4- Panel 3A

Japan and Philosophy

J. Goulding: Japanese Phenomenology: East and West 

Much appears concerning influence of Japanese thought on the work of Martin Heidegger (1889-1976). Less is written on Heidegger’s impact on Japanese philosophy. (1) Heidegger initiates a philosophical lexicon between East and West with his invention of hermeneutic and existential phenomenology. (2) Heidegger’s students utilize Zen to explore Western thought while Heidegger utilizes Western thought to explore Zen. (3) Many early translators of Dōgen Zenji 道元禅師 (1200–1253) are elite Heidegger students including Abe Masao 阿部正雄 (1915-2006) and Tsujimura Koīchi 辻村公一 (1922-2010). (4) The initial import of ancient Greco-Roman thought enters Japan primarily from Heidegger, arguably the greatest classics scholar of the contemporary world. From Japan’s side, the invention of the expression tetsugaku 哲学 (philosophy) is created to engage two people: Henri Bergson (1859-1941) and Heidegger that are seen to approximate Zen. From 1917 onward, the major thrust of Japanese interconnection with Western thinking comes through the Freiburg and Marburg “pilgrimages” to see Heidegger, an obligatory trip for Japanese philosophers arriving in Europe. Japanese scholars believe that Heidegger creates an uncanny parallel world to Dōgen with his idea of Schritt zurück (the step back) which shadows the Zen master’s taiho 退歩 (step back). Dōgen dismisses small miracles of Indian Buddhism in favour of big miracles of everyday life: breathing, sitting and gazing at the moon. Heidegger deconstructs small miracles of Western metaphysics in favour of big miracles of the everydayness including thinking, Da-sein (there-being), and essential prevailing of Being. 

J. Z. M. Vintila: The Invisible Actor: Dance Dances the Body 

The famous nō 能 theatre performer and choreographer Yoshi Oida 笈田ヨシ, student of Yukio Mishimai 三島由紀夫 (1925-1970) in The Invisible Actor (1997), explores the act of becoming invisible by means of disappearing and reappearing in a different character through the performance itself. Artistic techniques of re-appearance include masks, makeup, costumes and language. Oida believes that the stage is a body where the acting body situates itself by way of the “othering.” This is accomplished by embracing a spiritual world of the invisible within a material world of the visible. Dance is like the art of acting. The primary objective is to captivate a spectator by placing their dancing body in relation to (but not in authority of) the dancing movement. The “othering” of dance arises when both technique and idea dissolve together. The dance dances the body rather than the body dancing the dance. With an eye to Zen meditation and Heidegger’s step back, this paper features an extension of Oida’s classical Japanese forms to the practice of contemporary Western improvised dance. A realm of genuine, authentically raw movement emerges through Oida’s chapters Beginning, Moving, Performing, Speaking and Acting. These are compared with Western techniques. A cross-examination between two modes of somatic practice solidifies “the what” (movement) alongside the unseen. A good example is the altered state of “breaking the line.” With help from Heidegger’s fourfold, an “intolerable aesthetic” garnishes an invisible actor that exists in dramatic arts and improvised dance both in Japan and the West.

C. Satoor: Varley and Marra: Japanese Culture and History 

A main theme of phenomenology East and West is the idea of convergence. In the last several decades, there are a handful of Western scholars that have taken a strong grip on Japanese thought. This paper explores two of those top scholars: Paul Varley (1931-2015) for history and culture, and Michael F. Marra for philosophy and literature. Paul Varley, Professor at Columbia University and Sen Sōshitsu XV Professor of Japanese Cultural History at the University of Hawaii is a supreme leader in Japanese history. His book entitled Japanese Culture stands as one of the best ever to survey thousands of years of Japanese history and accompanying trends in culture and assemble them into a single volume of 400 pages. It is rare that a Western scholar could wield such elegance to create thumbnails sketches of such diverse eras in the vast spectrum of Japanese civilization. It exhibits depth and breadth that is unparalleled. Michael F. Marra (1956-2011) Professor of Asian Languages and Cultures UCLA is a pioneer in Japanese aesthetics and a keen commentator on the importance of Martin Heidegger’s work in respect to understanding Japanese thought. His vast publications range from ancient and medieval Japanese texts including translations of Motori Norinaga 本居 宣長 (1730-1801) all the way to contemporary literature and philosophy with his translations and thoughtful commentaries on Baron Kuki Shuzi 九鬼 周造 (1888-1941), renowned student of Heidegger. In November 1927, Kuki attends Heidegger’s lectures on Schelling’s Treatise on the Essence of Human Freedom at the University of Marburg where he offers an acute eye to the convergences of hermeneutics, phenomenology and Zen Buddhism, East and West.

L. Aysola: “Offering,” Butō 舞踏, Phenomenology 

In 2002, I performed “Offering” with the dance artists Eiko and Koma in New York. The performance is a ritual to heal the landscape from the tragedy of 9-11 and convey the sadness of the dead. This paper provides a glimpse of the aesthetics of Butō dance in its creation and performance. The idea of conceptlessness as an essential element of Butō allows beauty to come forth. My focus will be on the methods of Min Tanaka’s Body Weather Laboratory and Eiko and Koma’s Delicious Movement practice and the performance “Offering.” Heidegger’s phenomenology repeatedly avows conceptlessness: “Pre-conception shackles reflection on the being of particular beings. Thus, it happens that the prevailing concepts of the thing block the way to the thingness of the thing…by keeping at a distance the preconceptions and assaults of …modes of thinking, to allow the thing in its thing being, to rest itself” (Heidegger 1935-6, 12). Thingness is obscured by concept. The thingness in dance is the dance itself, rather than what is brought forth from movement. Heidegger calls for an “immediate encounter” through the senses. In Nishida Kitarō 西田幾多郎(1870- 1945), we find an elegant philosophy of direct encounter as well as the idea of conceptlessness that is influenced by Heidegger. Nishida’s links to Heidegger’s Being through his “active-intuition” as praxis of pure experience. Nishida redefines beauty as selflessness or the state of muga 無我, brought forth through the senses by active-intuition. The Japanese aesthetics of yügen 幽玄 and mono no aware 物の哀れ recall Heidegger’s conceptlessness.