Ninja

Ninja Religion: A Response
Kokeshi

Sorry... couldn't resist!

I received an interesting comment on an earlier article I wrote about Bujinkan Ninjutsu becoming a registered religious organisation and have decided that since it raised many interesting issues it deserved a proper reply. So here goes:

Firstly I would like to ask who the critics of the Bujinkan are and the sources that you have for their arguments against the Bujinkan? Not because I don’t believe you, it seems totally plausible criticism but I would like to know the source of this reference as you do not specify.

I have been involved with martial arts for about 10 years first practicing Wing Chun Kung Fu then Muay Thai and currently I’m training in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu and Judo. I also served as the president for the Thai boxing and Brazilian Jiu Jitsu sports societies at university so I have quite a bit of personal experience with martial arts communities and criticisms and discussions of other arts are common in such communities.

However, my main source for the arguments against the Bujinkan I presented is the large martial arts discussion forum ‘Martial Arts Planet’. I have been a member there for over 5 years and over the past year or so I have also become involved with moderating the site. At first I moderated the religion and the Thai boxing forums but for the past few months I have also took over moderating the Ninjutsu forum. As a result, I have read more discussions about Ninjutsu than probably most practitioners have and many of those discussions have revolved around criticisms. So that is the source from where I draw the criticisms from.

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The Religion of the Ninja

Rather than bother with a long winded philosophical ramble about my motivations or an indepth exploration of the deep personality flaws that undoubtedly underly my entrance to the blogging world I thought I would jump in at the deep end and kick things off with a discussion of the topic at the heart of almost all religious debates… ninjas!

Lest the infamous ability of the internet to eat sarcasm comes into effect I feel I should duly acknowledge that ninjas, although featuring prominently across the internet, are by and large absent from debates surrounding religion. However, this could all be about to change due to a recent announcement from Masaaki Hatsumi, the current head of the largest Ninjutsu organisation around today; the Bujinkan.

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