circle around G oethe. Majer recom-mended t he reading of t he O upnekhat to him.

27 Such seeming facticity was

destined to blossom, and to this day it regularly pops up in books and disserta-tions.

An author of a recent dissertation is not content with letting Majer supplythe reference to the Oupnekhatbut suggests that he introduced the yo ung phi-losopher to it s content: Schopenhauer receives a reference to the O upnekhat inthe winter of 1813/14 during his second stay in Weimar. It is the orientalist

24R udolf Merkel, Schopenhauers Indien-Lehrer, Jahrbuch der Schopenhauer-Gesellschaft32, 1945/

48: pp. 164165.25

It is rather unlikely that Schopenhauer already owned a copy of the O upnekhat in May of 1814.We know t hat he borro wed th e two large volumes again in D resden from June 8 to J uly 16; see JacobMhlethaler, D ie Mysti k bei Schopenhauer, Berlin: Alexander D uncker Verlag, 1910, p. 68. Whywould he have done so if he already owned them? A more likely scenario is that Schopenhauer gotpossession of his own set of the O upnekhatduring the first D resden summer (1814).26

Arthur H bscher, Ar thur Schopenhauer. Ei n Lebensbil d, Mannheim: Brockhaus, 1988: p. 68.27

Angelika Hbscher u. Michael Fleiter, Ar thur Schopenhauer. Phil osophie in Br iefen. Frankfurt a. M.:Insel Verlag, 1989: p. 200.


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Friedrich Majer who familiarizes him with this text.28

Another dissertation even

brings several translations of the U panishads into play:

Majer, who wrote several essays and prefaces on Indian religion and literature aswell as a book entitled Brahma: on the Brahminical Reli gion of I ndiain 1818, sug-gested to Schopenhauer that he read the most recent translations of theU paniadsby Anq uetil D uperron.

29

In fantasyland, Majers simple introduction to Indian antiquities continues togain color and scope. In the eyes of Brian Magee, for example, Schopenhauerlearned not only of a book: it was Friedrich Majer, the orientalist who intro-duced him to H induism and Buddhism.

30 U . W. Meyer thinks that Friedrich

Majer familiarized Schopenhauer for the first time with the term my31

andasserts that there is no doubt that Schopenhauer took over Majers understand-

ing of brahman.32

Stephen Batchelor has Majer giveSchopenhauer a copy of theO upnekhat

33 while Moira Nicholls dreams up an early date for Majers intro-

duction and is stingier in having Majer sell the Oupnekhat to Schopenhauer:Schopenhauer first acquired a copy of the O upnekhatfro m t he orientalist Frie-drich Majer in late 1813.

34I n f antasyland anything is possible, and dat es can of

course also be freely manipulated. Thus Roger-Pol D roit can proclaim: It is

28 Werner Scholz, Ar thur Schopenhauer ein Phi losoph zwi schen westl icher und stl icher T radi ti on,

Frankfurt/Bern: Peter Lang, 1996: pp. 2021.29

Berger, op. cit., p. 38. Berger does not specify what other translations Majer might have had inmind. But Bergers consistent mistaken reference to the title of the Oupnekhat (Secretum Legen-dum instead of D uperrons Secretum Tegendum ) is an interesting slip because, thanks to D r

Shakoh and D uperron, t he O upnekhat had indeed become a secret to be read (legendum) ratherthan one that one should keep silent about (tegendum)! I could not yet consult the book versionwhere such mistakes might be corrected: D ouglas Berger, The Veil of M aya: Schopenhauers Systemand Early I ndi an Thought,Binghampton, NY : G lobal Academic Publications, 2004.30

Brian Magee, The Phil osophy of Schopenhauer, O xford: C larendon P ress, 21997: 14.31

U rs Walter Meyer, Europische Rezeption indischer P hilosophie und R eligion, B ern: P eter Lang,1994: p. 149.32

Ibid., p. 250 (note 87).33

Stephen Batchelor, The Awakening of the West: The Encounter o f B uddhism and Western C ul-ture, Berkeley: Parallax Press, 1994: p. 255.34

Moira N icholls, The Inf luences of Eastern Thought o n Schopenhauers D octrine of the Thing-in-Itself, in: Janaway, Christopher, The Cambri dge Companion to Schopenhauer, C ambridge/N ewYork: C ambridge U niversity P ress, 1999: p. 178. N icholls refers to H bscher fo r this interesting bitof disinformation (The Phil osophy of Schopenhauer and I ts In tellectual Context: Thinker Against the

Tide, Lewiston: Edwin Mellen Press, 1989: pp. 6566). See note 26 for the the early ownership issue;in Nicholls case not even Schopenhauers first borrowing from the Weimar library would makesense. People who own books usually do not borrow the same, and to do so twice in a row would bestrange indeed.


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known that Friedrich Maier [sic], since 1811, made Schopenhauer discover the

O upnekhat .

35

Frdric Lenoir adds some more drama to this totally unsup-ported assertion by proclaiming that in 1811 Schopenhauer was seized by theO upnekhat .

36

Whatever such creative authors happen to imagine: Schopenhauer unambigu-ously stated that Majer introduced him to Indian antiquity, no more and noless; and his letter leaves no doubt that this introduction took place simultane-ously with his G oethe visits during the winter in Weimar, i. e. during t hewinter months of 1813/14. But luckily we do not have to leave it at that becausewe have additional sources at our d isposal.

Goethe and Juli us K laproth

As we have seen, in Schopenhauers recollection the two major events of theWeimar winter w ere his meetings with G oethe and Majers introduction t oIndian antiq uity . G oethes activities during this time are so w ell documentedthat we can establish a timeline of his meetings with Schopenhauer; for Majersintroduction, on the other hand, we must draw conclusions based on infer-ences from various sources.

Aft er presenting his dissertation t o the U niversity o f Jena near Weimar at theend of September of 1813, Schopenhauer stayed for an additional month in Ru-dolstadt. D uring this month he received his Ph. D . diploma

37and had 500 copies

of the dissertation printed. At the beginning of November Schopenhauer mailedhis book to various people including G oethe.

38Schopenhauer had already known

the famous writer and stat esman for several years, and G oethe had remarked theson of the hostess during gatherings at Mrs. Schopenhauers residence; but thetwo had never actually spoken to each other.

39 H ow ever, before Schopenhauer

had left for G tt ingen in 180940

and Berlin in 1811,41

G oethe had graciouslyagreed to write recommendation letters for the young st udent.

35 Roger-Po l Dro it, U ne statuett e tibtaine sur la chemine , in: Droit , Roger-Pol, Prsences de

Schopenhauer, P aris: G rasset, 1989: p. 203.36

Frdric Lenoir, La rencontre du B ouddhisme et de l occident, P aris: Fayard, 1999.37

Gesammelte Br iefeG Br 56, No . 11 (letter to H einrich Karl Abraham Eichstdt, w ritten in Rudol-stadt on O ctob er 5, 1813.38

G Br 6, No. 13. G oethe mentions the book fo r the first time on N ovember 4, 1813; see RobertSteiger, Goethes Leben von T ag zu Tag. Band V: 18071813, Zrich/Mnchen: Artemis Verlag, 1988,p. 756.39

G Br 53, No . 56; see also p. 655.40

See Steiger, o p. cit ., p. 353.


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A week aft er receiving Schopenhauers dissertation, G oethe for the first t ime

mentioned it to a visitor on November 11 of 1813.

42

O n that very day G oethereceived the visit of another young man of particular interest to our topic: JuliusKlaprot h (1783-1835),

43a renowned and ambitious orientalist with whose chem-

ist f ather Schopenhauer had studied in Berlin.44

Klaprot h had f irst visited Weimareleven years earlier, in the autumn of 1802, to examine exotic texts from thelibrary of Btt ner and to help Go ethe with cataloguing orientalia. At that timeKlaproth had managed to win Weimar resident Friedrich Majer as a major con-tributor to a two-volume collection of articles on Asia. This collection, edited bythe 19-year-old Klaproth and published at the local Industrie-C omptoir underthe t itle D as Asiati sche Magazin,

45is of particular interest because, as we w ill see,

it became the first known Asia-related source which Schopenhauer borrowedfrom a library.

