Zen, the Samurai and Learning To Be Truly Moral
16th century samurai general Hara Masatane
source: Public domain, Wikimedia Commons
Recently, I was re-perusing a Japanese classic on Samurai philosophy, Yagyu Munenori’s The Book of Family Traditions on the Art of War, my copy being Thomas Cleary’s translation of that and Miyamoto Musashi’s Book of Five Rings. In this re-reading, I was struck by a few passages, which I here reproduce to fully convey my reflections:
Learning is the gate to attainment of the Way. Therefore learning is the gate, not the house. You have to go through the gate to get to the house, which is inside, behind it.
A few paragraphs later:
When what you have studied leaves your mind entirely, and practice also disappears, then, when you perform whatever art you are engaged in, you accomplish the techniques easily without being inhibited by concern over what you have learned. This is spontaneously conforming to learning without being consciously aware of doing so.
Toward the end of this section, Munenori goes on to say:
[…] Once you have learned this successfully, learning disappears. This is the ultimate sense and the progressive transcendentalism of all the Zen arts. Forgetting learning, relinquishing mind, harmonizing without any self-conscious knowledge thereof, is the ultimate consummation of the Way.
The point he’s trying to make is that when you have truly mastered an action, you no longer have to consciously think to do it, it just happens.
The example that western writers on Buddhism commonly use is that of driving a car. When you first start learning, you have to consciously shift, steer and control how much force you apply to the gas and break pedals. You need to consciously check your mirrors and look out the windows to observe what’s going on within the proximity of the car to avoid colliding with obstacles. But an experienced driver no longer needs constant conscious control of their motor vehicle. Within reason, they can listen to the radio, think about things, or carry on conversation with a passenger, because all the functions of driving and obstacle detection become automatic.
In the context of his writing, Munenori is applying this principal to the samurai martial arts. The whole point of all the fighting routines is so when confronted with an actual opponent, you react not just reflexively, but with an ideal counter-action, what in the west is commonly referred to as “muscle memory.” Furthermore, combat strategy would be studied until it also became automatic.
But I feel these passages may also be applied to moral action. A subtle distinction could be drawn between one who behaves morally and one who is a fully moral being.
It is, of course, noble to want to be moral. Right thought must precede right action. But for most people of moral action, there is still a thought process; we judge possible actions for morality or, more often, we act based on expected consequences. We act on what might happen and also how our actions might change people’s perception of us.
On the other hand, if we cultivate morality until it becomes our very essence, there is no longer any internal discourse on a course of action; the moral action just happens. A fully moral being acts on a moral instinct, almost a “muscle memory” of morality. This may be an ideal that is nearly impossible to achieve, but if we aim this high we may at least achieve a higher level of honor and help make the world a more comfortable place for all beings.
The Buddhists have an entire practice dedicated to achieving this. Called mettā, the practitioner sits in meditation and generates strongly directed thoughts of good-will and compassion. The beginner starts by directing this good-will towards themselves. Over time, they expand out to directing towards their teachers and family, followed by fellow monks, then friends, then people they are neutral towards, eventually building up to a sentient beings, with special attention spent on achieving compassion towards one’s enemies. In this way, Buddhists have found the most direct way to achieve a state where compassion and good-will become their very essence and dictate every action.
On the distinction between one who acts morally and one who is a fully moral being, I also wish draw a parallel to Plato’s distinction between the sage and the philosopher. A philosopher is a seeker of wisdom because he is a lover of wisdom (literal translation of philósophos), while Plato’s Symposium defines a sage as one who no longer loves or seeks wisdom, because he already has achieved all the wisdom he needs. This may not be quite how Plato intended it, but I think it fits.
Please share so my humble reflections can help the world become a better place. I’m also always up for philosophical discourse; please share your thoughts on this topic below.
Passages from:
Miyamoto, Musashi. The Book of Five Rings. Trans. Thomas Cleary, Massachusetts: Shambhala Classics, 1993. 68-69. Print.
E.A.Coolidge on Philosophy 
