The Book of Five Rings
by Miyamoto Musashi
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Book Summary Information
Author: Miyamoto MusashiTranslator: Thomas Cleary
Edition: Mass Market Paperback
Audio: English (Original Language); English (Unknown); English (Published)
Published: 2005-01-11
ISBN: 1590302486
Number of pages: 192
Publisher: Shambhala
Book Reviews of The Book of Five Rings
Book Review: Two Books for the Price of One!! - Musashi & Munenori together in one place!!
Summary: 5 Stars
Unlike the dozens of other translations of "The Book of Five Rings", this one also contains "The Book of Family Traditions on the Art of War" by Yagyu Munenori (A contemporary of Musashi). How's that for value for money?!
The Book of Five Rings (Go Rin No Sho) is a GREAT book! If you take time to properly absorb and understand ALL of its teachings. It's not a very long book and so would be easy to read a few times over so that you get a proper flavour of the important message being presented. Thomas Cleary is a prolific writer and well qualified to produce such a translation.
A better and easier to digest version (IMHO) of this small book is "Samurai Strategies: 42 Martial Secrets" by Boye De Lafayette Mente, who very cleverly summarises this book into 42 easy to digest and understand and apply chapters.
The ideas in this book are NOT dangerous to anyone in the least, IF you balance and apply ALL of the lessons within it - that's the idea that the great undefeated warrior Musashi was trying to put across. The life saving principles he expounds here are designed to help us all have a better, easier and more fulfilled life, Martial Artist or not. His strategies can be applied and used by anyone.
"A knife is dangerous for anyone - you just have to learn how to use is safely & intelligently"
We are all so lucky & truly blessed that, nearly 400 years ago, someone called Lord Hosokawa had the foresight to ask the ageing Musashi to write down his secrets of success. Musashi himself was not only extremely talented but must have been a very intelligent man for his time to write such a treatise.
The comment (else ware) about this book not being for beginners is misleading I think, it isn't that hard to understand and extrapolate the true meaning and intentions that Musashi was trying to put across.
Don't be put off by ANY of the negative criticisms (in other reviews), it's only because they've missed the point or just quickly scanned & glossed over the book.
Although we are not entirely certain of Musashi's religious bent, Musashi bases his book [loosely] on the Zen Buddhist philosophies of the Five Elements - Earth, Water, Fire, Wind & Emptiness. One of his close associates was Takuan Soho, author of "The Unfettered Mind".
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