The statement that western and eastern thought differ due to abstract or concrete language is false. It may be true that Hebrew and related languages are not abstract, but "eastern" usually refers to india, china and related cultures. The most significant language of eastern philosophical thought is Sanskrit, the sacred language of the Hindus and with its vulgate forms of the Buddhists as well. Sanskrit is not only closely related to European languages, but is highly abstract. GET IT RIGHT!
I believe that the word orientation is derived from the word orient for the east. We find our bearing or face the correct direction when we are properly oriented. Prophetically in Christianity, Jesus will appear in the Eastern sky. Thus when you look for Jesus' return you properly "orient" yourself to Christ.
I believe that Hebrew word for light is ohr. This basic sound is common root for light. Jesus being the new light.
When we adjust for scale we adopt the same map reference vocabulary as the "hopi" tribe. What is revealing here is the greekness of our "left" and "right". This places man in the important position of being "the measure of all things", a greek notion, whereas the "hopi" clearly are subject to their environment and surroundings, and in that sense "humbled" by their environment. They more easily see themselves as a part of a greater whole rather than "the master of nature"
Some in our culture speak very concretely, but they are usually dismissed as imbecillic or crude! We have adopted snobbish attitudes, arrogant assertive deprecations and biased prejudicial comparisons. All cultures use metaphor freely and appropriately. Even the modern use of the concrete word "****" exhibits a rich analogical metaphorical useage. Humans cannot help but analogise.
The use of reference language is not so strange, we just commonly do not adjust for scale sometimes.
Abstract and concrete are themselves abstracts! The thought that philosophy or "abstract" arises later in a civilizations development is naive. consciousnees means sensational response and analogical or metaphorical response. Without this we would not have language at all. Thus all animates have a "language" if we can be bothered to learn it. I have no simple metaphor for plants, but suffice to say they have a chemical language. Thus it is the predilection of the culture at issue here.
A directional example in Indo-European language is "south" coming from the root for "left," since if you face the setting sun south is on your left. Another word is the same root is "sinister," that "left-handed." A concrete-->abstract example in English is "true" related to "tree," though the original idea may have been the concept "solid" or something similar.
@andrjsh Excellent examples, thank you. This supports the idea that all language and philosophy was concrete in nature, but evolved into abstracts over time.
Manchurian and Korean thought processes can; at times, be very abstract. Similarly ; the Irish tend to be quite literal (concrete). Perhaps these generalities weren’t intended to be as absolute as they seemed to be here. The better explanation would be to say western thought tends to be more serial and eastern thought more parallel. A story told in western thought has all events at the same time period being conveyed; and eastern story tellers have all similar events being conveyed.
Manchurian and Korean thought processes can; at times, be very abstract. Similarly ; the Irish tend to be quite literal (concrete). Perhaps these generalities weren’t intended to be as absolute as they seemed to be here. The better explanation would be to say western thought tends to be more serial and eastern thought more parallel. A story told in western thought has all events at the same time period being conveyed; and eastern story tellers have all similar events being conveyed.
good post the natives of north , central , south america are of the northern kingdom read 2 esdras 13:39 (in the apoch.) they sojourned to that region after assyrian captivity heres some litirature to validate my premise , lost tribes and the promise land ,MYSTERY OF THE MEXICAN PYRAMIDS Elias , Boudinot's = a star in the west and the negroes , haitians , jamacians are of the southern kingdom
Philosophy only became possible after societies became wealthy enough to sustain a layer, caste or class of leisured people with a large enough written corpus so as to be able to study and compare many, many instances of a the concrete in order to see the underlying abstract principle. Philosophers then devote themselves to a study of these principles. This occurred during what Jaspers called "the Axial Age". The earliest written scriptures contain very little philosophy.
@pirbird14 It is impossible for a society to not have a philosophy as your philosophy is how you think and perceive things. What you are probably referring to is a specific kind of philosophy that develops through the type of system you are mentioning.
1. examination of basic concepts: the branch of knowledge or academic study devoted to the systematic examination of basic concepts such as truth, existence, reality, causality, and freedom
The study of knowledge did not begin until the Axial Age, as I discussed.