Since November of 1813 Klaproth was thus once again46

in Weimar for closeto two months;47 this time he was busy finishing up the manuscript and arrang-ing for the publication of his second exploration voyage report.

48Ever curious,

G oethe wanted to hear about this expedition to t he C aucasus in detail and alsoto ok the occasion to q uestion the orientalist about a C hinese painting set.

49

41G Br 7, No. 14.

42 Six days after receiving the dissertat ion, G oethe spoke about it to Riemer. See Steiger, op. cit.,

p. 758.43

See the list of biographical sources in Martin G imm, Zu Klaproths erstem Katalo g chinesischerBcher, Weimar 1804 oder: Julius Klaproth als st udentische H ilfskraft bei G oethe? , in: H elwig

Schmidt-Glintz er, D as andere China: Festschrift fr Wol fgang Bauer zum 65. G eburtstag, Wiesbaden:H arassowitz , 1995: p. 559 ff.44

Klaproths fat her, Martin-Heinrich Klaproth, w as professor of chemistry in B erlin and is knownfor h is discovery of uranium.45

The second volume calls the publisher Landes-Industrie-C ompto ir. M ore informat ion in G imm,op. cit., p. 568.46

See G imm, op. cit. , pp. 574 & 582 for furt her visits in N ovember of 1803 and April of 1804.47

G imm (op. cit, p. 567) overlooked that in 1813 an earlier meeting of Klaprot h and G oethe to okplace in D resden, no t in Weimar; t hus there is no evidence for an August visit t o Weimar by Klap-rot h. This time, Klaproth left to wn af ter his new-year visit to G oethe; th e problem G imm (op. cit.:p. 581582) had with the initials H .R. Klaproth in t he record o f G oethes son August is easilysolved: it was indeed Julius Klaproth, and H .R. stands for Klaproths title H ofrat (court coun-selor).48

Geographisch-hi stor ische Beschreibung des stl i chen Kaukasus, zw ischen den F lssen Terek, Aragwi ,K ur und dem K aspischen M eere. According to G imm, op. cit., p. 569 the introductio n to t his book isdat ed Weimar d. 22. D ec. 1813.49

Steiger, op. cit., p. 758.


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Schopenhauer and Goethe

Schopenhauers first visit to G oethes house took place on No vember 23 of1813, and G oethe was favorably impressed by the young philosopher:

Der junge Schopenhauer hat sich mir alseinen merkwrdigen und interessantenMann dargestellt. [ ] ist mit einem gewis-sen scharfsinnigen Eigensinn beschftigtein Paroli und Sixleva in das Kartenspielunserer neuen Philosophie z u bringen. Manmu abwarten, ob ihn die H erren vomMetier in ihrer G ilde passiren lassen; ichfinde ihn geistreich und das brige lasseich dahin gestellt.

50

The young Schopenhauer has presentedhimself to me as a memorable and inte-resting man. [ ] With a certain astuteobstinacy he is engaged in raising the sta-kes three- or sixfold in the card game ofmodern philosophy. It is to be seenwhether the people of hi s profession will lethim pass in their guild; I find him intelli-gent and do not w orry about t he rest.

So it came that G oethe invited Schopenhauer to a series of intensive discussionsand demonstrations of his theory of colors at his Weimar residence. O n N o-vember 29 they held the first meeting which lasted the entire evening.

51Further

meetings are documented for D ecember 18,52

January 8 of 1814,53

January 13,54

January 26,

55March 2,

56and April 3.

57O n May 15 of 1814 Schopenhauer visited

G oethe in Berka to say good-bye before leaving for D resden where he was towrite his major work, D ie Welt als Wi ll e und Vorstell ung.

Let us now return to the beginning of D ecember of 1813, i.e. the days just af -ter the first study meeting of the aged writer with the young philosopher. Twodays after that first evening-long meeting with Schopenhauer, Klaproth visitedG oethe once more at his home.

58 D ecember was a socially active season in the

50Lett er by G oethe t o K nebel of N ovember 24, 1813; Steiger, op. cit., p. 756.

51 G oethes diary features only one entry fo r this evening: Abends Do ktor Schopenhauer [in t he

evening Dr Schopenhauer]. Steiger, op. cit ., p. 766.52

Steiger, op. cit., p. 771.53

Ro bert Steiger and Angelika Reimann, Goethes Leben von Tag zu Tag. Vol . VI : 18141820, Z rich /Mnchen: Artemis Verlag, 1993, p. 20.54

Steiger & Reimann, o p. cit., p. 22. See also G Br 9, N o. 18. Since other visito rs (Wolf f and Riemer)stayed f or d inner scheint t his meeting seems not to have been exclusively dedicated t o discussion ofG oethes color theory.55

Steiger & Reimann, op. cit., p. 28. Since G oethes diary f eatures no ot her entries it is possible thatSchopenhauer spent the entire afternoon and evening with G oethe.56

Steiger & Reimann, op. cit., p 43. N o o ther visitor is recorded for t his evening.57

Steiger & Reimann, op. cit., p. 52. This meeting took place on Palm Sunday afternoon and wasfollow ed by visits of oth er people.58

Steiger, op. cit., p. 767.


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47

small to wn, and G oethe not only received many visitors at ho me but also par-

ticipated at social gatherings elsewhere. The house of Schopenhauers motherwhere the young man lodged was a hub of social activity. In the evening of D e-cember 3, fo r example, Mrs. Schopenhauer held a party at her residence. G oethespent the whole evening until after midnight at this party, and it is quite possiblethat Julius Klaproth, the well-known son of a professor of Schopenhauer andacquaintance of G oethe, was also among the invited guests. We do know , at anyrate, that on t he very next day, D ecember 4, D r Schopenhauer w ent to the li-brary and borrowed, along with Newtons O pticks (which he certainly neededfor his studies with G oethe), a book w hich is very different from t he philosophi-cal and scientific works that he usually sought: the two-volumeDas Asiati scheMagazinwhose editor, as we have seen, was none other than Julius Klaproth.

Another possible participant in the gathering was Friedrich Majer who duringthis period was again living in Weimar; we know that two days after theSchopenhauer party he had lunch with G oethe.59It is impossible to say with anycertainty who gave Schopenhauer the reference to Das Asiati sche Magazin; sinceboth Majer and Klaproth had many contributions in this work we can guess thatone or the other talked to Schopenhauer about it , possibly at the party, and t hatSchopenhauer went to borrow it the following day; but in such a small townthere were certainly also many ot her occasions to meet either man, and G oethecannot be excluded either because he showed a pronounced interest in Asianmatters during this period.

The Weimar L ibrary Records from Fall of 1813 to Spring of 1814

D uring my 1997 Weimar visit the lending register of the ducal (now AnnaAmalia) library was still extant. It had been perused by several earlier research-ers; Mockrauer, for example, had examined it before 1928 and reported:

The register of t he former D uchy library of Weimar show s that Schopenhauerduring t hat w inter borrowed the Asiatische Magazin, edited by Beck, H nsel andBaumgrtner, vol. 1 3, 1806-1807, for fo ur months; the My tho logy o f t he H in-dous by Mrs de Polier, A. 1-2, 1809, for three months, and finally shortly beforethe end of his Weimar stay and t he move to D resden from March 26 to M ay 18,1814 theOupnekhat. It is possible that Majer also provided him with appropriateliterature.

60

59Steiger, op. cit., p. 768.

60 Franz Mockrauer, Schopenhauer und Indien, Jahrbuch der Schopenhauer-Gesellschaft 15, 1928:

p. 45.


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48

Schopenhauer had indeed checked o ut D as Asiati sche Magazin, but bot h the 1813

page and the 1814 page of the library record unmistakably say 2 Bde. (2 vol-umes), and Schopenhauers excerpts and references leave no doubt that what heborrowed was the two-volume set of Das Asiati sche Magazinedited by Klaprothin 1802. This shows once more the importance of careful inspection of primarysource materials. Since no transcription of this library record has been publishedto date I include here a draft transcription w ith some annotation and commentsrelated to Klaproth, Majer, and t o Schopenhauers study meetings w ith G oethe.

