Some thoughts on the spiritual side (or not)

Many years ago, I was asked to review a book written by women in the martial arts (and not for the first, or last time).  The book was a series of essays wherein the writers expressed their reasons for studying different disciplines and what their practices meant to them. 

Outside of the fact that some of the writing was horrifically bad (you think the Internet is bad?  You're right, but it did not invent bad writing, believe me), a repetitive theme that I found very troubling was that some writers were previous assault victims who were using their practice to somehow heal themelves.  In the midst of learning to punch, block and kick, they were using their martial arts training as therapy of one sort or another; to empower themselves or otherwise convert their practice into something I felt it was never intended to be. 

Many writers have discussed the shifting reasons for martial arts training.  Certainly, if any of the essay writers mentioned above declared that their training made them (as one guy many years ago declared in an email list I belonged to) "the best warrior I can be," I would have been equally dismayed.  It is very rare (and sometimes lucky) that a discretely applied empty-hand technique can give someone the upper hand in an encounter, but we do not use sticks (except in very rare cases) or swords or halberds, glaives or spears in our daily life any more.  Yet we still practice these things, so there must be a reason, even though the original reason has become less relevant.

One of those reasons is spiritual development - developing calmness of spirit, ability to think on our feet, and in some way roll better with life's day-to-day crap.  This is the idea behind the -do forms (kendo, iaido, kyudo, or collectively, budo), wherein "do" means "way."  I consider these to be worthy goals of practice, but spiritual development is hardly the sole province of martial arts training.  For example, one of my old sempai, who came and went at my old dojo before I even came on the scene, followed the spiritual aspects of his training to Japan.  After many years he followed it to its evident conclusion and became a Buddhist monk.  Interestingly, once he got to that point in his spiritual life, he gave up practicing budo, because, he said, even though the self-improvement, spiritual development aspects of budo are there, he felt the "bu" ("martial") part to be against the tenets of Buddhism, which frown altogether on the taking of life.  Koryu budo in particular involves practicing kata wherein the overt goal is to maim or kill an opponent.  The idea that somehow through this practice one was also supposed to become more spiritually developed and compassionate formed a paradox that he just could not get past.  So he stopped. 

A couple of weeks ago, one of my students balked at learning the iai kata Junto, in which the iaidoka takes on the role of assisting at a state-ordered suicide (for lack of a better expression).  As even casual observers know, Japan, up until the latter 19th century, had a practice of ordering an offender to commit suicide as a means of capital punishment.  The assistant would take up a position behind him or her, decapitating the person at the proper moment in order to finish carrying out the sentence.  This student was appalled at having to learn to do something which was against his personal beliefs.  He even felt that the miming of such an act was brutal. 

I told him he was right; it was brutal.  I have always found the practice of Junto to be very emotional and even troubling.  We never show this kata in public, but we learn to perform it anyway.  I explained that there were philosophical and spiritual reasons, as well as training reasons, for learning this kata. The stated, nominal reason that swordsmen learned this technique was, of course, that as a samurai, they had orders and were bound to follow them.  In fact, there were members of the samurai class for whom this was a job up until the end of the Edo period.  Observers like Lord Redesdale remarked that these men spent all of their time practicing with targets.  Though it was possible an individual might never be called upon to take part in an execution, he needed to be ready, just in case, and be able to perform a single, perfect cut. 

I told my student that there are a whole range of philosophical issues dredged up by this kata that are worthy of discussion and consideration.  One, of course, is the pursuit of excellence in finding and perfecting that one cut.  Additionally, that one cut could even be considered an act of compassion, since, properly done, it would save the condemned from suffering.  It is also worth considering that sometimes "orders" may be morally suspect.  After a brief chat, he agreed with me and decided to try to learn the kata, even though it still creeped him out.

As a performer by training, I tend to take a performance- and  aesthetic-oriented view of my practice.  Those elements are there by design; I did not invent them, but that point of view tends to rub people in various ways.  The warrior types don't like the idea that kata are beautiful and expressive.  For them, effectiveness is the most important quality (and it is there, if the style is worth anything).  The spiritual types like to gloss over the fact that we are studying contained and ritualized violence, and that the purpose of kata originally was to learn techniques to enable you win an encounter in which your life was at stake, or, more prosaically, that you were carrying out orders to kill this guy.  Sometimes the guy was actually running away from you, but he had to die nonetheless (orders, again).  Iaido practice actually encompases all of these things, and more besides. 

Compassion and self-control are also part of the practice.  On a practical level, that attitude was necessary in order to learn safely; and I think those who practice budo in order to develop those qualities and even to undertake spiritual healing are making lovely use of their time.  But I am on the side of my monk colleague that if you really want those qualities, there is more than one path to follow, and some other paths may be better ones.  For me, budo is a paradox, a puzzle, where brutality contends with contemplating life and death - mine, and other people's.  There's also beauty and strength and toughness of mind, compassion and duty (and maybe thinking about when blind loyalty is a problem, not a virtue).  Does my practice make me a better person?  I'd like to think so.  But I also can't help looking at the whole picture.