You have no way of knowing what the man in the street thought because most were illiterate. The earliest scriptures reflect what the ruling class thought people should do or think.
@04220H This just confirms what I suspect, all word are originated in the concrete, but over time we have replaced these concrete ideas with abstract.
To get the gist of what my comments are driving at please see:-
pinyinology . com / ontology / chouxiang8 . html
I am unable to view the diagrams.
Extract :- 'When there was no writing, let alone phonetic writing, the people have no way to detach the sound from the concept, thus to perceive the arbitrary relationship between these two elements, which is conductive to abstract thought, it was thus not possible for them to conceive of the ontological being. '
@dunklaw The article proposed that the concrete nature of Eastern thought comes from the ideographic style of writing. I think it is the opposite. Ideographic writing comes out of a concrete philosophy. I am convinced that concrete thought is natural and that is how all children and all primitives think. It is not until one is educated in abstracts that they can be grasped.
@ancienthebreworg I agree with your statement as a general development. But isn't alphabetic Canaanite a development beyond that point? Isn't the ability to construct such a written language an abstract development? If we are talking about Abram coming out of Ur then yes, the Mesopotamian language (cuneiform) is a hieroglyphic language along with Egyptian & Chinese , but aren't we looking at something that is a few stages forward in thought?
It has been explained to me that the difference between Greek (western/Platonian) and Hebrew thought is that Greek centers around logic alone but Hebrew, while it encorporates logic, its goal goes further toward integrity (i.e., wholeness) in relationship, particularly towards God.
You are on the right path. To put it simply, Greek thought concerns itself with knowledge while Hebrew thought concerns itself with action. Both of these are forms of logic, just different forms. It is interesting that in Christianity the goal is "knowledge" of God, while in Judaism it is "doing" for God.
For the word of God is living, and active, and sharper than any two-edged sword, and piercing even to the dividing
of soul and spirit, of both joints and marrow, and quick to discern the thoughts and intents of the heart.
It is actually the mechanism used to re-orient our view of God and guide us out of sin and "primitive" behavior. And this starts at our core and works outward.
The terms left and right are derived from the fact that some 90% of the population use the hand of the same side of their body for writing and other manual tasks. Through cognate of the word right in the meaning correct or good, the side with the hand most used was defined as the right side. The word left comes from the Old English lyft, meaning weak.
"Now the serpent was more subtil than any beast of the field which the LORD God had made And he said unto the woman Yea hath God said Ye shall not eat of every tree of the garden"
Would the introduction of the serpent in the garden of Eden, be considered a beginning of abstract terms in the psyche of Adam, (humanity) and Eve?
Some of what we call abstract is derived from a word from one culture crossing over to another without it original understanding - Form Germany:- * north (Proto-Germanic *norþ-) from a root *ner- "left, below", i.e. "to the left of the rising Sun". * east (*aus-to-) from the word for dawn, see Ēostre. * south (*sunþ-) is root-cognate to Sun itself, thus "the region of the Sun" * west (*wes-t-) from a word for "evening", root-cognate to Latin vesper.
@ancienthebreworg Just watched the Dan Everret video. These people seem totally insular and self sufficient. Do you think that the introduction of trade & especially the act of writing events down changes the language and it meanings?
Also as the language evolves through osmosis and/or environmental change referring back to the written history would quickly develop a larger concept of time - past and future?
Actually it is a very fascinating Lecture. The entire lecture is about 1.5 hours long and he explains that he was a missionary Bible Translator, but all that changed when he learned the langauge and culture. You can find it by going to Google Videos and type in Dan Everret.
Do you think that a major part of the concrete construction of the language is because is primary function was in trading transactions and business in general?
No, I don't think so, I believe it is the natural way we think. Abstracts have to be learned. If you give a child a piece of paper and crayons, you'll always get a picture of something concrete. It is not until we are adults that we learn to think abstractly and create abstract paintings like the one I used as an example in the video.
I do not think that the archaeological evidence shows that to be the case. The majority of texts (about 80%) from Mesopotamian, Phonetician, Ugarit, Ebla, Indus valley, Mycenaean etc. etc. are trade documents. Even including fixed exchange rates such as - a fixed amount of gold for a fixed amount of wheat. The drive for a relatively short hand written language seems to be trade & free flow of information. The real question is HOW LONG does it take to learn abstracts? (cont.)
