Book Description
The Code of the Samurai is a four-hundred-year-old explication of the rules and expectations embodied in Bushido, the Japanese way of the warrior. bushido has played a major role in shaping the behavior of modern Japanese government, corporations, society, and individuals, as well as in shaping the modern Martial Artsl arts within Japan and internationally. The Japanese original of this book has been one of the primary sources on the tenets of Bushido, a way of thought that remains fascinating to the modern world, East and West.


About the Author
Thomas Cleary is the translator of Opening the Dragon Gate (Tuttle, 1996) and The Story of Chinese Zen (Tuttle, 1995), as well as The Art of War, The Book of Five Rings, The Japanese Art of War, and dozens of other titles on Martial Artsl Philosophysophy, Buddhism, Taoism, religion, Philosophysophy, and motivation. He lives in Oakland, California.


Excerpted from Code of the Samurai : A Modern Translation of the Bushido Shoshinsu by Yuzan Daidoji, Oscar Ratti, Thomas Cleary. Copyright © 1999. Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved
One who is supposed to be a warrior considers it his foremost concern to keep death in mind at all times, every day and every night, from the morning of New Year's Day through the night of New Year's Eve. As long as you keep death in mind at all times, you will also fulfill the ways of loyalty and familial duty. You will also avoid myriad evils and calamities, you will be physically sound and healthy, and you will live a long life. What is more, your character will improve and your virtue will grow. Here are the reasons for that. All human life is likened to evening dew and morning frost, considered something quite fragile and ephemeral. While this is so of all people's lives, the life of the warrior is particularly precarious. If people comfort their minds with the assumption that they will live a long time, something might happen, because they think they will have forever to do their work and look after their parents-they may fail to perform for their employers and also treat their parents thoughtlessly. But if you realize that the life that is here today is not certain on the morrow, then when you take your orders from your employer, and when you look in on your parents, you will have the sense that this may be the last time-so you cannot fail to become truly attentive to your employer and your parents. This is why I say you also fulfill the paths of loyalty and familial duty when you keep death in mind. In any case, when you forget death and become inattentive, you are not circumspect about things. You may say something offensive to someone and get into an argument. You may challenge something you might as well have ignored, and get into a quarrel. Or you may stroll about in resorts where you have no business, not avoiding the crowds, where you might bump into some oaf and get into an unexpected brawl. You could lose your own life, get your employer bad publicity, and cause your parents and siblings difficulties. All this trouble comes from inattentiveness when you fail to keep death in mind at all times.

FROM THE PUBLISHER