Nishitani Keiji

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Keiji Nishitani

Nishitani Keiji ( Japanese 西 谷 啓 治 ; * February 27, 1900 ; † November 24, 1990 ) was a Japanese philosopher . He is considered one of the most important philosophers in Japan in the 20th century.

Live and act

Nishitani Keiji was a student and successor of Nishida Kitarō , the founder of the Kyoto school .

In 1924 Nishitani received his doctorate on the ideal and the real under Schelling and Bergson . In the years 1937 to 1939 he stayed to study with Martin Heidegger in Freiburg im Breisgau and taught as a professor in Kyoto from 1943 .

Nishitani was a religious philosopher who combined experiences from the practice of Zen Buddhism with existentialism and with Martin Buber's anthropological approach. Thanks to his detailed knowledge of western and eastern philosophy, a parallel representation of nihilism and shunyata is possible , which can also be formulated in Christian theological language. His main work on the philosophy of religion, "Shūkyō-towa-nanika", has been published in German translation under the title "Was ist Religion?" (Frankfurt a. M. 1982). The German philosopher Heinrich Rombach judged in a review of the book: "This author's case is coherent and convincing. [...] It will probably be difficult to present a more authentic self-representation of the Asian idea, and also at the level of the highest speculation and the latest historical interpretation , to find."

Works

  • Nishitani Keiji chosakushū (Collected Works of Nishitani Keiji). Sōbunsha, Tokyo 1986-1995.
  • What is religion German translation authorized by the author by Dora Fischer-Barnicol. Insel-Verlag, Frankfurt am Main 1982.
  • Religion and Nothingness . The University of California Press, Berkeley 1982, ISBN 0-520-04946-2 .
  • The Self-Overcoming of Nihilism . State University of New York Press, Albany 1990
  • The Japanese Art of Arranged Flowers . Translated by Jeff Shore. In: Robert C. Solomon, Kathleen M. Higgins (Eds.): World Philosophy: A Text with Readings . McGraw Hill, New York 1995.

literature

  • Fred Dallmayr: Heidegger and Zen Buddhism: a Salute to Nishitani Keiji. In: The Other Heidegger. Cornell University Press, Ithaca / London 1993.
  • Bret W. Davis: Shûkyô kara seiji e, seiji kara shûkyô e: Nishitani Keiji no tenkai (From religion to politics, from politics to religion: Nishitani's turn). In Fujita. 2003.
  • Myriam-Sonja Hantke: Mysticism in German Idealism and in Japanese Philosophy: Schelling, Hegel, Nishitani . Verlag Traugott Bautz, Nordhausen 2009. ISBN 978-3-88309-468-7
  • Johannes Ernst Seiffert: Way of Existence: to K. Nishitani: "What is religion?" in view of the similarities and differences between Heidegger's way of thinking and Zen. AIGN-Verlag, Kassel 2010, ISBN 978-3-931343-26-2 .
  • Taitetsu Unno (Ed.): The Religious Philosophy of Nishitani Keiji. Asian Humanities Press, Berkeley 1989.

Web links

Single receipts

  1. ^ Letter from Hans A. Fischer-Barnicol to Martin Buber dated November 3, 1964, in: Martin Buber: Correspondence from seven decades. Volume III, Heidelberg 1975, pp. 623-626.
  2. ↑ Philosophisches Jahrbuch 91 (1984) 440.
Japanese name: As is common in Japan, the family name comes before the first name in this article . Thus Nishitani is the family name, Keiji the first name.
personal data
SURNAME Nishitani, Keiji
ALTERNATIVE NAMES 西 谷 啓 治 (Japanese)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Japanese philosopher
DATE OF BIRTH February 27, 1900
DATE OF DEATH November 24, 1990