The name comes from the books Aristotle’s editors placed “after the physics”, which treat first philosophy. Metaphysics asks what is ultimately real and how the many arise from the one. The Indian darśanas, Neoplatonism, Islamic falsafa and Neo-Confucian li-qi thought are metaphysical systems, often joined to a path of practice.
Metaphysics
The study of the ultimate nature of reality: being, cause, mind, time and the first principle.