Lifting the Veil: Aikido Opens to the World
 

New blog post!

Lifting the Veil: Aikido Opens to the World - Kisshomaru Ueshiba, Shigeo Tokunaga and the first public Aikikai demonstration:

http://www.aikidosangenkai.org/blog/...s-to-the-world

Best,

Chris

Re: Lifting the Veil: Aikido Opens to the World
 

nice work Chris, as usual. Out of curiosity, do you know roughly when Ueshiba started saying that aiki(do) was for everyone?

Re: Lifting the Veil: Aikido Opens to the World
 

Hmm, I'd have to look around to see if that's really documented anywhere - my feeling is that the opening is more of the result of pressure from Kisshomaru than anything Morihei initiated. Of course, the "arms race" started by the Yoshinkan (it actually started with a very successful public demonstration by Gozo Shioda in 1954) provided a lot of the initial impetus.

Best,

Chris

Re: Lifting the Veil: Aikido Opens to the World
 

I seem to recall Ueshiba himself saying it in the audio interview from Aikido Journal, but I'd have to double check to be certain. I was just curious if you might know of earlier examples of him saying similar things or even if there's anything similar going back as far as Takeda? I know Takeda said Daito-ryu was also an art of peace or something similar, but it's always seemed to be more of a response to the recognition Ueshiba was getting than a way of promoting what he was doing. While Takeda seemed to have little problem teaching anyone who had the money, I don't think that's quite the same as "aikido is for everyone", but maybe I'm wrong there.

Re: Lifting the Veil: Aikido Opens to the World
 

Takeda would teach anybody - but we woudn't teach everybody everything.

Morihei definitely jumped on the bandwagon at some point (at least publicly), but that seems to have come after some resistance.

Best,

Chris

Re: Lifting the Veil: Aikido Opens to the World
 

Missed this one - the Spanish translation of "Lifting the Veil: Aikido Opens to the World", courtesy of Aikido en línea. The original English version is available on the Aikido Sangenkai blog.

Best,

Chris

Re: Lifting the Veil: Aikido Opens to the World
 

Very good article!