61

Book ti tl e as given in

Weimar L ibr ary Record

Checkout Retur n Comments

P latonis O pera Vol. V et VI

Edit. Bipont.

1813/06/10 1813/06/26 Summer to fall 1813

period: Books forwriting docto ral

dissertation

Kant s Kritik der reinen Ver-

nunft

1813/06/10 1813/07/21

_____ U rt heilskraf t 1813/06/10 1813/07/21

_____ Prolegomena zur

Metaphysik

1813/06/10 1813/07/21

Euklides xxxxx Buch der

Elemente

1813/06/10 1813/07/21

C artesii principia philoso-

phiae

1813/06/10 1813/07/21

Schellings System des t rans-

zendentalen Idealismus

1813/06/15 1813/07/28

P latonis O pera. Vol. X. Ed.

Bipont.

1813/06/15 1813/07/28

Ab. Burja G rxxxxx xxxxx 1813/06/15 1813/07/21

Reimarus xxxx xxxxx x.al. 1813/06/28 1813/07/21

61The book titles in the left column reproduce the entry in the library record; mistaken spellings

(such as apokriph instead of apokryph, O uphnekat instead of O upnekhat, D upperoninstead of D uperron , etc.) are also reproduced exactly as t hey appear in the o riginal. Illegible words

are reproduced as a series of x; their number approximately corresponds to the number of illegibleletters. The titles and d ates of check-out and return are given as they appear under Schopenhauer inthe Weimar library Ausleihbuchfor the years 1813 and 1814. The comments in the fourth column areof course by me.


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49

Kiesewett ers Logik 1813/06/28 1813/07/21

P latonis O pera T. 7 1813/06/28 1813/07/21

Leibnitii O pera T. II 4to 1813/06/28 1813/07/21

Eichhorns Einleitung in die

Apokriph. Bcher des A.T.

1813/07/29 1813/11/20

Reinhold Theorie des Vorstel-

lungs-Vermgens

1813/07/29 1813/11/20

_____ Erklrung darber 1813/07/29 1813/11/20

P latonis O pera D . Bip. Vol.

VII

1813/07/29 1813/11/20

Kant s Kritik der rein. Ver-

nunft

1813/07/29 1813/11/20

_____ U rt eilskraft 1813/07/29 1813/11/20

Essay s mo ral. 8 C c. 4, 135 1813/08/25 1813/11/20

Aristot elis O pera. Vol. 1. Ano

Allobr. 1607 8

1813/09/01 1813/11/20

Wolf ii O nt olog ia 15, xx xxxx 1813/09/09 1813/11/20

Kiesew etters Lo gik 1813/09/09 1813/11/20

Schellings System des t rans-

zendentalen Idealismus

1813/09/09 1813/11/20 N ov. 20, 1813: Last

borrowed boo k re-

lated to dissertation

returned

N ov. 11: Go ethewrites in letter about

Schopenhauers dis-

sertation ; receives

visit by Julius Kla-

proth

Essay s mo ral. 8 C o. 4: 134 1813/11/20 1814/03/20 Beginning of w inter

1813/14 peri od

Wolfi i I liados pars posterior 1813/11/20

P aulus C ommentar. N. T.

I I I teJg

1813/11/20 1814/02/04

C umberlands P lays T. I . I I . 1813/11/20 1814/03/23


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50

N ov. 27: Go ethe

writes that Klaprothis in Weimar (N ov.

1813 Jan. 1814)

N ov. 29: First study

meeting of Schopen-

hauer with G oethe

D ec. 1: Klaproth

visits G oethe

D ec. 3: G oethe

spends the who le

evening until af ter

midnight in Mrs.

Schopenhauers salon

Asiati sches Magazin, 2 Bde. 1813/12/04 1814/03/30 Fi rst documented

borrowing of A sia-

relat ed book by

Schopenhauer

N ewtons O ptick. 1813/12/04 1814/03/02

D ec. 5: Friedrich

Majer has lunch at

G oethes house

P aulus C omment . N .T. T. IV 1813/12/15 1814/02/02

_____ Zust ze 1813/12/15 1814/02/02_____ Krit ik 1813/12/15 1814/02/02

_____ C omment . N .T. 1 2 3te

Jge

1813/12/18 1814/02/02 D ec. 18: 2ndG oethe

study meeting

New Year 1814:

Klaproths farewell

visit to G oethe

Jan . 8, 1814: 3rd

G oethe study meet-

ing;

Jan. 13: 4th G oethe

study meetingVoigts Magazin der Naturk. 1

. 11 u. 12teJge

1814/01/16 1814/02/04


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51

O ken U eber Licht & Wrme 1814/01/16 1814/02/09

_____ N at urxxxx xxxx 1814/01/16 1814/03/02

Mitfort H ist. de la G rce, T. I.

I I

1814/01/26 1814/05/18 Jan. 26: Fif th G oet he

study meeting

Spitt lers G rundr der C hr.

Kirche 3 Bde.

1814/02/02 1814/02/05

Tao O pera T. 9. 10. 1814/02/05 1814/03/02

Steff ens N aturgesch. der Erd e 1814/02/09 1814/03/16

Runges Farbenkugel 1814/02/09 1814/03/02

Eichhorns G esch. d. Litt er. 1.

& 2. Bd.

1814/02/09 1814/03/02 Mar. 2: Sixt h G oethe

study meeting

H arper ber die U rsache desWahnsinns

1814/03/11 1814/03/16

Walchs C oncord ien-buch

1730

1814/03/16 1814/05/18

Baco n mo ral essays 1814/03/23 1814/05/18

Wolf ii I liad os p. II 1814/03/23 1814/05/18

O uphnekat Auct. Anquetil

D upperon T. I. I I.

1814/03/26 1814/05/18 Second bor rowed

Asia-related book i s

the Latin U panishad

translation

Polier sur la Mythologie des

Indous 2 Vol.

1814/03/26 1814/06/03 T hird and last A sia-

related book checked

out fr om the Weimar

library

P latonis O pera Vol. X 1814/03/30 1814/04/03 Apr. 3: Seventh and

last study meeting

with G oethe

O ken ber das U niversum 1814/04/30 1814/05/04

____ natrl. System der Erze 1814/04/30 1814/05/04

____ ber die Bedeutung der

Schdelknochen

1814/04/30 1814/05/04

May 15: F arewell visit

to G oethe


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52

Books borrowed in the first (summer/fall of 1813) period are directly related to

the redaction of Schopenhauers dissertation, and f rom D ecember onward severalbooks show a clear connection to the study meetings and discussions with G oethe.In Schopenhauers Manuscri pt Remains, various remarks, quotes, and themes canbe traced to specific books in the above list; but here we are exclusively concernedwith the three Asia-related works highlighted in the table by double enclosurelines. It is striking that after taking home Das Asiati sche Magazinon D ecember 4of 1813, almost four months passed before he borrow ed the next books related toAsia, Poliers Mythologie des I ndous

62and the famous Oupnekhat.

63O f course we

cannot exclude that Schopenhauer also borrowed Asia-related books from Weimarresidents like G oethe or Majer; but so far there is no evidence for this.

Majer s I ntr oduction of Schopenhauer to I ndi an Anti qui ti es

An unmistakable sign of Indian influence in the Manuscript Remains is the ex-pression Maja der Indier in section 189.

64Just before, in section 187, there is a

precise reference to a book of the I l iad which Schopenhauer had borrowed onMarch 23, i.e. three days before Polier and the Oupnekhat. It would thus appearthat the section with Maja der Indier was written around the end of March of1814 when Schopenhauer had borrow ed these two bo oks.

