Embodied Implacement in Kūkai and Nishida

Examined here is the importance of embodied implacement in correlativity with the environment in the philosophies of two significant philosophers in the history of Japanese thought: Kūkai (774–835), the founder of Shingon Buddhism, and Nishida Kitarō (1870–1945), the founder of Kyoto School philosophy. We look into Kūkai’s concepts of sokushinjōbutsu (“attainment of Buddhahood in this very body”) and hosshin seppō (“the dharma body’s expounding of the dharma”) and Nishida’s concepts of kōiteki chokkan (“acting-intuition”) and rekishiteki shintai (“historical body”) among others, to explore the significance for both of an embodied implacement in the world and in interaction with the environment. The body as the medium or place of interrelations, in both thinkers, proves to be a chiasma in manifold significances, as both microcosmic and macrocosmic. And as non-substantial, empty, it is an open body.