Abstract
This dialogue presents a profile of the late Joseph Kitagawa—a renowned scholar of the history of religions (Religionswissenschaft). It focuses on comparative religion and philosophy, as well as several other important issues related to his distinguished career as an Episcopal priest and dean of the Divinity School of the University of Chicago. They are: his experience of American concentration camps during World War II; Christian atheism and new theological models; concepts of time in Oriental and Occidental faiths; depth-psychology and contemporary ministry; and Paul Tillich's significance for the pastoral counseling movement.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
“Kitagawa was internationally known for helping establish and define the discipline of History of Religions.... His work led to the formation of the /lsChicago School’ of History of Religions, which stressed the study of religious phenomena within the discipline of religion, as opposed to study from other fields like sociology or psychology,”Anglican Advance, December 1992, 14.
“Born in Osaka, Japan, on March 8, 1915, he came to the United States in 1941 to study at a West Coast seminary, but within a year was placed in a detention camp for people of Japanese origin. During the time he lived in the camps, he was ordained an Episcopal priest. Only recently, in his book,The Christian Tradition, did he write about his incarceration.”Episcopal Life, January 1993, 25.
Specifically, he recommended: Kitagawa, J.M., “The History of Religions in America.” In Eliade, M., and Kitagawa, J.M., eds.,The History of Religions. Chicago, University of Chicago Press, 1959, pp. 1–30; and Eliade, M.,The Two and the One. Chicago, University of Chicago Press, 1965. I remember being struck by this book's profound comment: ”The discovery of the unconscious could be put on a level with the maritime discoveries of the Renaissance and the astronomical discoveries that followed the invention of the telescope. For each of these discoveries brought to light worlds whose existence was not even suspected. Each, by shattering the traditional image of the world and revealing the structure of a hitherto unimaginable Universe, achieved a ... ‘break-through,’” pp. 9–10.
Dr. Kitagawa expressed the same truths twenty-two years later in the Hale Lectures of Seabury-Western. An excellent summary of that series was published in the seminary's quarterly: Kitagawa, J.M., “Religious Visions of the Unity of Humankind,”Crossroads, 18, 3, 1988, 10–12.
The Very Rev. Scott Norton Jones died a few months before Dean Kitagawa did. He was Alan Watts's successor at Northwestern and the Episcopal chaplain of that university for thirty-six years.
Moss, D.M., “Parochial Ministry, the Episcopal Church and Alcoholism,”J. Religion and Health, 1975,14, 3, 192–197.
Both of these men were very familiar with Carroll Wise's doctoral program. One was a psychoanalyst on the faculty, Alfred Flarsheim, and the other was Armen Jorjorian, the dean of Seabury-Western.
The basic ideas of this sermon were subsequently developed into a book-length description: Kitagawa, J.M.,The Quest for Human Unity: A Religious History. Minneapolis, Augsburg Publishing House, 1990.
Marty, M.E., “A Complex Honorable Man,”The Christian Century, 1992,109, 30, 951.
Ibid..
On November 11, 1992, the Church of England approved the ordination of women to the priesthood. In many respects these new priests will confront the same issues that their sisters in America encountered more than fifteen years ago. Moss, D.M., “Adjustment Reactions and the Female Priest,”Advance Magazine, 1977,90, 2, 12–13.
See Armor, J., and Wright, P.,Manzanar: Photographs by Ansel Adams, Commentary by John Hersey. London, Secker & Warburg, 1988, dustjacket.
Professor Kitagawa's generativity was consistent. Shortly before he died he published two books:The Christian Tradition: Beyond Its European Captivity. Philadelphia, Trinity Press International, 1992; andReligious Studies, Theological Studies and the University. Atlanta, Scholars Press, 1992.
The cartoon was a proclamation by Pogo: “We have faults which we have hardly used yet.” Moss, D.M., “Odyssey of the Self: A Dialogue with Martin Marty,”Pilgrimage: The Journal of Pastoral Psychotherapy, 1978,6, 1, 29–44.
