The Art of Aiki

Ellis Amdur published during last year, from March to October, a series of articles related to the origins of weapons training in Aikido. The following are the links to the original articles, eight in total, in the Aikido Journal website.

• PART I - Takeda Sokaku: The Embodiment of Gokui (Essential Principals)


• PART II - Aikijutsu/do comes from Kenjutsu


• PART III - Ueshiba Morihei and Weapons — The Shadows of Yagyu


• PART IV - Ueshiba Morihei and Weapons — Kobukan sword: Shinto-ryu, Kage-ryu, Chujo-ryu


• PART V - Ueshiba Morihei and Weapons — The Influence of Spear Technique Upon Stave and Stick


• PART VI - Ueshiba Morihei and Weapons — A Chinese Connection After All?


• PART VII - Ante-Bellum: Bo & Jo


• Part VIII - The Solo Jo Form

Ellis Amdur is the author of "Dueling with Osensei", "Old School" and the Instructional DVD "Ukemi from the Ground Up". You can reach him at his website at www.edgework.info.

"We are learning how to apply Aikido techniques when uke uses a dagger." I used to think that also. These days I’m not so sure. In most dojo that I have seen, tantodori takes shape tsuki kotegaeshi, tsuki rokkyo, tsuki gokyo, yokomenuchi gokyo, and ushiro kotegaeshi. Of course you see a few kansetsuwaza thrown in as well. That was fine for me in the beginning. But I realize now that there are two basic flaws in the way that tantodori is usually taught: they don’t take into account the way a person committed to cutting you would attack you, and they don’t take into account the way a person committed to not being cut would defend themselves. In Aikido, most tantodori is conducted with uke performing tsuki, shomengiri, yokomen or kesagiri while holding a wooden tanto. While these are common vectors that any attack may come from, they do not represent a sincere attack given the nature of the knife. An attack with the knife is all over the place. Slashing and thrusting in rapid succession is perhaps the most basic handling of the knife. Training to fight someone when armed with a knife is a most serious business, much more than an all-or-nothing, vector-based, yokomen or tsuki. The person with a knife knows that if their attack fails, that they will most likely be justifiably killed.

Read the complete article at http://www.aikidojournal.com/?id=3149.

Kashima Shinto Ryu's keppan from May 1937, showing the names of Ueshiba and Akazawa.I have always being intrigued about this. Where did Ueshiba O'Sensei learn the sword techniques that were to be called Aikiken? Until now, the official history establishes that all Aikido was the genial creation of O'Sensei, that he created everything. It's often denied even that the hand arts, the taijutsu, is based on Daito Ryu Aikijujutsu. As always, there is one "official history" and one "real history".

The following is an extract from Koryu.com, written by Meik Skoss:

Shortly after I first raised these questions, in 1978 or '79, I visited the dojo of the late Koichiro Yoshikawa, 64th headmaster of the Kashima Shinto-ryu. He very graciously answered many questions about the history and techniques of the ryu. Moreover, he showed me a registry of the people who had entered the Kashima Shinto-ryu and performed keppan (lit., "blood seal," signing the enrollment register and sealing it with one's own blood as an earnest of one's sincerity and serious intent) dating from before World War II. Guess what, sports fans? One of the names in the register was that of Morihei Ueshiba, along with that of Zenzaburo Akazawa, his deshi. I was told that a number of people at the Kobukan, including Ueshiba, studied for a period of several years. Once again, when I brought up the subject of Kashima Shinto-ryu and its influence on aikido, several aikido people, including one of the most senior instructors at the Aikikai, assured me I was mistaken.

There is, thus, evidence that Ueshiba O'Sensei studied Kashima Shinto Ryu, and the trained eye can see similarities in Kashima Shinto Ryu waza with Aikiken waza. For example, Kashima Shinto Ryu's "ichi no tachi" is virtually identical to Aikiken's "ichi no kumitachi" as taught by the late Morihiro Saito Sensei.

Of course, Ueshiba, being the genius he was, was no content with just preserving what he learnt from the school, but modified it to adapt to the concept of Aiki. The following video from a Kashima Shinto Ryu exhibition is an ilustration of this point.

While one can see similar techniques here and there, it is obvious that the kata are not only not identical to those of the Aikiken, but also the intention is different.

More to come on this subject... maybe tomorrow.

During the practice of 'ran o toru', a free style method of practice used in the Kito Ryu Jujutsu system, Iikubo would repeatedly throw Kano, even though he was thirty years older than the young man. Kano began to analyze the process of throwing, to see what makes it effective. During this analyzation, Kano came upon three discoveries. Once he implemented them, he was capable of defeating nearly anyone. Upon relating these concepts to master Tsunetoshi Iikubo, he was admitted into the Okuden, inner traditions, of the Kito Ryu, and allowed to view the scrolls and books of the system.

Read the whole article at http://www.yoshinjujitsu.com/real_secrets_of_jujutsu.htm.

Attached in this post is a copy of the certificate that Takeda Sokaku issued to Ueshiba Morihei in the art of Daito Ryu Aikijujutsu.

