Essays From The Master

In the way of the bat one of the images of the Evading Shadow Kata is captioned with the mantra: “Strike first, strike hard, show no mercy” which is also echoed in the media of the martial arts, but what does mean? Context frames intent and details meaning as to an event in a way that words and other modes of communication cannot. When should one strike first, the answer is when one is in combat, when life is on the line or when one is being observably threatened. Why strike hard, the answer should is because the harder or more effectively one attacks the less one must attack in order to overcome the threat to one’s self. In combat, not in sparring or other type of contest, any show of mercy would be used by an attacker to further their goals. Showing no mercy does not mean a lack of self-awareness, showing no mercy does not mean a lack of control over one’s skills or the level of force being used. To be able to strike first one must be aware of a threat, having deemed a threat one must deal with it in such a way as to set the balance in one’s favor and the threat must be removed or negated i.e. one can show no mercy. A part of defining a threat is knowing the difference between dislike, hatred and danger, danger is a threat while dislike and hatred can lead to threats but are not in and of themselves. The hardness of the strike should complement the level of the threat, it should not be a waste of force or so overwrought that it shows one is desperate and weak i.e. open to attack or is prey.

It is in the fight or during the attack that one should show no mercy, this says nothing of before the event or after it. Mercy means to allow to start over, as though some ill had not been done, to show mercy in combat is to make one’s self a victim. Before combat one can avoid the threat and after combat one can aid the one that threatened if one chooses to do so. Being aware of the threat and thus enabling one to strike, hard, fast and without mercy allows one to set the tone and measure of the combat in keeping with the level of the threat. Being prepared to strike not only first but hard and without mercy sends out cues that lesser powers will be aware of and cause them to avoid a greater power. Being a greater power does not demand one be a threat to others or acting as a bully to those weaker than one so prepared, being a threat does not mean one is powerful or greater than the one being attacked. The serpent when it strikes does so with cause, with force equal to the task and does not hesitate to do so, is it wrong because it is effective in both defensive of its life and providing for its self? If a snake is not threatened or otherwise in need, does not waste its venom to prove that it is a power, the snake conserves and refines its venom so that when it is used the result is not in doubt. Mercy is often conflated with empathy and empathy is often confused with understanding, empathy is the sense that one feels what others feel while understanding is logic as to the experience of another usually based on one’s own; empathy is an ideal with understanding is possible.

To choose understanding over the ideals of mercy and empathy one is willfully going for what is possible and likely rather than going for an ideal that could be an excuse for non-action. In the moment of danger or threat the myth of civilization falls away which is why one would set aside ideals such as empathy or mercy in favor of understanding in order to prevail and thus survive. When the threat is no more one can afford any number of ideals but idealism is only as possible as the means one has to enforce and defend it. Striking first, hard and without mercy means that one must be aware enough to know when such is the best course of action which takes one back to the import of context. If one is able to prevail one is able to choose those ideals that one will cultivate and thus enforce the reality that those ideals propose.