Naruto is one of the best series in fiction as of now. It is a great adventure that we get to experience. Naruto teaches us loads of life lessons, inspiring stories, and greatly written characters.
With all the above-given features, Naruto also shows us some conflicting and diversified philosophies and Ideologies of Naruto Characters that make you think deeply about life. Some characters had a fixed way of life and attitude towards their activities. Whereas, some characters had a few turning points in the series that twisted their ideologies and shaped their overall characters.
Here, we will discuss some of the most interesting ideologies and philosophies of different Naruto Characters and see how intricately each and every character is different with a diversified perception of life.
These are not exactly a philosophy of a particular character, it is a mixture of their philosophies, ideologies, and way of life. We will use very simple language and there will be no usage of complex philosophical terms and abstract vocabulary.
Ideologies of Naruto Characters:
This is also not a ranking among the characters as the ones listed below are ranked randomly.
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Naruto Uzumaki / Jiraiya –
We are discussing the main character Naruto first. Naruto at the very beginning had a very dark path ahead of himself. If he didn’t have anyone like Iruka, Kakashi, and team 7, then he might have ended on a very dark path with a very different view of the world.
However, this did not happen and soon Naruto got people he cared about and wanted to protect wholeheartedly. Naruto at that time didn’t have a specific philosophy of life as all wanted was recognition by becoming the Hokage.
Naruto trains under Jiraiya, but his focus shifts to saving Sasuke and is very convoluted for a few years of his life. It is not until he takes on a bigger responsibility by fighting Pain to save his village that he finally shapes his ideology towards the bigger world.
Naruto takes after his master’s dream and makes his way of life to strive to bring world peace by breaking the cycle of vengeance which a lot of antagonists seem to be following.
Naruto strongly believes that the cycle of vengeance can be broken and everyone can live in peace. This is contested by Pain, when he kills Jiraiya, Kakashi, and several people in the village. Naruto has a chance to kill Pain, but he breaks the cycle by forgiving Pain for the crimes he committed.
Naruto strengthens his ideology up until the end of Shippuden while confronting Sasuke and bringing him back. Naruto’s philosophy never changed and stayed the same even in Boruto which he strongly follows and protects world peace.
This ideology was also strongly followed by both Hashirama Senju and Ashura Otsutsuki.
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Pain / Nagato –
Pain is one of the most well-written characters of the series. He’s a fan favorite and many consider him as the best antagonist of the series. Pain is a famous character & greatly appreciated because he has a very dark backstory and a very strong reason for turning evil.
Nagato’s past shaped him into what he becomes for the rest of the series and his philosophy towards life also strongly depends on his life experiences, be it positive or negative.
Pain believes in the cycle of vengeance and hatred. He thinks that conflict in this cursed shinobi world is inevitable, no matter what era. He strongly believes that shinobi will endlessly kill each other in the name of vengeance and have endless wars.
Nagato also experienced the problems of the small villages, who get crumbled under the oppression of the Five Great Nations. All the other small villages are used as battlefields during the war and their people suffer the most.
After experiencing various types of situations in his life, Nagato takes the identity of Pain. He joins the Akatsuki and works with the objective of World Domination.
Pain wants to become the one and only leader of all the Nations. He wants to dominate the world according to his rules and justice. He basically wants to be the sole leader of the entire ninja world in order to maintain peace.
That is why he tries to gather all the tailed beasts so that he could use the power of all the nine tailed beasts against the world in case of a rebellion.
Pain’s philosophy of course changes after fighting Naruto who proved the cycle can be broken and people can live peacefully. From that point, Nagato’s philosophy coincides with that of Naruto and Jiraiya.
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Madara Uchiha / Obito Uchiha
Obito and Madara are covered in the same section as they both had the same objective and ideology throughout the series.
Both the characters had lost someone very close to them which eventually became the driving force behind their way of life and their perception of the ninja world.
When Rin died, Obito lost his mind. He couldn’t live in a world without Rin and wanted a dream-like world where everyone gets what they want and they are happy and peaceful.
