My view on Zen(禅) related to Iaido (居 合 道):
Iaido as an applied philosophy and
the social implications out of it

Ray Ballisti
(Work in progress)
 
Link zur Deutschen Version.

Disclaimer:

It obvious that what follows is just my interpretation of the two concepts of ZEN (禅) and of IAIDO.
I do NOT try to explain what ZEN means, there are many good boooks about this.
(see Contribution from other people at the bottom and Wikipedia: Japanese ZEN ).
This is also the initial tentative explanation of the meaning of DO(道) in Iaido.
Nevertheless I think that is should be interesting to everybody to think about these topics.
I got some feedback, see at the end for the comments. Some criticises my limited interpretation of the meaning of ZEN. It is not my goal to write about the meaning of this branch of Buddhism. I just want to pick up the part of it which, in my opinion only, is important for the practice of Iaido, and even more important, to emphasis the social implications of this kind of view.

Thinking steps:

• General considerations about life on Earth
Observations of what is happening on our planet show that the primary goal of every living beings is survival.
The second main goal is the reproduction of the species.
There are a great variety of strategies to achieve either of these two goals.
For example, look at the different strategies of plants and animals.
In order to understand the way in which we practice Iaido, we need to understand how nature works and that evolution started with very simple molecular structures and build out of it more complex structures.
Everything started from inorganic substances and evolved through self-replicating molecules, then enzymes, then first membranes enclosing drops of water and so on. This tendency toward more complex structures is governed by a physical law which just say that nature move toward more stable (energy) states. By binding energy into those complex structures, the number of possible way of using that energy is restricted. In other words it makes the energy balance be more stable.
We should realise that nature just repeats certain processes over and over again without any change.
Fortunately, however, from time to time a mistake (error) occur that disrupt those processes.
Every mistake is an opportunity for a change: without mistakes there is no progress (no evolution).
It is interesting to see how this trend toward more complicated structures also applies to the development of our society.
This shows that making mistakes is not a "sin ", but an opportunity for improvements.
The will to improve is what count!


• Human psychology in a competitive world environment
The human race is one of the many present on this planet.
Thus the same basic goals apply to it: survival and reproduction.
We can say that life is basically a continuous fighting for survival.
But in a society like the human one, survival is more or less given.
Still we have competition for our position in our society.
We see that human being are always struggling for some reason.
Here comes my interpretation of the ZEN view of life:
in spite of all the efforts needed in life, we should keep a clear and peaceful view in our internal attitude toward life [Peace of mind].
One way to reach this is in practicing IAIDO or KYUDO. I will discuss here about IAIDO only.
The same way of thinking apply to KYUDO too.
Remember how some ZEN master gave a silly and unnecessary task to their pupils till they would understand that it is not the success in fulfilling the task which is important, but what count is the attitude with which you do it.
We could here introduce the concept of yaruki, which means a willingness to do something, an eagerness, or motivation for something.
To learn we need:

1. A task without any usefulness (read: PATIENCE)
2. Difficulties in doing it (read: CONCENTRATION) and
3. Instructions and supervision from a teacher (read: TRUST, confidence in your teacher).
Those are the three basic columns of ZEN: patience, concentration and trust(I mean to have confidence in your teacher and thus follow his/her instructions).
The latter is often translated with "duty-fulness", but I think it should better understood as trust toward the teacher.
We are free to chose our teacher, thus we have to do it carefully.
Learning how to use a sword in a correct way is really of no practical utility in today world (who goes around with a sword?) but it is difficult to learn.
If you would try to learn it by yourself, you will not have any feedback, and you will end up in believing of doing everything correctly.
If you do not encounter any difficulty, then you will not be able to improve yourself.
Thus you need a teacher who can correct your mistakes and help you to follow "the way".


• Common mistake about the understanding of ZEN (禅)
Pictures connected with explanation of ZEN masters always shows a peaceful world and idyllic sceneries. This is NOT the description of the world in which the master lives, but a description of the INSIDE of the master mind. Even ZEN masters lives in the same world as we do, full of everyday's problems, difficulties and threats.
It is important to understand that the goal of a ZEN follower is to reach and keep a quite mind IN SPITE of all difficulties around.
Therefore it is wrong to think that in practicing Iaido you should be in a quite and spiritual environment. The opposite is true: you need to be confronted with difficulties in order to learn how to keep your mind in a quite state in spite of what is going on outside you.
Let take an analogy with boats: a sailing boat in an harbour is safe, but this is not what it has been build for. A boat should go out into the sea and fight its way in spite of wind and waves. This cannot be learned inside an harbour. Thus in practicing Iaido we need challenges in order to learn how to keep a quite mind.
And where are the difficulties in Iaido from? You will have to recognise that the first problems come from your body and your mind, but then you will also understand that your teacher is the source of most of your problems that you encounter in practicing Iaido. And this is a very important role for a teacher if you see him also as a ZEN master. In fact he (or she) will always confront you with new tasks, new challenges and you should learn to keep your peace of mind in spite of all this.

In Zen Buddhism, to maintain a beginner’s mind means to be open to continuous growth and deeper understanding. One is encouraged to drink in each moment of life, without excessive desire, pride or judgment.
Please, read in https://creativesystemsthinking.wordpress.com/2016/05/15/zen-the-art-of-living-deeply/
In Japan, this also relates to the idea of kenkyo which means to cultivate modesty and humility, to not be full of oneself.


