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Skills of the Japanese Ninja

The Ninja was taught from an early age, typically 6 or 7 and would begin with basic conditioning and endurance training. Philosophy was also taught. Taking the example of the Togakure Ryu Ninjutsu, an ninja would first learn 18 basic skills, the Bugei Juhappan, then 18 more advanced skills, the Ninja Juhakken. Here is a catalogue of the Togakure ryu's Ninpo Juhakken:

Seishin Teki Kyoyo - Spiritual Refinement

Tai-Jutsu - Unarmed Combat

Ninjatou-Jutsu - Ninja Short Sword Techniques

Bo-Jutsu - Staff Techniques (includes Jo, Hanbo, Shinobizue)

Shuriken-Jutsu - Throwing blade Techniques

Yari-Jutsu - Spear Techniques

Naginata-Jutsu - Halberd Techniques (Naginata and Bisentou)

Kusarigama-Jutsu - Sickle-and-chain Techniques (Kusarigama, Kyoketsu Shoge, Mammukigama etc.)

Kayaku-Jutsu - Explosives

Henso-Jutsu - Disguise

Shinobi-Iri - Stealth and silent Entry Techniques

Ba-Jutsu - Horsemanship

Sui-Ren - Swimming and water Techniques

Bo-Ryaku - Strategy

Cho-Ho - Espionage

Inton-Jutsu - Disappearing techniques

Ten-Mon - Meteorology

Chi-Mon - Geography

Spiritual refinement was necessary to make sure the Ninja was in control of his own mind. He was geared towards thinking of his own purpose, and morality. Since a ninja was freely fading in and out of truth and falsehood, he had to make sure he knew who he was, or else what purpose would there be to his life or his mission?

Taijutsu formed the core of the ninja’s defence techniques; A strong grounding in Taijutsu made it easy for the ninja to adapt to the many weapons he would have to master. Once a ninja had been learning Taijutsu for a while he would progress to weapons training. A ninja did not master one or two weapons, but out of necessity would need to master every weapon he could conceivably encounter. The reasons for this are twofold. Firstly, experience with a weapon helps to build a sense of its movement, distancing and application, thus allowing a ninja specialised in xyz to be proficient in defending against xyz. Secondly, since every weapon has strengths and weaknesses, it would be a foolish mistake to master a single weapon since if the knowledge of this got out, potential enemies would be able to prepare counter-defences against this preferred weapon, and so the ninja would lose his advantage of surprise.