Obito’s ideology is very warped just like that of Madara. Their ideology is very self-centered and individualistic.
Both of them think that the world cannot be peaceful so let’s forcefully put them under an infinite dream so that there’s no more conflict.
Madara lost all of his brothers due to the conflict between the Senju and the Uchiha clan and even after co-creating the leaf village, he couldn’t liberate his desire to avenge himself for his deceased brothers.
Madara went on to corrupt Obito so that he could do his remaining work and succeeded to do so.
So, Obito and Madara’s ideology coincides with each other as they believe that there’s no hope for a peaceful world and all of the shinobi should be put to sleep.
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Itachi Uchiha
Itachi Uchiha is arguably the best-written character of the series. He’s widely considered as one of the greatest characters in anime. Itachi has a massive fan following in the community & contrary to it, he also has a huge number of haters just like any other character.
Itachi’s basic philosophy of life takes shape very early in his life. He was a kid during the Third Great Ninja War when he sees a huge number of shinobi dead in front of his eyes.
This experience makes Itachi question Life, Death, Purpose, and reason for existence at a very young age. He was known to have a thinking process of a Hokage as a kid. Due to those events, Itachi was very wise, gentle, and sensitive even at the academy. He did not like war and greatly valued peace.
His philosophy towards life strengthened after his bonding with Shisui Uchiha, who he considered his brother. Shisui taught him about living in self-sacrifice in service to the village for the greater benefit of the world. Shisui teaches him all about selflessness and dies in front of him by killing himself for the sake of the village.
Itachi awakens the Mangekyou Sharingan and decides to protect the peace in the village, even if he has to kill his own parents and his clan.
The mistake done by Itachi is that he couldn’t kill Sasuke because he loved him too much.
By not killing Sasuke, he puts his brother on a very dark path in life. He plans on willingly dying at the hands of his brother, thus not letting the world know the plans of the Uchiha Clan.
He selflessly dies in a fight against his brother Sasuke, making the world believe that he was the maniac who killed his clan. When in reality, it was actually for the sake of maintaining peace in the village and respect for the Uchiha Clan.
Itachi lived a life of self-sacrifice, being misunderstood & taking all the burden of blames as he believed world peace was achievable, which he later entrusted Naruto to achieve.
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Sasuke Uchiha
Sasuke is one of the most intricately written characters of the series.
He has many moments in the series that change his philosophy of life several times. He has turned out to be the most unpredictable character of the series.
As a kid, Sasuke didn’t really have a definite philosophy with his mind like a blank canvas. He just wanted to catch up to Itachi in terms of academic excellence. His being a child was exuberant towards ninja training. He wanted to show his father, his competence and achieve great things as his brother.
The Uchiha massacre completely changes Sasuke and his way of life. From a wonderful and joyful kid, he becomes very introverted with a very concrete and straightforward goal, to kill Itachi.
He thinks training at the academy would give him the strength to defeat Itachi but soon realizes that the bonds that he created at the village were holding him back. He deserts the village with the only purpose to kill Itachi.
Training under Orochimaru, he seems very focused on not killing anyone besides his brother. After successfully seeing his brother dead, Sasuke is in a position where he doesn’t have a path anymore. What he wanted to achieve was done. Right at this moment, Obito turns him again completely.
Sasuke is revealed the truth about Itachi, which gives him a second turning point in his life. He becomes a part of the cycle of vengeance, just like a few other characters. His goal becomes to destroy the leaf village and the people who wronged his brother. It can be seen from one of Sasuke Uchiha’s Quotes:
I have long since closed my eyes. My only goal is in the darkness.
However, his goal gets interrupted by Naruto and the 4th great ninja war.
After having a talk with the 1st & 2nd Hokage, knowing the history of the shinobi world and the Uchiha clan, he realizes that human conflict is inevitable and this cycle won’t end. Here he has his philosophy taking a new form again.
