Theodore Sicherbatskyt was born on October 1 [September 19, os.], 1866, at Kielce, Poland, where his father was then working. He died on March 18, 1942, at Borovoi in North Kazakhstan. His epitaph, translated into English, reads: "Не explained to his country the wisdom of the ancient Indian thinkers."
An epitaph is, of course, only an epitaph and it is not intended to be an exhaustive description of the total contribution of the person whose memory it cherishes. So are the words inscribed on Schabowski’s tomb, which are moreover chosen specially from the point of view of his countrymen. To the Indians, however, and particularly to those of our countrymen who want to make a serious study of our own philosophical tradition-the urge to say a great deal more about Stcherbatsky is almost irresistible. Their gratitude to him is immense. In an important sense, Stcherbatsky did help us the Indians to discover our own past and to restore the right perspective of our own philosophical heritage. Yet this was only one aspect of his grand contribution to Indology, though at the same time one cannot also help wondering how immensely the importance of this particular aspect of his contribution would have increased but for his personal fascination for the philosophy of Immanuel Kant and his consequent eagerness to read Kantian philosophy or the potentials thereof-in medieval Indian texts where these could not have historically belonged.
Thus for example, the greatest tribute Stcherbatsky could think of paying to Dharmakirti [c. 7th century A.D.), his favourite Indian philosopher, was to describe him as "the Indian Kant." Though eloquent was his personal admiration for both Dharmakirti and Kant, such a description has not even a figurative value for those for whom Kant is not the measure of philosophical greatness. Taken in its literal sense, on the other hand, it is likely to interfere with an objective under-standing of Dharmakirti's actual philosophical position in its concrete historical context. But more of this later.
Notwithstanding this, however, it is impossible to underestimate in any way the significance of Stcherbatsky's recognition-and even a passionate defence-of the stupendous importance of Dharmakirti or, more strictiy, of the epistemological and logical tradition associated with the names of Dharmakirti and his grand preceptor Dignaga (c. A.D. 500] in the development of Indian philosophical activity in its maturest phase. Perhaps in default of a more satisfactory description of it and also for the purpose of a convenient form of reference, Stcherbatsky called this the tradition of "Buddhist logic", though, rightly enough, without attaching any lop-sided religious significance to the word "Buddhist" in this particular context.
Our knowledge of "Buddhist logic" is inextricably connected with the work of Stcherbatsky and we could have called him its only discoverer but for the fact that when he was working on the subject, the Indian historian of Indian logic, S. C. Vidyabhusana, quite independently of Stcherbatsky but following the same line as followed by Stcherbatsky himself-worked as another pioneer worker on the subject.
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