No probs Brido. Once I stop hacking up slime I will come to the club on a Sunday. How did the guys get on at the tournament? The Bear.
Hi Guys, Interesting stuff on knife defence. All points mentioned are very valid but Aikido is a budo which essentially is based on battlefield fighting where everyone is tooled up and ready for a fight and most of the defence work we do is based on folk being squared up to each other and knowing a knife is there. Sadly, on the street the majority of people attacked by a knife weilding thug don't even realise they have been stabbed until they see the blood. You don't get to see the knife you don't even get to know he has a knife until it's plunged or slashed at you when your usually not looking or paying attention to him. In my experience if someone pulls a knife on you and lets you see it then they are more intent on intimidating you than stabbing you. If two people are squared up and one haves a knife then the principles are sound but it takes big kahunas to do it because there is always a risk you will get cut no matter how well you perform. I tend to rely on being street wise, brought about by being brought up in a particularily violent gang orientated glasgow housing scheme to keep me safe. It taught me the great aikido principle of don't be there when they come for you. Regards Teddy Bear
Hi Tedi kuma Agreed , best not to be there. But as Spike Milligan said "everybody has to be somewhere." About triangular entry. The art is executed from sankaku ho (triangular posture capable of movement in any direction) However when we enter ,the triangle is "sharpened" into hito emi (make the body small) rather like slipping in between two people. Below it appears that I am at right angles to Chris' line of attack. In fact I am in hito emi lefi foot pointing to Chris' rear kuzushi.This is a must in tachi dori (sword taking). As for tachi dori really this is for demonstration . I have trained with high ranking kendoka and would not consider attempting to "take" their sword. regards koyo
Hi Koyo Who am I to argue with the superior wisdom of Spike Milligan. The picture is a great example of how to reduce yourself as a target and then open up a new angle of attack at the same time, excellent! I have been training at a local dojo recently and trying to apply the principles that you have passed on to me, when I trained at your dojo and stated here on map and I have found it very useful in understanding and simplifying my Aikido. Regards Teddy Bear
Some more wisdom from Spike Milligan you might find useful: "I'm a hero with coward's legs." "I'm not afraid of dying I just don't want to be there when it happens." "It's all in the mind, you know." He was a master of Aikido and I don't think he even knew it! Regards Teddy Bear
Hey Bear, I saw you post this on the Ninjutsu forum: I believe what you are saying is that you can become proficient in using a weapon to kill someone else, but you will likely be killed or maimed yourself in the process. It takes more to use a weapon and not be killed or maimed. If so it reminds me of a story about a peasant that accidently bumped into a nobleman and the nobleman was so insulted he challenged the peasant to a duel. Long story short, the nobleman was a known duelist and the peasant knew he was going to die. All the peasant wanted to do is not dishonor himself and his family when we did die so he sought out a local sword master for training. Koyo, or anyone if you know this story or can point me to where it can be found, let me know... that would save me a lot of typing. I will save the end of the story until a future post when I have more time. The point I want to discuss about the idea of learning to use a weapon verse understanding and applying the principles is that you can learn to do many things, but until there is some experience and depth of training, things often don't click. I personally found out much of weapon principles when I cross-trained with FMA trained knife fighters. I know Koyo you have stressed many times the cross-training with kendoka. At some point some "depth of training" is needed like some wake up call to put things into perspective. Any probably more than one of these also... like washing your hair in the old days: wash, rinse... repeat.
