Tetsuro Watsuji
Encyclopedia
Tetsuro Watsuji (March 1, 1889–December 26, 1960) was a Japan
ese moral philosopher
, cultural historian
, and intellectual historian
.
, Hyōgo Prefecture
to a physician. During his youth he enjoyed poetry and had a passion for Western literature
. For a short time he was the coeditor of a literary magazine and was involved in writing poems and plays. His interests in Philosophy came to light while he was a student at First Higher School in Tokyo, although his interest in literature would always remain strong throughout his life.
In his early writings (between 1913 and 1915) he introduced the work of Søren Kierkegaard
to Japan, as well as working on Friedrich Nietzsche
, but in 1918 he turned against this earlier position, criticizing Western philosophical individualism
, and attacking its influence on Japanese thought and life. This led to a study of the roots of Japanese culture, including Japanese Buddhist art
, and notably the work of the mediæval Zen Buddhist Dogen
. Watsuji was also interested in the famous Japanese writer Natsume Sōseki
, whose books were influential during Watsuji's early years.
, Hosei
and Keio
universities, and at Tsuda Eigaku-juku
.
The issues of hermeneutics attracted his attention.
In 1925 Watsuji became professor of ethics at Kyoto University
, joining the other leading philosophers of the time, Nishida Kitaro
and Tanabe Hajime. He held the university's chair in ethics from 1934 until 1949.
During World War II
his ethical theories (which claimed the superiority of Japanese approaches to and understanding of human nature and ethics, and argued for the negation of self) provided support for certain nationalistic
, military factions — a fact which, after the war, he said that he regretted.
Watsuji died at the age of seventy-one.
and other environmental factors and the nature of human culture
s, and he distinguished three types of culture: pastoral, desert, and monsoon.
Japan
Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...
ese moral philosopher
Ethics
Ethics, also known as moral philosophy, is a branch of philosophy that addresses questions about morality—that is, concepts such as good and evil, right and wrong, virtue and vice, justice and crime, etc.Major branches of ethics include:...
, cultural historian
Cultural history
The term cultural history refers both to an academic discipline and to its subject matter.Cultural history, as a discipline, at least in its common definition since the 1970s, often combines the approaches of anthropology and history to look at popular cultural traditions and cultural...
, and intellectual historian
Intellectual history
Note: this article concerns the discipline of intellectual history, and not its object, the whole span of human thought since the invention of writing. For clarifications about the latter topic, please consult the writings of the intellectual historians listed here and entries on individual...
.
Early life
Watsuji was born in HimejiHimeji, Hyogo
is a city located in Hyōgo Prefecture in the Kansai region of Japan. As of April 1, 2011, the city has an estimated population of 535,945, with 206,409 households. The total area is 534.43 km².- History :...
, Hyōgo Prefecture
Hyogo Prefecture
is a prefecture of Japan located in the Kansai region on Honshū island. The capital is Kobe.The prefecture's name was previously alternately spelled as Hiogo.- History :...
to a physician. During his youth he enjoyed poetry and had a passion for Western literature
Western literature
Western literature refers to the literature written in the languages of Europe, including the ones belonging to the Indo-European language family as well as several geographically or historically related languages such as Basque, Hungarian, and so forth...
. For a short time he was the coeditor of a literary magazine and was involved in writing poems and plays. His interests in Philosophy came to light while he was a student at First Higher School in Tokyo, although his interest in literature would always remain strong throughout his life.
In his early writings (between 1913 and 1915) he introduced the work of Søren Kierkegaard
Søren Kierkegaard
Søren Aabye Kierkegaard was a Danish Christian philosopher, theologian and religious author. He was a critic of idealist intellectuals and philosophers of his time, such as Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph Schelling and Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Schlegel...
to Japan, as well as working on Friedrich Nietzsche
Friedrich Nietzsche
Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche was a 19th-century German philosopher, poet, composer and classical philologist...
, but in 1918 he turned against this earlier position, criticizing Western philosophical individualism
Individualism
Individualism is the moral stance, political philosophy, ideology, or social outlook that stresses "the moral worth of the individual". Individualists promote the exercise of one's goals and desires and so value independence and self-reliance while opposing most external interference upon one's own...
, and attacking its influence on Japanese thought and life. This led to a study of the roots of Japanese culture, including Japanese Buddhist art
Buddhist art
Buddhist art originated on the Indian subcontinent following the historical life of Siddhartha Gautama, 6th to 5th century BC, and thereafter evolved by contact with other cultures as it spread throughout Asia and the world....
, and notably the work of the mediæval Zen Buddhist Dogen
Dogen
Dōgen Zenji was a Japanese Zen Buddhist teacher born in Kyōto, and the founder of the Sōtō school of Zen in Japan after travelling to China and training under the Chinese Caodong lineage there...
. Watsuji was also interested in the famous Japanese writer Natsume Sōseki
Natsume Soseki
, born ', is widely considered to be the foremost Japanese novelist of the Meiji period . He is best known for his novels Kokoro, Botchan, I Am a Cat and his unfinished work Light and Darkness. He was also a scholar of British literature and composer of haiku, Chinese-style poetry, and fairy tales...
, whose books were influential during Watsuji's early years.
Career
In the early 1920s Watsuji taught at ToyoToyo University
Toyo University is a university with several branches in Japan, including .- Overview :...
