was a Japanese philosopher. He was a scholar of the Kyoto School and a disciple of Kitarō Nishida. In 1924, Nishitani received his doctorate from Kyoto Imperial University for his dissertation "Das Ideale und das Reale bei Schelling und Bergson". He studied under Martin Heidegger in Freiburg from 1937 to 1939.
Biography
Nishitani was born 1900 in a small town in the Ishikawa prefecture. He was fourteen years old when his father died of tuberculosis, a disease he suffered from too as a child. In comparison to their work, that tended to be more abstract, Nishitani included his own experiences with Zen Buddhism in his work. Another point of distinction is that he did not just use the language of Western philosophy to better articulate his thoughts; he criticised Western ideas from a Buddhist perspective.
After his graduation in 1924 he taught philosophy at local highschools for eight years and assumed a lectureship in the Ôtani University until 1935. In that time he was interested in Schelling and composed a number of works about him and translated two works of Schelling into Japanese.
Nishitani held the principal Chair of Philosophy and Religion at Kyoto University from 1943 until becoming emeritus in 1964. He then taught philosophy and religion at Ōtani University. At various times Nishitani was a visiting professor in the United States and Europe. His themes of teaching did not differ in the philosophy and religion department, because in Japanese thought these are not easily distinguishable. As years passed he focused more and more on Buddhist themes and rather used Western ideas to elucidate them.
In the years after the Second World War Nishitani's interest with the topic of nihilism coincided with a resurgence of concern in Europe with the very same topic. In 1949 Nishitani discussed the topic of nihilism in a small group and shortly after composed more and more writings about the topic resulting in his book nihirizumu.
According to James Heisig, after being banned from holding any public position by the United States occupation authorities in July 1946, Nishitani refrained from drawing "practical social conscience into philosophical and religious ideas, preferring to think about the insight of the individual rather than the reform of the social order."
In James Heisig's Philosophers of Nothingness Nishitani is quoted as saying "The fundamental problem of my life ... has always been, to put it simply, the overcoming of nihilism through nihilism."
Thought
On Heisig's reading, Nishitani's philosophy had a distinctive religious and subjective bent, drawing Nishitani close to existentialists and mystics, most notably Søren Kierkegaard and Meister Eckhart, rather than to the scholars and theologians who aimed at systematic elaborations of thought. Heisig further argues that Nishitani, "the stylistic superior of Nishida," brought Zen poetry, religion, literature, and philosophy organically together in his work to help lay the difficult foundations for a breaking free of the Japanese language, in a similar way to Blaise Pascal or Friedrich Nietzsche. In the essay "Philosophy in Contemporary Japan" (1967) he writes: <blockquote>We Japanese have fallen heir to two completely different cultures [...].This is a great priviledge that Westeners do not share in [...] but at the same time it puts a heavy responsibility on our shoulders: to lay the foundations of thought for a world in the making, for a new world united beyond differences of East and West. This logic inspires the inherent logic of the Western world that unfolds into the modern scientific view. Thus creating an underlying nihility which causes a spiritual void. Especially, in the works of Nietzsche, Heidegger and Sartre this philosophy of nihility becomes apparent. In Nishitani's view, it becomes impossible for the Western world to create meaning from their dualistic and Christian foundations.
He also criticised Descartes' philosophy that the self and things remain separate. This idea is portrayed in Descartes' res cogitans (consciousness), i.e. the self, and res extensa (extended matter), the things around the self, that are differentiated. The res cogitans is taken as the ultimate reality that cannot be doubted, while the res extensa remains without true connection to the res cogitans. This lays the foundation for the natural sciences that treat the world as a lifeless mechanism, material to be used for the self. He sees machinery as the ultimate appropriation of the laws of nature by people and the assertion of a distinguished self.
Field of consciousness
In this field things are experienced within a consciousness that poses oneself as the subjects and other things as objects. Nishitani states that in this field we are unable to encounter things in themselves, in their own mode of being. Moreover, we cannot just get into touch with objects but also ourselves. This is because this field is separated from things, one's emotions, thoughts and desires. People usually stay within this field distracting themselves from the nihility in life distracting themselves in everyday things. The nihility is confronted again when boredom and the meaninglessness of existence rise up again.
Field of nihility
In the field of nihility the existence of all things, including the self, are turned into a great question mark. One encounters the "Great Doubt" through the annihilation of the ego. This concept is similar to the "Great Death" in Zen Buddhism, that heralds the death of the illusion of the self. Within this transformation the world becomes entrenched with the death, because one realises that everything is impermanent. Nishitani connects this to Heidegger's concept of "being-towards-death"–the encounter with death that most profoundly highlights the question of Being. In this field the relation of life and death becomes clear, it is "death-as-life" and "life-as-death", so Nishitani states:<blockquote>I shall not say that one should love death; but one should love life with such magnimity, and without calculating exceptions, that one involuntarily always includes death (as the averted half of life) and loves it along with life...it is thinkable that death stands infinitely nearer to us that life itself.</blockquote>Furthermore, Nishitani characterises the Field of Nihility as a field where everything is cut off from everything else, "[...] the self-enclosure of things is absolute. All things that are scatter apart from one another endlessly."
Field of emptiness
The field of nihility is necessary to transition to the field of emptiness, because nihility is needed in order to convert to a perception of reality grounded on śūnyatā, the Buddhist concept of emptiness. This nihility then has to be radically questioned. The emptiness of nihility is then emptied itself, resulting in an 'absolute emptiness.'</blockquote>Our encounter with things then becomes genuine as we see them for what they truly are without a projection of our consciousness. We are encountering the perspective of the other. Another doctrine of Buddhism, dependent arising, is actualised within perception too. One sees all phenomena as a web of circuminsessional interpretation that links all things together.
The field of emptiness is best achieved by eliminating our ignorance and practising meditation. This is inspired by Dōgen's Zazen practice and his idea of "body-and-mind dropping off." Moreover, a type of thinking of the existential kind can support the transition into the Field of Emptiness. This type of thinking is encouraged by Zen/Chan Kōans. With this type of practice the self has a free access to reality that enables true joy with every interaction. The thinking is no longer under the control of a self, but by the things on encounters as they pass by the Field of Emptiness, "[...] the place where things are on their own home-ground, just as they are, manifest their own suchness."
Meister Eckhart
Nishitani criticises Christianity for the chasm existing between God and his creation, that comes from the dualistic world view of Christianity. However, his belief shares similarities with Meister Eckhhart's conception of God. He defines God as a godhead which is unknowable, and interpenetrates the deepest human essence while it is interpenetrated by the human essence as well. God is therefore transcendently immanent in his creation. This abandonment of any distinction between immanence and transcendence, and God and his creation is very similar to Nishitani's conception of Śūnyatā (Emptiness), that is totally non-dualistic. Meister Eckhart also used the term "absolute nothingness" for the godhead.
In works such as Religion and Nothingness, Nishitani focuses on the Buddhist term Śūnyatā (Emptiness/Nothingness) and its relation to Western nihilism. To contrast with the Western idea of nihility as the absence of meaning Nishitani's Śūnyatā relates to the acceptance of Anātman (No-Self), one of the three Right Understandings in the Noble Eightfold Path and the rejection of the ego in order to recognize the Pratītyasamutpāda, to be one with everything. Stating: "All things that are in the world are linked together, one way or the other. Not a single thing comes into being without some relationship to every other thing." Furthermore, he elaborates that Śūnyatā takes place in double negation, the first negation happening through nihility that needs to be negated again to achieve a "transcendence-through-negation-of-all-being."