But Ransom was no longer sure he believed in satori, the final lightning stroke in which all is
    revealed.  The monks stayed in the mountains, cross-legged, unmoving; and the samurai who
    studied Zen and landscape painting had also chopped heads at the whims of their overlords.
    Ransom was no samurai; at best he was a ronin, a masterless samurai, and this was a contradiction
    in terms.  A ronin, a "man on the wave," unmoored and tossed on the waters, was an instrument
    without a purpose.

Jay McInerney * Model Behavior