In view of Schopenhauers library record we are now faced with the question:when did Majers famous introduction t o I ndian antiquity actually take place?Assuming that such an introduction would trigger at least some reading activity,one w ould point either to early D ecember of 1813, i. e. before Schopenhauerborrowed D as Asiati sche Magazin, or to late March of 1814 (before he checkedout Poliers

Mythologieand the

Oupnekhat). The additional assumption that an

introduction w hich had according to Schopenhauer an essential impact onhim wo uld produce some unmistakable trace in the Manuscript Remainsleaves usonly with March of 1814. It would indeed be strange if Schopenhauer had re-ceived such a stimulating introduct ion in D ecember and refrained from readingup on the matter or writing about it for almost four months. We may thus hy-pothesize that Schopenhauer got the reference to D as Asiati sche Magazinaroundthe beginning of D ecember of 1813 and that Majers unsolicited intro duction toIndian antiquity took place in March of 1814. This scenario would imply thatwhat incited Schopenhauer to borrow Polier and the O upnekhat in late March

62Antoine Louis H enri de P olier, Mythologie des I ndous, Rudolstadt & Paris 1809.

63

Abraham Hy acinthe Anquetil-Duperron, O upnekhat ( id est, secretum tegendum), Argentorati:Levrault, 1801.64

H N1: 104 (No. 189). See below f or t he possibly earliest sign in section 171 of H N 1 (the elephant turtle passage)


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53

was Majers introduction. Is there any supporting evidence for this? What was

the content of Majers introduction? Why did Schopenhauer specify that itwas an introduction to Indian antiquity rather than, say, Indian philosophyor Indian religion?

Answers to some of these questions can be found in the preface and first partof Majers Brahma or the Reli gion of the Indi ans as Brahmani sm.

65This book was

published in 1818, shortly before Majers death. It is the culminating point of atypically romantic quest for mankinds original religion, the U rreli gion(primevalreligion). I n this Majer rightly saw himself as an heir to H erder, the man whohad written the laudatory preface to Majers H istori cal I nvestigations on the Cul-tural H istory of the Peoples.

66 In a string of books from the early 1770s to the

completion in 1791 of his magnum opus entitled I deas on the Philosophy of theH istory of Mankind,

67H erder had sought to trace the source of all religion and

culture, and in this realm of prehistory my th w as a guiding light. Seeing the O ldTestament as just one local expression of a common U rreli gion, H erders searchled via Persia ever closer to mankinds ultimate birthplace in the C aucasusperhaps, or in Kashmir?

68 O n the w ay east, ancient t exts such as the Zend

Avesta69appeared to him as additional O ld Testaments. But where was the oldest

of them all to be found, that elusive U rtextof t he U rreli gion? H erder could notyet find it; but his pupil Friedrich Majer, who for a time had free access toH erders house in Weimar,

70was luckier.

From a time w hen in G ermany almost nobody other than H erder and Kleu-ker spoke in public about India, Majer thought that in India, more than any-where else, all development and education of mankind had its source in relig-ion.

71H e sought to document this U rreli gionin various publications including

Klaproths Asiatic Magazineand [ ] in the entries on Ind ia in the Mythological

L exicon72

and planned a magnum opuswhich, on the model of H erders Ideason the Philosophy of the H istory of Mankind , was supposed to develop on t he

65Friedrich Majer, Br ahma oder di e Religion der I ndi er als Br ahmaismus, Leipzig: Reclam, 1818.

66 Friedrich Majer, Zur K ul tur geschichte der Vlker, histori sche U ntersuchungen, Leipzig: J. F. H art-

knoch , 1798.67

Johann G ottf ried H erder, Werke. Band I I I : I deen zur Phil osophie der Geschichte der M enschhei t, ed.by Wolfgang Pro ss. Mnchen/Wien: C arl H anser, 2002.68

C f. Jrgen Faust, Mythologien und Religionen des O stens bei Johann G ottfr ied von H erder, Mnster:Aschendorff, 1977.69

Abraham Hy acinthe Anquetil-D uperron, Zend- Av esta, Zoroasters lebendiges Wor t, tr. by J. F. Kleu-ker. Riga 17761777.70

Friedrich Majer, Mythol ogisches Taschenbuch oder D arstell ung und Schi lderung der M ythen, reli gisenI deen und Gebruche all er Vlker, Weimar: Verlag des Landes-In dustrie-C ompt oirs, 1811, preface.71

Majer, Brahma, p. VI.72

Friedrich Majer, Al lgemeines Mythologisches Lexicon, Weimar: Landes-Indust rie-Co mpto ir, 1803.


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54

basis of the oldest history of India a histo ry of the universe, our solar system,

the earth, and mankind.

73

For this purpose Majer collected a considerableamount of materials on the history and antiquity of India, but for various rea-sons he never got around to realize this grandiose plan. For us, however, eventhe plan is of great interest since we are looking for hints regarding the contentof Majers introduction to Indian antiquity.

Around 18111813, Majer w as still pursuing his dream, but now it had t akenthe form of a series of mytho logical pocketbooks in which he wanted to tracethe history of all religions, beginning with the aborigines of America.

74 Al-

most a century before Majer, the Jesuit missionary Pre Lafitau had already at-tempted a similar feat in a four-volume work, but at that time the origin of allth ings was firmly set in the Middle East of the Old Testament, and the AmericanIndians had to get their U rreli gionfrom J erusalem and G reece by way o f C hina.

75

For Majer, on the other hand, everything began in India.

Von den Brahmanen, welche in diesemLande gebohren sind, sollen alle Menschenauf der Erde ihre verschiedenen G ebruchelernen. U nd eben hier liegen jene G egendenIndiens, von deren zauberischen Reizenseine D ichter in allen Jahrhunderten mit dergrten Begeisterung gesungen haben; jeneBlumenthler von Agra; jene im Abglanzeines ewigen klaren H immels und der reins-ten Sonne sich spiegelnden G efilde vonMatura; jene von der Jamunablauen Wellen

umwundenen H aine Vrindavans, wo diesanften Lfte von Malayas H geln dieweichen Blthen der G ewrzpflanzen alsomuthw illig umspielen, da von ihren reichenWohlgerchen selbst die H erzen frommerEinsiedler verfhrt werden, wo die Bumeerklingen mit den melodischen tnen derN achtigallen und dem G esumme der H onigbereitenden Schwrme. Es wird begreiflich,wie von den wunderbaren Stimmen, welcheaus dieser paradiesischen Natur zu den

From the Brahmans, born in this land, thepeoples all over the world were destinedto learn t heir various customs. And just inthis land were those regions of Indiabesung by its poets throughout the centu-ries in highest ecstasy; those flower val-leys of Agra; those blessed realms of Ma-tura mirroring an eternally clear sky andthe purest sun; those meadows of Vrinda-van encircled by the blue waves of theJamuna,where the mild breezes from the

hills of Malayacaress the soft blossoms ofspice plants so playfully that even thehearts of devout hermits get seduced bytheir rich perfumes; where the trees re-sound with the melodious tunes of nigh-tingales and the humming of honeybees.

These wonderful voices speaking fromparadisiacal nature to the hearts of thefirst human inhabitants in whose breasts a

73Majer, Brahma, p. VI.

74Ibid, p. VIIVII I.

75Joseph Franois Lafitau, Moeurs des sauvages Ameriquai ns compares aux moeur s des premi ers temps,

Paris: Saugrain, 1724 (4 vols.)


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55

H erzen ihrer ersten menschlichen Bewo h-

ner sprachen, in deren Brust ein noch reines,unverstimmtes Saitenspiel ertnte, jenesfrhe gttliche Aufflammen des menschli-chen Geistes veranlat werden konnte,durch dessen spterhin nach allen Richtun-gen ber die Erde verbreitete Lichtstrahlenalles hhere Leben, Weben und D aseyn derMenschheit hervorgerufen wurde.

76

still pure, unaltered harmony reverberated

does it not become apparent how thatearly, divine flare of the human spiritcould thus originate, that light throughwhose rays later all higher life in all direc-tions, the entire life and activity and exis-tence of mankind, took its origin?

