Samurai Strategy Texts

Samurai Strategy Texts: From Miyamoto Musashi's Book of Five Rings to Yamamoto Tsunetomo's Hagakure, Japan's warrior writings blended swordsmanship, Zen and hard earned psychology, and they are now read by executives, athletes and artists far from any battlefield.

Miyamoto Musashi: Japan's most famous swordsman claimed he won more than 60 duels without a loss, then spent his final years painting, sculpting and writing about strategy rather than fighting.

The Book of Five Rings: Written in 1645 and split into Earth, Water, Fire, Wind and Void scrolls, it compares a commander to a master carpenter who must know every tool and every worker's strengths.

Reigando Cave: Musashi withdrew to this cave near Kumamoto to write The Book of Five Rings, finishing it only weeks before his death.

Ganryujima: In 1612 Musashi arrived late to his duel with Sasaki Kojiro on this tiny island, reportedly carrying a wooden sword carved from a boat oar, a lesson in using timing and irritation as weapons.

Dokkodo: Written about a week before his death, Musashi's 'Path of Aloneness' lists 21 terse precepts, including a refusal to regret past actions and a warning against longing for comfort.

Hagakure: Its most famous line, 'the way of the samurai is found in death,' is really advice to act as if already dead, freeing a person from the fear that paralyzes decisive action.

Yamamoto Tsunetomo: When his lord died in 1700 he was barred from following him in ritual death because the practice had been banned, so he became a monk and spent his remaining years dictating the Hagakure.

Tashiro Tsuramoto: The young samurai who recorded Tsunetomo's words over about seven years preserved advice like making any decision within the space of seven breaths.

Nabeshima Clan: The Hagakure circulated secretly among this Saga domain clan for nearly two centuries and was reportedly meant to be burned, only becoming widely known in the 20th century.

Yukio Mishima: The novelist called Hagakure his lifelong companion and published a commentary on it in 1967, three years before his dramatic ritual death in 1970.

Ghost Dog: The Way of the Samurai: Jim Jarmusch's 1999 film has Forest Whitaker's hitman living by the Hagakure, with passages from the book flashing on screen between scenes.

Takuan Soho: The Zen monk's letters to a sword master, known as The Unfettered Mind, warn that a mind that stops on the opponent's blade is already defeated, advice later applied to sports and public speaking.

Yagyu Munenori: Sword instructor to the Tokugawa shoguns, he rose to the rank of daimyo, and his 1632 text The Life Giving Sword argued the highest skill is preventing violence rather than winning it.

Budo Shoshinshu: Daidoji Yuzan's early 1700s guide for beginning warriors opens by insisting that keeping death in mind every day is the foundation of a well lived, loyal and disciplined life.

Koyo Gunkan: This chronicle of Takeda Shingen's clan tactics is often cited as the earliest written use of the word bushido, long before the term became a national ideal.

Furinkazan: Takeda Shingen's battle banner quoted Sun Tzu, 'swift as the wind, quiet as the forest, fierce as fire, immovable as the mountain,' showing how deeply samurai borrowed from Chinese strategy.

Bushido: The Soul of Japan: Nitobe Inazo wrote it in English in 1900 to explain Japanese values to the West, and Theodore Roosevelt was so taken with it that he handed out copies to friends.

Heiho Sanjugo Kajo: Musashi's 35 Articles on Strategy, written in 1641 for the lord Hosokawa Tadatoshi, was the rough draft for ideas that later became The Book of Five Rings.

Shrike on a Withered Branch: Musashi's ink painting of a lone bird is designated an Important Cultural Property in Japan, proof his idea of mastering many arts applied to the brush as well as the blade.

Victor Harris: His 1974 English translation of The Book of Five Rings became a surprise hit with American businessmen in the 1980s, who treated it as a guide to competing with Japanese corporations.

Arima Kihei: Musashi wrote that he won his very first duel against this trained swordsman at just 13 years old, the opening boast of The Book of Five Rings.

Niten Ichi Ryu: Musashi's two sword school, which trained fighters to wield long and short blades at once, is still taught today through a lineage traced back to him.

Eiji Yoshikawa: His novel Musashi, serialized in the Asahi Shimbun from 1935 to 1939, invented much of the swordsman's popular image, including the legend of Takuan Soho tying the wild young Musashi up in a tree.

Void Scroll: The shortest part of The Book of Five Rings is only a page or so long, describing a state beyond technique where action flows without conscious thought, a concept athletes now call flow.