The Deification of the Sword

[m a s a m u n e]

Hello Everyone,

I was just thinking about...stuff...and this question popped in my head. Why are swords always deified? In so many cultures (maybe even in all), the sword has always been held in a high regard. It has been made a holy/evil weapon, a sign of status, a thing of etiquette, a sign of refinement, the epitome of power, and much more. These themes for the sword has been made universal. How?

Yours Truly,

[Tony Peters]

in his novel 'Snow Crash'. "A gun anyone can shoot but a Sword needs no demonstration" (I may have paraphrased a bit, but its close). The sword is a weapon that requires a great deal of skill and commitment to master. A gun any idiot can pick up and be deadly with, a sword on the other hand requires and its wielder be experienced in its use, so that he doesn't kill himself with his own weapon.

[dbeaird]

I think I'll just let the comment that anyone can shoot a gun sorta pass with one comment....yes, anyone can shoot a gun, but not just anyone can hit what they want with it. Being an expert with a gun takes a lot of work, just like a sword or anything else really.

Anyway...I think the cult of the sword is a result not of difficulty of training, but a matter of expense. To this day, good swords are extremely expensive items, and they are relatively inexpensive compared with the cost in the days when high quality metals were almost as rare as the craftsmen able to work them into beautiful and effective weapons. A good sword was about the equivalent of owning a car without the financing option.

Another factor is that swords are easy to carry compared with all other weapons, except the knife which was a tool carried by everybody. This made it a status symbol that could be displayed conveniently and doubled as a means of defense when needed.

So with the qualities of display of wealth and power, and being so easy to carry, the sword became a status symbol in many countries. The step from status symbol to a symbol of the power and wealth of the people who carried the sword is a simple jump of association.

Finally, the use of the sword as a method of execution in many cultures linked it directly with the exercise of power.

Certainly using a sword effectively requires serious study and practice, but rather like a gun, anyone can strap one on, or wave it about in dramatic style, or even kill someone with it. I rather doubt that the average peasant on seeing a nobleman and his retinue armed with swords was impressed by their abilities as martial artists, but rather by the power that is represented by wealth and weapons of destruction.

[Carlos Estrella]

As a life long martial artist, I've often felt as if the sword (specifically the Japanese-styled blade used for Iai or Batto (and of course in combat by the Samurai)) had an almost holy aura to it, although my faith prevents me from actually "worshiping" one. However, the question of why swords tend to be so deified does deserve some thought...

ANYTHING that can both be used for life and death is a serious thing, and things that serious tend to weigh on the mind of man (and woman of course). Then again, it depends on the actual thing to an extent. In other words, what do you fear more, a "Saturday Night Special (forgive me Mas Ayoob - my shooting mentor and a great human being), or a 44 Magnum, the "most powerful handgun in the world and it'll blow your head clean off..." We tend to look at not just the capability, but the "hype." You could have the crappiest Masamune sword ever made but dammit, it's a MASAMUNE and can kill a hundred with a single stroke and raise the dead, feed a crowd with a few loaves and fishes... oops... wrong story <g>.

I bow to my sword before I place it in my obi, but I don't pray to it. On the other hand, the "Kami" of a sword may be important to another person, and I respect that. Deification is basically in the eyes of the beholder, and the temptation to deify a sword is basically a combination of hype, history, tradition and potential of the object or person deified.

Just my humble opinion.

Yours in the Spirit of Budo,

Carlos

[Soulend]

Good question, but although respect for swords was widespread, it was not universal. In Nordic/Scandanavian lore one seems to find just as much, if not more, deification of spears, axes, and hammers as swords. The Mongols seemed to prize the bow above all else..fitting, as they were so damn good with them. The Roman legionairre seemed to have little sentiment concerning his gladius- it appears to have only been considered a tool for killing, without myth or legend. And even in Japan the spear and the bow seemed once to hold more respect than the sword.

I'm thinking along the lines of Mr. Beaird. In those cultures or eras where use and carry of the sword was restricted to (or more commonly carried by) an 'elite' or 'noble' section of society, that seems to be where we see the most myths, legends, and 'deification.'

As to 'any idiot' being able to pick up a gun and use it safely or effectively, I disagree completely. I don't think that becoming a champion rifle or pistol shot takes any less commitment than attaining great skill with a sword. I submit that I could hand a sword to an untrained man (just as you could an axe, large knife, or machete) and he could kill people with it just fine. Could he kill a trained swordsman with it? Probably not..but if you were to hand him a pistol he couldn't out-draw Ed McGivern or outshoot Jerry Barnhart either.

[Tony Peters]

Dan, I agree with you point about the power that owning a sword shows as far as one's position, The modern example of a Naval Officers sword comes to mind Officers have them enlisted don't. Marines NCO's are authorized a sword but they have more power (perceived or otherwise) than the average grunt.
As for a gun taking more time to master...spray and pray will still kill people. you can't do that with a sword.

[dbeaird]

Tony, I recall a thread on E-Budo a while back about a guy who ran into an English church swinging a sword and managed to be moderately successful in the mayhem and death strewing department. I agree that it probably wasn't as easy or effective as hosing the place down with a mac-10 but it achieved a similar result. I also don't remember reading that this guy had any sword training.

Shooting a gun may be more intuitive than swinging a sword, but hitting someone with a sword is still pretty easy assuming the other feller ain't got one. I expect that's where gun fights get chancy too.

[Soulend]

As for a gun taking more time to master...spray and pray will still kill people. you can't do that with a sword

This is due to technology, not due to ease of mastery. You 'can't do that with a sword' because the sword isn't capable of it, not because swordsmanship is neccesarily more difficult or time consuming to learn properly. And I don't think anyone said a gun took 'more time to master'. I actually agree that the sword would probably take longer, but it doesn't mean any old idiot can pick up a rifle and be transformed into Carlos Hathcock either. I've been shooting for 25 years or so and I'm not even close.

I don't quite understand the logic...kind of like saying that since flying a jet will take you places faster than riding a horse, becoming a good pilot must be easier than becoming a good equestrian.

While to a kenjutsuka a katana is a thing of balanced and deadly beauty, let's demystify the object itself for a second. It is a long piece of sharpened steel. You could swing it like a baseball bat and kill someone.

I certainly don't want to downplay the time, dedication, and effort it takes to become proficient with a sword...but I have known competition shooters that spent hour after hour on a daily basis shooting, handloading, and tweaking their weapons and expending thousands of rounds in the process. Even I would get sick of fooling with guns after following their regimen for any length of time. It is by no means easy to become as skillful as they, just as it isn't easy to become good with a sword.

[Tony Peters]

since no one here is going to be swayed I have but one comparison to make the psycho guy in england with the $100 (or pound) Chinese sword vs the psycho guy in the San Diego McDonalds wth the $100 Chinese SKS. Was technology a factor? yes but then the (US) Army and Marines can train a know nothing kid into a deadly gundo expert in under three months the same is not likely to be said of any form of swordsmanship.

[Soulend]

Nope, in three months we produce a basically trained Marine, not a deadly expert at anything.