Talk:Bushido/Archive 1

message: I feel this page is in need of protection against vandalism.  Within the article on a heading, I found the word "mansack" with absolutely no relation to anything whatsoever. Gederoth 20:09, 8 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Vandalism

message: Why the heck would you quote "serious historians" like Karl Friday?  I'd rather hear from someone who actually lived there and translated the books themselves, seeking the advice of experts.  Karl Friday didn't even bother to crack open a Japanese dictionary which would have explained to him that it is very old.  He is obviously just another westerner trying to rewrite history.
:This does Dr.Karl Friday a major diservice.  He most certainly did live in Japan, is a trained historian, and much more besides.  I expand on this below.  His contrary (to the article) arguments are not unique to him or Western historians.  I wont add the link to one of his articles just to keep the peace but dissing people who don't particularily agree with you is bad form.Peter Rehse 12:15, 19 November 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: What you say would make sense, if the "sharp" and "pointed" content in question had any theoric basis. Never saw those claims anywhere else. What I did see, funnily enough, is exactly the "fictional and misleading" claims. I'll refrain from this discussion from now one, though. Better that way.--Kaonashi 00:03, 10 Mar 2005 (UTC)

text: Fair enough, not sure what more I can do to convince you otherwise outside of the link I posted right here as well as my first post above, and the other information I added in my original post, all of which has been taken from a great variety of textbooks on the subject. Please feel free to check out this page, too: The Top 11 Misconceptions About the Samurai. If I still can't sway your opinion, *shrug* what more can I do? --AngusH 03:17, 10 Mar 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Either way, it seems to have been fixed now by this PHG figure. I've never seen the claims made by 203.62.217.146 anywhere else, and chances are they were just supporting a wild conspiracy theory or something with little basis in reality. It is good the way it is, and if someone can back up up those unfamiliar claims with fact I will accept it. Until then, the whole "Bushidō didn't exist" argument stands alongside those infernal "Hirohito was evil" and "Japanese people are lazy" rants in my mind. elvenscout742 13:41, 12 Mar 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: What's here now is fair enough I guess. Let me clear one thing up though: Bushido did "exist" and I don't mean to imply it didn't, it just wasn't a "code". Bushido simply means "way of the warrior", and there was obviously a "way of the warrior" (i.e.. a way that a warrior could be expected to behave), and it did go by this name. This was more cultural than anything else though, and was the result of centuries of families specialising in the martial arts, and varied in many ways from house to house. Out of interest I picked up my copy of the Cambridge History of Japan volumes 3 & 4 (arguably the best and most complete books you can get on the topic of Japanese history, which explains their price...), which cover the samurai/bushi periods, and checked the index for mentionings of "bushido". There are precious few, I believe only two, neither being longer than a single sentence. I feel this should help people gauge exactly how important bushido was in the grand scheme of things.--AngusH 04:22, 15 Mar 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I realise this has all been going on some while ago, and that it's probably all sorted by now, but while I can sit and listen to any argument about the reality or otherwise of Bushido (not being a historian myself and generally unfamiliar with Japanese history), this idea about 'modern seppuku' needs addressing.  First, the matter that previous posters here seem to have got hung up on is whether or not Tokyo has barriers on subway stations to prevent suicides.  That's not the point.  The point is that suicides happen all over the world, and where there are trains there will be people who select that particular method.  Similarly, where there are cars that emit carbon monoxide, there will be people who choose that.  People throw themselves in front of tube (subway) trains in London almost daily.  Is there any reason to believe they are committing a ritual seppuku to reclaim their honour?  There are many motivations for suicide, and I think it's an unsafe assertion to claim that people kill themselves for a specific reason based purely on where they are.  Japanese-style swords are freely available from the Internet in Britain - I can only assume they're similarly available in Japan.  If someone wanted to commit a ritual suicide in this particular style, then I cannot imagine any reason why they would not obtain a sword to do it with - that way at least the method would suggest the reasoning for investigators.--Adaru 11:31, 4 October 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Factual accuracy 

message: The writings of Imagawa Ryoshun, author of "Michiyukiburi" and "Nan taiheki" mentions "The Way of The Warrior" (Bu Shi Do) in his "regulations" (AD1412).  The regulations were respected by traditional Japanese as a guide to correct moral and ethical behavior until world war II.
:Afraid not, at least in the Imagawa Letter (or his regulations, as they are more commonly known). The term he uses is budo, which has a very different meaning than the bushido that is being discussed here.--AngusH 04:12, 15 July 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  The word "Bushido" did exist as a word before the Tokugawa era 

