Читать книгу A Gaijin's Guide to Japan: An alternative look at Japanese life, history and culture - Ben Stevens - Страница 18

Or ‘Way of the Warrior’ (literally ‘Warrior’s Way’, though that doesn’t sound half as good), encompasses the typical ‘manly’ characteristics, such as self-control, perseverance, courage, honesty, loyalty and so on.

Inazo Nitobe, in his famous book imaginatively entitled BushidŦ (it would probably have to be called Fighting Techniques of Japan’s Deadly Flying Samurai Ninja Warrior Monks of Death to succeed in today’s market) observed that the samurai’s code of practice wasn’t that different from the Western knight’s chivalric code, and most fighting forces dating from the beginning of time would probably claim to possess the above attributes.

BushidŦ expected the samurai to readily meet his own death at a moment’s notice—a death he was often required to mete out to himself through the act of seppuku, or the cutting open of his own belly with a short sword. This was thought to release the samurai’s spirit in the most dramatic way possible (I’d have to agree with that), and was the only way to escape defeat on the battlefield or to avoid some other source of great shame.

Naturally, seppuku was extremely painful. Hence the usual presence of another samurai, armed with a long sword with which to cut off his friend’s head and end his suffering the moment the act was completed.