Even when modern Japanese people first hold a katana, whilst fearful of
its horrible
efficiency as a cutting weapon, they can also recognise its beauty.
Non-Japanese people
can recognise this beauty too. However, we Japanese understand not only
the beauty,
but also the sanctity of the Japanese sword. Why is this? The difference
is because we
can sense the spirit of our ancestors.
The Japanese sword came to be known as ‘the soul of the samurai’. This
soul or spirit
derives from the ancient Japanese Yamato people’s word, tama. Tama means life,
and
the powerful continuance of spirit after death. Even now, the phrase
“tama wo toru” is
still used. This means ‘to take life’. Our ancestors took this tama, or
spirit, and infused it
into the sword. Kamikaze pilots would take their military swords into
their confined
cockpits in order to raise their own spirits and invoke the protection of the spirits
of our
ancestors. When a Japanese person holds a Japanese sword for the first
time, they
experience various emotions. This is because they can sense this power
of the spirit of
their ancestors.
Takayama
Takeshi, a Japanese sword researcher, says that the Japanese sword has three
facets.
In laymen’s terms it is a functional weapon, a spiritual protector for the
warrior,
and
has Japanese aesthetic. None is more important than the other. It is the
combination
of
these three things together that epitomise the Japanese sword.
The spirituality of the tea
ceremony,flower arranging and calligraphy, along with an
intrinsic beauty are condensed
into the Japanese sword. Our ancestors included all the
elements of creation in the
Japanese sword. Therefore, the Japanese sword is not solely
for warriors; it is the heart
of the Japanese people, carved out of steel in our own image.
A special edition of Budo
Tsushin magazine on the Japanese sword (Oct 1997) featured
an article entitled “When You
Look at the Sword, You Can See the Character of the
Nation”. At that time the Japanese people had lost
sight of themselves. My message
was to look to the sword to
regain sight of who we are.
10 years after the publication of our first edition, bushido philosophy
has become
popular. This is delightful. However, there are times when the
government speaks of
bushido and the Japanese sword as the soul of the warrior for its own
gains. When this
happens it is not the true form of the warrior, and the true image of
the Japanese people
is obscured.
Let’s begin to
talk about the Japanese sword again with today’s young samurai and
Japanese sword enthusiasts from around the world.
Chapter 1
prologue. The Origins of the Japanese People.
Why before the
katana is there no relation to class? Author N. Okazaki wrote “before
the sword there
are no two things”. The
point he was trying to make, that was no two
things, all things
are one. In today’s usage this has become ‘before the sword everyone
is equal”. All classes, samurai, farmers, artisans
and merchants were all seen as equal
before the sword.
It is said that the sword has been a self-portrait of the Japanese people
since ancient times.