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Axial Age

The Axial Age, spanning from 800 to 200 BCE, was a period marked by the emergence of significant philosophical and religious ideas across various cultures, including Confucianism in China, Buddhism and Jainism in India, and Jewish monotheism. This era also saw the rise of Greek philosophy with figures like Plato and Aristotle, as well as the establishment of democracy in Athens. The ideas from this period have profoundly influenced subsequent intellectual and religious developments throughout history.

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59 views1 page

Axial Age

The Axial Age, spanning from 800 to 200 BCE, was a period marked by the emergence of significant philosophical and religious ideas across various cultures, including Confucianism in China, Buddhism and Jainism in India, and Jewish monotheism. This era also saw the rise of Greek philosophy with figures like Plato and Aristotle, as well as the establishment of democracy in Athens. The ideas from this period have profoundly influenced subsequent intellectual and religious developments throughout history.

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Axial Age

Main article: Axial Age

Standing Buddha from Gandhara, 2nd century CE


From 800 to 200 BCE,[118] the Axial Age saw the emergence of transformative
philosophical and religious ideas that developed in many different places mostly
independently of each other.[119] Chinese Confucianism,
[120]
Indian Buddhism and Jainism,[121] and Jewish monotheism all arose during this
period.[122] Persian Zoroastrianism began earlier, perhaps around 1000 BCE, but was
institutionalized by the Achaemenid Empire during the Axial Age.[123] New
philosophies took hold in Greece during the 5th century BCE, epitomized by thinkers
such as Plato and Aristotle.[124] The first Olympic Games were held in 776 BCE, marking
a period known as "classical antiquity".[125] In 508 BCE, the world's first democratic
system of government was instituted in Athens.[126]
Axial Age ideas shaped subsequent intellectual and religious history. Confucianism was
one of the three schools of thought that came to dominate Chinese thinking, along
with Taoism and Legalism.[127] The Confucian tradition, which would become
particularly influential, looked for political morality not to the force of law but to the
power and example of tradition.[128] Confucianism would later spread to Korea and
Japan.[129] Buddhism reached China in about the 1st century CE[130] and spread widely,
with 30,000 Buddhist temples in northern China alone by the 7th century CE.
[131]
Buddhism became the main religion in much of South, Southeast, and East Asia.
[132]
The Greek philosophical tradition[133] diffused throughout the Mediterranean world
and as far as India, starting in the 4th century BCE after the conquests of Alexander
the Great of Macedon.[134] Both Christianity and Islam developed from the beliefs
of Judaism.[135]

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