(cont.) the biblical text spans over 1000 years and during that time there is proven and considerable contact between Canaanite speaking races and pre-Greek writing traders - 800 BC onwards & there is evidence to show that the abstract ideas of these people was fairly well developed quite early in to this cultural overlap.
Thanks again an excellent production the content is good too;)
urkyle11 1 week ago
The statement that western and eastern thought differ due to abstract or concrete language is false. It may be true that Hebrew and related languages are not abstract, but "eastern" usually refers to india, china and related cultures. The most significant language of eastern philosophical thought is Sanskrit, the sacred language of the Hindus and with its vulgate forms of the Buddhists as well. Sanskrit is not only closely related to European languages, but is highly abstract. GET IT RIGHT!
huraha96704 4 months ago
Comment removed
NothingButSocksOn 4 months ago
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NothingButSocksOn 4 months ago
I believe that the word orientation is derived from the word orient for the east. We find our bearing or face the correct direction when we are properly oriented. Prophetically in Christianity, Jesus will appear in the Eastern sky. Thus when you look for Jesus' return you properly "orient" yourself to Christ.
I believe that Hebrew word for light is ohr. This basic sound is common root for light. Jesus being the new light.
VictorLepanto 6 months ago
When we adjust for scale we adopt the same map reference vocabulary as the "hopi" tribe. What is revealing here is the greekness of our "left" and "right". This places man in the important position of being "the measure of all things", a greek notion, whereas the "hopi" clearly are subject to their environment and surroundings, and in that sense "humbled" by their environment. They more easily see themselves as a part of a greater whole rather than "the master of nature"
jehovajah 11 months ago
Some in our culture speak very concretely, but they are usually dismissed as imbecillic or crude! We have adopted snobbish attitudes, arrogant assertive deprecations and biased prejudicial comparisons. All cultures use metaphor freely and appropriately. Even the modern use of the concrete word "****" exhibits a rich analogical metaphorical useage. Humans cannot help but analogise.
The use of reference language is not so strange, we just commonly do not adjust for scale sometimes.
jehovajah 11 months ago
Abstract and concrete are themselves abstracts! The thought that philosophy or "abstract" arises later in a civilizations development is naive. consciousnees means sensational response and analogical or metaphorical response. Without this we would not have language at all. Thus all animates have a "language" if we can be bothered to learn it. I have no simple metaphor for plants, but suffice to say they have a chemical language. Thus it is the predilection of the culture at issue here.
jehovajah 11 months ago
I can relate to this because of mylanguage. This is awesome.
blackworldonline 11 months ago
oh I love that, ppl of doing and senses :-))) I can relate to that
deborahbetty58 1 year ago
A directional example in Indo-European language is "south" coming from the root for "left," since if you face the setting sun south is on your left. Another word is the same root is "sinister," that "left-handed." A concrete-->abstract example in English is "true" related to "tree," though the original idea may have been the concept "solid" or something similar.
andrjsh 1 year ago
@andrjsh Excellent examples, thank you. This supports the idea that all language and philosophy was concrete in nature, but evolved into abstracts over time.
ancienthebreworg 1 year ago
@andrjsh That's intersting, Left in Middle eastern Arabic is north ...
TheKsk1997 11 months ago
This has been flagged as spam show
Manchurian and Korean thought processes can; at times, be very abstract. Similarly ; the Irish tend to be quite literal (concrete). Perhaps these generalities weren’t intended to be as absolute as they seemed to be here. The better explanation would be to say western thought tends to be more serial and eastern thought more parallel. A story told in western thought has all events at the same time period being conveyed; and eastern story tellers have all similar events being conveyed.
YisraelinDiaspora 1 year ago
Manchurian and Korean thought processes can; at times, be very abstract. Similarly ; the Irish tend to be quite literal (concrete). Perhaps these generalities weren’t intended to be as absolute as they seemed to be here. The better explanation would be to say western thought tends to be more serial and eastern thought more parallel. A story told in western thought has all events at the same time period being conveyed; and eastern story tellers have all similar events being conveyed.
