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Buddhism
The Buddha is said to have questioned all concepts of metaphysical being and non-being, and this critique is seen as a fundamental aspect of the Buddha's approach.[2] Particular points of Buddhist philosophy have often been the subject of disputes between different schools of Buddhism. While theory for its own sake is not valued in Buddhism, theory pursued in the interest of enlightenment is consistent with Buddhist values and ethics. Buddhism as a whole may be seen either as a practical philosophy or as a religion, depending on the senses one assumes for the terms "philosophy" and "religion". In the South and East Asian cultures in which Buddhism achieved most of its development, the distinction between philosophy and religion is somewhat unclear and possibly quite spurious, so this may be a semantic problem arising in the West alone. It is "practical" in that it has specific methods of application of various sets of philosophical principles. Proponents of such a view may argue that (a) Buddhism is non-theistic (i.e., it has no special use for the existence or non-existence of a god or gods (see non-theism or atheistic)) and (b) religions necessarily involve some form of theism. Others might contest either part of such an argument. Other arguments for Buddhism "as" philosophy may claim that Buddhism does not have doctrines in the same sense as other religions. A third perspective might take the position that Buddhism can be practiced either as a religion or as a philosophy. A similar distinction is often made with reference to Taoism. Lama Anagorika Govinda expressed it as follows in A Living Buddhism for the West
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