message: Historian Wrong About Samurai--http://hnn.us/comments/32133.html
Volume 56 Number 1, January/February 2003
RELICS OF THE KAMIKAZE
Excavations off Japan's coast are uncovering Kublai Khan's ill-fated invasion fleet.
BY JAMES P. DELGADO
http://www.archaeology.org/0301/etc/kamikaze.html
(excerpt)
"In his recent book In Little Need of Divine Intervention, which analyzes two Japanese scrolls that depict the Mongol invasion, Bowdoin College historian Thomas Conlan suggests that a scene showing a samurai falling from his horse as a bomb explodes over him was a later addition. Conlan's research masterfully refutes many of the traditional myths and commonly held perceptions of the invasion, downplaying the number of ships and troops involved and arguing that it was not the storms but the Japanese defenders ashore, as well as confusion and a lack of coordination, that thwarted the khan's two invasions. But his suggestion that the exploding bomb is an anachronism has now been demolished by solid archaeological evidence. Moreover, when the Japanese x-rayed two intact bombs, they found that one was filled just with gunpowder while the other was packed with gunpowder and more than a dozen square pieces of iron shrapnel intended to cut down the enemy. "''
:Uh, OK. So he is proven wrong thanks to new information, and so should not be used again as a source? I don't think so. There are numerous bits of outdated information in Sansom's three volumes of history on Japan, should we throw those in the garbage too?--AngusH 01:42, 19 August 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: What the article says is that the "exploding bomb is an anachronism has now been demolished by solid archaeological evidence".  It does not say his interpretation of the artwork is wrong and even if it were - this is the realm of historical research and opinion.  New finds, new information change old ideas.  Artwork and manuscripts were altered in both China and Japan quite commonly (in the West also).  Figures added, poetry overlayed.  Think of a medival wiki.  Its not a question of fake but when something was added.  As I understand it he made his supposition on style and composition rather than an assumption that bombs were not used.  The article goes out of its way to describe most of his premis as masterful.  His expressed ideas about samurai (which is what this is about) are not unique to him or other Western historians.Peter Rehse 10:38, 18 November 2005 (UTC)

text: Oh please. I just finished reading his monograph State of War: The Violent Order of Fourteenth-Century Japan and it was a fascinating read, with each statement and conclusion he states backed up using primary sources. I hardly think that someone going for publicity would be writing about the 14th century anyway, as it's a specialist field that few outside of enthusiast even care about... --AngusH 00:25, 8 June 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  The Sad Truth About Thomas Conlan--   why would you want to use him as a source? 

message: I moved the biographical information on Kato to his own, already existing, biography page.  That's what links are for.  The article is already quite long.Peter Rehse 04:36, 18 November 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Biographical Information 

message: Hey guys, i dont mean to start a p*ssing contest here, but each lord has a small intro after each quote to describe who he is and a little bit about his persona.  This is very important information.  If it is okay with you, Lord Kato, probably one of the most impressive Samurai, had his intro stripped off with no discussion.  I would like to add that back.  I am the person who wrote pretty much this entire page in its current form.  If we dont have this intro, it leaves out A LOT of very important details about how Japan ended up in history.
:I'm the guy that moved your description to Kato Kiyomasa's own page (please read the discussion point above).  I liked what was written but I really do think it belongs there rather than  the Bushido section.  As I said above that is what links are all about.  If we had a similar length addition for everyone mentioned in that article it would be problematic.  As it stands now your text is repeated in two places and should be removed from one of them.    I'll leave it to you but perhaps you could modify the sentence which first mentions Kato and leave the expansion in the Kato Kiyomasa biography page.  Right now the description of the man is longer than what he says about Bushido - more than the usual small intro.Peter Rehse 05:04, 18 November 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I also didn't realize how much you did contribute to the article.  I didn't mean to step on toes.Peter Rehse 05:14, 18 November 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: No problem.  I'll remove the paragraph from the biography page to sooth my hatred of redundancy so we will be back where we were before.  I don't think people are disputing the existance of codes on honor (by whatever name) but there is a bit of reactionism against over romantization.  For every example of the higher ideal there is another of the more base.  Nitobe tried showing the west how alike Bushido and Chivilry were in the good sense, but one does have to ask how the average knight or samurai behaved.  I don't know who it was that critisized Karl Friday above (the advantages of registration) but he lived and studied in Japan, studied one of the older Koryu (has a menkyo kaiden), and has probably read the same texts in Japanese.  He certainly doesn't make the case that codes of conduct didn't exist - just that they weren't universily followed.Peter Rehse 05:51, 18 November 2005 (UTC)

