The Zen abbot Takuan Sōhō (沢庵宗彭; 1573–1645) wrote for Yagyū Munenori and the swordsmen around him, and his letters became part of how the Shinkage-ryū understood its own teaching. Below are my translations:
We begin with a short matching-rhyme verse bound into the front matter of the 1898 Takuan Zenshū that is believed to have been authored by Takuan. The Taiaki (太阿記) is a short missive translated from the kanbun of the Bujutsu sōsho (1915) with its Edo vernacular commentary. The Fudōchi Shinmyōroku (不動智神妙録; “The Marvelous Record of Immovable Wisdom”) is read against the Tsuki no Shō of Yagyū Mitsuyoshi.
