Bushidō

Bushidō
Japanese Term
Kanji	▷✅
Hiragana	し う う う う う う う う う う う う
Japanese samurai in his armor, 1860. Photograph by Felice Beato.

In the Japanese tradition, the bushidō ( 武士道, &# 39;'bushidō''^?) is a term translated as “the way of the warrior”.

It is a strict and particular ethical code to which many samurai (or bushi) gave their lives, which demanded loyalty and honor until death. If a samurai failed to keep his honor, he could recover it by practicing seppuku (ritual suicide). It is said that from childhood, the bushidō was instilled in the Japanese of the ruling class even before taking off from the mother's chest.

The word samurai comes from the Japanese verb saburau, which means "to serve as an assistant." The word bushi is a Japanese word meaning "armed knight." The word "samurai" was used by other social classes, while warriors called themselves by a more dignified term, bushi.

It has come to be known as the samurai code, but it is more than that. The given name is not "the code" or "the law" of the warrior, but rather, "the Way". It is not simply a list of rules that a warrior must adhere to in exchange for his title, but a set of principles that prepare a man to fight without losing his humanity, and to lead and command without losing touch with others. the basic values. It is a description of a way of life, and a prescription for making a noble man-warrior.

At the heart of bushido is the samurai's acceptance of death.

The way of the samurai lies in death.

says the Hagakure, an explanation of bushido from 1716 whose title literally means "Hidden in the leaves."

"Once the warrior is prepared for the death, he lives his life without the concern of dying, and chooses his actions based on a principle, not fear."

If you properly prepare your heart every morning and night, you are able to live as if your body was already dead, you gain freedom on The Way. Your whole life will be blameless, and you will succeed in your call.

Fonts

This moral code has four main sources:

Kusunoki Masashige Statue in Tokyo, an icon of the bushidō.

Confucianism

The worship and worship of ancestors and powers, among which the sky is the clearest, clearly stems from Confucianism. Another important element in Confucianism is the Emperor, also called the Son of Heaven, mediator between Heaven and men.

The practice of Ren supposes the virtues of "loyalty" and "compassion" being able to practice justice and good principles, called Yi.

The man who practices the virtues is a Junzi, a superior man; what opposes Shumin, the commoners. It should be noted that the term refers to moral superiority not linked to social origin.

Buddhism

Buddhism gave the warrior a full and tenacious stoicism that accompanied the samurai until the last days of his life. The bushi accepts death as an inescapable reality and trusts his character as the builder of his destiny. In the words of the Prince of Myth:

Anyone can get into the hardest part of the battle and die. It is easy for a paternal, but for a samurai it is true just decision in equanimity, and a true value to know how to live when it is to live, and die when it is to die.

Buddhism offered the bushidō a method of contemplation underlying a phenomenon that put the warrior in harmony with the absolute.

Zen

His Zen practice freed his mind from distraction and enabled him to pursue perfection in all things, from haiku (Japanese verse mode) to seppuku (suicide ritual, also known as harakiri). The Zen branch of Buddhism adapts to the warrior characteristics of the samurai and his cult of courage, which is reflected in the haiku:

I'm glad to know everything's empty.

Honor to the sword of the enemy, only the spring breeze will hurt

with the flash of lightning.

Shinto

On the other hand, Shinto gave bushidō ethical values of affinity and love for all living things, and a deep teaching of loyalty to the sovereign in its most traditional aspect. Shintoism believed in the purity of the innate, so there was no room for original sin in it. The works of Mencius and Confucius were the main teachings for young samurai and an interesting resolution pattern for larger issues.

Wan Yang Ming, one of the great sages of Chinese philosophy who most influenced the minds of all samurai, held as a basic moral criterion that "Speaking and doing are the same thing".

The bushidō has no owner in the words of a single personification. Nor is it the object of an era. It is the thought of decades and centuries of men who made possible the tenacity and courage to act in battle, using the tools of honesty and justice, courage and love, among other things. The nobly applied bushidō is a moral code that currently on the lips of many may be contemptible words, but for other more sentimental eyes, today it can constitute values of nobility and humanity.

The "seven virtues" of bushido

In its original form, seven associated virtues are recognized in bushidō:

義 Gi — Justice or Righteousness (correct decisions)

The samurai is honest in his dealings with everyone. He believes in justice, but not in the one that emanates from others, but in the one that emanates from his heart. For a true samurai there are no shades of gray when it comes to honesty and justice; there is only right and wrong.

勇 Yu — Courage

The samurai stands tall above the masses of people who fear to act. Hiding like a turtle hides in its shell is not living. A samurai must have heroic courage, accepting the risks involved in being faithful to one's own principles. This leads him to live life fully, completely, wonderfully. Heroic courage is not blind, it is smart and strong: it replaces visceral fear with rational respect and caution.

仁 Jin — Compassion

Through intense training and meditation the samurai becomes fast, strong and wise. He develops a power that differentiates him from the others but that he will use for the good of all. He feels compassion towards his fellow men and helps his companions at any opportunity. If the occasion does not arise, the samurai goes looking for it.

