Abstract

Nishitani Keiji elaborated the celebrated concept of nihility (虚無) in his seminal work Religion and Nothingness. In this paper, I discuss this concept of nihility in relation to the Christian cross and the theological concept of kenosis. After briefly recapitulating the context and function of the theological concept of kenosis, I show how the notion of nihility is particularly apt to problematize the Christian cross from Nishitani’s Mahayana Buddhist standpoint of emptiness (空). Furthermore, I make use of the concept of nihility to shed some light on one of the earliest texts of Nishitani, in which he expressly engages with Christianity and the Christian cross. Read along this line of continuous development in Nishitani’s thinking, his early and critical reflections on the Christian cross can serve to illustrate what is at stake when Nishitani later attempts to show nihility as a preliminary experience; an experience which must be overcome for the subject to reach the experience of true emptiness. I thereby suggest that Nishitani’s early critique of the worship or adoration of the crucified God anticipates and exemplifies the later generalized move beyond the “field of nihility” (虚無の場) unto the field of emptiness (空の場). Thus, I demonstrate how, from his Buddhist standpoint, Nishitani articulates a profound challenge to any Christian theology of the cross.