The Most Famous
PHILOSOPHERS from Pakistan
This page contains a list of the greatest Pakistani Philosophers. The pantheon dataset contains 1,267 Philosophers, 3 of which were born in Pakistan. This makes Pakistan the birth place of the 45th most number of Philosophers behind Bulgaria, and Afghanistan.
Top 3
The following people are considered by Pantheon to be the most legendary Pakistani Philosophers of all time. This list of famous Pakistani Philosophers is sorted by HPI (Historical Popularity Index), a metric that aggregates information on a biography’s online popularity.
1. Chanakya (-375 - -283)
With an HPI of 76.78, Chanakya is the most famous Pakistani Philosopher. His biography has been translated into 115 different languages on wikipedia.
According to legendary narratives, preserved in various traditions dating from the 4th to 11th century CE, Chanakya (ISO: Cāṇakya, ) was a Brahmin who assisted the first Mauryan emperor Chandragupta in his rise to power and the establishment of the Maurya Empire. According to these narratives, Chanakya served as the chief advisor and Prime Minister of the both emperors Chandragupta Maurya and his son Bindusara. Chanakya was traditionally identified with Kauṭilya, the author of the ancient Indian political treatise, the Arthashastra. The Arthashastra is now thought with high probability to have been composed by multiple authors during the early centuries of the common era—several centuries after the Mauryan period—the backdated identification with Chanakya to have served to add prestige to the work.
2. Asanga (300 - 301)
With an HPI of 68.84, Asanga is the 2nd most famous Pakistani Philosopher. His biography has been translated into 32 different languages.
Asaṅga (Sanskrit: असंग, Tibetan: ཐོགས་མེད།, Wylie: thogs med, traditional Chinese: 無著; ; pinyin: Wúzhuó; Romaji: Mujaku) (fl. 4th century C.E.) was one of the most important spiritual figures of Mahayana Buddhism and the founder of the Yogachara school. Traditionally, he and his half-brother Vasubandhu are regarded as the major classical Indian Sanskrit exponents of Mahayana Abhidharma, Vijñanavada (awareness only; also called Vijñaptivāda, the doctrine of ideas or percepts, and Vijñaptimātratā-vāda, the doctrine of 'mere representation) thought and Mahayana teachings on the bodhisattva path. He is also traditionally considered as one of the seventeen Nalanda masters who taught at the monastery which is located in modern-day Bihar.
3. Fazlur Rahman Malik (1919 - 1988)
With an HPI of 58.35, Fazlur Rahman Malik is the 3rd most famous Pakistani Philosopher. His biography has been translated into 15 different languages.
Fazlur Rahman Malik ( FAHZ-luhr-RAH-mahn-MAL-ik; Urdu: فضل الرحمان ملک; September 21, 1919 – July 26, 1988), commonly known as Fazlur Rahman, was a modernist scholar and Islamic philosopher from present-day Pakistan. Recognized as a leading liberal reformer within Islam, he focused on educational reform and promoting independent reasoning (ijtihad). His work has attracted both significant interest and criticism in Muslim-majority countries. His reformist ideas led to protests by over a thousand clerics, faqihs, muftis, and teachers in Pakistan, ultimately resulting in his exile. After teaching in the UK and in Canada, where he formed a close friendship with philosopher Ismail al-Faruqi, Fazlur Rahman was appointed head of Pakistan’s Central Institute of Islamic Research in 1963. While widely respected among Islamic reformers, his ideas drew strong criticism from conservative scholars who viewed his approach as excessively liberal. Political opponents of his ally, General Ayub Khan, capitalized on this dissent, ultimately leading to Fazlur Rahman’s departure from Pakistan in 1968. He relocated to the United States, where he taught at the University of California, Los Angeles and later at the University of Chicago.
People
Pantheon has 3 people classified as Pakistani philosophers born between 375 BC and 1919. Of these 3, none of them are still alive today. The most famous deceased Pakistani philosophers include Chanakya, Asanga, and Fazlur Rahman Malik. As of April 2024, 1 new Pakistani philosophers have been added to Pantheon including Fazlur Rahman Malik.
