Kazoh Kitamori

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Kazoh Kitamori北 森 嘉 蔵Kitamori Kazō (born January 2, 1916 in Kumamoto , † September 29, 1998 in Takasaki ) was a Japanese Protestant theologian and professor of the United Church of Christ in Japan .

Life

Kitamori grew up in a family that adhered to Jōdo Shinshū Buddhism. In his first year as a student at Kyoto University , Kitamori got into a life crisis. In 1934 he read a work by Shigehiko Satō on Luther's commentary on the Romans . He was then baptized in the Lutheran Church and immediately entered the Japan Lutheran Theological Seminary . At the Tokyo Union Theological Seminary he held the chair for systematic theology (dogmatics) from 1949 until his retirement in 1984.

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Kitamori's main work, "Theology of God's Pain" (神 の 痛 み の 神学Kami no itami no shingaku ), was written as early as 1946 and against the backdrop of the Second World War. It is considered Japanese theology of the cross and was translated into various Western languages ​​in the 1960s. Kitamori combines biblical impulses in the concept of the suffering God (for example Jer 31,20  LUT , Isa 63,15  LUT ) with the thought of tsurasa (tragedy, agony) from classical Japanese literature. He draws from an intensive knowledge of Japanese philosophy and Mahayana Buddhism . At Kyōto University he was influenced by the philosophy of Nishida Kitarōs . Kitamori also studied the work of Karl Barth , with whom he dealt critically.

Wilfried Joest characterizes Kitamori's design as a "very peculiarly formulated" theology of the cross, which, however, is close to the designs of Eberhard Jüngel and Jürgen Moltmann. Kitamori understand the cross as the acceptance of suffering by God on the basis of his love. “God must hate sin and cannot bear the sinner. But now it happens that God does not cease to love this person who cannot be loved. Then his anger turns into pain for the person, and love breaks out again from the pain. ”God suffers from the unacceptability of man and yet accepts him.

Publications

  • Theology of God's pain . Translated from Japanese by Tsuneaki Kato and Paul Schneiss. Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Göttingen 1972.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Hisakazu Inagaki, J. Nelson Jennings: Philosophical Theology and East-West Dialogue , Amsterdam / Atlanta 2000, p one hundred and first
  2. ^ A b J. Nelson Jennings: Theology in Japan . In: Mark Mullins (Ed.): Handbook of Christianity in Japan , Leiden / Boston 2003, pp. 181–204, here p. 196.
  3. ↑ Wilfried Joest: Dogmatics . Volume 1: The Reality of God 3rd edition, Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Göttingen 1989, p. 251 f.
personal data
SURNAME Kitamori, Kazoh
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Kitamori, Kazō
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Japanese Protestant theologian and university professor
DATE OF BIRTH January 2, 1916
PLACE OF BIRTH Kumamoto
DATE OF DEATH September 29, 1998
Place of death Takasaki