Is the pen mightier than the sword? Why?

Question

Thank you!

Answer 1

The weapon can only be as proficient as the skillfulness of the one in whose hands it is held.

Applied by the wise worldly warlord, the pen dispels all ignorance, intellectual diversity and spiritual ignorance with a stroke of its hand.

The considered and justified application of the sharp sword dealt upon the divergent element removes the head with one swift stroke.

Both weapons or tools in the hands of the dual natured are rendered as less than useless. Many banal ambiguous words spoken with ambivalence and courageless rhetoric without conviction or cause gives free speech and mindless warfare a thoroughly bad press.

The hacking with a blunted sword of duplicity and deception neither severs nor overtly wounds, merely and tediously thuds and chops monotonously and repetitiously forcing the set upon to plead for a quick end ...

Answer 2

Words convey thought and meaning that can last for ages.

Words can destroy entire armies, conquer whole continents, heal nations, save millions...

Answer 3

the sword has killed armies the pen has killed countries

*(please pick me)

Answer 4

Indeed!

-While the King's away the advisors are signing papers to sell his kingdom to the highest bidder.

-Identity theft a form of stealing one's good name and reputation all in the paper works

-A boss writes a false reason as to why you're fired

- A police report says you attacked someone when really you were defending yourself

-A vote for President gets added to a "stuffed" box

-History written by the victors but what really happened? We weren't there so we have to trust the written word

-For centuries and even today the Bible was and is taken literally and was strictly upheld... even though it was written by mankind.

-Someone writes a nasty rumor on a school website... though just words, scribbles on a page

don't these things wound deeper than any cut?

A poem, a book a phrase a lyric can move you to deeper or higher or lower levels... a sword (or gun in modern world) can injure you can kill you.. but then once dead it doesn't matter any more does it?

But words, how many times do you repeat in your head your own hidden doubts and shames? How many times do you repeat a statement like "I'm fat" or "I can't..."?

So tell me what is the difference between the power of words and the power of a sword?

Answer 5

Because what you write down can live on for millennia! If you kill someone with a sword, they die and are eventually made obsolete.

If you write about that person and it's successful, it will remain on paper for ages and you can paint them anyway you wish (hero/villain).  

Answer 6

You can kill someone with a sword, but you can destroy them with words.  

Answer 7

i think so, in the sense that there are worse things than death.

and those things, like betrayal, are word-driven.

Answer 8

Words can spread much further than the effect of a sword..

Answer 9

Yes, words go farther than any one swipe of the sword could ever hope to go.

It's easier to forget physical pain, but it's much harder to forget mental pain.

Answer 10

It depends on what you mean. You're not supposed to take this too literally. For instance if I were to make a bill stating nobody could wear slippers on a Saturday, this would in a way apply to everyone, and so it would affect a lot of people (hence the pen part). However how am I going to enforce this law? I can probably send a warning or a fine, but the fine and warrant are as only as good as the institution enforcing it.  Therefore I would need police to enforce the law. And the police would make you pay the fine. In the end physical strength is the base of everything. The power of fear and the possibility of physical harm is the binding force of society.

As we evolve into a more egalitarian society this phrase will be cliched to a greater degree. Let me give you a more powerful example, the Peace Corps operates in countries that are relatively safe. But in more hostile countries you have to send only the military (Operation Iraqi Freedom). The whole thing is an hypocrisy. In the end you the sword must complement the pen. They're both equal.  

Answer 11

Too many answers here are thinking only of destruction. The sword is solely destructive, but the pen can create as well.

Without the sword, and its modern equivalents, there would be no destruction of civilisations. But without the pen there would have been no civilisations to destroy.

Answer 12

pen is a weapon of mass destruction.

love

Pluto

Answer 13

Well the pen can be mightier because the writing you make can be very descriptive.

Answer 14

the pen rules over the sword

Answer 15

what is that supposed to mean. You can make me feel bad about myself, but in the end you die. Im not sure it works

Answer 16

Yes, because you can kill with a sword, but negotiate , discuss and often avoid violence with a pen. A sword is a tool of destruction, a pen can be more often a tool of communication.

Answer 17

ummmm random scrubs quote:

"sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will hurt forever." -JD.

also my brother once stabbed my other brother with a pen. he poked a hole in his skin. a tiny pen sized hole...

Answer 18

The power of the written word far surpasses man's capacity to engender suffering and death. Consider the lasting effects of Shakespeare's works upon our society: Four-hundred plus years after his death, Shakespeare's plays are still practiced around the world and have been adapted for film dozens of times over.

The pen is man's greatest invention; hope, his greatest ally.  

Answer 19

Easier to conceal.

Answer 20

Oh heck, this forum just went hopelessly to the romantic side of this question... "Yes, the pen is so great..." "The pen can destroy the world". Goodness. Is the pen really mightier than the sword? Can the sword not destroy the pen itself or simply render it useless? People, the pen is NOT mightier than the sword. The sword is NOT mightier than the pen. They control one another. The pen has the might to stay the sword, yet the sword can still stay the pen. But when it comes to the very end, what will end it all? A pen? or a sword? Neither. I firmly believe the spoken word has more power than either. The spoken word is what controls these tools. You can even go farther, but in the end the result is still the same. Neither is stronger.

Update:

In response to later postings ---

Although works have endured for years that's no support for a pen's might. So what if words can be repeated? That gives them no power. Shakespeare's plays changed nothing. And even so, if they had been destroyed, the sword would have reigned again, still proving the equality of both. How many other greater works now decay, unknown to humans in this time, because they were denied progress from the sword? How many ideas have been lost to the blade? They will forever be equal.