Enough with Polemics! Against Polemical Reductionism

Abstract

This article engages in a critical reflection on the concept of polemics, questioning its dominance as an interpretative category in the fields of Buddhist, Tibetan, and religious studies more broadly. It argues that we ought to rehabilitate the concept of argument or debate as a central presupposition of the philosophical approach and that interpretations are impeded by reducing all critical engagement of others’ ideas and texts to polemical intents. The article proceeds with a theoretical part intended to motivate a distinction between polemics and debate or an antagonistic and an agonistic practice of engagement with others, and a practical application of the distinction. The theoretical development proposes both a conceptual distinction between these two practices, illustrated historically by different texts from Western and South Asian literatures, and a genealogical interpretation of the polemical reductionism that relates a certain social science approach to the treatment of truth and power as found in the works of Michel Foucault. The next part takes the specific example of the debate between two Tibetan authors, Mi pham (1846–1912) and Brag dkar sprul sku (1866–1928), to show the interpretative gain made by maintaining this distinction. In conclusion, the article offers a further argument for maintaining this distinction from the disciplinary point of view according to which the overuse of the category of polemics has potentially reduced the philosophical appeal of Buddhist and Tibetan texts to a wider audience of philosophers.