The Samurai Priesthood and Suicide

In the Japanese traditionalist belief system, suicide is morally meritorious. Shintoism preaches the notion of direct reincarnation as a fact rather than just an idea that can be spiritually postulated. In samurai rhetoric and law, these ideas had the force of law for this pre-existent military elite inside Japan. If you were killed or if you committed ritual suicide, you immediately were reborn in a mother's womb 40 days later as a new human being. This meant that in their conception of self, suicide was not the end.