What is the guy saying at 00:10 onwards...And why is he saying it in the middle of a iai-kata? [ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iNADXZRi2zU"]Dude...What?[/ame]
It's a kind of prayer used in that particular ryuha, related to Shingon Buddhism. It's quite rare for some ryuha to do such things, but not uncommon. The rest of the iai kata in Taisha-ryu are more combative, and the one epicted above is the first in the tradition's teachings. It's kind of a primer of the mindset and body before doing the other kata, which include a lot of tobi-chigai and other rather energetic techniques. There are a number of other ryuha that do prayer prior to kata. The most notable is Kiraku-ryu jujutsu, where they sit in iai-goshi facing each other, pray, do reiho and then commence with kata-geiko.
