Inoue Tetsujiro 1855 – 1944
Inoue Tetsujiro was a Japanese philosopher of the Meiji and Taisho eras and one of the founders of academic philosophy in modern Japan. After early studies under foreign teachers in Tokyo and a long period of study in Germany under Eduard von Hartmann, he became the first Japanese national to hold a chair in Western philosophy at Tokyo Imperial University. He compiled the first Japanese-Western philosophical dictionary, helped to translate the philosophical vocabulary of European thought into Japanese, and produced a long sequence of works on the Confucian and Buddhist heritage. His role in articulating the official ethics of imperial Japan made his legacy controversial in the postwar period.
Key facts
- Nationality
- Japanese
- Era
- Contemporary
- Movements
- Confucianism, Political
Selected quotes
-
Attributed to Inoue Tetsujiro:
“Eastern and Western philosophy must be brought into dialogue, each enriched by the other.”
-
Attributed to Inoue Tetsujiro:
“Translation is the labor of philosophy in a time of cultural meeting.”
-
Attributed to Inoue Tetsujiro:
“The Confucian and Buddhist heritage shapes the Japanese moral imagination.”
-
Attributed to Inoue Tetsujiro:
“Loyalty rightly directed is the foundation of every social order.”
-
Attributed to Inoue Tetsujiro:
“The history of thought in Japan is itself a history of philosophy.”