Kiyoshi Miki: A Philosopher Who Embodies the Critical Edge of Modern Japanese Thought and Died with the Times, 1910-1945

Kiyoshi Miki: A Philosopher Who Embodies the Critical Edge of Modern Japanese Thought and Died with the Times, 1910-1945
Kiyoshi Miki (1897-1945) was a philosopher who, as a disciple of Kitaro Nishida, inherited the philosophical tradition of the Kyoto School and absorbed a wide range of thought, including Marxism, Hegelian philosophy, and existential thought, and acutely analyzed the spiritual crisis that modern Japan was facing. The period between 1910 and 1945, when he was developing his thought, was a time when Japan wavered between rapid modernization and militarization, and liberal thought was being suppressed. Individualism was on the rise during the Taisho period, but in the Showa period, thought control was strengthened under the Public Security Law, and academic freedom was gradually lost.

Under these circumstances, Miki continued to stand on the side of reason and freedom, and explored the anxieties of modern man, tensions with the community, and the possibility of individual freedom in "An Introduction to Philosophy" and "Society and the Individual," among others. His representative work, "Notes on the Theory of Life" (1940), in which he wrote in plain language about universal themes such as happiness, loneliness, and destiny, provided deep solace and an opportunity for contemplation for many readers whose spirits had been drained by the war. Miki's philosophy is unique in that it is not limited to abstract theory, but is developed as an urgent question, "How can one live in historical reality?

However, Miki was detained as a thought criminal under the security law system and died in Abashiri Prison in 1945 while ill. His death is regarded as a symbolic case in which the state's suppression of thought deprived a philosopher of his very life. Despite his short and tragic death, Miki's ideological legacy continues to exert a strong influence on postwar ethics, social thought, and philosophical studies.