Last Writings: Nothingness and the Religious Worldview

by Kitarō Nishida

Nishida Kitarô, Japan's premier modern philosopher, was born in 1870 and grew to intellectual maturity in the final decades of the Meiji period (1868–1912). He achieved recognition as Japan's leading establishment philosopher during his tenure as professor of philosophy at Kyoto University. After his retirement in 1927, and until his death in 1945, Nishida published a continuous stream of original essays that can best be described as intercivilizational, a meeting point of East and West.

His final essay, "The Logic of the Place of Nothingness and the Religious Worldview," completed in the last few months before his death, is a summation of his philosophy of religion and has come to be regarded as the foundational text of the Kyoto school. It is one of the few places in his writings where Nishida draws openly and freely on East Asian Buddhist sources as analogs of his own ideas.

Here Nishida argues for the existential primordiality of the religious consciousness against Kant, while also critically engaging the thought of such authors as Aristotle, the Christian Neo-Platonists, Spinoza, Fichte, Hegel, Barth, and Tillich. He makes it clear that he is also indebted to Pascal, Kierkegaard, and Dostoievsky as well as to Nâgârjuna, the Ch'an masters, Shinran, Dôgen, and other Buddhist thinkers. This book--a translation of the most seminal work of Nishida's career--also includes a translation of his "Last Writing" (Zeppitsu), written just two days before his death.

Genres: Philosophy, Religion, Buddhism, Theology, Japan, Zen, Japanese Literature

176 pages, Paperback

First published June 1, 1993

Reviews

[Floris Meertens]

Als iemand me dit zou kunnen uitleggen zou ik erg blij zijn, want het klinkt briljant maar ik durf niet te zeggen dat ik ook maar 5% van heb begrepen.

[Esther · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a very hard one to rate. It is, on the one hand, one of the most fascinating and provocative studies of religious metaphysics I have ever encounter and draws from so many disparate sources that it could almost be considered a Summa on the subject. And yet the edge of Nishida’s conclusions are dulled by his repeating them ad nauseum along with the same few quotes. Brilliant yet bloated, even for an essay this comparatively brief. The introduction and afterword are first rate though, and were invaluable to my comprehension of Nishida’s text.

[Sarsha Geo · Rating 5 out of 5]

I majored in Nishida Philosophy in University.Because I wanted to know about Japanese identity.
I seeked for the philosophy,for Japanese by Japanese.I found his pholosophy and also his students were really excellent.They wrote many books and they are so excellent.

[Sreena · Rating 4 out of 5]

Embrace the infinite possibilities that lie within the realm of nothingness.

Best Part Of The Book
Nishida's ability to seamlessly blend Eastern and Western philosophies. He effortlessly draws from Zen Buddhism, Daoism, and the works of Western philosophers such as Martin Heidegger, creating a harmonious bridge between different intellectual traditions. In doing so, Nishida invites us to transcend cultural boundaries and embrace a holistic understanding of the human experience.

"When we face nothingness, we come face to face with our own essence."

A profound statement encapsulates Nishida's exploration of nothingness as a gateway to self-discovery and transcendence. It reminds us that by embracing the void, we can strip away the layers of societal conditioning and connect with the fundamental truths that lie within us.

[Michael M · Rating 5 out of 5]

I did not read the parts that were not written by Nishida.

The essay in this book, "Nothingness and the Religious Worldview," is nothing short of a masterpiece. It is exactly what the West is missing today in its understanding of God and ultimately, reality. The translation is easy to follow (for those of a philosophical bent), however, I do have an understanding of Japanese so some interesting sentence structure was simple for me to understand.

Read this if you are working on any concept of a metaphysic of non-being and have Christian / Buddhist influences.

[Finlay · Rating 2 out of 5]

2.4 - Incredibly historically important piece, represents the foundation of Japanese philosophy as we know it now. Yet the writing style felt akin to kant or nietzche in that concepts were unnecessarily convoluted. It was also raw and unrefined, useful to understand the thought process of Nishida himself, but difficult to read as a philosophical framework.