Essays and Reflections

This, the first of two volumes of translations by the celebrated Japanese philosopher Nishitani Keiji, contains a collection of 17 essays on general Buddhist thought and Zen, and reflections on the modern world, rounded off by 7 records of interviews and personal reminiscences. Together they give us a portrait of the opening of Japanese philosophy to the wider world and a challenge to its customarily Eurocentric inclinations. The range of Nishitani’s knowledge of Buddhism, Christianity, and the intellectual history of thought from the ancient world down to the present is both astonishing and illuminating.