He died of pneumonia. This illness was the result of a recent stroke.
See Kitagawa, J.M.,Spiritual Resistance: Art from the Concentration Camps. Philadelphia, Jewish Publication Society, 1987.
Wach, J.,Types of Religious Experience: Christian and Non-Christian. Chicago, University of Chicago Press, 1951. A section of this important text relied on a memorial lecture that Professor Wach delivered at Seabury-Western in 1945, “Church, Denomination and Sect,” pp. 187–208.
Kitagawa, “The History of Religions in America,”op. cit.In, pp. 1.
See Cobb, J.B., ed.,The Theology of Thomas Altizer: Critique and Response. Philadelphia, Westminster Press, 1970; and Moss, D.M.,Prolegomena Post Mortem Dei: A Critical Overview of the Nature and Structure of Radical Theology. Unpublished master's thesis, Evanston, Seabury-Western Theological Seminary, 1969.
This is an expression that refers to Moses of the Exodus, Moses ben Maimon (Maimonides), and Moses Mendelssohn.
This is particularly evident in two of Prof. Altizer's early books:Oriental Mysticism and Biblical Eschatology. Philadelphia, Westminster Press, 1961; andMircea Eliade and the Dialectic of the Sacred. Philadelphia, Westminster Press, 1963.
The History of Religions: Essays in Divinity, Vol. I. Chicago, University of Chicago Press, 1967. This book was dedicated to the memory of Profs. Wach and Tillich.
See Moss, D.M., “‘On the Margins’: A Dialogue with Andrew Greeley,”J. Religion and Health, 1990,29, 4, 266–267.
When he was a professor of religion at Emory University, Dr. Altizer was seen by more students as a spiritual thinker than a “Christian atheist.”
See Moss, D.M., “Reality Principle,”Dictionary of Pastoral Care and Counseling. R.H. Hunter, ed. Nashville, Abington Press, 1990, p. 1045,
See, especially, Altizer, T.J.J., ed.,Toward a New Christianity: Readings in the Death of God Theology. New York, Harcourt, Brace & World, 1967.
Rubenstein, R.L.,Power Struggle: An Autobiographical Confession. New York, Charles Scribner's Sons, 1974.
On October 13 Dr. Eliade wrote: “We learned that, this morning at four o'clock, Paul had a heart attack and was taken to the clinic. He is in an oxygen tent. And suddenly I feel guilty: if I hadn't insisted that he give his lecture, if he hadn't talked with such passion last night at Kitagawa's....” The next day one of the entries reads: “Paul Tillich had a new attack.... At eight o'clock, phone call from the University: Paul had just died.... Paul knew that he was going to die, the doctor said, but he was serene, at peace.” Eliade, M.,No Souvenirs: Journals, 1957–1969. New York, Harper & Row, 1977, 276.
Moss, D.M., “Psychoanalysis with Sigmund Freud and New Frontiers in Mental Health: A Dialogue with Roy R. Grinber, Sr.,Pilgrimage: The Journal of Pastoral Psychotherapy, 1975,3, 2, 27.
See Kitagawa, J.M.,Buddhism and Asian History. New York, MacMillan Publishing Co., 1989.
Collingwood, R.G.,Idea of History. New York, Oxford University Press, 1946.
Schweitzer, A.,The Quest of the Historical Jesus. New York, MacMillan Company, 1954.
This is a philosophical statement Prof. Eliade used to describe the basic focus of the journal he edited with Dean Kitagawa,History of Religions.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Additional information
David M. Moss, Ph.D., Th.D., is the Book Review Editor of thisjournal and the Past President of the Georgia Chapter of the American Association's Division of Psychoanalysis. The interview is part of a series that will be published in a volume entitledDialogues in Depth Psychology and Religion.
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Moss, D.M. Internment and ministry: A dialogue with Joseph Kitagawa. J Relig Health 32, 163–178 (1993). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00995650
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00995650