I have, however, marked in red a section that reads "Takeda O'Sensei".

Now, I thought that only Ueshiba was reffered to as "O'Sensei", but it seems that I was wrong. At least his teacher, Takeda Sensei, was also using that title. And good to know too that he spelled it "大先生" (meaning Great Master), as opposed to "翁先生" (Venerable Master).

Update (08/12/2008):

The 大先生 in Ueshiba's kyoju dairi is properly read "Dai Sensei". This is what Takeda was known by, as a check of some of the Daito Ryu related articles at Aikido Journal and Kondo Katsuyuki's website daito-ryu.org will confirm.

"Dai Sensei" is the usual reading of that compound. "O'Sensei" is somewhat irregular.

Thanks to Josh Reyer for the info.

From "Aikido in Daily Life" by Koichi Tohei pg.33 copyright 1966 ISBN 0870402218

Koichi Tohei wrote:

2. The Breathing Method Used in Aikido

As pre-practice training in aikido we frequently use a breathing method that calls for inhaling and exhaling through the nose.

1. Stand with your legs open about a half step. In this breathing method you may either open or close your eyes. Spread your fingers, and let your arms hang naturally, (fig.2a).


2. Breathe in as if you were drawing in the ki of the universal, close the fingers of both hands in order beginning with the little fingers. As you inhale, rise up on your toes. Inhalation should take about five seconds, (fig. 2b).


3. When you have taken in sufficient breath, lower your fists as if you were about to fall on them, tense the single spot in the lower abdomen, and lower your heels, (fig. 2c). In this case it is not as if your ki were sinking into the spot in the lower abdomen. It is rather that you are concentrating all of your body's strength there. This will cause you too feel strength surging all through your body. Remain fixed in this position for about five seconds.


4. Keeping your mouth closed, begin exhaling through your nose as if you were driving out all of your body's strength. Simultaneously, open the fingers of both hands in order, and when they are open turn them palms down as if you were pressing on the surface of the earth. Swing both hands in the directions shown by the dotted lines in fig. 2d. When you have finished exhaing, tense the single spot in the lower abdomen, and return you hands to the position in which they seem to be pressing downward. This process should take a total of about ten seconds.


5. When you have completely exhaled immediately open your fingers, face them outward, and return to the position in fig 2a to begin inhaling again.

Though this breathing method falls short of the misogi method in deep spiritual and bodily unification and in the propagation of real srength, its advantage lies in the brief time it takes under daily circumstances. Five or six times is enough to do it, and because it takes only twenty seconds to go through one exercise, a whole set only requres from one and one half to two minutes.

We have a reason for saying that you should tense the single spot in the lower abdomen when you do this breathing exercise. When you are shocked, extremely tired, or angry it is difficult to sink you spirit into the single spot in the lower abdomen, because, we say, under such conditions we cannot locate that sopt. This breathing method is very effective in such cases. If you tense your lower abdomen without breath practice your blood will rush upward, and you will find it still harder to find the single spot, whereas if you do both, your strength will concentrate in the single spot in the lower abdomen. Once you have unified completely your body and spirit and relaxed you will be able to collect ki in the single spot. When you are tired this method will quickly restore your strength by helping you reunite the sundered spirit and body to give birth to new strength. Even when you are not tired and about to begin some task, practice this breathing method, and it will give you a sense of security to begin and show what real strength you have.

• Fig. 2a shows K. Tohei standing with feet about shoulder length apart with arms out at waist and fingers splayed out.


• Fig. 2b shows him on his toes, hands closed to fists with inside arm facing front. Chest and shoulders have risen from inhalation.


• Fig. 2c shows him with feet on floor, chest and shoulders down. Hands in fists with arrows drawn down along arms, showing direction of focus.


• Fig. 2d Shows him with fingers splayed out and palms facing the ground. Directional arrows show a circular swing to the center. There is no stepping or change in position in all four poses.

What follows are answers from Kurita Sensei during an interview with Aikido Online, in which he points some interesting notes about Aikido nomenclature and training.

Is yokomenuchi this way or tenkan this way? Is this Aikido? Everyone is doing yokomen this way, the wrong way, or like that. Everyone is doing shomenuchi like this, but it's wrong. Is it this way with a bokken or that way?

Shomenuchi one way, shomenuchi another way. You may call this shomenuchi or you can call that shomenuchi, but that doesn't answer the question: which one is correct? The correct name is actually katate uchi, not shomenuchi.

Why is there confusion? Because they never understood it properly. Shomen is this way, from the top of the head in an arc downwards, not from the front of the face forwards.

Aikido's tsuki is called furi komi, a strike diagonally up. It comes from not the open hand strike but rather like having a tanto in your hand and striking upward.

Today we were doing a warm-up like karate but Aikido is not that way. O-Sensei said "we don't know any karate". Tsuki, for example. Kanai Sensei does it this way. O-Sensei did it differently. Does it mean that O-Sensei was lying when he said there is no karate in Aikido or was Kanai Sensei lying when he said punch this way?