• Why ZEN was very important to the samurai in Japan
Samurai were warriors. They were fighting with different weapons of which the most common and well known was the sword, usually a KATANA. At the beginning of the 17th century Japan was unified and submitted to the government of a military dictator, the SHOGUN. The following centuries were mostly without battles between armies, thus we could say it was a peaceful period. But there were anyway a lot of fighting, mostly ambushes, traitors, plots and similar events. The samurai had to keep alert all the time and be able to detect all menaces. Now, if your mind is full of some thinking and maybe sorrows, your attention to what comes from the outside is low.
Let make an example: you are inside a room with many people speaking together, but you would like to listen to the birds in the garden just outside. The people speaking inside the room represent your thoughts in your mind. The birds outside represents the possible threats. Thus in order to be able to listen to what sound is coming from the outside of the room, you need first to make the people (your thoughts) be quite inside the room.
A peaceful and QUITE mind allows you to be aware of what is coming from the outside, thus make you aware of any possible danger.
This concept is often explained with mizu no kokoro.
This was for the samurai very important for their survival.


• The content of the iaido teaching reflects the ZEN philosophy and thus has important social implications:
In a random order, here some points:
• I think that we all wish to contribute for a better world.
  Unfortunately our genes and memes (=thoughts that we learn from somebody and teach to others) have been build more then 200'000 years ago, and the last 10'000 years are not enough to modify the nature of the "animal man". But some progress has been done. So let us continue.
  To do this we have to be very pragmatic and adapt ourself to the situation (do you recognise? This is the meaning of the word IAI 居 合).
• I guess that you will agree with me when I say that empathy is a key quality to the human race.
  To have empathy we need to use fantasy and knowledge: both are needed in iaido too.
• Then we need to take responsibility for our doing.
  In iaido we use katana, with which we could do a lot of arm if we would get crazy: and during the training we have to be aware of people around us in order to not cause any injury. We have to take the responsability of swinging a sword in a room with people in it.
• By training a kata we need patience and concentration. Both quality which are very useful in the daily life.
• Then we learn that we cannot progress without that our colleagues also improves and without the help of more advanced teachers. So we learn to collaborate and join with others to reach a common goal (teamwork). This is also very useful in our society.
• Then we see that there are many schools (ryu) and that the same goal can be reached from different ways.
  This teach us to be tolerant and respectful toward different ideas.
• Then we see that in spite of our training at each seminar the sensei correct us and it looks like we will never learn enough. So we realise that progress will never finish. It is like following a way (DO) on our planet: you will never arrive because there is no end (sphere!). But you also discover that on the way you learn a lot and have a lot of experiences which will (should) make you wiser.
• If we teach we see the many mistakes that beginners do, but we learn to appreciate their will for improvement and we try to encourage and support them on the way. This is also a good social behaviour. And if the beginners bit by bit become better than you, then they will help you, and we learn to be modest and open to critics.
  To accept criticism is also a good thing that we learn from iaido.With no criticism no improvement. So we learn to keep our ego in the right place and not in the front in our daily life.
• Kigurai is the Japanese word to describe the feeling that one have if he(she) feel capable for a task (using the sword, for example) but without being arrogant, still keeping modest but confident in oneself.
  As stated by Geoff in kendoinfo: kigurai:
  kigurai can mean confidence, grace, the ability to dominate your opponent through strength of character. Kigurai can also be seen as fearlessness or a high level of internal energy. What it is not, is posturing, self congratulating or show-boating.
• In my opinion fear is the leading feeling which determine the human behaviour.
  This was vital for survival 100'000 years ago and is predominant today too.
  You deal with fear in iaido because kata has only one issue: you win or you're dead.
  A Japanese teacher told me that in order to execute a good kata we should try to think how the situation was at that time and how people would feel in it. This explains why the ancient samurai were not afraid of dead: no feeling should disturb your mind while fighting!
• Greed is also a main source of troubles in our society.
  Greed appears in iaido if you are not patient enough and want to do too much at once: your kata becomes imprecise and with many mistakes. Or if you get angry because you fail an exam and you do not understand why.



• Contribution from other people
Andi Watson suggested to read the book Zen and the Art of Archery.
I read it in the original version: ZEN in der Kunst des Bogenschiessen by Eugen Herrigel, 1948/1953.
I would like to mention here another interesting article about this topic:
The Myth of Zen in the Art of Archery by Yamada Shoji in the
Japanese Journal of Religious Studies, 2001 28/1-2

Thomas C Helm sent me the following links:
• https://cookdingskitchen.blogspot.com/search?q=zen-samurai-and-martial-arts
and

• https://youtu.be/rAXNHCHR_hA
Xenia WanJung Bichler-Hwang made some other suggestions.
From another person I got this:
If you are a Japanese speaker, I would recommend this book, "山岡鉄舟 剣禅話" (Kenzenwa by Yamaoka Tesshu). A historic figure in the Edo period. This is a good book to start with. ... There are other works by him, but are somewhat more in depth and may be difficult to grasp. I can only find Amazon had an English title: Yamaoka Tesshu : zen and swordsmanship, but don't know if you can get a hold of it.
 
I am grateful to all those comments and suggestions. Thank you so much!