Martial Arts, Spiritual Practice, Alchemy, and the Hidden Legacy of the Samurai
David Jones
Nothing’s Shadow
Martial Arts, Spiritual Practice, Alchemy, and the Hidden Legacy of
the Samurai
By PETER ALEXANDER
There is a scene in Stanley Kubrick’s ‘2001 A Space Odyssey’ that he
clearly and accurately saw as pivotal in the evolution of Humanity.
One ape picked up an animal femur and smashed the other over the head
with it.
From a moment like that, early humans were plunged into a paradigm
shift that has continued to push us into the space age. Two of
Humanity’s distinctive features, our capacity to use tools and our
capacity to kill each other, effectively arrived simultaneously.
Our families, our tribes, our nations, our cultures, our creeds and
our civilisations derived and evolved as a protection from the chaos
unleashed in that inevitable act. Our weapons made us the cooperative
hunters from whom all animals fled, the highest predator. It also
allowed us to prey on the top of the food chain, to kill each other.
War, oppression, slavery and violence became features of the human
condition. These are abominations that have yet to be redressed.
Our nations, our economies, our religions, our medicines, our
inventions, our laws and our governments, have all developed within
this paradigm of violence; to keep us safe from the enemy, to keep us
well, to get on top of adversity. All have at heart the dream to be
free from threat, to freely pursue happiness and satisfaction.
Unfortunately our institutions also have the will to freely violate
the outsider, the foreigner, the poor, the disobedient, the infidel
and unbeliever. If our laws are right, then other laws must be wrong.
If our culture is wisest then others are barbarians. If we are losing,
they must be winning. If we are peace loving then the others must be
war-mongering.
The price for this stage of our evolution has been enormous; fear and
loathing, unnecessary death and violence, confusion, unhappiness,
disease, persecution and slavery. The completion of it will only occur
when we have overcome these characteristics in ourselves and in our
society. The finest sword is never drawn.
Enter the Warrior.....
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