에도시대 일본무사들의 주자학 수용과 검술적 변용 - 『兵法家傳書』를 중심으로

Abstract

This paper aims to explore the acceptance of Neo-Confucianism and swordsmanship transformation of Japanese warriors during the Edo period. In order to examine the philosophical meaning of Japanese swordsmanship in the Edo period, it must be discussed based on Neo-Confucianism. Through this consideration, it will be easier to understand the ultimate goal of cultivation and the transformed philosophical meaning of Japanese warriors in the Edo period through the absorption of Neo-Confucianism. During the Edo period, Neo-Confucianism was designated as a government school and used as a governing ideology. This Neo-Confucianism naturally melted into the swordsmanship of warriors. As a specific theory of cultivation of Neo-Confucianism, the warriors accepted the ideas of ‘Gewuzhizhi(格物致知)’, ‘the way ward human mind, the Moral min(人心道心)’, and ‘Jing(敬)’. Takuang Soho(澤庵宗彭, 1573∼1646) and Yagyu Munenori(柳生宗矩, 1571∼1646) saw ‘Jing(敬)’ as a spiritual unification that concentrates the mind in one place and prevents it from being scattered elsewhere. However, ‘Jing(敬)’ is a low-level training method, and a higher level is Buddhism's ‘one should generate a mind that is not fixed on anything(應無所住, 而生其心)’. In other words, in terms of swordsmanship, it was more important to release the mind freely than to hold it. As such, Japanese Zen monks and warriors accepted the theories of Neo-Confucianism, but reinterpreted them in a Buddhist way along with their practical experience of swordsmanship. The most notable cultural characteristics of kendo over its long history are its emphasis on spirituality. The problem with this spirituality lies in the view of personality through training along with the state of mind when facing the enemy. This means that the highest state of swordsmanship is that the sword and the heart become one. In the end, what Japanese martial arts ultimately wanted to pursue through the philosophical foundation of Neo-Confucianism was ‘composure(平常心)’.