For Majer, even Mexican and Peruvian kings had received the first light-rays ofa revelation from India. These light-rays had appeared thousands of years ear-lier on the old continent , on the shores of the Jamuna and G anga . Thus culture

had made its way from ancient India t o t he Americas in all its splendor and indue course enlightened an entire society.77

The Indian primeval revelation was thus mankinds original religion and the

source of all culture which H erder had so passionately sought but had f ailed toprecisely locate. According to Majer, Roger, Baldaeus, la C roz e, Sonnerat , Pau-linus, Kleuker, Polier etc. had all sought to portray it. But unfortunately all ofthese previous authors w riting about India had do ne so in confused ways;

78above

all else, they had failed to properly distinguish between Indias pure, ancientcreed the religion of Brahma and its degenerate successors which are Shi-vaism, Vishnuism, and Buddhism.

79I t w as Majers plan to w rite a tome on each

of these four religions and present the whole as a kind of blueprint for the uni-versal history of mankind; but he lost a tragic struggle against adverse circum-stances and a debilitating illness and barely managed to finish the first volume.

But as this testament, the volume on the religion of Brahma, presents thefoundation of Majers who le edifice it is quite sufficient for us to get an idea ofhis whole project. Everything rests on this original revelation, the oldest andpurest form of religion; and just this religion forms the core of Majers Indianantiquity . C ould it be that t races of this golden age had by chance survived inwritt en form a message in a bot tle from t he dawn of time, the oldest t estamentof them all?

76Majer, Brahma, pp. 1718.

77Majer, Brahma, p. VII I.78

Ibid., p. XI.79

Ibid., pp. XIXII .


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56

The O upnekhat and Poli er Recommendations

According to Majer, mankinds oldest testament had indeed survived, and itsname is O upnekhat. Thanks to the indefatigable efforts of that old praisewor-thy India sailor Anq uetil du P erron, the man who had also made resound amongus Ormuzds word of life to Zoroaster,

80 the Oupnekhathad been brought to

European shores and been translated into Latin. In the Brahma preface Majerretells in detail the story of Anquetil-D uperrons O upnekhat and defends itsauthenticity against critics. Majer acknowledges that the Latin translation fromthe Persian represents only a mediated source but emphasizes that it unques-tionably is a rich collection of genuine Veda-U panishads w hich ought to oc-cupy the first place among all sources for Indian history of religion and scienceof antiquity [Alterthumskunde] as long as we do not receive a direct translationof the Sanskrit original.

81

O f co urse Majer was not exactly a prophet in the desert. H e was only onefigure among a whole group of G erman mythologists and symbologists w howanted, in the wake of H erder, to take advantage of this oldest testament o fmankind to explain the entire course of early human history. Kanne, C reuzer,and G rres had received the same message fro m the dawn of humanity ; aft er thepublication of the Latin Oupnekhat in 1802, this famous trio was busily con-structing architectures of the history of mankind that were based on this fossil,the worlds oldest text. The Oupnekhat thus appeared as an imprint of themother of all religions able to firmly anchor all ancient human culture and relig-ion in myth ical Ind ia. On this line G rres wrot e in 1809:

From this [ ] we conclude that in the U pnekhat we really possess the System ofthe ancient Vedams; that the entire Asian mythology rests o n it; that [Asian my-

thology] can exclusively be grasped in this common mother system; and that thebook itself is thus of infinite importance for the religious and philosophical his-to ry of the O rient until the Vedams themselves, from w hich it issued, become ac-cessible to us.

82

I w ill discuss the fascinating Franco-G erman Oupnekhat tradition and its won-drous blossoms in a forthcoming monograph; in the present context it is suffi-cient to see 1. what Indian antiquity signified for Majer, and 2. that the Oup-

80 Majer, Brahma, p. 6. Majer refers to Anquetil-Duperrons first feat, the pioneering study and

translation o f t he Zend-Avesta: Zend- Av esta, ouvrage de Zoroastre, P aris 1771.81

Ibid., p. 13. Majer insists that doubts about the faithfulness of [Anquetils] translation and even

more so about the Persian one are unjustified and mentions in his support great admirers of theO upnekhatin France like Senator Lanjuinais.82

Review of the O upnekhat from t he H eidelberger Jahrbcherof 1809; reprinted in Joseph G rres,Gesammelte Schri ften, Band 5: M ythengeschichte der asiati schen Welt ,Kln: J. P. Bachem, 1935: p. 325.


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58

H bscher to whine: H e should have mentioned P lato and Kant in the first place

yet he names the U panishads.

87

But was this encounter with the Oupnekhat Schopenhauers first acquaint-ance with I ndian tho ught? O r was there an earlier, initial encount er which couldhave prepared the ground for Majers arguments and the O upnekhatrevolution?These questions bring us back to the odd 4-mont h hiatus betw een D ecember 4th of 1813 and March 26 of 1814. D id D as Asiati sche Magazinhave any discernibleimpact on Schopenhauer? D id it contain anything related t o I ndian philosophywhich could have stimulated the young thinker, and are there any traces ofSchopenhauers study of the Magazin in his Manuscript Remains?

D as Asiati sche Magazin

The content of the Magazin, as we will call it fo r brevitys and G erman gram-mars sake, has been almost entirely ignored in previous research. In an earliercontribution I mentioned some of the Buddhism-related articles in the Magazinwhich happen to constitute Schopenhauers earliest known reading matter onBuddhism.

88But the Magazin also contains a fair amount of material about In-

dian thought, and if Schopenhauer did not let these two volumes sleep for fourmonths in a corner of his Weimar room we can assume that the Magazin alsocont ains his earliest know n reading matt er in the field of Indian philosophy . O urlist of Weimar book borrowings shows that Schopenhauer sometimes returnedbooks after only a few days and visited the library frequently; so it is not far-fetched to think that he kept the Magazinfor some purpose and harbored a defi-nite interest in it. As it happens, two early excerpts from the Magazin fromSchopenhauers hand exist on an undated loose sheet;

89 and quotations, notes,

and references90

in Schopenhauers unpublished and published works indicatethat he did read the Magazinwith attention; but the timing of such reading canat present not be conclusively established. H is interest w as not short-lived be-cause at a later point he took the trouble to actually buy these two volumes.

91

Each volume of the Magazin contains about 30 articles, and editor Klaprothand Friedrich Majer are the main contributors as each had furnished about adozen articles. Both were young men eager to impress others and leave their

87Arthur H bscher, D enker gegen den Strom. Schopenhauer: G estern H eute Morgen, Bonn: Bou-

vier Verlag H ermann G rundman n, 1973, pp. 5051.88

U rs App, Schopenhauers Begegnung mit dem Buddhismus, Schopenhauer-Jahrbuch 79, 1998:pp. 3558.89Schopenhauer Archiv, case XXVIII, pp. 9293; see the next sections.90

In H N5: p. 334 Hbscher provides only fo ur references; t his hardly scratches the surface.91

See the indications in H N5: p. 334.


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mark in the scholarly world, and both resorted to questionable means to achieve

that end which included passing off other peoples work as their own, either byleaving articles by others unsigned (editor Klaproth)92

or by stating in big lett ers by Friedrich Majer even when his was o nly the translation from English. Morepertinent to the present inquiry, however, are questions concerning the contentof t he Magazinand evidence for Schopenhauers interest in it .

A Loose Sheet w ith N otes

From the Weimar library records we know that Schopenhauer borrowed theMagazin for almost four months and we may assume that he read its contents;but do we have any proof of that? There is no conclusive proof, unfortunately,

but we do have rather convincing evidence in form of notes from Schopen-hauers hand which, in my opinion, stem fro m the time betw een D ecember of1813 and March o f 1814.

The notes in question are on a loose folded sheet of paper which forms fourpages and which on pages 2 and 3 contains excerpts from Majers Bhagavadgttranslation.

93 But let us first loo k at the entire sheet. H bscher proposes tw o

dates for it: about 1815/16,94

and around 1816.95

The only evidence he ad-duces for this dating is the handwriting,

96but in fact the handwriting of these

not es is such that precision dating is absolutely impossible. D ating by co ntent ismore promising since some notes relate to specific newspapers or to bookswhich Schopenhauer had borrowed from libraries.

O n the first page, Schopenhauer copied out o f a Nrnberg newspaper a storyof someone who starved himself to death; this story appeared on July 29 of 1813,and because it is a newspaper report we may not be too wrong in assuming thatSchopenhauer jotted this down not very long after it appeared, i.e., sometimeduring the summer of 1813.

