Hagakure - Book of the Samurai

Quite a letdown after Musashi’s Book of Five Rings, read immediately prior. Rife with hearsay, self contradictions aplenty, rampant misogyny, unthinking conservatism, laughable medical advice (drinking horse feces for example), etc. Just not good. Is there some wisdom here ? Some, but I’d be hard pressed to specify any that can’t be found elsewhere. (My own father, a combat veteran, taught me the central piece of genuine wisdom in this book - to preserve your life you must kill it- when I was still a young girl). I am not at all surprised that Yukio Mishima, narcissistic right-wing nationalistic fanatic that he was, loved this book.

A good distillation of a culture is like wine. There is color, there is character, there are bracing effects, there are notes and complexities. Bushido is a culture within a culture, a rich mix. The ideals are kindness and capacity for quick and lethal action. The shadow of death is to be embraced in every moment.

The author was not a samurai. He was a Zen student, Confucian scholar, scribe / retainer to a lord whose father and grandfather were samurai, and finally a mountain-dwelling, married Buddhist priest. Hagakure is a mixing vat of many elements, but its main notes, first and last, are living with death, inhaling it, to the final breath. Sip it to your pleasure and think about how deeply to swallow it in.

I have mixed feelings about this book. As a historical book and a tenet on philosophy, this is a worthwhile read for a history buff, particularly those who want to learn more about Japanese history and philosophy. The book I read also offered a bio on the author (and was also annotated. Which I HIGHLY recommend for ANY old text, especially translations/foreign books) which will help readers understand the text a little more.

There are some good bits of advice to be gleaned from this book, as well as a perspective in the way that many samurai thought and felt. Much of it is what one who has some knowledge in Japanese history would expect, but it is still crazy how people would commit seppuku over what we modern day readers would consider show more trivial, or meriting only a lesser punishment. One thing that particularly stuck in my craw was that a dead retainer was better than a dead enemy.

Wait, whoa, what? You would rather have your servant dead (from killing himself to prove loyalty) and your enemy running around? Yes, the code of samurai was different, hundreds of years ago, and their perspective on things were different than ours, but the price paid for their sense of honor could be really stupefying sometimes.

He also encourages people to plunge recklessly into battle, not thinking of victory or defeat. More than once does he give advice that a good soldier would consider foolhardy. And he also recommends, more than once, to consume horse feces. No, I'm serious.

There is not that much good advice to be gleaned from this particular title, in my opinion. I found Book of the Five Rings from Musashi to be a clearer and more coherent read. show less

|Hagakure ("In the Shadow of Leaves"') is a manual for the samurai classes consisting of a series of short anecdotes and reflections that give both insight and instruction-in the philosophy and code of behavior that foster the true spirit of Bushido-the Way of the Warrior. It is not a book of philosophy as most would understand the word: it is a collection of thoughts and sayings recorded over a period of seven years, and as such covers a wide variety of subjects, often in no particular sequence. The work represents an attitude far removed from our modern pragmatism and materialism, and posesses an intuitive rather than rational appeal in its assertion that Bushido is a Way of Dying, and that only a samurai retainer prepared and willing show more to die at any moment can be totally true to his lord. While Hagakure was for many years a secret text known only to the warrior vassals of the Hizen fief to which the author belonged, it later came to be recognized as a classic exposition of samurai thought and came to influence many subsequent generations, including Yukio Mishima. This translation offers 300 selections that constitute the core texts of the 1,300 present in the original. show less

This book was scribed by a younger samurai who sat basically at the deathbed of the samurai Yamamoto Tsunetomo. For seven years, the scribe sat and had conversations with Tsunetomo. Tsunetomo had become a monk after the death of his 'Master' in 1700. By 1716 the conversations ended, the result was a large manuscript. Hagakure is a compilation or thread of the most meaningful and 'best' of the manuscript.

The book is a mix of advice, stories, Buddhist teachings and koans, and direction on how to be the best samurai possible. As is more realistic and pure samurai teachings, this focuses less on swordplay than do most of the contemporary 20th and 21st century movies. The book is very much about loyalty--so much so that it is bound to show more conflict with modern and especially American views of independence, bootstrapping, etc.

Because it is written in small chunks without a specific plot or flow, I found the book to be great as a 'daily reader'. The author seems very calm, sane and without anger, and while I suspect no one would call him Enlightened, it reads without malice. From a Buddhist perspective, I had good luck replacing the word 'master' with 'compassion' and it worked almost seamlessly as a Buddhist reading meditation. show less

It has a lot of good general every day advice but man it was jarring to read one paragraph about good manners around guests and then the next paragraph be about how to kill people in the proper samurai way 😭 I'm a samurai now tho (they'd hate me for that cuz I'm a woman)

Despite it's history (martial manual for Axis era Japan), the 'Hagakure' in it's originality is a striking text resplendent with one sole emphasis: carry out your duty.

It is not a Sun Tzu type 'Art of War' but rather a nostalgic yearning for times long gone. Profound yet spontaneous, I learnt the essentiality of forbearance from this book.