-Japanese version has been posted separately- 
-日本語版は「「葉隠」私見」のタイトルで別個に掲載中です-

I purchased a mountain bike!

In this forced self-quarantine life under lockdown, I took this time to undertake lots of housework and family duties that have piled up, until that is... my bike is delivered.

Inevitably, I found myself in the presense of my infant boy around the clock.

This made me recall a paragraph on parenting in the Japanese Classic literature, Hagakure which I read years ago. 

I have translated excerpt below:

It was a shocking revelation to me, for I had always presumed Spartan education and fist-law were the style of parenting for every young samurai.  

However, Hagakure highlights that:
The infliction of mental trauma does irrecoverable damage to the development of a child.
Discipline applied at a very young stage is crucial.
The relationship between parents / parent(s)-child can negatively affect the child.

I could not help but be amazed by the fact that all these things that have been advocated by mordern-day child psychology had already been taught by this one samurai dwelling in the backcoutry in mid-Edo era Japan.

Hagakure is one of many books that I was into as a young man. Like the majority of people who took an interest in this book, my initial image of this scroll was that it was the bible for ruthless dare-devil warriors.

It turned out to be nothing like the stereotype.

At first, I was confused at the mismatch, then went on to indulge myself in cherry-picking and interpreting the texts arbitrarily. As I am ageing, having read some books on it I have come to appreciate those parts I formally had not.

General perception of the book, I presume, must appear as such below:

 

1.The Bible of the samurai which is consistant, chronological and perfectly organized.

2.Classic literature that was read/was expected to be read by the samurai nationwide.

3.The author is a battle-hardened warrior.

It is quite the opposite to any of these.

About 1. 

Hagakure was dictated by a samurai named Yamamoto Tsunetomo of the Nabeshima clan of present-day Saga prefecture in the mid-Edo era, to a fellow samurai named Tashiro Tsuramoto.  It had been recorded, on a whim, over six - seven years, and is more like an randomly put together fables and preachings.

It is far from consistant - it is very common for him to have given contradictory answers/interpretations on the same topics discussed before. 

About 2.

In feudel Japan, not only internationally but also domestically, movements between each clan in terms of both people and material, were strictly controlled. It is unnatural to presume a book written by a recluse of the backcountry on the western-most island had prevailed among the samurai class across the nation. Besides, until the mordern era, I would imagine that the concept of learning of history or ethics from Japanese scrolls must have been foreign to the Japanese. They predominantly studied Chinese classics.  Tsunetomo never even dreamt of his monologue going down as a classic of Japanese literature, for he had specifically instructed the interviewer to burn his note after memorizing it.

It is only after the dawn of the mordern era that the script was excavated and popularised, largely because the militarists found it useful for education for its subjects.

About 3.

It was already 60 years after the commencement of Tokugawa Shogunate (Edo-era) when Tsunetomo was born, who lived to be 60 years of age. By the time of his birth, as the warrior class turned into highly beaurocratic rulers, Bushido(code of the samurai) had long changed from actual martial discipline and techniques to survive battles to a philosophy. Tsunetomo was born physically weak to a 70 year old father. With all that, I would imagine he never had a single fight in his life, let alone any life-threatening battles.

Another theme he frequently mentioned was homosexuality.

According to the works of a Taiwanese scholar, Tsunetomo started to adore his young master Mitsushige,the lord of the clan, when he at the age of nine, was nominated as a boy servant (who, back in the era, not uncommonly served for their lord's sexual pleasure) for him. He maintained these emotions for his entire life. After getting dismissed from the position later in his adolescence, he missed his master so much, but it was impossible to express it to the lord. He described these feelings as 'enduring love'. 

It was forbidden to commit seppuku or harakiri1, to follow one's lord then, so Tsunetomo decided to retreat from the world and became a monk. As the wife of the late lord later made Tsunetomo's hermitage to be the place for the prayer for her late husband, then later her own graveyard, he had to move out of it.

Amid of all that, he poured his passion into writing 'Osorenagarakakiokinooboe', a book of self-education for becoming a great lord for the young sucessor Muneshige, the son of Mitsushige. 

A true 'enduring love', indeed.

Born physically weak in peaceful times to die in peace(at least on the surface) in old age, fantasizing of a strong body and soul, envisioning victories in battlefields and glorious death...

Mental gymnastics of sublimating impossible love for his lord, homosexuality to philosophical loyality...

He was a very complicated man,who was all so different to my initial presumption of a battle-seasoned samurai warrior.

Life is very strange and transcendent for every one of us.

Interpretations of this elusive and mysterious book also keep changing at each phase of one's life.

That could be a reason why it never fails to amaze us.

1. a ritual suicide only permitted for the samurai that was considered an honourable way to die. It was done by cutting one's stomach by a dagger, followed by an aiding samurai with katana to slay his head off. 

References and inspirations for this post:

・'Hagakure' dictated by Yamamoto Tsunetomo, scribed by Tashiro Tsuramoto
・'Osorenagarakakiokinooboe' by Yamamoto Tsunetomo

・'Bushido: The Soul of Japan' by Nitobe Inazo (Originally written in English by the author) 

・'Bushido' by Nitobe Inazo (Japanese translation)

・''Hagakure Nyumon' - The Way of the Samurai: Yukio Mishima on Hagakure in Modern Life' by Mishima Yukio 

・'Yamamoto Tsunetomo' on Wikipedia

・'Mishima is interviewed in English on a range of subjects on YouTube, from a 1980s BBC documentary' 

・'Mishima is interviewed in English about Japanese nationalism on YouTube from Canadian Television' 

・「「武士道」改題　ーノーブレス・オブリージュとはー」李登輝著 

・「死ぬことと見つけたり」隆慶一郎著 

・「葉隠における武士の衆道と忠義 ー「命を捨てる」ことを中心にー」頼　鈺菁著 

Born out of the peach fruit...
(Photo taken in London, England by the author)

... Die like a Sakura flower. 
(Photo taken in London, England by the author)

Japanese garden in Hammersmith 
(Photo taken in London, England by the author)