Zen Buddhism is a form of Mahāyāna Buddhism that originated in China and is strongly focused on meditation. It is characteristically sceptical towards language and distrustful of conceptual thought, which explains why Zen Buddhist sayings are so enigmatic and succinct. But despite Zen Buddhism's hostility towards theory and discourse, it is possible to reflect philosophically on Zen Buddhism and bring out its philosophical insights. In this short book, Byung-Chul Han seeks to unfold the philosophical force inherent in Zen Buddhism, delving into the foundations of Far Eastern thought to which Zen Buddhism is indebted. Han does this comparatively by confronting and contrasting the insights of Zen Buddhism with the philosophies of Plato, Leibniz, Fichte, Hegel, Schopenhauer, Nietzsche, Kierkegaard, Heidegger and others, showing that Zen Buddhism and Western philosophy have very different ways of understanding religion, subjectivity, emptiness, friendliness and death. This important work by one of the most widely read philosophers and cultural theorists of our time will be of great value to anyone interested in comparative philosophy and religion.
Author
Byung-Chul Han, also spelled Pyŏng-ch'ŏl Han (born 1959 in Seoul), is a German author, cultural theorist, and Professor at the Universität der Künste Berlin (UdK) in Berlin, Germany. Byung-Chul Han studied metallurgy in Korea before he moved to Germany in the 1980s to study Philosophy, German Literature and Catholic theology in Freiburg im Breisgau and Munich. He received his doctoral degree at Freiburg with a dissertation on Martin Heidegger in 1994. In 2000, he joined the Department of Philosophy at the University of Basel, where he completed his Habilitation. In 2010 he became a faculty member at the HfG Karlsruhe, where his areas of interest were philosophy of the 18th, 19th and 20th century, ethics, social philosophy, phenomenology, cultural theory, aesthetics, religion, media theory, and intercultural philosophy. Since 2012 he teaches philosophy and cultural studies at the Universität der Künste Berlin (UdK), where he directs the newly established Studium Generale general-studies program. Han is the author of sixteen books, of which the most recent are treatises on what he terms a "society of tiredness" (Müdigkeitsgesellschaft), a "society of transparency" (Transparenzgesellschaft), and on his neologist concept of shanzai, which seeks to identify modes of deconstruction in contemporary practices of Chinese capitalism. Han's current work focuses on transparency as a cultural norm created by neoliberal market forces, which he understands as the insatiable drive toward voluntary disclosure bordering on the pornographic. According to Han, the dictates of transparency enforce a totalitarian system of openness at the expense of other social values such as shame, secrecy, and trust. Until recently, he refused to give radio and television interviews and rarely divulges any biographical or personal details, including his date of birth, in public. Han has written on topics such as attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, borderline, burnout, depression, exhaustion, internet, love, pop culture, power, rationality, religion, social media, subjectivity, tiredness, transparency and violence.
