In the recesses of an abandoned granary the strong light of the countryside was swallowed up in shadow. It was cool in there, a coldness like newly turned earth before the Spring gets to work on it. Maybe it was the dark or the dampness or the frigid feeling like something ancient and waiting, but the murderer fled there like someone heading home.

In the intuitive way children have, the boy knew he was in the presence of evil.

The pursuers ran them to ground in the granary. There was a crowd of farmers, the potter, the local blacksmith-men who knew all the local ways someone could try to escape. They all knew the boy, too. Once the murderer and his hostage disappeared into the building the crowd paused, momentarily at a loss.

"We should send for the constable," the potter whispered.

"Idiot," the blacksmith countered." It'll take hours. By that time, he'll be long gone. And once he's gone. . ." he drew a finger across his throat, "He doesn't need the boy."

tyle="FONT-SIZE: 10pt">The discussion dissolved into futile suggestions, sounds of despair. A crowd gathered, intent that the murderer should not escape, but intent on saving the boy, and equally perplexed about how to go about doing it.

tyle="FONT-SIZE: 10pt">A small group of men came into view down the road. They had obviously been traveling: their sandals were dirty and their robes had been hitched up to avoid the mud. The crowd slowly grew silent as they approached, eyeing each other warily: these were samurai. Their clothes, their distinctive top-knot hairstyle, but most of all, the daisho-the short and long sword of the warrior-they each carried gave them a fierce, predatory look.

The crowd sank to the ground and bowed deeply, a new element of anxiety adding to their consternation. Samurai were notoriously unpredictable. In the hierarchy of things, farmers were said to be the backbone of the country, but the real power lay in the hands of the men with swords. Warriors ate the rice the farmers grew, but often treated them like the dirt they spent their lives working.

The oldest man present approached the swordsmen and, with a great deal of bowing and apologies, explained the situation. The swordsmen began to murmur, loosening their blades and spreading out for action. They seemed excited by the prospect of fighting, the chance to bring a murderer to justice, and the potential it all had for their reputations as warriors. The villagers grew more agitated. Could it be possible that the samurai failed to see the real problem? It wasn't that they had a murderer trapped here; it was that a boy from their village was being held hostage.

The village elder began to stammer, trying to figure out a way to stop what seemed like an inevitable blood bath.

"Wait." The oldest swordsman was smaller than the others. He had an impassive face with deep lines cut by seasons of squinting in the sun of countless battlefields. Compared to his burlier companions he seamed almost frail, although he had the thick, over-developed forearms of a swordsman. The others deferred to him, however.

For the first time, the village elder spoke directly to the leader, bypassing the conventional go-between. It was a risk, since the swordsman could take great offense, but what was he to do? Remain silent and have to explain to the boy's parents that, yes the boy died, but the social niceties were never violated?

The swordsman listened again to the elder's explanation, standing there quietly, not interrupting, and asking only a few questions when the elder was done. How was the man armed? How long had he been fleeing? How big was the boy?

The bushi sighed to himself, rubbing his chin as he tried to think of a way to solve the problem. A frontal assault was out-while there was no question his disciples would cut the man down, the boy would most certainly die as well.

He sighed again. Such a waste of life. He had seen a great deal of blood spilled in his time. In a way, he had spent his life studying the most efficient ways of doing just that, traveling with his disciples across the country, looking to perfect his skills. But he hated to see innocent life lost and, in a strange way, felt that saving the occasional innocent might somehow make up for the long roll of men he had dispatched.

The problem here was that he could see no way of saving the boy. So he squatted down and waited.

His students hated this about him. They were young and full of energy. They itched to use their skills. The master constantly reminded them, however, that waiting was a skill as well. So they all waited, the warriors and the people in the crowd, while the sun crept across the sky and the shadows began to lengthen.

"Hey out there. I want water. Food. Bring it to me." From the shadows the boy squealed briefly in pain as the murderer punctuated his demands.

The villagers looked at the master for guidance. They were all a bit afraid to approach the granary-after all, there was no reason to make things worse or tempt fate. At the same time, if one of the hot-blooded young swordsmen were picked, there was no telling what might happen.

