Wilhelm Halbfass (11 May 1940, in

Northeim Northeim (; nds, Nuurten) is a town in Lower Saxony, Germany, seat of the district of Northeim, with, in 2011, a population of 29,000. It lies on the German Half-Timbered House Road. History Northeim is first mentioned in 800 in a document ...

– 25 May 2000) was a

German German(s) may refer to: * Germany (of or related to) ** Germania (historical use) * Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language ** For citizens of Germany, see also German nationality law **Ge ...

-born

Indologist Indology, also known as South Asian studies, is the academic study of the history and cultures, languages, and literature of the Indian subcontinent, and as such is a subset of Asian studies. The term ''Indology'' (in German, ''Indologie'') is ...

and philosopher.

Life

Wilhelm Halbfass studied Philosophy,

Indology Indology, also known as South Asian studies, is the academic study of the history and cultures, languages, and literature of the Indian subcontinent, and as such is a subset of Asian studies. The term ''Indology'' (in German, ''Indologie'') is ...

and

Classical Philology Classics or classical studies is the study of classical antiquity. In the Western world, classics traditionally refers to the study of Classical Greek and Roman literature and their related original languages, Ancient Greek and Latin. Classics ...

at the Universities of Vienna and Göttingen and successfully defended his doctoral thesis on Indian Philosophy at

Göttingen University Göttingen (, , ; nds, Chöttingen) is a university city in Lower Saxony, central Germany, the capital of the eponymous district. The River Leine runs through it. At the end of 2019, the population was 118,911. General information The o ...

in 1967. He was a professor in the departments of Asian and Middle Eastern Studies and South Asia Regional Studies at the

University of Pennsylvania The University of Pennsylvania (also known as Penn or UPenn) is a private research university in Philadelphia. It is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and is ranked among the highest-regarded universitie ...

from 1982 until his death in 2000. Along with Prof.

Ludo Rocher Ludo Rocher (1926–2016) was an eminent Sanskrit scholar, and the W. Norman Brown Professor Emeritus of South Asia Studies at the University of Pennsylvania. Biography Ludo Rocher was born in Hemiksem in the province of Antwerp, Belgium on 25 Apri ...

, Prof. Ernest Bender, Prof.

George Cardona George Cardona (; born June 3, 1936) is an American linguist, Indologist, Sanskritist, and scholar of Pāṇini. Described as "a luminary" in Indo-European, Indo-Aryan, and Pāṇinian linguistics since the early sixties, Cardona has been recogni ...

, and several other Sanskritists, he made the

the center of Sanskrit learning in North America.

Works

His works include ''Indien und Europa, Perspektiven ihrer geistigen Begegnung'' (1981), English translation ''India and Europe: An Essay in Understanding'' (1988). It is a comprehensive survey of the intellectual encounters between India and Europe from antiquity to the present day. He explores these encounters in terms of what he calls

xenology Astrobiology, and the related field of exobiology, is an interdisciplinary scientific field that studies the origins, early evolution, distribution, and future of life in the universe. Astrobiology is the multidisciplinary field that investig ...

, the various ways in which self and otherness are defined "within a historically complex collision of cultures".Harvey P. Alper, review of ''Indien und Europa, Perspektiven ihrer geistigen Begegnung'', in ''Philosophy East and West'', Vol. 33, No. 2 (April, 1983), pp. 189-196

References

German Indologists 1940 births 2000 deaths University of Pennsylvania faculty German male non-fiction writers Neo-Vedanta {{Germany-academic-bio-stub