Book Review: Forrest Morgan's "Living the Martial Way"

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                It was during my recent stint studying avian social behavior in California that I stumbled upon a book which has contributed immensely to my understanding of traditional martial arts and the often perplexing result of their interweaving with Western culture and ideals. I found it on my third trip to an independent used books store in Monterey, which, to my delight, had an entire shelf labeled “martial arts”. I spent at least an hour squeezed up against that shelf as I made room for other shoppers in the narrow aisle, thumbing eagerly through the mess of second hand titles the store had to offer. The book which caught my eye at this particular time was “Living the Martial Way” by Forrest E. Morgan.

                The title of the book, generic as it is, was not what impressed me, but it’s subtitle “A manual for the way a modern warrior should think” was immediately appealing. As a primarily traditional martial artist, I have always been interested in the integration of skills and ideas from my training into both everyday life and non-traditional arts. “Living the Martial Way”, written in 1992 by a major in the U.S. Air Force, confronted precisely those issues—and many more.

                The first thing I noticed about the book was the sheer breadth of the material it covers; from defining martial arts to separating traditional from modern, from Eastern spirituality to mental focus methods, from ways of upholding honor to tips for diet and exercise. Overall, Morgan presents a thorough, exhaustive account of possible conflicts, situations and ideas to be confronted by a modern martial artist, and the traditional viewpoints on how they might be solved. His overall thesis in the book, one which I respect immensely, is that as a modern martial artist, “[y]ou should never lose your ties to those noble warriors of the past,” that is, much can still be learned from traditional arts, and to abandon their ways completely might be a case of throwing the baby out with the bathwater.

                Particularly appealing to me was Morgan’s style (presumably rooted in his military experience) of explaining concepts as clearly and explicitly as possible. Lists, neatly numbered and bulleted, saturate the book, with at least one appearing in nearly every chapter. He does a fantastic job of simplifying esoteric Japanese terminology and translating it into tractable concepts which practitioners can begin employing in their practice. He also makes great use of his military education in providing a conceptual framework for understanding how different styles of martial arts work. For example, defining how specific tactics are part of a strategy employed under a central doctrine of a style (he defines these terms as well). With Morgan’s explanations of styles, training halls, and training techniques, a modern martial artist would enter or continue their training with a much broader, clearer understanding of what exactly they are doing and why.

                Perhaps one of my favorite ideas from the book is that “all systems are artificial”, meaning that every style was still designed by a specific person or group of people, faced with a particular group of threats or particular group of goals in the creation of their doctrine or art. Thus, all styles are in a way an incomplete picture of the theoretical “whole” of combat situations. Consequently, as Morgan explains, it is important that martial artists seek training in styles different from their own, or else risk shutting out ideas from other sources, and missing valuable truths they might otherwise have encountered. As a firm believer in the role of interdisciplinary training (“cross-training”) in the modern martial arts, I was overjoyed to hear this point repeatedly reiterated throughout the book, and found my thoughts deepened and legitimized as I read on.

                The breadth (and much of the time, depth) that Morgan achieved in “Living the Martial Way” is truly impressive. I got the feeling, however that at times he was biting off more than he could chew. As he admits in his interview with the martial arts blog Ikigai Way, much of the information he uses in his section for “warrior diets” turned out to be false as the next two decades progressed. What’s more, the vast majority of terminology used in the book is either Japanese or Korean, understandably restricted to the author’s formal training background. However, the viewpoints and philosophies expressed within are almost entirely Japanese. The traditional attitude Morgan advocates throughout the book is very obviously and strictly one of budo, the Japanese “way of the warrior”. I find this Japan-centric approach a bit limiting, especially the way it is unequivocally touted as “the way”. Many martial arts were originally designed for and practiced by non-warriors for the sole purpose of defending themselves against warriors, for example in the origin of Shaolin kempo, in which Bodidharma supposedly taught peaceable Buddhist monks the martial arts to help enhance their meditation and abilities to defend themselves.

                As might be expected from a text heavily rooted in the traditions of budo, “Living the Martial Way” at times presents a very black-and-white viewpoint. For example, pervasive to the book is the idea of the “Warrior”, the ideal to which Morgan believes all martial artists must compare themselves. All people are either “warriors” or “non-warriors”, the latter are of course referred to somewhat condescendingly throughout the book. There are even faint hints of elitism springing up as Morgan explains that “warriors, by the very nature of their calling, tend to make themselves physically, mentally, and spiritually superior to the rest of society,” and how, as warriors, “we are stronger and faster than our docile, sedentary peers”.  This intensity even goes far enough as to include a chapter exclusively dedicated to revenge and suicide—enough to make me put down the book and pause for thought.

                Morgan also denounces modern training methods with little justification other than that they are different from traditional methods, and leaves some more spiritual-sounding assertions regarding the efficacy of traditional methods entirely unsupported. As he also admits in his Ikigai Way interview, he feels less confident about some of his previous confidence in those areas.

                Overall, I think “Living the Martial Way” comprises a solid guide for a modern martial artist, providing a wealth of well-organized information and guidance on a variety of subjects. It’s main drawbacks come from a budo-centric outlook focused mostly on traditional Japanese viewpoints, and a sort of over-adherence to ideals that I might regard as rather antiquated. Though these portions of the book may be irrelevant to the modern martial artist, it can’t be denied that most others are perfectly germane. I would highly recommend the text to anyone looking to add depth, seriousness, and motivation to their training, and also to learn more about traditional ways of thinking in the martial arts. However, some sections should be taken with a grain of salt, unless readers are indeed serving as attendants to some feudal lord.