Jennifer M.

Yoo
April 2009
Religion& History

Heart of the Sword: The Relationship Between the Samurai and Zen Buddhism

Surrounded on all sides by an emerald green bamboo grove, a figure stands

silently in the center. His eyes are closed, his body poised. Leaves break free from

the bamboo trees and drift down. Hearing them flutter, his eyes snap open and he

draws his katana. In a flash of light, the leaves are sliced cleanly in two. One would

think he is a peerless warrior; they would never guess how hard his heart pounds

when he has to charge into battle on horseback. And so he is headed to where he

can learn the necessary skills to turn his soul into steel as sharp his blade: a

monastery. Zen Buddhism has been often referred to as the “religion” of the

samurai, but upon examination it becomes apparent that the samurai’s interest in

Zen comes purely from a warrior’s perspective. Despite this, the bond between

them is so significant that both Zen and the samurai have been mutually influenced

by their interaction, although in slightly different ways. And even centuries after

the samurai’s practical need for Zen has waned, Zen is still heavily associated with

the samurai and Japanese culture today.

Zen Buddhism’s origins may be traced back to the preaching of the historical

Buddha, but not through any scriptures like the Lotus Sutra. Rather, it is said that

when the Buddha was once asked to preach the Law, he said nothing and instead

simply let a flower fall from his hand. All of his disciples were mystified save one,

Mahakāshyapa, who silently smiled in response. It is he who supposedly realized

the significance of the teaching, and was thus entrusted with a truth that could not

be transmitted through words.

 During the Kamakura period, an age threatened by the uncertainty of mappō,

Zen offered a solution that was the complete opposite from the popular Amidist

sects. Instead of teaching that people could no longer help themselves but must be

aided by another, Zen, which means “meditation” or “concentration,” proclaimed

that salvation was not to be sought outside oneself or in another world, for each

person has an inner Buddha-nature. Unlike many other Buddhist sects, Zen

demanded discipline and emphasized self-understanding rather than the study of

texts. With this, its stress on intuition and action rather than contemplation and

philosophy, and its promise of enlightenment within this life rather than in the next,

Zen Buddhism was the ideal religion for a samurai who wished to face the prospect

of death with an attitude of detachment. (Suzuki 16-18)

Today in popular media, literature, and in imaginations of people today, the

samurai stands resolute, staring death straight in the face without fear. They

exemplify values such as honor and loyalty and demonstrate an elegant mastery of

swordsmanship and a developed code of conduct called bushido. But back in the

twelfth and thirteenth centuries, samurai were no such individuals. From around

the Kamakura period all the way through the Azuchi-Momoyama period, the

samurai’s primary occupation was fighting. Their whole lifestyle was structured

around the need to be prepared for combat at any time. During wartime, samurai

were quite content with appearing as stern, stoic, but still moralistic warrior-

barbarians from the east, to the court aristocrats in Kyoto. The samurai disdained

the court’s grandiose and largely effeminate culture, finding their own Spartan

virtues far more preferable. Literary education, the cultivation of arts such as the

tea ceremony and calligraphy, all of these things were secondary to preparing
oneself for combat. During this time, the concept of dying on the battlefield was a

very real possibility.

To the samurai, Zen was appealing because it was simple and easily

adaptable to their lifestyle. However, at least during wartime, the samurai were not

particularly interested in Zen for religious purposes. Their interest in Zen was

purely practical. It presented a means to completely let go of one’s own self –

remove the ego – and in so doing achieve a preternatural level of control and

stability that would be of immense help when facing the enemy’s ranks in battle.

Taking all of these elements into consideration, and the fact that Zen proclaimed an

existential rather than an intellectual approach, where Truth lay within the one’s

own self and capacities, it is no wonder that it had such an enormous appeal to the

samurai.

Fate is in Heaven, the armor is on the breast, success is with the legs.
Go to the battlefield firmly confident of victory, and you will come home with
no wounds whatever. Engage in combat fully determined to die and you will
be alive; wish to survive in the battle and you will surely meet death. When
you leave the house determined not to see it again you will come home
safely; when you have any thought of returning you will not return. You may
not be in the wrong to think that the world is always subject to change, but
the warrior must not entertain this way of thinking, for his fate is always
determined.
--- Uesugi Kenshin
(Suzuki 188)

Many a samurai would journey to Zen monasteries in order to accomplish this

heightened awareness. Daimyo, or feudal lords, would even send their samurai to

turn them into more capable warriors. Taking all of these elements into

consideration, and the fact that Zen proclaimed an existential rather than an

intellectual approach, where Truth lay within the one’s own self and capacities, it is

no wonder that it had such an enormous appeal to the samurai. Many a samurai

would journey to Zen monasteries in order to accomplish this heightened

awareness. Daimyo, or feudal lords, would even send their samurai to turn them

into more capable warriors.

Throughout history, the Japanese have had a tendency to be rather utilitarian

in its assimilation of foreign cultures. They have been very good at adopting select

elements and transforming the foreign influence into something uniquely Japanese.

