Bushido refers not only to martial rectitude, but to personal rectitude: Rectitude or Justice, is the strongest virtue of Bushido. A well-known samurai defines it this way: ‘Rectitude is one’s power to decide upon a course of conduct in accordance with reason, without wavering; to die when to die is right, to strike when to strike is right.’ Another speaks of it in the following terms: ‘Rectitude is the bone that gives firmness and stature. Without bones the head cannot rest on top of the spine, nor hands move nor feet stand. So, without Rectitude neither talent nor learning can make the human frame into a samurai.’
II.
Courage
Bushido
distinguishes between bravery and courage: Courage is worthy of
being counted among virtues only if it’s exercised in the cause of
Righteousness and Rectitude. In his Analects,
Confucius says: ‘Perceiving what is right and doing it not reveals a lack of
Courage.’ In short, ‘Courage is doing what is right.’
III.
Benevolence or Mercy
A
man invested with the power to command and the power to kill was expected to
demonstrate equally extraordinary powers of benevolence and mercy: Love,
magnanimity, affection for others, sympathy and pity, are traits of
Benevolence, the highest attribute of the human soul. Both Confucius and
Mencius often said the highest requirement of a ruler of men is Benevolence.
IV.
Politeness
Discerning
the difference between obsequiousness and politeness can be difficult for
casual visitors to Japan, but for a true man, courtesy is rooted in
benevolence: Courtesy and good manners have been noticed by every foreign
tourist as distinctive Japanese trait. But Politeness should be the expression
of a benevolent regard for the feelings of others; it’s a poor virtue if it’s
motivated only by a fear of offending good taste. In its highest form
Politeness approaches love.
V.
Honesty and Sincerity
True samurai, according
to author Nitobe, disdained money, believing that “men must grudge money, for
riches hinder wisdom.” Thus children of high-ranking samurai were
raised to believe that talking about money showed poor taste, and that
ignorance of the value of different coins showed good breeding: Bushido encouraged
thrift, not for economic reasons so much as for the exercise of abstinence.
Luxury was thought the greatest menace to manhood, and severe simplicity was
required of the warrior class … the counting machine and abacus were abhorred.
VI.
Honor
Though Bushido deals
with the profession of soldiering, it is equally concerned with non-martial
behavior: The sense of Honor, a vivid consciousness of personal dignity
and worth, characterized the samurai.
He was born and bred to value the duties and privileges of his profession. Fear
of disgrace hung like a sword over the head of every samurai …
To take offense at slight provocation was ridiculed as ‘short-tempered.’ As the
popular adage put it: ‘True patience means bearing the unbearable.’
VII.
Loyalty
Economic
reality has dealt a blow to organizational loyalty around the world.
Nonetheless, true men remain loyal to those to whom they are indebted: Loyalty
to a superior was the most distinctive virtue of the feudal era. Personal
fidelity exists among all sorts of men: a gang of pickpockets swears allegiance
to its leader. But only in the code of chivalrous Honor does Loyalty assume
paramount importance.
VIII.
Character and Self-Control
Bushido teaches
that men should behave according to an absolute moral standard, one that
transcends logic. What’s right is right, and what’s wrong is wrong. The
difference between good and bad and between right and wrong are givens, not
arguments subject to discussion or justification, and a man should know the
difference. Finally, it is a man’s obligation to teach his children moral
standards through the model of his own behavior: The
first objective of samurai education was to
build up Character. The subtler faculties of prudence, intelligence, and
dialectics were less important. Intellectual superiority was esteemed, but a
samurai was essentially a man of action. No historian would
argue that Hideyoshi personified the Eight Virtues of Bushido throughout
his life. Like many great men, deep faults paralleled his towering gifts. Yet
by choosing compassion over confrontation, and benevolence over belligerence,
he demonstrated ageless qualities of manliness.
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