text: The article is "Bushidó or Bull? A Medieval Historian’s Perspective on the Imperial Army and the Japanese Warrior Tradition". Not Bushido is Bull.  It is complete with references to both English and Japanese articles and makes an interesting and pretty convincing case.  The main thrust is a comparison between what the Imperial Army defined and glorified as Bushido and what the medieval samurai knew as such.  If anything his case is that the behaviour of the Japanese imperial army during WWII was a propagandistic corruption of the Japanese Warrior Tradition.  I would certainly like to think so.  I personally think Dr. Karl Friday does a very good job and would recommend his books.  "Hired Swords: The Rise of Private Warrior Power in Japan." is a bit academic, while Legacies of the Sword: The Kashima-Shinryu and Samurai Martial Culture is mainly about the Koryu he trained in while studying history in Japan.  I never got the impression that he was not intimately familiar with his area of expertise which extends far beyond English language sources.  I'm pretty sure he has read the same stuff you have and far more (ie Japanese sources).  Not trying to put Karl Friday up or your perspective down but I really don't see him disagreeing with your overall thesis.  I will say that accusing him of not cracking a book or looking things up is a bit off.Peter Rehse 08:39, 18 November 2005 (UTC)

text: Personally I am not that hung up on the word.  If a different term was used to describe essentially the same thing during different periods that is fine.  Just as point of discussion, the defections to Tokugawa were not only decisive but a clear example of a failure to follow the ideals of Bushido (ie loyalty).  Historically intances of ideals being set aside for convenience abound.  This is, in my opinion, an important consideration when describing the who and what the samurai were.  Of course this article is about Bushido not all aspects of the samurai.Peter Rehse 07:08, 18 November 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Please allow intro for Kato Kiyomasa 

message: I cant find any mention of Samurai Creed in Japanese Literature.  I think this is a modern invention and should be omitted
:People posting here seem to have the bad habit of not identifying themselves.
:Bathrobe 07:48, 12 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Link to "Samurai Creed" should be reconsidered 