The master stood up, stretching his back. "Ahh. . ."

"I will go," came a voice from the crowd. A monk, drawn to the commotion, had been sitting there for some time. The master looked at the monk as if seeing him for the first time-the shaved head and saffron robe of office symbols of this man's total devotion to compassion and his complete removal from the concerns of the world. The perfect emissary.

It took some time to assemble the food and water-more time than you would think to find a water gourd and some rice balls. The boy's whimpering could sometimes be heard by the crowd. Eventually the monk emerged and slowly approached the granary. He walked a bit unsteadily, as if afraid to do what he was sent to do. He wobbled along the weedy path to the door, eventually ending up on its right hand side. The murderer had eyed his approach with contempt but moved cautiously into the middle of the door to keep an eye on the monk.

"That's far enough." The monk was unarmed, but a lifetime of caution told the murderer to keep him at least an arm's length away. He still held on to the boy with one hand and his sword with the other.

"I am unarmed," the monk said. Despite his wobbly approach his voice seamed calm and quiet. But who could feel threatened by a monk? "Here is food," he said, holding out two rice balls. The murderer began to reach out, hunger driving away some caution. "Here. I will come no nearer." The monk gently tossed the ball of rice. The man relaxed his grip on the short sword-it was attached to his wrist by a cord-and caught the ball. Without pause, the monk tossed the other one in the same gentle manner.

The murderer fumbled for a split second to manage the boy, the rice ball he held, and the one tossed to him. In a flash, the man the killer thought was a monk was on him. A crashing blow, a twist of the arm, and the killer's feet were swept out from under him.

"Tie him up," the master said to his disciples as they rushed the granary. Then, walking back down the path to the crowd, he said, "Thank you for the loan of your garment, monk. Whatever you may believe, for today at least there is a little less suffering in the world."

The master walked through the crowd, ruefully rubbing his newly shaven head and wondering how long it would take to grow a top-knot back.

As human beings, the world of the senses offers us great joy and great danger. Buddhists speak of the problem of maya (illusion) as an impediment to enlightenment. It is not only that the senses can deceive us; the problem is often that we set too great a store by appearances.

The vignette I have presented above is a famous one in the martial arts-it was even used by Akira Kurasowa as the opening scene of The Seven Samurai. The way it is generally interpreted is as a demonstration of how the incredible skill of a martial artist can be put to use righting wrongs or helping the innocent. In a sense, this is true. I think it is even more importantly an exploration of how the martial artist's obligation to society-for with great skill comes great responsibility-can impel him or her to transcend a concern with appearances and illusions.

Notice in the story that the essential trick that is being played on the murderer is one that surrounds perception. In this case, the master swordsman disguises himself as a Buddhist monk-a peaceful, unthreatening, somewhat inept person-to effect the boy's rescue. The outer badges of a monk's identity-a shaven head, a distinctive type of clothing-delude the killer into permitting the master to get within range. The murderer is by definition deluded, since his mind has been clouded by rage, and the master knows this and uses it against him.

The importance of symbolic trappings in this story has something else to tell us, however. We have to remember that the country where this story took place, feudal Japan, was a deeply class-conscious one. Like many societies of this type, class distinctions were expressed in terms of dress, hairstyle, manners, and even language. Even today, it is possible to listen to two Japanese people speaking and guess, merely from the level of polite language each uses, which speaker has a higher social status.

In feudal Japan, members of the warrior, farmer, and merchant classes were easily identified. They dressed differently (a variety of sumptuary laws even specified what type of fabrics non-samurai were allowed to wear). Their hairstyles were distinct, as well. The men of the warrior class had the top of their heads shaved and grew a top-knot that was combed forward. At around age five, samurai boys were symbolically initiated into their warrior status in a ceremony where they stood on a go board (symbolizing strategy) and presented with a toy sword. Their heads were also shaved in the manner described above. So from a very early age, warriors were aware of how the way they looked was related to who they really were.

