text: The subject provided a good historical perspective on Japan's Renaissance period, post civil wars and pre-westernization. In many respects Musashi, a Ronin represents Japan's search for an identity, a country ruled by military might in the form of the Shogun, yet keeping an Emperor who they revered as a god, a god without power. This Sword Saint was a man of great prowess with a sword of wood or of steel; he was also an artist, a lithographer and an author. Yet, he was masterless, masterless in a time when righteous was measured in a retainer's devotion to his master. He was his own master, in a time when Japan had no voice, serving all, without righteous. It would take an other two hundred and fifty years or so and a world war to release the spirit of the Samurai, that being honor amongst personal sacrifice a picture painted in the person of Miyamoto Musashi struggle for perfection and personal mastery of his profession, master of the sword
  