“Non- or de-mysticism involves a double negation, a release from the ego and then from God. God is let go of for the sake of nothing, that is, for an experience of absolute nothingness, which in turn returns us to a direct engagement in the here and now of everyday activity” (Bret W. Davis) Nishida: … Continue reading Non-Mysticism
“When the Scripture says, ‘Moses entered into the thick darkness where God was’, this shows to those capable of understanding, that God is invisible and beyond expression by words.”(Clement of Alexandria) “Jesus often withdrew in lonely places and prayed” Jesus himself is known to have practiced silent prayer and contemplation, as indicated in the synoptic … Continue reading Christian Apophatic Tradition
“Students, even if you gain enlightenment, do not stop practicing, thinking that you have attained the ultimate. The Buddha Way is endless. Once enlightened you must practice even more” (Dogen). A Zen Classic Whereas Nishida Kitaro, the founder of the Kyoto School, had focused on a reformulation of East Asia’s apprehension of reality as self-contradictory, … Continue reading The Elusive Ox
“Of particular concern to me in my Eckhart interpretation is the following: In the texts of the German sermons, I have identified two doctrines, the doctrine based on the motif of ‘birth’ where ‘God (the Father) gives birth to his single Son in the soul’, and the doctrine based on the motif of ‘breakthrough’ where … Continue reading Marburg Dissertation on Meister Eckhart
“Precisely in the midst of despair in the modern world, [an] unadulterated radical origin of philosophy as a practice of thinking while living and living while thinking can be revived … Nishida spoke of ‘digging down in between East and West’. Today it is necessary to dig down beneath the bottom of the homogenized world. … Continue reading The Kyoto School – A Call to Dig Down Deeper
“Ueda’s “lifework has taken place in a space opened by the overlapping of two kinds of “between” – between “religious existence (shukyo-teki jisuzon) and “philosophical thought” (tetsukaku-teki shidaku) on the one hand, and between the intellectual tradition of the West and the spiritual traditions of East Asia on the other (Bret W. Davis).” Bret Davis, … Continue reading Ueda Shizuteru (1926-2019)