97 The remaining three pages contain a total of ten

notes or excerpts.98

Page 2 contains notes 1, 2, and part of note 3. Note 1 is a

92For an example of Klaproths plagiarism see Urs App, Schopenhauers Begegnung mit dem Bud-

dhismus, Schopenhauer-Jahrbuch79, 1998: p. 43 (esp. no te 3).93

Schopenhauer Archiv, case XXVIII, pp. 9194.94

H N 2, p. XXIX.95

H N 5, p. 334.96

H N 2, p. XXIX.97

See H N 1, p. XXI X; t he story it self is reproduced in H N 5: p. 507. Schopenhauer made use of thisstory in D ie Welt als Will e und V orstellun gvol. 1 (see H N 1: p. XXI X).98

These notes are transcribed in H N 1, pp. 245247. To avoid conf usion I use H bschers numberingscheme.


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simple reference to a boo k review that had appeared in 1806 and cannot be dated.

N ote 2 is related to the redness of hot iron and the possibility of vision in neardarkness; these might w ell be notes for questions to be discussed with G oetheduring their meetings which began on November 29 of 1813. N ote 3 is the ex-cerpt f rom Klaproths Magazinand begins with Schopenhauers indication of thesource: Aus dem Asiatischen Magazin. Theil II . p. 287 Bhaguat -G eeta. D ialog13. According to my hypothesis, this excerpt (which takes up a whole hand-writt en page and runs up to the first third of page 3) was w ritten dow n betweenD ecember 4 of 1813 and March 30 of 1814. Since it is fro m a later dialogue involume 2, I would tend to place it in the first months of 1814 rather than D e-cember of 1813. Note 4contains several references with dates; the last of these,Mrz 1814, appears to point to the source of Schopenhauers information.March or April of 1814 might thus be considered as possible dates for note 4.The rest of the notes mostly relate to books which Schopenhauer borrowed inD resden between the summer of 1814 and t he end of 1815/16; they have lessimportance here since the notes obviously were made sequentially at varioustimes. H ere we are primarily interested in the date of no te 3 which consists ofSchopenhauers Bhagavadgtexcerpts.

The result of these rather technical considerations is that everything in thecontent and sequence of notes on this loose sheet supports the hypothesis thatSchopenhauers Bhagavadgt excerpts were indeed written while he had bor-rowed the Magazin from the Weimar library. In the absence of evidence to thecontrary

99it thus makes sense to assume that the Bhagavadgtexcerpts from the

Magazinstem f rom t he time betw een D ecember 4 of 1813 and March 30 of 1814and can be regarded as a trace of Schopenhauers initial encounter with Indianthought. While the evidence does not amount to solid proof it is sufficient for a

strong conjecture. At any rate, Schopenhauer borrowed the Magazinand kept itat home for almost four months while its editor Klaproth (until early January1814) and the Bhagavadgt translator Friedrich Majer (throughout this period)were living in the same small town of Weimar. It is improbable that under suchcircumstances Schopenhauer would borrow the Magazin for such a long timejust to leave it unread. Furthermore, there is another indication that he was in-deed reading the Magazinduring this period: a remark in Schopenhauers Manu-

99Merkels assertion (op. cit., p. 166) that Schopenhauer also used D as Asiati sche Magazinin Dres-

den betw een September 24 and O cto ber 19 of 1815 seems to o specific to be a simple conjecture.H ow ever, neither Merkel nor anyo ne else furnished any supporting evidence. Mhlethalers list of allthe materials borrowed by Schopenhauer from the D resden library shows no t race of any Magazin

entry during the period in question (op. cit., p. 72), and according to Perk Loesch of the SchsischeLandesbibliothek /Staats- und U niversittsbibliothek D resden (letter dat ed May 8, 1996) it is impos-sible to reconstruct what materials the India closet at the said library which both Schopenhauerand Kr ause used cont ained.


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script Remainsfrom early 1814. It appears to be related to a series of articles by

Majer entitled O n the I ncarnations of Vishnu

100

and might well constitute theearliest sign o f Schopenhauers I ndia-related reading:

Welcher U nsinn sich selbst erklren, sichselbst erkennen zu wollen! sich selbst zurVorstellung machen zu wollen und dannnichts brig zu lassen das eben alle dieseerklrten (verbundenen) Vorstellungen hat!Ist das nicht die Erde vom Atlas, den Atlasvom Elephanten, diesen von einer Schild-krte und diese von Nichts tragen lassen?

101

What nonsense to attempt to explain one-self, to know oneself! to want to turn one-self into a representation and then to leavenothing which has all of these explained(connected) representations! Is t his not likeletting the earth be carried by Atlas, Atlasby the elephant, the elephant by the tortoi-se, and the tort oise by no thing?

102

Whether this metaphor is related to Locke, Majers writing on Vishnu mythol-ogy or to his introduction to Indian antiquity we cannot tell; but since we arehere primarily concerned with philosophy rather than mythology we may regardthe Bhagavadgt as the earliest source with which Schopenhauer came into di-rect cont act. O f co urse Schopenhauer did no t encounter a modern t ranslation,and neither did he consult Wilkins. True to the principles of historical inquirywe must examine the exact same source as Schopenhauer, i. e. Majers presenta-tion and interpretation of the Bhagavadgt in the Magazin. It is through thisprismthat Schopenhauer initially got into contact with Indian thought, andsince this encount er took place earlier than the one with Anq uetil-D uperronsO upnekhat(and, as explained above, possibly earlier than Majers introductionto Indian antiquity, too), Majers translations from the Bhagavadgt in theMagazinmerit a close reading.

Majer s Bhagavadgt

H aving come to t he conclusion that Schopenhauers initial encounter withIndian thought probably did not, as hitherto maintained, consist in FriedrichMajers introduction to Indian antiquity and the subsequent discovery of theO upnekhataround the end of March of 1814 but rather in an earlier encounter

100 Friedrich Majer, D ie Verkrperungen des Wischnu ; Asiati sches Magazin vol. I, pp. 221244,

359405 and vol. II, pp. 1170; for Schopenhauers possible source for the elephant/tortoise meta-phor see vol. I, pp. 235236 and vol. II, p. 250.101

H N 1: p. 96 (no. 171)102 C f. E. F. J. Pay nes flawed translation in Ar thur Schopenhauer. Ear ly Manuscri pts ( 18041818).

O xford/New York/H amburg: Berg, 1988: p. 104. N oth ing o f course refers to t he absence of asubject in which such Vorstellungenarise.


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with the Bhagavadgt in t he G erman t ranslation of Friedrich Majer, we must

now investigate what Schopenhauer encountered in this translation.Apart from the Vishnu-related series of articles that was just mentioned, theMagazin contains a number of contributions of interest in the Schopenhauercontext.

103Most pertinent to our present inquiry is a series of five contributions

that all bear the t itle D er Bhaguat-G eeta, oder G esprche zwischen Kreeshnaund Arjoon.

104Each article is proudly signed by D r. Fr. Majer . H owever, as

mentioned above, these articles are only t ranslations into G erman from C harlesWilkins English translation of the Indian classic.

105Majers original contribution

is thus limited to his G erman translation, a number of notes, and a preface. Thefact that the bulk of t he five installments is no more than a t ranslation fro m theEnglish is only mentioned in Majers preface to the first article; all installmentsproudly bear the signature by Friedrich Majer. But the extent of Majers owncontribution and the faithfulness of his translation is of little concern to ourinquiry: it was through this translation with this introduction and these notesthat Schopenhauer encountered the Bhagavadgt, and neither Wilkins nor anyother translation o ught t o co ncern us here. I n his preface to the first installment,Majer explains the interest o f t he Bhagavadgtas follows:

Keinem aufmerksamen Leser wird es entge-hen, wie diese wenigstens viertausend Jahrealten Ideen und Trume der aus einerhchsteigenthmlichen Verbindung seltsa-mer Fabeln und Einbildungen, und der ab-stractesten Speculation bestehenden Weisheitdes fernen Orients in einem wunderbarenZusammenhange mit dem stehen, was in ganz

andern Zeiten und H immelsstrichen einPlato, Spinoza oder Jacob Bhm ber dieinteressantesten G egenstnde des N achden-kens glaubten und dachten, wenn auch inandern Formen sagten und vort rugen.