YisraelinDiaspora 1 year ago
Comment removed
YisraelinDiaspora 1 year ago
good post the natives of north , central , south america are of the northern kingdom read 2 esdras 13:39 (in the apoch.) they sojourned to that region after assyrian captivity heres some litirature to validate my premise , lost tribes and the promise land ,MYSTERY OF THE MEXICAN PYRAMIDS Elias , Boudinot's = a star in the west and the negroes , haitians , jamacians are of the southern kingdom
MrFocushiram 1 year ago
Philosophy only became possible after societies became wealthy enough to sustain a layer, caste or class of leisured people with a large enough written corpus so as to be able to study and compare many, many instances of a the concrete in order to see the underlying abstract principle. Philosophers then devote themselves to a study of these principles. This occurred during what Jaspers called "the Axial Age". The earliest written scriptures contain very little philosophy.
pirbird14 1 year ago
@pirbird14 It is impossible for a society to not have a philosophy as your philosophy is how you think and perceive things. What you are probably referring to is a specific kind of philosophy that develops through the type of system you are mentioning.
ancienthebreworg 1 year ago
From MSN Encarta:
Philosophy
1. examination of basic concepts: the branch of knowledge or academic study devoted to the systematic examination of basic concepts such as truth, existence, reality, causality, and freedom
The study of knowledge did not begin until the Axial Age, as I discussed.
You have no way of knowing what the man in the street thought because most were illiterate. The earliest scriptures reflect what the ruling class thought people should do or think.
pirbird14 1 year ago
Intrestingly among modern languages in finnish all different names for 8 points of compass are concrete of origin, f.ex. north is "bottom".
04220H 1 year ago
@04220H This just confirms what I suspect, all word are originated in the concrete, but over time we have replaced these concrete ideas with abstract.
ancienthebreworg 1 year ago
Jeff,
To get the gist of what my comments are driving at please see:-
pinyinology . com / ontology / chouxiang8 . html
I am unable to view the diagrams.
Extract :- 'When there was no writing, let alone phonetic writing, the people have no way to detach the sound from the concept, thus to perceive the arbitrary relationship between these two elements, which is conductive to abstract thought, it was thus not possible for them to conceive of the ontological being. '
dunklaw 1 year ago
@dunklaw The article proposed that the concrete nature of Eastern thought comes from the ideographic style of writing. I think it is the opposite. Ideographic writing comes out of a concrete philosophy. I am convinced that concrete thought is natural and that is how all children and all primitives think. It is not until one is educated in abstracts that they can be grasped.
ancienthebreworg 1 year ago
@ancienthebreworg I agree with your statement as a general development. But isn't alphabetic Canaanite a development beyond that point? Isn't the ability to construct such a written language an abstract development? If we are talking about Abram coming out of Ur then yes, the Mesopotamian language (cuneiform) is a hieroglyphic language along with Egyptian & Chinese , but aren't we looking at something that is a few stages forward in thought?
dunklaw 1 year ago
Cont. 2:
It has been explained to me that the difference between Greek (western/Platonian) and Hebrew thought is that Greek centers around logic alone but Hebrew, while it encorporates logic, its goal goes further toward integrity (i.e., wholeness) in relationship, particularly towards God.
I'd be interested to hear you expound on this.
Sincerely in Jesus' (Yeshua's) name,
Jonathan
jonboy700 1 year ago
@jonboy700
You are on the right path. To put it simply, Greek thought concerns itself with knowledge while Hebrew thought concerns itself with action. Both of these are forms of logic, just different forms. It is interesting that in Christianity the goal is "knowledge" of God, while in Judaism it is "doing" for God.
ancienthebreworg 1 year ago
Cont. 1:
It states in Hebrews 4:10:
For the word of God is living, and active, and sharper than any two-edged sword, and piercing even to the dividing
of soul and spirit, of both joints and marrow, and quick to discern the thoughts and intents of the heart.
