Bushido

Hello fellow samurais and curious observers. Here is some tasty copypasta I stumbled upon on the seven branches of the samurai's code of chivalry: The Bushido. Thought this might be a nice piece to read for all those who play the job for more than dishing out tasty damage, or anyone else that is interested in the history of the samurai. Enjoy!

Gi
Honesty and Justice
==========================
Be acutely honest throughout your dealings with all people. Believe in justice. Not from other people, but from yourself. To the true samurai there are no shades of gray in the question of honesty and justice. There is only right and wrong.

Rei
Polite Courtesy
=========================
Samurai have no reason to be cruel. They do not need to prove their strength. A samurai is courteous even to his enemies. Without this outward show of respect we are nothing more than animals. A samurai is not only respected for his strength in battle but also by his dealing with other men. The true strength of a samurai becomes apparent during difficult times.

Yu
Heroic Courage
=======================
Rise up above the masses of people who are afraid to act. Hiding like a turtle in a shell is not living at all. A samurai must have heroic courage. It is absolutely risky. It is dangerous. It is living completely, fully, wonderfully. Heroic courage is not blind. It is intelligent and strong.

Meiyo
Honor
===============
A true samurai has only one judge of honor, and this is himself. Decisions you make and how these decisions are carried out are a reflection of whom you truly are. You cannot hide from yourself.

Jin
Compassion
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Through intense training, the samurai becomes quick and strong. He is not as other men. He develops a power that must be used for the good of all. He has compassion. He helps his fellow man at every opportunity. If an opportunity does not arise, he goes out of his way to find one.

Makoto
Complete Sincerity
===========================
When a samurai has said he will perform an action, it is as good as done. Nothing will stop him from completing what he has said he will do. He does not have to 'give his word'. He does not have to 'promise'. Speaking and doing are the same action.

Chu
Duty and Loyalty
=======================
For the samurai, having done some 'thing' or said some 'thing', he knows he owns that 'thing'. He is responsible for it, and all the consequences that follow. A samurai is immensely loyal to those in his care. To those he is responsible for, he remains fiercely true.

wheres the part about commiting honrable suicides?

nice, need to copypasta this on my computer.

LOL I was thinking the same thing...

We're morbid.

seppuku?

I thought the word started with an H...

Hara-kari

your thinking of Harakiri, it's just another form of Seppuku lol.

fack i got beat D:

Here's a picture of the real deal. Back in around 1870 I believe. Tom Cruise wasn't around at the time unfortunately xD

Tom Cruise is gay.

*** Tom Cruise, where's Ken Watanabe?! That guy's awesome ^^

no clan flag? most samurai are loyal to a family and usually display it religiously.

odd that there is no sign of it.

Unfortunately the camera's time of existence isn't conducive to the samurai's prosperous generation. As you're well aware, feudal Japan quickly became martial and law ruled in the late 19th century.

http://encyclopediadramatica.com/Weeaboo

Care to actually contribute something other than this lame ***?

Thats better used to descrbe the animetard fans.

Not particulary.

The whole honorable suicide thing gets blown way out of proportion in Western interpretation.

Think of it this way:

Whenever an American politician, corporate CEO, or anyone else in a public position makes the tiniest mistake -- especially if that mistake results in tragedy for an unrelated party, or a party they are directly responsible for -- what's the first thing Americans do? En masse?

Ask the person to resign immediately, as a matter of principle. Often before even really examining all the facts.

This is demanding, in a sense, a form of career suicide. We are asking them to publicly kill their own careers as a symbolic gesture of remorse and acceptance of personal responsibility. While we're perfectly willing to ask them to destroy their own lives this way, asking them to actually take their own lives shocks the American conscience because of historical Judeo-Christian influence on American culture.

Samurai was not a job. Samurai was a caste that you were born into, and made up less than 3% of the population at their most numerous. Despite what crappy B-movies and anime might portray, you could not become samurai if you were not born one, and you could not "resign" from being a samurai just because you didn't want to be one anymore.

At the same time, the Buddhist and Shinto influence on Japanese culture at the time dictated a cyclical, naturalistic death and rebirth. Death was not seen as the epic, one-way, singular end event like it historically was in American religion and culture.

Thus, if you screwed up in your job as a samurai -- especially in a way that resulted in spectacular tragedy or suffering for those you represented or were ultimately responsible for -- it was expected that you would "resign" your position immediately. As samurai was a born position, (the only ones usually expected to commit seppuku, by the way), and leading religious beliefs at the time centered around reincarnation, the way you "resigned" as a samurai was by killing yourself and coming back as something else next time.

The reason they chose to do it in the most painful way possible (self-disembowling), is the same reason why, if you're resigning as the disgraced head of a major American corporation, giving yourself a $500M severance package on the way out just might be interpreted by others as a sign of little actual remorse or sense of personal responsibility.

Really, it's exactly the same underlying reasoning in both cultures. The only difference is culture/religious influence on how the problem should be dealt with.