Musashi's Dokkodo (The Way of Walking Alone)

Precept 16:
Do not collect weapons or practice
with weapons beyond what is useful
“Practical wisdom is only to be learned in the school of
experience. Precepts and instruction are useful so far as
they go, but, without the discipline of real life, they remain
of the nature of theory only.” — Samuel Smiles
Monk:
Often people accept an edict from authority unquestionably. This, of
course, happens in religions of all kinds. However, sometimes when
one examines these edicts a conflict arises. This is discovered
discord. Discovered discord can take many different forms but one of
the most common ones is when something that appears to be
necessary and essential simply is not. As an example, it is not
necessary to say the Nicene Creed to be a Christian.
[32]
You could
argue the reasons why it is necessary to say the creed, of course,
but Christianity is not dependent on that creed. Belief in an
omniscient, omnipotent, and omnipresent God who is the creator of
everything that exists, and the agent of redemption, Christ, these are
at the core of Christianity’s tenants. These aspects exist regardless
of whether a creed is stated or not.
This same discovered discord can happen in all aspects of our life.
While reading Musashi’s simple statement, “Do not collect weapons
or practice with weapons beyond what is useful,” a moment of clarity
happened for me. I have a pair of sai, Okinawan weapons that looks
like mini handheld pitchforks, which I have owned since the early

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eighties. While they are very high quality, I rarely use them and they
mostly collect dust.
In general, I have little interest in martial arts weapons. Outside of
the little boy inside me that likes sticks and swords I have no real use
for these sai. Oddly however, I have an emotional attachment to
them even though they honestly serve no real purpose for me. I
handed them to one of my black belts and said, “You like these, go
ahead take them home, you can practice more there.” These are not
useful to me and I have stopped practicing with and teaching them.
In fact, I suspect they are going to go the way of the buggy whip;
horse-drawn buggies are gone and with that them the once
ubiquitous buggy whips used to control the horse. Similarly, the sai
are on the same path as the buggy whip. If they are not at that point
for everyone, they surely have gotten to that place in my mind
anyway.
It is evident that I no longer need to hang on to weapons that I no
longer need. To that end, the sai and tonfa, two weapons that have
great historic value but are not horribly practical in modern times are
no longer going to be part of my martial arts effort. I don’t practice
enough with them to have the level of competency that I require of
myself so they have become as Musashi puts it, “Beyond what is
useful.” I will go even further with Musashi in that in his Book of Five
Rings he states that I need to, “Be familiar with all weapons.”
Musashi, with these two writings, has made his opinion clear. Be
familiar with what weapons that are out there and how they are used,
but practice with your weapon, the one you find most valuable, and
get very good at using it.
In my case, my focus is on an empty hand. While karate might have
some synergies with weapons forms, it is not dependent on kobudo,
the practice of traditional Okinawan weapons. This is not a case of
me telling others what to do, not in the least. My martial arts are not
defined by the collection of forms or weapons, just as the heart of a
person is not determined by the presence or absence of a creed.
The immense majority of my training is empty hand. I am also

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familiar with the many kobudo weapons; while I’m not highly
proficient with them, I know what they can do. So, I am in agreement
with Musashi. I will no longer divide my study time between karate
and kobudo.