Japanese Zen Buddhism is no different. Through the samurai, Zen developed from

being a practice to achieve egolessness as a means to not only be more prepared

for death at any time, but also be better at killing. Their code of conduct centered

on this resolution to die, by achieving egolessness the samurai were able to view

not only their own inevitable deaths at a distance, but also the deaths of others,

thus sharpening their ability to kill. In addition to what the concept of egolessness

represented to the samurai, Zen itself came to emphasize devotion to one's lord

more than one's personal path of liberation from desire and delusion or

enlightenment. "I have no desire to attain Buddhahood, " Yamamoto Tsunetomo,

author of the Hagakure, wrote after he had retired to become a monk. "The sincere

resolution deeply engraved on my mind is to be reborn for as many as seven times

as a Nabeshima samurai and administer our clan." (Yamamoto 169) Thus Zen

transformed into a “religion” that taught the samurai how to be loyal to their

daimyo and how to fight better for their daimyo to such an extent that it

superseded the fundamental Buddhist precept not to kill any living beings,

especially humans.

Much of this changed, however, when the need for samurai and their martial

prowess in terms of warfare disappeared. Ironically, this occurred in the same era

of the samurai’s official “supremacy,” the Tokugawa period. Despite the efforts

made to maintain the same image the samurai had during times of unrest, the truth
of the matter was that a samurai who would not have to unsheathe his sword even

once in combat was totally different from his Kamakura period ancestors waging

battle after battle on blood-soaked sand against the rival warrior clans. In this era

of peace, where lethal combat was rare, save for on occasion away from the capital,

usually as a means to settle some quarrel or vendetta. Even in the instances when

such “combat” did occur, oftentimes it was carried out using wooden swords and

was for reputation-purposes.

The field of martial arts is particularly rife with flamboyant

swordsmanship, with commercial popularization and profiteering on the part
of both those who teach the science and those who study it. The result of this
must be, as someone said, that 'amateuristic martial arts are a source of
serious wounds.
---Miyamoto Musashi
(Musashi 8)

In order to continue to survive as a distinct class, the samurai had little choice but

to transform their mundane daily routine into their new battlefield. They became

preoccupied with concepts such as defining honor, one’s reputation as a

swordsman, and demonstrating loyalty. And to a certain extent duels were, in

comparison to the expansive battles waged years earlier, for petty reasons such as

expunging an insult. And yet at the same time, literary work concerning the

samurai was being produced. Accomplished swordsmen began writing about their

impressions of swordsmanship and military strategy. Famous swordsman Miyamoto

Musashi wrote such a text which he titled The Book of Five Rings, and gave it a

rather Zen-Buddhist tone. Texts such as Hagakure and The Code of the Samurai,

formalized the samurai’s code of conduct and developed what had been simply a

lifestyle into almost a refined art. What had previously been only roughly intuited

was now being written down and made nobler and more elegant.
 Regardless of the times, the strong connection between Zen and the samurai

cannot be denied. Unfortunately, this very same connection is the cause for the

popular misconception that almost all things samurai-related can be explained

completely by their adoption of Zen. D.T. Suzuki believes that everything, from

garden design to sumi-e paintings and haiku poetry, from the tea ceremony to the

concept of suicide, that is identified as an aspect of Japanese culture can be

explained through Zen. Zen was undoubtedly attractive to the samurai, and some

warriors were known to have practiced meditation with such dedication that they

were awarded certificates by Chinese masters. But to assume that Zen, was the

sole contributor to the development of the samurai class let alone Japanese culture

is to ignore the accommodative view the Japanese held of religions. In fact, many of

the supposed unique tenets of Zen that are most often associated with the samurai

can be seen in other schools of thought, both Buddhist and non-Buddhist. Self-

discipline plays a central role in Confucianism, for instance. Samurai practitioners

of Zen were not the only ones who willingly accepted death in battle; this is

apparent in the samurai who fought in the Ikkō-ikki armies of True Pure Land

Buddhism. The esoteric Shingon, too, with its mystical rituals and secret

transmission of doctrine, resembles Zen in its essential intangibility and its promise

of enlightenment within this life. (Turnbull 138) And according to Nitobe Inazo,

even Shintoism played a part in developing bushido and thus the samurai.

Even when there was no longer a practical need for Zen Buddhism, the

samurai as a class never adopted it wholeheartedly as a religion. But by the same

token, the samurai did not abandon Zen either. This is perhaps testament to how

large a role it played in the samurai lifestyle. Despite several other religions clearly

having a degree of influence on the character of the samurai, Zen alone is popularly
considered the “religion” of the samurai. One cannot deny that Zen became the

religion of the warrior because its approach to life was so adaptable to the character

and aims of the samurai class. But Zen is about existential Dharma, a Dharma that

can be realized within oneself and through one’s own abilities. In order for the

samurai to have such strong faith in the efficacy of Zen, they would have to have

had an equally strong belief in themselves. And that is probably the closest thing to

a religion the samurai will ever have.

Works Cited or Used as Reference

Daidoji, Yuzan. The Code of the Samurai. Trans. Thomas Cleary. North Clarendon:
Tuttle Publishing, 1999.

King, Winston L. Zen and the Way of the Sword: Arming the Samurai Psyche. New
York: Oxford
University Press, 1993.

Musashi, Miyamoto. The Book of Five Rings. Trans. William Scott Wilson. Japan:
Kodansha International,
2002.

Nitobe, Inazo. Bushido: The Soul of Japan. Japan: Kodansha International, 2002.

Suzuki, D.T. Zen and Japanese Culture. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1959.

Turnbull, Stephen. The Samurai and the Sacred. Great Britain: Osprey Publishing,
2006.
Yamamoto, Tsunetomo. Hagakure: The Book of the Samurai. Trans. William Scott
Wilson. Japan:
Kodansha International, 2002.