Pietersen's categorisation of the paradigmatic individuals
I am not going to be able to read Jaspers' book soon, because I will not be able to get to any library soon for that purpose. However, Herman Pietersen's article in the previous entry is at least a place to start.
Pietersen starts by noting the major reason for Jaspers' choice of this particular group of four people:
He then goes on to state that he has his own reason for singling out these four people:
In this respect, I am very intrigued by his characterisation of the four paradigmatic individuals because of its elegance. He delineates each type of understanding according to three binary properties: Worldliness/Other-worldliness, Immanence/Transcendence and Rationalism/Subjectivism. A worldly individual is interested in salvation in this world, while an other-worldly individual is interested in salvation in the next world. An immanent individual looks for salvation from within herself, while a transcendent individual looks for salvation outside herself. A rationalist individual looks for salvation in reason, while a subjectivist individual looks for salvation in mysticism or some other arational source.
Two of the four individuals are worldy: Socrates and Confucius, because both are concerned with how humanity can improve its lot in the world. Two of the four are other-worldly: Buddha and Jesus, because both attempt to show humanity what it has to do to in order to get to the next world. Two are immanent: Socrates and Jesus, because both look to salvation from within, independent of one's external surroundings. Two are transcendent: Buddha and Confucius, because both look outside the self for salvation. Two are rationalist: Socrates and Buddha, because both look to enlightenment through conscious thought and reasoning for salvation. Two are subjectivist: Jesus and Confucius, because both focus on means to salvation that do not necessarily admit of rational justification.
It is already suspicious that this characterisation looks a little too perfect. It seems very convenient that Jaspers' four paradigmatic individuals should all admit of such regular divisions within themselves to delineate Pietersen's three binary states, two individuals to illustrate each state. I presume that a scholar of these individuals--which I am not!--would be able to blur the distinctions made here by Pietersen considerably. This, however, is only a minor caveat to his analysis.
What intrigues me more is the fact that these three states would logically admit of eight different paradigms. Yet only four are covered by Pietersen, because he is mapping Jaspers' four paradigmatic individuals onto specific permutations of those states. This leaves four hypothetical paradigms left to be analysed. Given the large number of other great and influential thinkers in history, it seems reasonable to suppose that we could map the remaining four paradigms onto four reasonably fitting individuals.
To begin with, let's map the different permutations of the three binary states. We'll also note which of Jaspers' paradigmatic individuals map onto which permutations:
This leaves us with four missing individuals:
Pietersen starts by noting the major reason for Jaspers' choice of this particular group of four people:
A more mundane, and partial explanation is that the book originally forms part of one of Jaspers voluminous works on philosophy and philosophers, and that his interest in the four men had a more proper philosophical goal, namely, to examine the nature and impact of their thought and actions from a comparative perspective, as a venture into philosophical anthropology.
He then goes on to state that he has his own reason for singling out these four people:
That is, namely, that these individuals can also be shown to be major exemplars of distinct (meta-paradigmatic) types of understanding in human history.
In this respect, I am very intrigued by his characterisation of the four paradigmatic individuals because of its elegance. He delineates each type of understanding according to three binary properties: Worldliness/Other-worldliness, Immanence/Transcendence and Rationalism/Subjectivism. A worldly individual is interested in salvation in this world, while an other-worldly individual is interested in salvation in the next world. An immanent individual looks for salvation from within herself, while a transcendent individual looks for salvation outside herself. A rationalist individual looks for salvation in reason, while a subjectivist individual looks for salvation in mysticism or some other arational source.
Two of the four individuals are worldy: Socrates and Confucius, because both are concerned with how humanity can improve its lot in the world. Two of the four are other-worldly: Buddha and Jesus, because both attempt to show humanity what it has to do to in order to get to the next world. Two are immanent: Socrates and Jesus, because both look to salvation from within, independent of one's external surroundings. Two are transcendent: Buddha and Confucius, because both look outside the self for salvation. Two are rationalist: Socrates and Buddha, because both look to enlightenment through conscious thought and reasoning for salvation. Two are subjectivist: Jesus and Confucius, because both focus on means to salvation that do not necessarily admit of rational justification.
It is already suspicious that this characterisation looks a little too perfect. It seems very convenient that Jaspers' four paradigmatic individuals should all admit of such regular divisions within themselves to delineate Pietersen's three binary states, two individuals to illustrate each state. I presume that a scholar of these individuals--which I am not!--would be able to blur the distinctions made here by Pietersen considerably. This, however, is only a minor caveat to his analysis.
What intrigues me more is the fact that these three states would logically admit of eight different paradigms. Yet only four are covered by Pietersen, because he is mapping Jaspers' four paradigmatic individuals onto specific permutations of those states. This leaves four hypothetical paradigms left to be analysed. Given the large number of other great and influential thinkers in history, it seems reasonable to suppose that we could map the remaining four paradigms onto four reasonably fitting individuals.
To begin with, let's map the different permutations of the three binary states. We'll also note which of Jaspers' paradigmatic individuals map onto which permutations:
| Worldly | Immanent | Rationalist | Individual |
| F | F | F | |
| F | F | T | Buddha |
| F | T | F | Jesus |
| F | T | T | |
| T | F | F | Confucius |
| T | F | T | |
| T | T | F | |
| T | T | T | Socrates |
This leaves us with four missing individuals:
- An other-worldly, transcendentalist subjectivist;
- An other-worldly, immanentalist rationalist;
- A worldly, transcendentalist rationalist; and
- A worldly, immanentalist subjectivist.
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