Myths, Masters and Mayhem

Stories of the Martial Arts

6 - Miyamoto Musashi: The Definitive Martial Artist?

Like many who are involved in the martial arts, I find Musashi a fascinating enigma - a lethal swordsman during his early life, in later life he became a respected military strategist and architect, artist, poet, and Zen master. Irrespective of what he did in his life, the constant thread was his personal quest for perfection through the Way of the Sword.

For an historic person who is revered in Japan, there is a lot that is not known about his life, especially the early part. For example, there is uncertainty about who was his mother and where he was actually born. It is generally agreed that Musashi was born in or around 1583 in Miyamoto village or possibly Banshu village. He was of a lesser samurai family with affiliations to the more powerful Shinmen clan. His father was a accomplished teacher of martial arts and what little formal martial arts instruction he received would have come from him. His father left the family when Musashi was eight and this could explain a lot of about what drove him later in life.

What is well known, however, is that between the age of 13 and 30 he defeated 60 opponents in duels, often using only a bokken (wooden sword). To just survive this number of duels let alone never being defeated was unheard of. What is more surprising is that he was largely self-taught and often, as a young man, matched himself against swordsman with superior technical skills.

In the Book of Five Rings Musashi states that he taught himself the sword by practicing and studying diligently. A clue as to how he did this can be found by studying his paintings and carvings. These clearly demonstrate that he was a man of keen observational abilities. It can be imagined that as he wandered (technically Musashi was a ronin, or master-less samurai, throughout his life) perfecting his art, offering and accepting challenges, he would have visited dojos and talked with other wandering samurai also following the sword path. By carefully watching and listening he could take away skills and techniques that he would then incorporate into his own fighting style.

Musashi's most famous duel occurred when he was 28 or 29 against Sasaki Kojiro. Sasaki was an exceptional swordsman trained in the venerable Chujo-ryu sword school. He was cultured, refined and had affiliations to the powerful Hosokawa clan. On the other hand Musashi was self taught, lived rough, had a reputation for wining his duels in the most efficient means possible (often without what could be considered proper regard to etiquette), and had no formal clan affiliation. In the society of the time he was not a respectable person.

It is likely that they never met before their first and final meeting, but the rivalry was strong. The duel was carried out on a little island in the strait between Honshu and Kyushu. Musashi had no illusions about the skill of Sasaki and he also knew that he would have to counter the reach Sasaki's unusually long sword.

It is here that we see why Musashi still has so much to teach the modern martial artist. Upon accepting a duel, Musashi's sole focus was on winning - manners or preconceived ideas about the right way to do things were of no importance. His strategy and tactics relied on taking the opponents strengths and turning them into weaknesses. In this case Sasaki was used to having the advantage of the longer sword, Musashi countered this by carving an oar into a weapon with a longer reach. Sasaki was a proud and proper man aware of his rank and precognitives- Musashi ensured that he arrived late and so kept him waiting. As can be imagined when Musashi finally arrived, Sasaki was livid, already the advantage was with Musashi. Musashi also timed his arrival to ensure that as he got out the boat, the sun was over his shoulder and shining into Sasaki's eyes.

The actual duel lasted mere seconds with one strike delivered by each. Sasaki's cut severed Musashi's headband. Musashi's stroke knocked Sasaki senseless - he never regained consciousness.

After this combat there is no record of Musashi killing an opponent in a duel. In fact there is no record of him using a 'live' sword in a duel. From then on he only used one or two bokken (Musashi is also credited with perfecting the simultaneous use of two swords). It is as if having proved that he could defeat any opponent he no longer needed to take extreme measures. He still engaged in tests of skill with other swordsman, but these usually involved him neutralising the opponent's technique until such time as the opponent gave up. It was not uncommon for Musashi to acquire pupils in this manner.

Musashi died of natural causes (probably due to stomach cancer) at the age of 61. Near the end of his life he still lived simply in the Reigan-do cave on Kyushu, but even by then he was a legend to the Japanese.