All Topics  
Yamamoto Tsunetomo

 

   Email Print
   Bookmark   Link






 

Yamamoto Tsunetomo



 
 
, also read Yamamoto Jocho (June 11 1659 - November 30, 1719) was a samurai of the Saga Domain
Saga Domain

Saga Domain was a han , or fief, in Tokugawa period Japan. Largely contiguous with Hizen Province on Kyushu, the domain was governed from Saga Castle in the capital city of Saga, Saga by the Nabeshima clan of tozama daimyo....
 in Hizen Province
Hizen Province

was a former old provinces of Japan of Japan which bordered on the provinces Chikuzen province and Chikugo province. It was included in Saikaido, and today the area is split into Saga prefecture and Nagasaki prefecture prefectures, although it did not include the regions of Tsushima Province and Iki Province that are now part of modern Nagasaki...
 under his lord Nabeshima Mitsushige
Nabeshima Mitsushige

was a Japanese daimyo of the early Edo period. Famed for his forbidding of junshi, the form of traditional suicide whereby a retainer followed his lord in death....
. For thirty years Yamamoto devoted his life to the service of his lord and clan. When Nabeshima died in 1700, Yamamoto did not choose to follow his master in death in junshi
Junshi

Junshi ??: following the lord in death, sometimes translated as "suicide through fidelity", refers to the medieval Japanese act of vassals committing seppuku upon the death of their lord....
 because the master had expressed a dislike of the practice in his life. Instead, Yamamoto followed his lord's wishes and refrained from junshi.






Discussion
Ask a question about 'Yamamoto Tsunetomo'
Start a new discussion about 'Yamamoto Tsunetomo'
Answer questions from other users
Full Discussion Forum



Quotations


A faultless person is one who withdraws from affairs. This must be done with strength.

A person who is discreet in speaking will be useful during the good times and will avoid punishment during the bad.

According to their nature, there are both people who have quick intelligence, and those who must withdraw and take time to think things over.

As everything in this world is but a shame, Death is the only sincerity. Chapter 11

If you are slain in battle, you should be resolved to have your corpse facing the enemy.

In the eyes of mercy, no one should have hateful thoughts. Feel pity for the man who is even more at fault. The area and size of mercy is limitless.






Encyclopedia


, also read Yamamoto Jocho (June 11 1659 - November 30, 1719) was a samurai of the Saga Domain
Saga Domain

Saga Domain was a han , or fief, in Tokugawa period Japan. Largely contiguous with Hizen Province on Kyushu, the domain was governed from Saga Castle in the capital city of Saga, Saga by the Nabeshima clan of tozama daimyo....
 in Hizen Province
Hizen Province

was a former old provinces of Japan of Japan which bordered on the provinces Chikuzen province and Chikugo province. It was included in Saikaido, and today the area is split into Saga prefecture and Nagasaki prefecture prefectures, although it did not include the regions of Tsushima Province and Iki Province that are now part of modern Nagasaki...
 under his lord Nabeshima Mitsushige
Nabeshima Mitsushige

was a Japanese daimyo of the early Edo period. Famed for his forbidding of junshi, the form of traditional suicide whereby a retainer followed his lord in death....
. For thirty years Yamamoto devoted his life to the service of his lord and clan. When Nabeshima died in 1700, Yamamoto did not choose to follow his master in death in junshi
Junshi

Junshi ??: following the lord in death, sometimes translated as "suicide through fidelity", refers to the medieval Japanese act of vassals committing seppuku upon the death of their lord....
 because the master had expressed a dislike of the practice in his life. Instead, Yamamoto followed his lord's wishes and refrained from junshi. After some disagreements with Nabeshima's successor, Yamamoto renounced the world and retired to a hermitage in the mountains. Late in life (between 1709 and 1716), he narrated many of his thoughts to a fellow samurai, Tsuramoto Tashiro
Tsuramoto Tashiro

, was a young samurai who visited an ageing recluse Yamamoto Tsunetomo on March 5 1710 and remained fascinated by the older samurai of the Saga domain....
. Many of these aphorisms concerned his lord's father and grandfather Naoshige
Nabeshima Naoshige

a retainer of the Ryuzoji clan during the Sengoku period of the 16th century. Naoshige was the son of Nabeshima Kiyosada and was known as Nobumasa throughout half of his career under the Ryuzoji....
 and the failing ways of the samurai caste. These commentaries were compiled and published in 1716 under the title of Hagakure
Hagakure

Hagakure , or is a practical and spiritual guide for a warrior, drawn from a collection of commentaries by the samurai, Yamamoto Tsunetomo, former retainer to Nabeshima Mitsushige, the third ruler of what is now the Saga prefecture in Japan....
; a word that can be translated as either In the shadow the Leaves or hidden leaves.

The Hagakure was not widely known during the years following Tsunetomo's death, but by the 1930s it had become one of the most famous representatives of bushido
Bushido

, meaning "Way of the Warrior", is a Japanese code of conduct and a way of the samurai life, loosely analogous to the concept of chivalry. It originates from the samurai moral code and stresses frugality, loyalty, martial arts mastery, and honour until death....
 taught in Japan
Japan

Japan is an island country in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, People's Republic of China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south....
.

Tsunetomo believed that becoming one with death in one's thoughts, even in life, was the highest attainment of purity and focus. He felt that a resolution to die gives rise to a higher state of life, infused with beauty and grace beyond the reach of those concerned with self-preservation. He similarly believed in immediate action, and in the Hagakure criticized the carefully planned Ako vendetta of the Forty-seven Ronin
Forty-seven Ronin

The revenge of the , also known as the Forty-seven Samurai, the Ako vendetta, or the took place in Japan at the start of the eighteenth century....
 (a major event in his lifetime) for its delayed response.

Yamamoto Tsunetomo is also known as Yamamoto Jocho, the name he took after retiring and becoming a monk.

Footnotes


External links

  • by