message: This page (http://www.wsu.edu:8080/~dee/TOKJAPAN/NEO.HTM) has the following passage about Yamaga Soko. Would be interested in any comments on the passage, which seems to be at odds with the idea that Bushido was already current before the Edo period. Is the passage totally off the mark, and if it is, how does Yamaga Soko fit into the overall picture -- perhaps a reformulator or restater of the code of Bushido?
*Yamaga Soko was parroting the REAL warriors whom he studied under.  There is nothing wrong with this. However, to get a accurate picture of how the Takeda, for example, thought and acted in real war times, you can read their written works.  I would never consider Yamago Soko a source of anything original or anything having to do with creating bushido.   Whoever wrote the above article was a novice and completely erronous. Thank you for bringing this to our attention. 
*This is the main misconception of western scholars.  They rely on English translations from the few sources available, Satow, Mitford, Chamberlain, Hearn and a small handful of others.  These sources were usually from the late-19th century.  In my opinion, and this is backed by the research of the writers quoted in the wikipedia/Bushido page, the writings of the academics in the west are based on  only the limited works translated into English.
*At some point, some western academics realized Bushido DID exist long ago and they now had to find a way to cover up the mistakes of the papers and essays they had written based on the works of Chamberlain.  So what was done was to strictly interpret Bushido by saying that the criteria was that it has to be in writing, it has to contain strict codes or laws etc.  Then, they had to contend with the fact that Wilson and Streenstrup had actually sought out Japanese experts and translated the Kakun or Samurai House codes and found that pretty much all of the tenets of Yamaga Soko's Bushido were already in place from the 10th or 12th century onwards.  This was a major disaster and embarassment for western academia. All of the major tenets of Bushido occur in the Kakun of the warrior houses: Loyalty, duty, good manners/etiqutte/politeness, education, filial piety,honesty, hard work, humility, etc.  In fact, the warriors were rewarded based on loyalty.  They were also under orders to strive towards this ideal, in addition to being raised in a household with these values.  Keeping in mind that the warriors did come from a wide variety of geography and socio-economic backgrounds, it is amazing how constant bushido remained.  This article in BBC has a fairly good write up on samurai except for the section on Bushido.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/h2g2/A663077
*Now I am no appologist for the crazy Imperial line listed in the early Japanese texts like the Kojiki (The early emperors lived to be more than 109 years old), but the "bushido didnt exist" essay is way out of line and easily contradicted by the warriors own written laws. 
*Yamaga Soko re-emphasized and reinterpreted confucianism.  There were several waves of both religion and philosophy which came from China over the previous centuries.  At first it was the elite who studied Buddhism and the written classics of China.  Then it filtered down to the lower classes.
::"Perhaps the most important cultural application of Confucianism in Japan was the invention of bushido or "the way of the warrior," an invention of Yamaga Soko (1622-1685). Like Kumazawa, Yamaga was a ronin , a samurai without allegiance to any specific lord. Now the samurai class was a rough and illiterate class in medieval Japan; their job was simply to fight.
*This passage tries to oversimplify history.  By the medieval period, the Japanese culture had already developed and the warriors already had an ideal of a literate person to strive for. This description would more fit the warriors before the Medieval period and they were not even called Samurai.  BY "Medieval", i am assuming that the writer means roughly between 1300 to 1575AD.
*Wilson states that the Warrior Ideal was in place in the Heike Monogatari which was written about 12th century warriors:
Elegant, and yet unwincing at the prospect of death, he he lived and died as both courtier and manly warrior.
And, at the declaration of his death,
Friends and foes alike wet their sleeves with tears and said, "What a pity! Tadanori was a great general, pre-eminent in the arts of both sword and poetry." (Kitagawa and Tsuchida, 1975)
The warriors in the Heike Monogatari served as models for the educated warriors of later generations, and the ideals depicted by them were not assumed to be beyond reach. Rather, these ideals were vigorously pursued in the upper echelons of warrior society and recommended as the proper form of the Japanese man of arms. With the Heike Monogatari, the image of the Japanese warrior in literature came to its full maturity.
But Tokugawa Japan was a period of domestic peace, so the samurai class found themselves with little to do. In addition, the Tokugawa regime, in an effort to guarantee peace, rigidly enforced class distinctions and made the samurai class an important class in this system. The purpose was to prevent the large-scale arming of commoners by individual lords trying to raise an army; if you make the warrior class an exclusive class with certain privileges (only the warrior class could bear arms) and if you don't allow entrance by non-warriors into that class, you can keep territorial armies at a reasonable size. These two developments—the creation of warriors as an exclusive and privileged class and the lack of any productive labor for these warriors to do—led to a redefinition of the samurai: their purpose, their character, and their ethical standards.
*There were short periods of social mobility in Japanese society.  Hideyoshi was from a lower class background and rose up to be one of the great leaders of the country.  He later banned social mobility and confiscated weapons in his famous sword hunt.  Other than that, the classes of people were already fixed.  Again, this article oversimplfies,  there were some samurai who did labor jobs and farming when they had to, but those employed by the larger clans were professional warriors. During the Tokugawa era, rebellions were suppressed by using "Sankin Kotai" (alternate attendance) whereby the feudal lord had to spend time as a hostage on alternate years in EDo and then trade places with his wife and children back home.  The lords were organized into "Inner and outer" lords where the lords perceived as loyal to Ieyasu were placed in the outlying regions of Japan and the rest placed strategically nearby.  travel became stricly controlled on the roads and checkpoints kept track of a persons travel along the path.  The Tokugawa instituted a police state, and had a massive intelligence network of spies.  Intermarriage and political alliances cemented loyalties. (Marrying your enemies daughter or son into your family as a hostage).  The high cost of the alternate attendance to most feudal lords kept them from causing trouble.   These are the true methods used to prevent rebellion, not locking social mobility as the author above implies.
*Wilson states that Hideyoshi, not Tokugawa, closed the classes and social mobility:
The image of the aristocratic warrior described in the early chronicles tells only part of the story. Although many of its leaders came from aristocratic or even imperial lineage, the ranks of the samurai class were bolstered by the low class ashigaru (foot soldier), who did not share the cultural background or economic means of his betters. Still, some of these men and their families came up through the ranks rewarded for ability or feats of courage. They became, if not aristocrats, upper-class warriors and generals. This phenomenon was most pronounced during the Warring States Period, and the extreme example would be that of Toyotomi Hideyoshi, who rose from a very low estate to be the most powerful ruler in the country. Ironically, this was the same man who, beginning with the famous "sword hunt" of 1588 and through an edict in 1591, closed the social mobility by which he and others had risen, enclosing Japanese society within the four classes of warriors, farmers, artisans and merchants.
here are some good books about Hideyoshi:
Life of Toyotomi Hideyoshiby Walter Denning (former Ambassador to Japan)
Hideyoshiby Mary Elizabeth Berry 
::Both Kumazawa and Yamaga were deeply concerned about the constant inactivity of the samurai, and Yamaga went about defining what the samurai in times of peace should be doing with all that free time they found on their hands. The purpose of the samurai class according to Yamaga is to serve as a model for the rest of society; 
*Read the writings I have posted which predate Yamaga Soko.  The lords consider themselves as role models for the other classes and encouraged polite respectful behavior.  
*In time of peace and prosperity, culture flourished and the warriors began to indulge in activites other than fighting: art, noh drama, poetry, calligraphy, more so than in the past.  They also had time for more introspection and self analysis, which is why Yamaga Soko had time to write.
in School of Mind Neo-Confucianism it is not enough to understand moral behavior, one must put it into action for to be truly moral. The samurai would serve as a model of cultural, moral, and intellectual development; in particular, the samurai would exemplify a devotion to duties (giri ) and unswerving loyalty. The moral life of the samurai would center around the obligations he has willingly agreed to meet for his lord; his life would be one of temperance, self-sacrifice, high discipline, and fearlessness, particularly fearlessness in the face of death. In addition to these qualities, the samurai would cultivate intellectual, cultural, and political arts; the new role for the samurai, as Yamaga saw it, was to assume political and intellectual leadership. This new educated and politically savvy class would eventually tear down the Tokugawa bakufu and invent a new, centralized government around the figure of the emperor in the late nineteenth century.
*This role was already in place after the 12th century.  The southern samurai clans had their own intentions for the overthrow of the Tokugawa:  They were still mad after 268 years at having their land taken by the Tokugawa.  As soon as Saigo and the other Southern Samurai realized that the Meiji Emporer was abolishing their class and their right to bear arms, they rebelled.  (Saigo was the most powerful man in Japan at one point, as secretary general of the Japanese imperial army)
It is fitting that these samurai leading the Meiji Restoration and government also led the charge in adopting Western social and political models, for Yamaga Soko was one of the first Japanese intellectuals to call for the adoption of Western technology, a warning that went largely unheeded until Commodore Perry sailed up with his gunboats in 1853. The term, bushido would in later years be applied to Yamaga's writings on the role and character of the samurai, which he called shido (the way of the samurai) and bukyo (the warrior's creed)."
*This was done so as to avoid military defeat.  The Samurai wanted access to modern military weapons to keep up with the western nations.  Yamaga Soko's "Shido" was less radical than bushido
See also http://www.britannica.com/eb/article-9077755 and, of course, the Wikipedia article Yamaga Soko. This is not a troll, it is a serious question.
Bathrobe 11:30, 5 February 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Yamaga Soko