礼 Rei — Respect, courtesy

A samurai has no reason to be cruel, nor does he need to prove his strength. He is respectful towards his enemies because without this direct show of respect, he would be behaving like an animal. A samurai is respected not only for his fierceness in battle, but also for his treatment of others. The true inner strength of the samurai becomes evident in difficult times.

誠 Makoto — Honesty, absolute sincerity

When a samurai says he'll do something, it's as if it's already done. Nothing on this earth will stop him from doing what he has said he will do. He does not have to "give his word", he does not need to promise or threaten, because the mere fact of speaking is part of the action. Talking and doing are the same thing.

名誉「名譽」Meiyo — Honor

It is the most important virtue of all. The true samurai only has one judge of his own honor, and that is himself. The decisions he makes and how he carries them out are a reflection of who he really is. He can't hide from himself. In this sense, the samurai is existentialist, because for him there is no human or divine entity on which to discharge guilt or shame. In case his honor is sullied in his own eyes, the only way to restore it is through Seppuku or ritual suicide.

忠義 Chugi — Loyalty

Having done or said something means that something belongs to you. He is responsible for it and for all the consequences that derive from it. A samurai is intensely loyal to those under his care and always remains faithful to those for whom he is responsible. To the samurai, a man's words are like his footprints: you can follow them wherever he may go.

The bushidō and its relationship with today's traditional Japanese martial arts

Several are the martial arts with and without weapons influenced by the bushidō. Empty-handed, sumai, the predecessor of sumo, and the so-called Jūjutsu also known as Yawara (one of the oldest martial arts in Japan, attributed to Kamakura Ushogi in the Heian and Fujiwara eras) stood out.. Talking about bushidō implies referring to the moral precepts of chivalry, and for this reason archery and horsemanship, etc., were added to the samurai's training. The martial life, constituted by this code of life, was also very marked by literature, calligraphy and painting.

Currently the ancient Japanese martial arts ryu, or koryū budō, and modern Japanese martial arts or gendai budō, such as: the kendō, aikidō, shorinji kempo, judo, karate, kyūdō, kobudō, and iaido; which owe much of their philosophical and/or moral basis to the component philosophies of bushidō. Martial arts reflect the spirit of bushidō, in the different codes of conduct or Dojo Kun that are still taught in the different training rooms or dōjō. The codes sought to psychologically incorporate the warrior into civil society in peacetime. Currently they seek to give moral and ethical training to their practitioners.

Classical and modern personalities associated with bushidō

Some important characters in the creation, development and preservation of bushidō are:

• Miyamoto Musashi, the most famous samurai and fencing woman from all over Japan.
• Yamamoto Tsunetomo, samurái famous for the compilation of the Japanese warrior tradition in the Dokure.
• Yamaga Sokō, a neo-confucian master and medieval military strategist, with his works helped to shape the bushidō.
• Katō Kiyomasa, a devoted samurai of Buddhism, who helped consolidate Japan as a single nation.
• Torii Mototada, samurai martyr of medieval Japanese history.
• Inazo Nitobe, a diplomat of samurai lineage, pioneered in making known the tradition of the Japanese warrior in the West.
• Saigō Takamori, a military and political samurai who played an important role in modernizing Japan, as it was the support of the Japanese empire to regain its political power that was in the hands of the Tokugawa shogunate.
• Sōkaku Takeda, one of the last samurai, belonging to the Takeda family, master of the tradition of daitō-ryū aiki-jiujitsu famous warrior and master of Morihei Ueshiba, and Korean Choi Young Sool, founder of hapkido.
• Gichin Funakoshi, educator and philosopher, follower of confucianism, promoter of traditional modern martial art, karate.
• Jigoro Kano, educator, diplomat and interpreter, founder of traditional modern martial art, Judo.
• Morihei Ueshiba, soldier, mystical and religious follower of sintoism, founder of traditional modern martial art, aikidō.
• Masaaki Hatsumi, martial artist and writer, world-wide promoter of stealth art ninjutsu.
• Kenwa Mabuni, teacher of samurái origin (the first generation samurai) creator of karate shitō-ryūimplement the bushidō as canon for karate teaching.

Interpretations of bushido

In the Western ideology

In the West, this philosophy is viewed with romanticism, as is the case with many others born in the East (such as Buddhism in many of its forms and schools).

However, many masters today see today's bushidō as an evolved form of their original warrior purpose. One of the best known is the master Morihei Ueshiba, also known as "O'Sensei", who disclosed a new style of martial arts, where combat can be understood as a harmonious way of life. In the martial art of his creation, the aikidō or path of harmony with the energy of the universe. The philosophy of bushidō is based on a renewed thought, where tolerance is a strategy and at the same time a complementary and fluid form of combat, which allows knowing the opponent by defeating him on his own ground and without causing damage. unnecessarily physical, with the consequent respect that can come to mean in the mind of an "enemy" rational, all this without losing the essential characteristics of effectiveness and tolerance, proposed by several of the contemporary traditional martial arts.