Hi Rebel I know the story so I shall leave it to you to finish it and offer another story with the same moral. A modern day japanese archer who, with his bow that had sights and modern attachments, could hit the bull every time laughed at an old zen archer who hit the bull occasionally. "Why do you cling to old traditions" he asked The old archer told him to knock and draw his bow. This the modern archer did. The old zen archer took up his bow and walked in front of him turned less than Twenty feet away knocked and drew his bow. I am ready to fire are you???? regards koyo
Sorry to interrupt the thread flow guys. Aikido was based on Daito-ryu aikijujutsu. If one reads the official history of the ryuha, one of the older names of Daito-ryu was Oshiki-uchi (Inside the threshold/court) and was devised as a system of unarmed combat for dignitaries in court. Also since, a lot of the history stated by Daito-ryu cannot be historically proven via documentation and artifact, most scholars admit that Daito-ryu is a budo formed during the mid-Meiji period. By 1890, when the school was founded, battlefield combat of what everyone imagines had not been conducted in almost 300 years. It is best to say that Daito-ryu was a kind of peacetime combative system, especially due to the complexity of some of the techniques contained in it's syllabus. Some of the older schools from the Muromachi period to the very early Edo period that were used in combat aren't that complex in technique. The main formula is - Take/throw the enemy down and stab/beat to death. An exemplar of this is Goto-ha Yagyu Shingan-ryu, where the enemy is picked up via leverage and dumped on his skull ala WWF. In armour, with the accumulated weight and movement resrictions, that will turn the enemy into either a) brown bread or b) a paraplegic. Another example is from another branch of Yagyu Shingan-ryu that still train in Kacchu(armour). The defender uses his helmet to deflect the enemy's cut and then beats him to death with it. [ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FiE4bKuhuE4]Goto-ha Yagyu Shingan-ryu taijutsu [/ame] [ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Yl5M0Ox4gU]Yagyu Shingan-ryu Kacchu Heiho Kogusoku & Jingasajutsu[/ame] There's a big difference in technique between wartime and peacetime combatives systems. Hope this helps.
Nice post Kogusoku. I remember being told and shown at some length the differences between different martial arts based on where they came from. I don't remember it all but some things like the origins of karate came from a peasant art. Peasants were used on the battlefield as soldiers and so much of what was drilled was in formations. The movement of the "K-step" rather than just stepping forward was because the soldiers used the step to clear high grass for the ones behind them. I was also shown variations of techniques used by what would be the imperial bodyguards. Since they were the last line of defense, it was very linear and aggresive, the idea was to kill and stop as many of the enemy as possible before dieing. Much of things today do not have this same context, this leads to confusion.
Karate isn't Japanese, it's Sino-Okinawan/Ryukyuan. There is a very big difference in the combative techniques taught to the upper classmen in the Okinawan Royal Heirarchy, than the lower classes. It wasn't at all a peasant art. Who taught you these? Also since this was before Aikido was formed, which ryuha were these techniques from?
Thanks for the input kogusoku. I am always fascinated by the history of the arts. I even enjoy the "stories" that make a point such as the guy who is ready to die has an edge over the one who wishes to display his technique. I have always doubted the stories of farmers turning farm implements against samurai. I doubt that a farmer could handle a classicaly trained warrior. I have seen (and been thrown) by the techniques you spoke of (yagyu shingan ryu) The main one was similar to judo's kata garuma. Rather like a fireman's lift. The "breakfall (would be) non existant. Another is yama arashi again no breakfall. So much that is offered as "fact" today is simply to enhance the reputation of the art.Or to add a bit of "mystery" Aikido has suffered badly from this with some saying there was no influence from Daito ryu despite proof to he contrary.Indeed aikido has suffered so badly from "personal" interpretation that at times I do not recognise the art. Statements by shihan are to be investigated. The most extreme I have heard of late being that by studying the empty hand art alone you can become a master of the sword. The opposite of my belief that if you study the sword intensively it shall improve your hand technique. Regards koyo
Hi Kogusoku, Sorry for my clumsy wording in my post. I did not mean that Aikido is a battlefield art but it is based on other arts which come from battlefield arts. All our training is done with the appreciation of this.We train in a method where we know of the existance of the weapon and we are either squared up for an encounter or prepared for an encounter if not squared up. I was only pointing out that the principles in Aikido and that stated by Koyo work well in this type of situation but from my experience with knife encounters on the street most individuals will attack you unprovocked and when they think you're not looking at them or prepared for them. This is in their nature, they will try minimise the risk to themselves. What I was indicating was that I believe you also need to be street wise to how these situations occur and avoid putting yourself in a bad position. Regards Teddy Bear
That is not quite accurate. There were frequent rebellions during the tokugawa shogunate. The ranged from small disturbances to major rebellions. However the general overall stability did allow more training of samurai than in the less stable past. Battlefield arts where still required and used frequently, the term peace is a relative term, pax romanus would by our standards be a period of war. I think this could apply equally to the tokugawa shogunate. The Bear.
