Bushido

See also: Bushido (homonymy)

The Bushidō is the code of the moral principles that the knight S Japan board were held to observe.

Origin of the word

Bushidō (武士道) is a Japanese Mot coming from the Chinese 武士道 (“ wu shi CAD ”) literally meaning “the way of the Guerrier” - of “ Bushi ” (Guerrier) and “ Dō ” (the way).

The first mention of this word is made in the Kōyō Gunkan, written in the neighborhoods of 1616 but the appearance of Bushidō is related to that of the Japanese Féodalité and the first Shogun S at the time of Minamoto No Yoritomo with the XIIe century.

Sources of Bushidō

This code of life borrowed from the Bouddhisme the endurance Stoïque, the contempt of the danger and death; with the Shintoïsme, the religious worship of the Fatherland and the Emperor; with the Confucianism, a certain literary and artistic culture as well as the social morals of the “relations”: parent-children, Master and servant, husband, brothers, friends. Mencius was also a great source of inspiration for Bushidō.

A very strict code

The majority of the Samurai dedicated their life with the bushidō, a strict code which required Loyauté and Honneur until death. If a Samurai failed to keep his honor it could regain it by making the Seppuku (ritual suicide), that one knows better in occident under the term (unsuitable however) of “ Hara-Kiri ” or “the action to open the belly” (“ will hara ”: the belly, sits of the Ki (power, energy) and “''kiri ”: cross to the saber).

In its purest form, the bushidō requires its practitioners whom they consider effectively died the present moment compared to their characteristic, as if they were not already any more this world. It is particularly true for the initial forms of Bushidō or Budo. Moreover, the traditionalists criticize the later forms: “they clearly reason with the idea to remain in life in the spirit. ”

Quotations

Here an outline of the law of Bushidô such as it is expressed towards the end of the 17th century:

" True courage consists in living when it is right of living, to die when it is right to die "

" To eat with moderation, to avoid pleasure "

" A Samurai will act out of wire and faithful subject. He will not leave his sovereign, when well even the number of its subjects would pass from one hundred to ten, of ten with a "

" Of time of war, the testimony of its honesty will consist in going if one needs it ahead of them enemy arrows without making case of its life "

" … if it loses the combat and if it is obliged to deliver its head (…) he will die while smiling, without any cheap pace "

" Bushido means the given will to die. When you find yourself with the crossroads of the ways and that you will have to choose the road, does not hesitate: chosen the way of death. Do not pose for that any particular reason and that your spirit is firm and ready. Somebody will be able to say that if you die without to have achieved any goal, your death will not have a direction: it will be like the death of a dog. But when you are with the crossroads, you should not think has to achieve a goal: it is not the moment to make plans. All prefer the life with dead and if we reason ourselves or if we make projects we will choose the road of the life. But if you miss the goal and if you remainders in life, actually you will be a couard. This is an important consideration. If you die without achieving a goal, your death could be the death of a dog, the death of the madness, but there will be no spot on your honor. In Bushido, the honor comes in first. Consequently, that the idea of death is printed in your spirit each morning and each evening. When your determination to die in some moment that it is will have found a residence stable in your heart, you will have reached the top of the instruction of the bushido".

Seven virtues of Bushidō

There exist seven large Vertu S confucéennes associated with Bushidō:

  • 義 - Gi - Uprightness (sometimes also translated by " rectitude" or " rigueur")

  • 勇 - Yu - Courage
  • 仁 - Jin - Benevolence (sometimes also translated by " size of âme" , " compassion" or " générosité")
  • 礼 - Rei - Courtesy (correspondence with the label appeared in France at the same time or in a more general way, the " respect")
  • 誠 - Makoto - Sincerity (or " Honesty ")
  • 名誉 - Meiyo - Honor
  • 尽忠 - Chugi - Honesty

Important personalities in the development of Bushidō

Bushidō was used also basic spiritual for the Kamikaze S during the Second world war. For this reason, several martial arts enracinés in the bushidō was prohibited by American during the occupation of post-war period.

The Meiji era

With the radical modernization of the country under the Reform Meiji (1868), the existence of the social classes was banished and the samurais lost their particular status who made kinds of feudal police officers of them, only abilities to carry a knife.

Pledged to the Emperor, of many samuraïs followed the reform and became mainly leaders of the Japanese army to Western in the course of formation (See film, " the Last Samurai "), as well as politicians and later of the captains of industry. Thus, at the end of the 19th century, they accepted the reins, on impulse of the government, of what were going to become the large industrial conglomerates and of trade (Mitsui, Mitsubishi, Sumitomo, etc). These economic enterprises were the first true modern capital intensive structures of the Japan. This foundation is then marked by the mode of management of these leaders, old samuraïs, who organized their companies according to the values of their corpus of reference: Bushidō.

Bushidō today

One can consider that today Bushidō is still very present in the social organization and economic of Japan, because it is the way of thinking which historically structured the capitalist activity at the 20th century. The business connections, the close connection between the individual and the group to which it belongs, the concepts of confidence, respect and harmony within the Japanese business world are directly based on Bushidō. This one would be thus at the origin of the ideology of industrial Harmonie of modern Japan, which made it possible the country to become, with the Japanese Miracle of the post-war period of years 50-60, the leader of the Asian political economy.

Bushidō in the sport

The modern sport Kendo car its philosophy of Bushidō; to the difference in other martial arts, the prolonged contact or the multiple blows tends to being underprivileged to privilege simple and clean attacks on the body or the head. Bushido also inspired the code of honor of disciplines like the Judo, the Jujitsu or the Karate.

See too

References

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