, Hosei
Hosei University
is a private university based in Tokyo, Japan.The university originated in a school of law, Tōkyō Hōgakusha , established in 1880, and the following year renamed Tōkyō Hōgakkō . This was from 1883 headed by Dr. Gustave Emile Boissonade, and was heavily influenced by the French legal tradition...
and Keio
Keio University
,abbreviated as Keio or Keidai , is a Japanese university located in Minato, Tokyo. It is known as the oldest institute of higher education in Japan. Founder Fukuzawa Yukichi originally established it as a school for Western studies in 1858 in Edo . It has eleven campuses in Tokyo and Kanagawa...
universities, and at Tsuda Eigaku-juku
Tsuda College
is a private women's college in Kodaira, Tokyo. The college was founded in 1900 by Tsuda Umeko as Joshi Eigaku Juku. The name was later changed to Tsuda Eigaku Juku and then Tsuda Juku Senmon Gakko and finally Tsuda Juku Daigaku in 1948....
.
The issues of hermeneutics attracted his attention.
In 1925 Watsuji became professor of ethics at Kyoto University
Kyoto University
, or is a national university located in Kyoto, Japan. It is the second oldest Japanese university, and formerly one of Japan's Imperial Universities.- History :...
, joining the other leading philosophers of the time, Nishida Kitaro
Nishida Kitaro
was a prominent Japanese philosopher, founder of what has been called the Kyoto School of philosophy. He graduated from The University of Tokyo during the Meiji period in 1894 with a degree in philosophy. He was named professor of the Fourth High School in Ishikawa Prefecture in 1899 and later...
and Tanabe Hajime. He held the university's chair in ethics from 1934 until 1949.
During World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
his ethical theories (which claimed the superiority of Japanese approaches to and understanding of human nature and ethics, and argued for the negation of self) provided support for certain nationalistic
Japanese nationalism
encompasses a broad range of ideas and sentiments harbored by the Japanese people over the last two centuries regarding their native country, its cultural nature, political form and historical destiny...
, military factions — a fact which, after the war, he said that he regretted.
Watsuji died at the age of seventy-one.
Work
Watsuji's three main works were his two-volume 1954 History of Japanese Ethical Thought, his three-volume Rinrigaku (Ethics), first published in 1937, 1942, and 1949, and his 1935 Fudo. The last of these develops his most distinctive thought. In it, Watsuji argues for an essential relationship between climateClimate
Climate encompasses the statistics of temperature, humidity, atmospheric pressure, wind, rainfall, atmospheric particle count and other meteorological elemental measurements in a given region over long periods...
and other environmental factors and the nature of human culture
Culture
Culture is a term that has many different inter-related meanings. For example, in 1952, Alfred Kroeber and Clyde Kluckhohn compiled a list of 164 definitions of "culture" in Culture: A Critical Review of Concepts and Definitions...
s, and he distinguished three types of culture: pastoral, desert, and monsoon.
Writings
- 1961–1963: Watsuji Tetsurō Zenshū (Complete Works of Tetsuro Watsuji) 20 volumes (Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten)
English translations
- 1961: Climate and Culture: A Philosophical Study trans. from by Geoffrey Bownas (Westport, CT: Greenwood Press)
- 1969: Japanese Ethical Thought in the NohNoh, or - derived from the Sino-Japanese word for "skill" or "talent" - is a major form of classical Japanese musical drama that has been performed since the 14th century. Many characters are masked, with men playing male and female roles. Traditionally, a Noh "performance day" lasts all day and...
Plays of the Muromachi PeriodMuromachi periodThe is a division of Japanese history running from approximately 1336 to 1573. The period marks the governance of the Muromachi or Ashikaga shogunate, which was officially established in 1338 by the first Muromachi shogun, Ashikaga Takauji, two years after the brief Kemmu restoration of imperial...
trans. from chapter 4 of by David A. Dilworth (Monumenta Nipponica 24:4, 467-498) http://www.jstor.org/stable/2383883 - 1971: The Significance of Ethics As the Study of Man trans. from the introduction to vol. 1 by David A. Dilworth (Monumenta Nipponica 26:3/4, 395-413) http://www.jstor.org/stable/2383653
- 1996: Watsuji Tetsurō's Rinrigaku: Ethics in Japan trans. from the first half of vol. 1 by Seisaku Yamamoto & Robert Carter (Albany: State University of New York Press)
- 1998: Various essays in Sourcebook for Modern Japanese Philosophy by David Dilworth and Valdo Viglielmo with Agustin Jacinto Zavala.
- 2009: Mask and Persona trans. from by Carl M. Johnson http://carlsensei.com/docs/translations/mask-and-persona.html
- 2009: The Psychology of Idol Worship trans. from by Carl M. Johnson http://carlsensei.com/docs/translations/psychology-of-idol-worship.html
- 2011: Purifying Zen: Watsuji Tetsurō's Shamon Dōgen trans. from by Steve Bein (Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press) http://www.uhpress.hawaii.edu/shopcore/978-0-8248-3556-9/
- 2011: Pilgrimages in The Ancient Temples in NaraNara, Narais the capital city of Nara Prefecture in the Kansai region of Japan. The city occupies the northern part of Nara Prefecture, directly bordering Kyoto Prefecture...
trans. from by Hiroshi Nara (Portland, ME: Merwin Asia) (Forthcoming Fall 2011)http://www.merwinasia.com/books/pilgrimeges.html