106

No interested reader will fail to see howthese ideas and dreams, which are at leastfour thousand years old and constitute thewisdom of t he remote O rient in form of amost peculiar combination of wondroustales and impressions with highly abstractspeculation, stand in a marvelous connecti-on with what a Plato, Spinoza, or Jacob

Boehme believed and thought in very diffe-rent times and regions of the globe aboutthe most interesting themes of thinking,even though they expressed and presentedthis in different forms.

103 O f particular interest are t he articles related t o B uddhism such as U eber die Fo-Religion in

C hina (vol. 1, pp. 148169) w hich probably constitut e Schopenhauers earliest readings on t his reli-gion. See U rs App, Schopenhauers Begegnung mit dem Buddhismus, Schopenhauer-Jahrbuch 79,1998: p. 42 ff .104D as Asiati sche Magazin vol. 1, pp. 406453; vol. 2, pp. 105135, pp. 229255, pp. 273293, and

pp. 454490.105

T he Bhaguat-G eeta, or D ialogues of K reeshna and A rjoon; i n E ighteen L ectures; w it h N otes. T rans-lated from the original Sanskreet, or Ancient L anguage of the Brahmans, by C harles Wilkins, Londo n1785.106Asiati sches Magazinvol. 1, pp. 406407. The emphases stem f rom the Magazin.


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Such words of Majer have a familiar ring for readers of Schopenhauer whose

statements about the marvelous connection between his own philosophy and thewisdo m of t he O rient are well-know n. Since we may here be facing the verybeginning of this marvelous connection for Schopenhauer, one of the upper-most questions in our mind concerns its contentat this early point in time. Majerregarded the Bhagavadgt as one of the prime treasures of Indian antiquity, ahighly relevant source worthy of his still very imperfect attempts to explain(via foot notes) the scatt ered t reasures of Indian metaphysics, higher t heology,and mythical poetry and fable from a single common point of view .

107

But before we take a closer look at Majers Bhagavadgtwe need to remind our-selves that we should be wary of reading too much into this initial encounter. After all,if we are to believe the philosophers account, Majer introduced Schopenhauer to In-dian antiquity without being asked to do so. Assuming that this introduction indeedtook place in March of 1814 we would thus have to conclude that Schopenhauer wastoo little interested or too shy to pose India-related questions to Majer, or alternativelythat he did not have an occasion to do so. Most available evidence points to the Oup-nekhatas the match which definitely lit Schopenhauers fiery interest in Indian phi-losophy and religion. But there are the above-mentioned turtle-and-elephant metaphorand Schopenhauers excerpts from the Bhagavadgt, both of which appear to datefrom the months before his encounter with Anquetil-D uperrons Latino-PersianU panishads. We thus return to the hypothesis raised above concerning a possible nurs-ing of interest in Indian thought between December of 1813 and March of 1814. In thefollowing we will look at some facets of Majers Bhagavadgtwhile trying to find outwhat it was that attracted Schopenhauers interest to such an extent that he wrotedown excerpts and kept them for the rest of his life.

Yogic Concentration

In a letter by Warren H astings w hich precedes Wilkins Bhagavadgtrenderingand also opens Majers G erman translation, it is stated that the Brahmans arebound to a kind of mental discipline in which the mind is concentrated on asingle point whereby the mental confusion which engenders ignorance isdissolved.

108

D ie, welche sich dieser U ebung ergeben,vermgen nicht allein ihr H erz vor jedersinnlichen Begierde rein zu erhalten, son-

Those who engage in this practice managenot only to keep their heart pure in theface of any sensual desire, but also to

107Ibid., p. 408.

108Friedrich Majer, D as Bhaguat-G eeta, o der G esprche zwischen Kreeshna und Arjoon , in: Julius

Klaproth (ed.), Asiati sches Magazin, Weimar: I ndust rie-Co mpto ir, 1802, vol. I, p. 412413.


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dern auch ihre Aufmerksamkeit von jedem

ueren Objecte abzuz iehen und gnzlichauf den G egenstand ihrer Meditation z uheften.

109

withdraw their attention from any external

object and t o fix it entirely o n the object oftheir meditation.110

This kind of objective attention was highly esteemed by Schopenhauer froman early period. When in the Winter semester of 1810/11 Prof. Schulze made aremark to the effect that immersed concentration (Vertieftsein) was nothingother than an inability to direct ones attention, while focused on one object,also on other things, Schopenhauer wrote a sharp rejoinder next to Schulzesobservation:

Ego. An dieser G eistesschwche hat alsoSokrates stark laborirt, als er, wie Alkibia-des im Symposion erzhlt, ein Mal 24Stunden unbeweglich auf dem Feldestand.

111

I [say]: Socrates did thus acutely sufferfrom this debility of mind when he, asAlcibiades recounts in [Platos] Sympo-sium, once remained immobile in a field f or24 hours.

Schopenhauer might t hus have agreed with H astings who stated in the introduc-to ry letter w hose G erman t ranslation appears before the Bhagavadgttext: Even the most diligent men of Europe find that it is difficult to fix ones att en-tion to such a high degree. In India, by contrast, there are people who oftenhave had a daily habit of engaging in absolute contemplation [absolute An-schauung] from youth to mature age, thus adding their own insights to thetreasures accumulated by their forebears.

112As the body gains strength through

exercise, so does the mind; and according t o H astings it is exactly t hrough such

exercise that I ndians were able to achieve discoveries of new t rajecto ries, of newconnections of ideas and to develop their own, original philosophical systems.

113

[Solche G eistesbungen fhrten] zu Sys-temen, die, obgleich speculativ und subtil,dennoch gleich den einfachsten der unsri-

[Such exercise led the Indians] to systemswhich, t hough speculative and subtle, couldnevertheless be founded on truth like the

109Majer 1802 I: p. 413.

110In the interest of unbiased appraisal of what Schopenhauer actually read, this English translation

was made by the author without consulting the English original.111

H N 2, p. 15.112

Majer Magazinvol. 1, p. 414. As mentioned abo ve, the translations from Majers cont ributions are(in the int erest o f unbiased appraisal of w hat Schopenhauer actually read) made from Majers G er-man into English without consultation of the English originals.113

Ibid.


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gen, auf Wahrheit gegrndet seyn knnen,

da sie den Vortheil haben, aus einer vonjeder fremden Mischung gereinigten Q uel-le herzuflieen.

114

most basic [systems] of ours because

they have the advantage to stem from asource which is freed from any foreignadmixture.

The Gt, in H astings view, is thus a work of great o riginality, lofty inspiration,and an almost unequalled power of reasoning and diction which, in spite of itsspecial method, contains as a peculiar exception among all religions known tous a theology which corresponds best with that o f the C hristian church andexplains its basic doct rine in a glorious manner.

115

K ri shnas Revelation

Needless to say, the Bhagavadgt is an episode from the voluminous Mahab-harata epic and one of Indias most acclaimed literary products. In this episode,the hero Krishna reveals himself to the Pandu prince Arjuna, who faces battleagainst his own kin, as the incarnation of the creator/destroyer Vishnu. Vishnuis, according to Majer, the indestructible world spirit (Weltgeist)

116 which as-

sumes myriad forms and is, among many other names, called eternal , uni versal,endur ing, unchangeable, invi sible and ungraspable.

117 Since Majer had also in-

cluded a three-part series of articles about the incarnations of Vishnu in theMagazin, it is clear that the subject was of the greatest interest to him.

Let us now loo k at the first conversation between Kreeshna and Arjoon , touse Majers spelling. Whereas men of limited capacity [ ] deliver their heart t oearthly desires and expect recompense for the deeds of this life,

118t he accom-

plished man att ains true wisdom

119

which is nothing other than freedom fromdesire. Free from duality,120

he keeps steadfastly to the track of truth,121

hasrenounced all thoughts about the fruits of his actions

122and devotes his mind

with constant application ceaselessly to contemplation .123

114Ibid.