It is actually the mechanism used to re-orient our view of God and guide us out of sin and "primitive" behavior. And this starts at our core and works outward.
jonboy700 1 year ago
@ReligionFreeDeist
Oh really? Oh okay :-), I wonder who told me about it.
ancienthebreworg 1 year ago
@ReligionFreeDeist
You know, I think you were the one who told me about it in the first place :-)
ancienthebreworg 1 year ago
@ReligionFreeDeist yea, I watched it today, VERY great video
Mencel89 1 year ago
Well done. It kind of drew me in, even thought the title was nothing I was interested in.
preachinshawn 1 year ago
@preachinshawn
That is good to hear, thank you very much for the comment.
ancienthebreworg 1 year ago
this is great stuff Jeff, keep up the videos
Yirmeyahu23 1 year ago
@Yirmeyahu23
Thanks, I appreciate that and I will :-)
ancienthebreworg 1 year ago
Comment removed
canadianbacon007 1 year ago 2
The terms left and right are derived from the fact that some 90% of the population use the hand of the same side of their body for writing and other manual tasks. Through cognate of the word right in the meaning correct or good, the side with the hand most used was defined as the right side. The word left comes from the Old English lyft, meaning weak.
dunklaw 1 year ago
"Now the serpent was more subtil than any beast of the field which the LORD God had made And he said unto the woman Yea hath God said Ye shall not eat of every tree of the garden"
Would the introduction of the serpent in the garden of Eden, be considered a beginning of abstract terms in the psyche of Adam, (humanity) and Eve?
Sort of like the Mona Lisa smile.
canadianbacon007 1 year ago
Some of what we call abstract is derived from a word from one culture crossing over to another without it original understanding - Form Germany:- * north (Proto-Germanic *norþ-) from a root *ner- "left, below", i.e. "to the left of the rising Sun". * east (*aus-to-) from the word for dawn, see Ēostre. * south (*sunþ-) is root-cognate to Sun itself, thus "the region of the Sun" * west (*wes-t-) from a word for "evening", root-cognate to Latin vesper.
dunklaw 1 year ago
@dunklaw
Excellent point, while they may be abstract words to us today, at one time they had a very concrete meaning. Thanks Duncan.
ancienthebreworg 1 year ago
@ancienthebreworg Just watched the Dan Everret video. These people seem totally insular and self sufficient. Do you think that the introduction of trade & especially the act of writing events down changes the language and it meanings?
Also as the language evolves through osmosis and/or environmental change referring back to the written history would quickly develop a larger concept of time - past and future?
dunklaw 1 year ago
hey, where did you get the video of that one linguist? that sounds interesting
Mencel89 1 year ago
@Mencel89
Actually it is a very fascinating Lecture. The entire lecture is about 1.5 hours long and he explains that he was a missionary Bible Translator, but all that changed when he learned the langauge and culture. You can find it by going to Google Videos and type in Dan Everret.
ancienthebreworg 1 year ago
Do you think that a major part of the concrete construction of the language is because is primary function was in trading transactions and business in general?
dunklaw 1 year ago
@dunklaw
No, I don't think so, I believe it is the natural way we think. Abstracts have to be learned. If you give a child a piece of paper and crayons, you'll always get a picture of something concrete. It is not until we are adults that we learn to think abstractly and create abstract paintings like the one I used as an example in the video.
ancienthebreworg 1 year ago
I do not think that the archaeological evidence shows that to be the case. The majority of texts (about 80%) from Mesopotamian, Phonetician, Ugarit, Ebla, Indus valley, Mycenaean etc. etc. are trade documents. Even including fixed exchange rates such as - a fixed amount of gold for a fixed amount of wheat. The drive for a relatively short hand written language seems to be trade & free flow of information. The real question is HOW LONG does it take to learn abstracts? (cont.)
dunklaw 1 year ago
(cont.) the biblical text spans over 1000 years and during that time there is proven and considerable contact between Canaanite speaking races and pre-Greek writing traders - 800 BC onwards & there is evidence to show that the abstract ideas of these people was fairly well developed quite early in to this cultural overlap.
dunklaw 1 year ago
Hey BAR had an article on early Hebrew in the newest issue. It was excellent. I will e-mail it to you.
wayman29 1 year ago
@wayman29
Yes, please do, thanks wayman.
ancienthebreworg 1 year ago