ABSTRACT

This chapter indicates key elements of China's intellectual heritage in order to provide some understanding of the characteristic qualities of the concepts. It examines how the interplay and transformation of dominant orientations and countertendencies operated in the case of the introduction of Buddhism to China and its ultimate sinicization. The chapter argues that one of the differences between the Chinese philosophical tradition and other traditions is difference in the types of questions they are concerned with. It has been shown in the chapter that not only language, but also social structure and even geography contribute in different ways to the distinctive nature of the Chinese intellectual heritage. The chapter outlines the geographic, social structural and linguistic context of the Chinese intellectual heritage. The Chinese intellectual heritage projects an image of the world that is also a self-image of that heritage, of order in chaos and persistence in continuing transformation.