115Majer Magazinvol. 1, p. 415.


117Majer Magazinvol. 1, p. 440; the italics are from the Asiati sches Magazin.

118Majer Magazinvol. 1, p. 442


120Ibid. Frey von der Zweyheit (D uplicitt).

121Ibid.122

Majer 1802 I: p. 443.123

Majer 1802 I: p. 444.


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D erjenige hegt w ahre Weisheit in sich,

welcher sein H erz jegli cher Begierde ver-schliet, der mi t sich selbst zufr ieden ist, undsein G lck i n sich selbst t rgt. I hm schlgt imU nglcke sein H erz ni cht unruhiger, er fhltsich glcklich und zufrieden, wenn es ihmwohl geht, U nruhe, Furcht und Zorn bleibenihm fremd.

124

H e embod ies genuine wisdo m who shuts off

his heart to any desire, who i s at peace withhimself and carri es his fortune within him-self. I n misfor tune his heart i s not less at ease,and he also feels as happy and content aswhen thi ngs go well for him. U nease, anxietyand i re are foreign to him .

The similarity of such statements to Schopenhauers better consciousness, aconception he had been developing for years and which stands opposed to mansempirical consciousness marked by self-interest and ever unfulfilled desire, isstriking. According to Majers Bhagavadgt, the deluded one w ho commits act sonly out of self-interest (Eigennutz)

125harbors the illusion that it is he him-

self who does all these deeds which [in truth] are simply the result of the princi-ple of his constitution ,

126and his mind is enthralled by objects of the senses.

127

The wise man, by contrast, attains victory against passion, that dangerousdestroyer of wisdom and science (Zerstrer der Weisheit und der Wissen-schaft),

128 and finds something which goes beyond reason: the essence (das

Wesen).129

At the end of the first installment of Majers translation t his Wesenis defined as follows: The encompassing soul, a world-spirit of which the indi-vidual soul forms but a part ( D ie allgemeine Seele, ein Weltgeist, von dem dieLebensseele nur ein Theil ist).

130 But only a wise man knows this Weltgeist, a

man who remains free from desire in all his actions (der bey allen seinenU nternehmungen frey vom Begehren bleibt ):

131

Ein solcher begehrt keinen Lohn fr seineH andlungen, er ist stets zufrieden undunabhngig, und kann, wenn er gleich aneinem Werke Theil nimmt, doch immer alsnichthandelnd betrachtet werden. Er istohne U nruhe, demthigen H erzens und

Such [a wise man] desires no recompensefor his actions, is always content and inde-pendent and can, even though he engagesin some enterprise, still always be regardedas unengaged. H e is without unrest, o fhumble heart and mind, and free of all

124Ibid.; t he italics are from the Asiati sches Magazin. See also vol. 2, p. 118.





129Majer Magazinvol. 1, p. 453; the emphasis is from the Magazin.130

Ibid.131

Majer Magazinvol. 2, p. 109.


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G eistes, und von allem Sinnengenusse frey;

und da er nur die Functionen des Krperserfllt, so begeht er keine Snde. Er bleibtzufrieden, was auch geschehen mag: er hatdie Zweyseitigkeitberwunden, und ist freyvon Begierde. Im G lcke wie im U nglckebleibt er immer derselbe, und ob er gleichhandelt, so wird er doch von der H andlungnicht beschrnkt.

132

sensual enjoyment; and since he only per-

forms the functions of the body he doesnot commit any sin. H e remains contentwhatever may happen: he has overcomeduality and is free from desire. In fortuneand misfortune he always stays the same,and though he may act he is not limited byhis action.

But who can attain such marvelous wisdom, such better consciousness? Krish-na, as relayed to y oung Scho penhauer by Wilkins via Majer, answ ers: H eattainsit who combines his firm resolve with knowledge of himself ( D er gelangt dazu,welcher mit einem festen Entschlusse die Kenntni seiner selbst verbindet).

133

Wessen G emth die G abe dieser Andachtbesitzt , wer alle D inge mit gleichem Blickebetrachtet, der sieht die Weltseele in allenD ingen, und alle D inge in dem allgemeinenWeltgeiste.

134

H e whose soul possesses the gift of suchdevotion, who sees all things with impartialvision: he sees the world-soul in all things,and all things in the encompassing worldspirit.

U nfort unately only very few mortals135

attain such insight into this primordialbeing ( U rwesen) w hich manifests itself in the material and spiritual elementsof humanity.

136But , lofty as such insight may be, it is not y et the highest:

Aber berdies wisse, da ich ein andres,von diesem unterschiednes und weit hhe-

res Wesen habe

137

, dessen Natur das Lebenist, und durch welches die Welt erhalten

But you must further know that I haveanother essence which is distinct from this

and f ar higher: [an essence] w hose nature islife and by which the world is maintained.

132Ibid. The emphasis is in the o riginal. See p. 113 where freedom fro m duality ( D oppelseitigkeit )

is again mentioned.133

Majer Magazinvol. 2, p. 122.134


Among ten thousand mortals only very few aspire to perfection, and among those who do andatt ain it there again is only a small number who know me according to my nat ure (U nter zehntau-send Sterblichen streben nur sehr wenige nach Vollkommenheit, und unter denen, die danach stre-ben, und dahin gelangen, ist wiederum nur eine kleine Anzahl, die mich meiner Natur gemkennt ). Majer Magazinvol. 2, p. 126.136

My primordial essence consists of eight parts, earth, water, fire, air, and ether (Khang), along

wit h feeling, reason, and Ahang-Kar, [which is] knowledge of oneself ( Mein U rwesen besteht ausacht Theilen, Erde, Wasser, Feuer, Luft und Aether (Khang) n ebst G emth, Verstand und Ahang-Kar, d ie Kenntni seiner selbst. Majer Magazinvol. 2, p. 126.137

Wilkins explains in a note: The life soul ( D ie Lebensseele ).


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wird. Wisse, da diese beyden Wesen die

Erzeugungsquellen der ganzen Natur sind.

138

You must know that these two are the

generative sources of all of nature.

This fundamental essence constitutes everything, from the wetness in water tolight in the sun and from human nature in man to life in all beings: it isthe eternal seed of nature as a whole.

139

In the ninth and tenth conversations, Krishna finally reveals himself to hislistener Arjuna as Vishnu, the creator and destroyer of everything, the inex-haustible seed of nature

140 and the soul which inhabits the body of every be-

ing;141

moreover, he shows himself also as all-devouring death as well as resur-rection of those who return to life.

142

The following conversation, number 11, brings us to a peak of this divinerevelation; watched by the stunned Arjuna, Krishna reveals his own body as theentire living and lifeless world :

143

Schaue, Arjoon, die Millionen meinergtt lichen Formen, deren G attungen ebenso verschieden sind, als die G estalten undFarben von einander abweichen.

144

See, Arjuna, the millions of my divineforms, the species of which are just asdifferent and varied as forms and colors.

In this w ay Arjuna is finally brought to the realization: You are this everlastingessence, distinct from all transitory things,

145 and he sings Krishnas praise:

Everything is included in you; thus you are everything (Alles ist in dir einge-schlossen; du bist also Alles).

146

Schopenhauers Fi rst Excerpt from the Bhagavadgt

After Arjuna, trembling in awe, was allowed to see the entire cosmos in the bodyof Krishna, Krishna in the thirteenth conversation goes on to reveal himself, as itwere, as the innermost being of Arjuna himself, namely, as the perceiver

138Majer, Magazinvol. 2, p. 126.

139Majer, Magazinvol. 2, p. 127. See also pp. 234 and 254.





144Ibid.145


Majer Magazinvol. 2, p. 281.


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(kshetra-gna) of Arjunas own bo dy (kshetra). This, characteristically, is the place

where Schopenhauers first excerpt from the Bhagavadgt begins on the loosesheet of paper which might date from the first months of 1814:

Kreeshna oder Gott spricht:147

Lerne da dasWort Kshetra den Krper bedeutet, u. Kshetra-gna denjenigen, welcher

Documents

Schopenhauer’s Initial Encounter With Indian Thought