I'm embarrassed to admit that I didn't really know the answer to this one -- something I, for one, ought to know. My guess (which was not correct) was that Zoroaster was way early, Gautama was in the middle and Confuscius was fairly recent. I'll give this much away: first it's a trick question and, after a week's time, I'll tell you why. The other thing I'll say is that this question is much harder than I thought originally. All three of these religious leaders lived about the same time.
Karl Jaspers came up with the term, "the Axial Age" for the time from between 600 to 500 BCE. During that time in an almost mystical way, great thinkers simultaneous arose all across the globe, without much knowledge of each other. In Greece, it was the pre-socratics (Heraclitus and Pythagoras), in Palestine it was the Hebrew prophets (Elijah, Isaiah, Jeremiah), in Persia Zoroaster, in India Siddhartha Gautama and in China it was Lao Tzu & Confucius. The axial age marked the beginning of universal thought as opposed to tribal thought.
"What is new about this age, in all...[affected] areas of the world," wrote Jaspers, "is that man becomes conscious of Being as a whole, of himself and his limitations." He says further: "Measured against the lucid humanity of the Axial Period, a strange veil seems to lie over the most ancient cultures preceding it, as though man had not yet really come to himself."
That is the problem with history--it keeps changing.
These questions were developed pre-internet and I'm sorry I did no more research since then. (Spoiler alert)Your answers coincide with the 'traditional' dates which is what I used, so 'traditionally' you win. I await your always informative explanations. I assume they will relate to Gautama, who's life is (again) stirring discussion.
Here's why this was a trick question. Nobody really knows when Zoroaster was born. According to the World Book Encyclopedia:
Estimates for the lifetime of Zoroaster vary widely, depending upon the sources used:
1400 B.C.E. to 1000 B.C.E., which represents the current scholarly consensus, is cited by Mary Boyce in her A History of Zoroastrianism (1989). "Before 458 B.C.E." is cited by H.S. Nyberg (1889-1974) in Die Religionen des Alten Iran (1938). The Bundahishn ("Creation"), an important Zoroastrian religious text, cites the time of Zoroaster as 258 years before Alexander the Great's invasion of Persia (i.e., 588 B.C.E.). This "Traditional Date of Zoroaster" was accepted by many scholars, among them S.H. Taghizadeh (1878-1970) and W.B. Henning (1908-1967). Although other scholars such as James Darmesteter (1849-1894), who placed Zoroaster around 100 B.C.E., have argued for later dates, these theories are now widely rejected.
So, while probably Zoroaster was first, "Before 458 B.C.E." could put him last.
4 comments:
I'm embarrassed to admit that I didn't really know the answer to this one -- something I, for one, ought to know. My guess (which was not correct) was that Zoroaster was way early, Gautama was in the middle and Confuscius was fairly recent. I'll give this much away: first it's a trick question and, after a week's time, I'll tell you why. The other thing I'll say is that this question is much harder than I thought originally. All three of these religious leaders lived about the same time.
Karl Jaspers came up with the term, "the Axial Age" for the time from between 600 to 500 BCE. During that time in an almost mystical way, great thinkers simultaneous arose all across the globe, without much knowledge of each other. In Greece, it was the pre-socratics (Heraclitus and Pythagoras), in Palestine it was the Hebrew prophets (Elijah, Isaiah, Jeremiah), in Persia Zoroaster, in India Siddhartha Gautama and in China it was Lao Tzu & Confucius. The axial age marked the beginning of universal thought as opposed to tribal thought.
"What is new about this age, in all...[affected] areas of the world," wrote Jaspers, "is that man becomes conscious of Being as a whole, of himself and his limitations." He says further: "Measured against the lucid humanity of the Axial Period, a strange veil seems to lie over the most ancient cultures preceding it, as though man had not yet really come to himself."
That is the problem with history--it keeps changing.
These questions were developed pre-internet and I'm sorry I did no more research since then. (Spoiler alert)Your answers coincide with the 'traditional' dates which is what I used, so 'traditionally' you win. I await your always informative explanations. I assume they will relate to Gautama, who's life is (again) stirring discussion.
Answer (from earliest to latest)
1. (b) Zoroaster 660 B.C.E. (traditional), recently estimated between the 18th and 10th centuries B.C.E.
2. (a) Buddha 563 B.C.E. (traditional), recently perhaps 80 years later.
3. (c) Confucius 551 B.C.E. (traditional)
Here's why this was a trick question. Nobody really knows when Zoroaster was born. According to the World Book Encyclopedia:
Estimates for the lifetime of Zoroaster vary widely, depending upon the sources used:
1400 B.C.E. to 1000 B.C.E., which represents the current scholarly consensus, is cited by Mary Boyce in her A History of Zoroastrianism (1989).
"Before 458 B.C.E." is cited by H.S. Nyberg (1889-1974) in Die Religionen des Alten Iran (1938).
The Bundahishn ("Creation"), an important Zoroastrian religious text, cites the time of Zoroaster as 258 years before Alexander the Great's invasion of Persia (i.e., 588 B.C.E.). This "Traditional Date of Zoroaster" was accepted by many scholars, among them S.H. Taghizadeh (1878-1970) and W.B. Henning (1908-1967).
Although other scholars such as James Darmesteter (1849-1894), who placed Zoroaster around 100 B.C.E., have argued for later dates, these theories are now widely rejected.
So, while probably Zoroaster was first, "Before 458 B.C.E." could put him last.
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