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I hope that you can help me...I'm really worried, because my teacher at school asked me to explain
about philosophy and religion, and I really don't know how to do it, or how to start to explain it.
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The trick here is to notexplain it... Let me explain. There is no 'outside' philosophy, some 'other'
vantage point which is non-philosophical from where philosophy can be observed neutrally, coolly,
accurately and explained. Your teacher needs to be informed of this. Any explanation of philosophy is
itself a philosophy. Is your teacher therefore expecting a fully thought-through philosophy from you?
Also, the question of the unity of philosophy, that it is one thing, is questionable. There is Jewish
philosophy, there is Christian philosophy, there is Anglo-American analytical and empirical philosophy
and there is Continental philosophy. The question to our teacher is, therefore, which philosophy?
Basically, though, philosophy is about a community of the question as I see it. The question of what,
you may ask. Exactly, I reply, the question of what?
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As for religion... Behind religion are philosophical questions like, Where do we come from? Where are
we headed? How shall we live? Why such evil? Why such disaster and mayhem? How can I live
more, fully, absolutely? One can say things about religion in terms of which of these questions it is
answering, and in what way. Persons who exemplify it often start religion and it cannot survive unless
it continues to be exemplified in the person of the practitioner.
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