Ruegg’s elucidation and application of the notion of “family resemblance” or of “topos” to such discussions is also extremely illumining here. See his Buddha-nature, Mind and the Problem of Gradualism in a Comparative Perspective (1989), pp. 2, 5, 13, 109, 123-124, and so forth. Therein he notes that (p. 2)
[t]he notion of family resemblance was made use of in philosophy by L. Wittgenstein.… [I]n a polythetic arrangement or chain no single feature is essential, or sufficient, for membership in the classification in which all the individual do not share one single characteristic feature. … [W]hen we consider Buddhism in its various traditions in India, China and in Tibet … the question may even arise as to whether the name ‘Buddhism’ denotes one single entity rather than a classification embracing (more or less polythetically) a very large number of strands held together by family resemblances. Return to text

See Ducrot, Oswald and Tzvetan Todorov (trans. Catherine Porter), Encyclopedic Dictionary of the Sciences of Language (Johns Hopkins U. Press: Baltimore, 1994), p. 36 for further explanation of these terms and an extensive bibliography. Return to text

These “emic” and “etic” approaches may be seen to be related to the useful distinction that Wayne Proudfoot makes in Religious Experience (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1985) between “description” and “explanation,” respectively. Return to text

Select Bibliography

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Cabezón, José Ignacio. “Buddhist Principles in the Tibetan Liberation Movement.” In Engaged Buddhism: Buddhist Liberation Movements in Asia, ed. by Christopher S. Queen and Sallie B. King, pp. 295-320. Albany: State University of New York Press, 1996.

Chakravarti, Uma. The Social Dimensions of Early Buddhism. Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1987.

Coward, Harold. “New Theology on Population, Consumption, and Ecology.” Journal of the American Academy of Religion 65, no. 2: 259-273, 1997.

Eller, Cynthia. “The Impact of Christianity on Buddhist Nonviolence in the West.” In Inner Peace, World Peace: Essays on Buddhism and Nonviolence, ed. by Kenneth Kraft, pp. 91-109. Albany: State University of New York Press, 1992.

Eppsteiner, Fred, ed. The Path of Compassion: Writings on Socially Engaged Buddhism. Berkeley: Parallax Press, 1988.

Foster, Nelson. “To Enter the Marketplace.” In The Path of Compassion: Writings on Socially Engaged Buddhism, ed. by Fred Eppsteiner, pp. 47-64. Berkeley: Parallax Press, 1988.

Garfield, Jay L., trans. and comm. The Fundamental Wisdom of the Middle Way: Nagarjuna’s Mūlamadhyamakakārikā. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1995.

Gómez, Luis O. “Oriental Wisdom and the Cure of Souls: Jung and the Indian East.” In Curators of the Buddha: The Study of Buddhism Under Colonialism, ed. by Donald S. Lopez, Jr., pp. 197-250. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1996.

Green, Paula. “Walking for Peace: Nipponzan Myohoji.” In Engaged Buddhism in the West, ed. by Christopher S. Queen, pp. 128-156. Boston: Wisdom Publications, 2000.

Gross, Rita M. “Toward a Buddhist Environmental Ethic.” Journal of the American Academy