message: Is it really necessary to tell the 47 Ronin tale in its entirety in this article?  I think the link to just the 47 Ronin article would work just fine by itself. Bueller 007 05:34, 9 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Akoroshi 

message: ::: Another suggestion to improve this article would be to actually make a separate article on the literature of Bushido, such that the flow of the article is not interupted by the exerpts (which in my mind are useful, but are not essential to the main thrust). That way, if the reader is interested, they can explore rather than being force-fed too much information in one hit. Also there are a lot of sections that can either be broken up (also onto other pages) or are replicating existing pages. We should aim to be concise - with every section (and every entry) relating specifically to Bushido, and not to Japanese history per se.
Does any one have a particular objection to this suggestion?--OzzieB 23:12, 27 June 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  This article needs to be split over several pages 

message: I've been moving material (hopefully not annoying too many people) to the Bushido literature page - however I can't help but feel that there is another significant problem. The page contains rather lengthy sections on individual samurai, but I'm not sur that they really fit within a Bushido page (and if so, should be greatly shortend, and limited to those aspects of Bushido that they encapsulate). I would recommend that sections such as dealing with Kato Kiyomasa (as an example) be moved. Where there aren't existing pages for these peronages, I think we should create new ones, but in the above example there is already a page. I would not feel comfortable however just copying this over complete into those pages... Any comments?--OzzieB 09:40, 30 June 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Separation of Samurai warrior histories