The fact that Buddhist monks shaved their heads was a real symbol of their renunciation of the world and its social order. Samurai sometimes entered the monkhood, but usually when they were old men and their utility as warriors was done. In any other situation, to lose your top-knot was a source of real humiliation.

But here we are presented with a story where a master swordsman-a man whose entire life was devoted to refining the arts that helped define the samurai as a class-voluntarily shaves his head to do a good deed. It may not seem terribly significant to readers today, but this was an unheard of thing. This was a society where the warrior class took for granted their superiority and viewed all other people as essentially existing to service the needs of the upper class. This kind of world view breeds a certain callousness. In fact, any samurai, anywhere, who felt that they had even been insulted by a lower-class person, had the legal right to kill that person on the spot and walk away, no questions asked. The gulf between warriors and others was that wide.

The lesson, although centuries old, is relevant for martial artists today. You only have to observe the many subtle ways in which rank and status are indicated in dojo to understand that questions of pride and humility are enduring ones, and that even today we create illusory chasms between ourselves and others. The hunger for rank and advancement on the part of novices is a common phenomenon in many training halls. The white belt stumbles onto the floor, gazing with envious eyes at the yudansha. They wear hakama. Or obi, somber, dark as night, heavy with mystery. They are, to the uninitiated, the embodiment of skill and arcane knowledge that is part of the allure of the arts. They are different, more experienced, more skilled. It is quite common for all involved to believe that they are somehow superior.

Here the danger of illusion is as real for the trainee as it was for the murderer in the story. In the environment of the training hall, it is easy for the more advanced student to let things get to his or her head. It is easy to forget that the trainee is always, in some ways, a novice, and needs to approach training (and relations with others) with that in mind. Many of us can remember coming across individuals who, although skilled, were tremendously self-satisfied about the fact (as if all skill is not relative); seniors who were more interested in impressing others with their competence than with helping their juniors gain some insight into the art.

In judo dojo, for instance, a central concern for all lower ranks (whether they admit it or not) is to try to identify which yudansha will help beginners to learn and which will merely use randori as a way to pound home the fact that a black belt can make a lower rank fall down in a number of different ways. In good dojo, the sensei usually monitors this situation and is not averse to stepping in to teach the senior student a little humility. This is, in fact, an important lesson that needs to be imparted. After working so long and so hard to gain a certain level of skill, students indulge in the quite understandable feeling that they have accomplished something admirable. They have, of course, but they are not done learning. Above all, they run the risk of thinking about themselves more than they think about the art. In such a situation, they lose the focus and seriousness that the martial arts demand. By celebrating their own accomplishments, by forgetting the more complex goals of training , and, above all, by forgetting their obligation to others, they lose the quality of single-heartedness, or isshin, that is so important in martial arts training. They are not a violent type of criminal like the man in the story, but the same flaw that makes them arrogant causes them to lose their capacity to become actors in a positive moral sense in the human community.

The swordsman in the story is obviously someone who has transcended the conceit that comes with accomplishment. He is devoted to his art, not to himself. His sincere pursuit of the way, despite the discomfort and danger it brings him, is an example of the quality of isshin. This man was a master swordsman. His skill was so great that he had attracted a body of students who followed him around. His confidence was so strong that he traveled the country seeking out opponents to vanquish. He may have traveled through the countryside, but in social terms he barely touched the ground as far as local farmers were concerned. Yet he pauses in his journey and voluntarily submits to a type of humiliation in order to save the life of a total stranger-and a lower class stranger at that-when it would have been a great deal more convenient to let the local authorities try to solve what was really a parochial and rather squalid situation that could do little for his reputation as a fighter.

I believe that this is the crux of the story. Disarming an armed man is an impressive feat. The power of the art in subduing a madman pales, however, next to the force it exerts on the master. For by virtue of his pursuit of the way, he is compelled to transcend the limitations of his own pride and concern for public opinion, and to do what is right. His sincere pursuit of the way, despite the discomfort and danger it brings him, is an example of the quality of isshin-single heartedness-that is a central part of training in a martial way, and of the moral dimension implicit in walking this path.

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