Philosophy of the Samurai

Soon after the Samurai became a permanent fixture in Japan. They began to be seen as mighty warriors. They had their own way of training and their own way of thinking. The Samurai had their own philosophies as well. They believed that Buddhism and Zen had influenced the samurai culture as well as the Shinto cultures. Zen meditation became a teaching to help the samurai relax and calm the inner warrior’s mind.

They believed that the Buddhist concept of reincarnation and rebirth change the Samurai’s look at the way they killed and some even gave up killing all together, they thought the killings were unnecessary. Some even became Buddhist monks when they realized that the killings were not worth it. Unfortunately, some samurai’s came to that understanding that the killings were useless when they were in the middle of battle and they died while understanding that killing was not what they should be doing

The most shining moment came when Confucianism began to play a part in the samurai philosophy. This important thought was that the importance of the lord –retainer relationship, meaning the lord and warrior relationship. The samurai was required to show loyalty to their lord. The warriors were required to follow a Bushido which was another term for code of conduct. This was created so the Tokugawa Shogunate so they could control the samurais. There was even a book published called Hagakure: The Book of the Samurai by Yamamoto Tsunetomo, it was basically a manual of instructions on how to be a samurai and how the code of conduct will work.

Over time there has been a debates about how the samurai’s should act and how the Bushido should be enforced. Some thought they should be criminal types who went around killings and torturing bad people and others thought of Samurai’s as protectors of the good and the innocent.