Without understanding the Sword, you can never understand Aikido - Shoji Nishio Sensei

I use to tease my Judo, Jujitsu and Aikido buddies about their arts being nothing more than wrist grabbing on steroids. If you put a knife or a sword in someones hands. Suddenly, at least to me, those arts make perfect sense. What I liked especially about the DVDs is how Nishio Sensei showed applications from a punch rather than the defacto wrist grab. I especially liked his view that you must already reached your opponent before they start their attack. There seems to be a tug-a-war over whether to let the Martial Art aspect of Aikido go in lieu of making it into a new age self improvement technique. Being a newbie to the art, it feels like a choice is being implied. Do you become a Yoshinkan/Daito Ryu type of practitioner? Or, do you become a Ki-Society type of practitioner?

:D

SA

Hey, stranger! nice to see you here!

Hi Aiki 1,
Communicating in these forums can be challenging with out the benefits of the inflection of live conversation.
Are you saying?:

- The use of bokken in training, "...really has nothing to do ultimately with Aikido itself...."?
In other words, you can have an ultimate understanding of aikido without ken training?

- "Now, if he was really addressing the fact that Aikido is far beyond simply the techniques, then I disagree"
Are you saying that aikido is only about techniques?

Sorry, if I'm missunderstanding.
Respectfully,
Will

we might do well to consider why a person says these things before running to agree or disagree.

when Nishio Sensei, or other senior instructors who trained with O'sensei say something such as "Without understanding the Sword, you can never really understand Aikido!" we might also consider their cultural constitution and influences. the katana is as "japanese" as baseball and apple pie is american. perhpas moreso: we have had baseball for a scant 150 years at most, and apple pie for 250 maybe; japan has had the sword among its three cultural icons (sword, mirror, gem) for 750+ years. He also had a background in iaido, as well as jodo and yari- staff and spear.

In my life I find themes- that permaculture, for instance, is to landscape ecology what aikido is to spiritual practice, and even at the core of their teachings; that Non violent communication (NVC) is to conflict resolution and consensus what aikido is to movement and physical efforts. some may or may not agree with these observations, and others may not understand them.

Certainly he has seen structures and metaphysics which we arent aware of; his life and culture are not ours, and his practice was deep. perhaps what is most important is to respect that a person has made these practices over a long and positive life. from this perspective we can ask "what experience does exploring his admonision give me", and find out in each of our own lifes and practice if this works.

that aikido cannot be understood without swordwork was his experience; while It is also mine, it is not the experience of others whom I respect and love. and I will probably never be as close to necessary use of live blade as he was, neither in a cultural context or conflict situation. He was japanese during the war and the occuupation, old enough to have seen that war close up. he was old enough to have enlisted as japanese soldier. as a vet, I understand something of how these expereinces shape a person, even if I dont know his shape. but because he was a prewar japanese citizen, and furthermore budoka, the sword cannot be separated from him. it exists in his core, even after the blade, the hands, and the body are gone. Ito, muto yuishin. one sword, no sword: only mind.

On a side note, at recent seminars Koretoshi Maruyama Sensei was teaching 500 year old sword kata, tachi dori and lots of shinkage ryu work. we did swords & jyo on the beach in wailua (kauai, hawaii) every morning at sunrise for 2 hours a day over four days. O, gods it was a blast!

Hi Paula. I was considering your remark, "The lesson I have learned the most from bokken is a fantastic sense of hips, or rather maybe it might be more accurate to say a sense of center and control in the area of my pelvis. Subtle ways to firmly drop and be very solid, good ways to turn and lead without losing center. "

I believe Tai-Chi can also be an excellent path to increase that awareness and control. The style I practice maintains that all movement should flow from there (the dan tien).

R/
Wayne

I repeat. the ONLY person who can have claimed to heve "mastered" aikido was O'Sensei. Anybody else tells me that they have Mastered aikido, I will avoid their dojo like the plague.