O-Sensei did only Aikido. Aikido is not against karate or against judo. Aikido is Aikido. Aikido's tsuki is called furi komi, a strike diagonally up. It comes from not the open hand strike but rather like having a tanto in your hand and striking upward.

Many people don't know that O-Sensei taught furi komi tsuki. That's why everyone teaches punching straight like karate's tsuki. Therefore Aikido is being taught against karate's strikes.

Koichi Tohei Sensei and others taught the karate tsuki. So who is correct, who is telling the truth, and who is telling a lie? If furi komi fails it turns into shomenuchi, but if a straight strike fails what does it turn into? It becomes two directions of a cutting motion.

The raising part is a little bit larger and it turns into tsuki. So that seems far more reasonable as a way to attack. Besides from a physical point of view which one is better, a straight strike or a strike angling up, from a purely mechanical point of view? Because people don't study physics or mechanics people just say "Aikido is this way, a straight strike" but that is not true.

We always start by learning that the attacker holds you and you do the technique. The attacker does shomenuchi and the defender does a technique. If I were to attack could I do the technique? If uke were to hold could he also do the technique? Isn't that a possibility? We never practice the uke attacking and then doing the technique as well. People say that in Aikido there is no attack, but who says so? That's not right.

Why shouldn't you be able to attack and do the technique? Many people think there is no attack in Aikido, that Aikido is only defensive. That is not correct. Where did they hear that?

If you hold me, perhaps if you have a knife you can cut me. I would like to do ikkyo or kotegaeshi. If you had a knife and rather than hold my hand you cut off my hand, could I do shihonage? No I wouldn't be able to. Normally we think of katate tori shihonage with uke holding nage. But if uke were holding a knife and nage grabs uke's wrist to keep him from cutting, couldn't nage do shihonage?

For example one way to arrive at the position where nage is holding the wrist and applying the technique is to evoke an attack of shomen with awase, and then take the wrist and do the technique.

Awase and musubi go together. Awase is like reaching for something, for example when you are reaching for a cup. Musubi is tasting what you taste when you drink what is in the cup, and then being able to say, “It’s tasty”.

O-Sensei said there were ichi no tachi, ni no tachi, san no tachi, yon no tachi, etc. ki musubi no tachi, Aiki Kempo. Who knows about these things? Sugano Sensei, Chiba Sensei? All of these other teachers were uchi deshi but who of those knows about these things. For example Sugano Sensei was teaching bokken, but does he know about ichi no tachi, ni no tachi etc.? Does he know about these things?

Many people call themselves uchi deshi of O-Sensei. But it is not so simple. There were uchi deshi in Iwama and in Tokyo. In Iwama and in Tokyo, it was different in each place. Chiba Sensei and I would go with O-Sensei to Iwama, so would we have learned the same thing even though we went to Iwama together? No. Does this mean that Chiba Sensei did not learn anything and only I learned something? I really don’t know.

Even though we were all taught the same, does that mean the other shihan did not learn and I was the only one that learned? I don’t know! Why O-Sensei didn’t insist on a particular curriculum I don’t know.

There is something called kihon. Who is saying this is kihon? O-Sensei said these are the principles, not basics. So somebody translated incorrectly. In Japanese it’s called gengi. Gengi and kihon are not the same thing. Gengi are the principles. Kihon are the basics.

It’s the same with bokken. Not kihon but gengi. Awase means if I can see it and grab it, i.e. the packet, that’s awase, and then if I stir the sugar into the coffee and taste it and I say “that’s tasty” that would be musubi.

You really understand these things already, but to make it more clear by example, when you first met Penny you were overtaken by her beauty and you said “oh she’s so beautiful” that was awase, and when you consummated the relationship that was musubi. Then you got married and you were so happy together, that also would be musubi. But sometimes you’re not too happy and you say “I want a divorce” -- that’s musubi too.

Right now we’re just talking about the principles, that’s awase, but when you really try to carry them out and see if they work that’s musubi. You can have a concept or an idea and you do nothing, nothing manifests, it’s just an idea. No one derives anything from it. Many people are interested only in learning the concepts of Aikido. But for how long have you kept the concepts only?

We use Aikido in daily life, and if you use those principles and everyone is happy that is awase and musubi. Many people focus on musubi but forget awase. Which is most important? Both.

Ki Musubi no tachi, awase no tachi, we didn’t know about these things in these terms for the longest time, the same as with the brain, we didn’t know these things. O-Sensei knew this for the longest time, about awase no tachi and musubi no tachi, but many Aikido practitioners still do not understand this.

If you make a knot in a napkin, the knot is musubi. When you bring the ends together its awase. When you cross them to make the knot and pull the ends to tighten the knot that is musubi. Awase is when you bring the ends together.

Awase is joining the tips of the napkin, the knot is musubi. When we make a knot it is musubi. If you use a sword technique to show this, it is musubi no tachi. If you and I join, and then we cross swords and mesh -- it is musubi.