In literature

Inazo Nitobe, one of the first English-language Japanese writers, wrote eloquently in English about bushidō and we owe much of the content of this section to his 1905 book Bushidō: the ethical code of the samurai and the soul of Japan, referring to samurai as "knights" and comparing the bushidō in some way with the code of chivalry. In the same way that a few ideals of chivalry have persisted as norms of behavior in Western society, he suggests that the principles that shaped the samurai influenced all aspects of Japanese civilization. This is not very surprising, considering that the samurai controlled the government for at least 676 years, possibly longer. The transformation of Japan from a country in complete isolation in the mid 19th century to a world power in the mid XX, is due in part to samurai skills and values related to discipline and concentration.

During World War II

After the entry of the Empire of Japan as a belligerent power, the monarchical government promoted the implantation of the iron doctrines that derive from the bushidō in the different levels of the State and the Armed Forces, in order to to endow its various institutions with a vertical and inflexible normative spirit that demanded the most extreme sacrifices from its subordinates. The treatment that the Japanese authorities provided to enemy prisoners of war (both civilian and military) is an example of this type of indoctrination, based on the fact that one of the things that the bushidō teaches is the absolute contempt for the enemy who surrenders, since this is a dishonor that makes death preferable.

The bushidō was also used by the military as the moral foundation for those soldiers enlisted in the ranks of the kamikaze ("divine wind" in Japanese) units of the Imperial Japanese Air Force during World War II. World War (1939-1945). For this reason, many martial arts with roots in bushidō were banned and the Dai Nihon Butokukai was shut down during the US occupation after the war. The ban was lifted a few years later.

Roots, evolution and reforms of bushido

The roots of bushidō are not at all clear. What is known is that the postulates changed over the years, and that it was not until after the abolition of the samurai caste that the written bushidō code appeared as we know it today.

In the Meiji era, when Japan was beginning to open up to the foreigner, the Japanese needed a warrior's code that did not oppose the ethics of the West, therefore, the code was fixed by completely changing what it was in its origins. This was done to make the bushidō presentable to foreigners, who arrived with very different ideas regarding morality and other philosophical aspects, in contrast to those prevailing in the Japanese regime of the time, which had not gone through a renaissance, and which was still anchored in the most extreme feudalism.

The most widespread idea currently about this code is that it was something to train "kind warriors", loaded with impeccable morality and rectitude. However, in its beginnings it was not straight or honorable. There were ideas that are in stark contrast to the fixed and reshaped version later on. For example Tōdō Takatora said: "A warrior who has not changed lord 7 times, cannot be considered a true bushi". This goes to say that it doesn't matter how many times you change lords in the pursuit of fame and fortune, and is in stark contrast to the idea of loyalty and austerity later associated with the bushidō. We also have another reference in the words of Asakura Sōteki: "Even if they call you a dog, even if they call you a beast, anything goes to win". Here the not honorable idea of winning at any price is reflected, something similar to the Machiavellian idea that the end justifies the means. Such were the first postulates. Pragmatic, materialistic and opportunistic; some values that contrast completely with the idea that today is had of the code.

Another important point to take into account is that these postulates were addressed exclusively to the samurai caste, and not to any Japanese citizen as it began to be said after World War II. In fact, many of its first proponents would surely not agree that the code was addressed to descendants of other castes considered inferior at the time. They would probably see it as an aberration when descendants of merchant families, peasants, or even burakumin spoke of following the bushidō, not to mention foreigners.

Therefore, the bushidō in its origins was a kind of manual to indoctrinate the samurai class and create lethal warriors for war or the political interests of feudal lords, efficient machines that did not They questioned orders and had no feelings, willing to die or kill at any time for their lord. At first there wasn't any kind of ethics in this, since ethics as we know it today is something that came out of Western culture, and it didn't come to Japan until the arrival of the black ships and the end of the Sakoku. (isolation of the country abroad). Ideas such as compassion for the weak, the warrior's morality, rectitude, the defense of those in need, justice, fair play, etc... are nothing more than make-up that the bushidō suffered through from then on based on texts, books (such as the well-known "Musashi Miyamoto" by Eiji Yoshikawa or some works by Shiba Ryōtarō), and cinema (Akira Kurosawa, etc...); all of them after the Bakumatsu. (However, there is a film director like Masaki Kobayashi who treats the subject of the samurai from a less idyllic perspective). It is necessary to understand that the codes or way of life of the warriors are not a list that someone invents at a moment x, but rather it is a way of life that is transmitted from generation to generation, adapting to their historical times and whenever someone makes a mistake. Compilation work such as Nitobe seeks to enhance the image of his men and his nation by amplifying the positive parts and minimizing the negative ones.

The code of bushidō is therefore not something fixed and immovable, but rather evolved along with the Japanese martial arts and the philosophy attached to them, the latter influenced by changes in the martial arts itself. country and new ideas coming from abroad. The reforms in the bushidō, had a lot to do with the change in Japanese martial arts, and are closely related to the transition from bujutsu to budō.