The myth of the honourable Samurai busted?

[manganimefan227]

What kind of evidence do you expect? Most "evidence" on the internet is about as accuarate as what you see here. For all you know, they could be lying, too.

[Twisted]

Personally? I would like to see hard printed evidence based on acual facts that can be traced historically.

And the I would ignore them and live in the blissfull facade that honorable samurai did exist.

I mean, I watching Shinkenger. Which is about Kanji and Samurai. And Bushido. And stuff...

Like I said, I don't want that image to be busted. I love that cool image of samurai too much I guess...

[Nyororin]

Living in Japan, I have to say that I`ve seen very little romanticism of samurai, and particularly not of bushido. That seems to be massively popular with people from outside of Japan, so tourism doesn`t hesitate to do so. As far as romanticism I have experienced - look to ninjas. Nowhere even close to the level done outside Japan, but still very removed from reality.

There seem to be romanticized stories of specific samurai groups or individuals... But as a whole, I`ve seen them painted as lazy, arrogant, abusive of power, etc, far more than I have seen them portrayed as honorable.

I`d say pretty much everyone knows the phrase 切捨御免 and it`s origin.

[Sangetsu]

Interesting, as I've read texts dating to the 16th and 17th centuries which use the term "bushido". But then there are stories also on the internet that the Apollo moon landings weren't real either, and that space aliens visit the White House regularly.

Believe nothing that you read, and only half of what you see.

There are numerous manuals and guides belonging to various schools of the martial arts (including the style which I myself studied) which date to well before 1900, and describe the "warrior discipline". Musashi's "Gorin no sho" (written in 1645) describes bushido as "the way of the warrior", describing a path to enlightenment by adhering to it's virtues.

The term bushido was not coined by 20th century nationalists, it was merely counterfeited.

[Ronin4hire]

Ill repeat what I said before as some are questioning the source of this idea.

The idea was presented in a class Im taking at a JAPANESE university concerning Japan and Nationalism/Nation-state ideology.

Though I suppose it should be mentioned that it was posited against the idea that Bushido actually existed. However one thing is clear. What Bushido is was never defined explicitly untill the Meiji era by the author Nitobe Inazo who took a bunch of writings which are said to expose the Samurai spirit (as well as ommitting details about the atrocities the Samurai committed) slapped them together and called them Bushido.

This would mean that while the term may have existed before then, our concept of Bushido and what it is is is completely imagined.

I mean dont get me wrong, I have nothing against the imagined Bushido principles themselves (though to be honest I know nothing about them directly, my impression of them is that they seek to foster strength of character while remaining humble with regard to your place in nature, which is not a bad thing in my opinion). However when this is used to perpetuate a false concept of religious proportions, about a culture or nation then I have a problem with it.