Aye, but what does that have to do with Daito-ryu aikijujutsu, the progenitor of Aikido? Dare I mention that most of these rebellions were quelled with the use of Poruguese Arquebus (Musket)?
Take him to a rifle range. Then have him do tameshigiri. I don't want to see any frays on that tatami omote now, y'hear
Not the story I was looking for, but a more famous story with the same moral: The doctrine of kenjutsu contains the interesting episode of the tea master of Lord Yamanouchi of Tosa province, who had been forced by his lord's insistent requests to leave the quiet of Tosa Castle and follow his master of Edo, where, evidently, Lord Yamanouchi whiched to display his retainer's skill in performing the cha-no-yu. In Edo one day, the peaceful tea master (who was not of samurai rank, although required, by protocol, to dress like one) had an encounter which he had expected and feared ever since leaving home: he met a ronin who challenged him to a duel. The tea master explained his status, but the ronin, hoping to extort money from his victim, continued to threaten him. To pay in order to be left alone would have represented, for the tea master, for his lord, and for his clan, a dishonorable action. The only alternative was to accept the challenge. Once he had resigned himself to death, the tea master's only wish was to die in a manner befitting a samurai. He therefor asked his opponent's permission to delay the encounter and then rushed off to a school of fencing he had noticed nearby hoping to receive at least the basic information he required, that is, the rudiments of dying honorably by the sword. Without a letter of introduction, it was usually difficult to secure an audience with the master of a school, but, in this instance, even the gatekeepers could not help but notice how seriously disturbed the tea master was, and they were finally impressed by the desperate urgency with which he entreated that he be allowed to enter. At last he was introduced to the master, who, having listened carefully to the story, requested that the tea master serve him some tea before learning teh art of dying. Watching him perform the tea ceremony with total concentration and mental serenity, the story continues that the master swordsman, at a certain point, "struck his own knee, a sign of hearty approval, and exclaimed": Thanking the swordsman profusely, the tea master went back to the roin, prepared himself, and waited. The ronin saw "an altogether different person" and "asked the Tea Master's pardon for his rude request... leaving the field hurriedly."
I was actually thinking of China as the origins of karate... but point taken. I shall rephrase... examining the origins of the "footwork" taught in martial arts can often lead to a better understanding of where the art came from. Some arts, for instance, emphasize more upper body evasion and less stepping, for instance arts whose origins are thought to come from the Chinese Opera boats (or whatever they were called) where good footing on a boat was a concern. I was taught that the "sweeping" motion with the stepping in karate was something to do with fighting in high fields of grass or rough terrain. I'm not saying that karate developed this, only the origins of the foot movements. I am not, unfortunately, able to find historical documentation to back this up, so consider it speculation. But I think there is some fact in it. More specifically, Japan had ties with Korea, though marriages. So there were some Japanese families that lived in castles in Korea. Given this is even true... I was taught techniques involving very linear and straight forward footwork developed for the bodyguards of these nobles. The footwork was to be employed in narrow hallways where a few bodyguards could hold off a much larger attacking force. It was very aggressive and designed to take out as many of the enemy as possible as quickly as possible to give time for the nobles to escape. Looking to the environment that an art was developed can help to understand movements. Today we learn martial arts but often we don't have the same environments so some of the movements and "footwork" doesn't make as much sense... adjustments need to be made. The great thing, IMHO, is that the principles stay the same, it is just application that adjusts.
Whoever said this has either never handled a sword or is blatantly lying. I'm by no stretch of the imagination a master of either Aikido or the sword. But I have gone through some fairly simple kata with a live sword and it's totally different from using a bokken. The weight of the blade compared to a wooden bokken changes so much. It's like starting all over again. I really don't see how anybody could master the sword without ever picking one up.
It was a ninjutsu post. When the student asked if he should study the sword at a swordschool he was told that simply studying the hand techniques of ninjustsu would automatically make him a master of the sword. There was a long debate on this when I offered an opinion I was told since I do not study ninjutsu that I do not know what I am talking about. regards koyo
