AikiWeb Aikido Forums

AikiWeb Aikido Forums (http://www.aikiweb.com/forums/index.php)
-   Websites (http://www.aikiweb.com/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=9)
-   -   Hiroshi Tada Interview, Part 2 (http://www.aikiweb.com/forums/showthread.php?t=21663)

Chris Li 08-18-2012 08:57 PM

Hiroshi Tada Interview, Part 2
 
New blog post!

Aikido Shihan Hiroshi Tada: The Budo Body, Part 2 - Hiroshi Tada Sensei meets Tempu Nakamura

Enjoy!

Chris

Alex Megann 08-19-2012 04:39 AM

Re: Hiroshi Tada Interview, Part 2
 
"...there might be things such as basic telepathy practice."

I can't wait!

Alex

chillzATL 08-19-2012 07:15 AM

Re: Hiroshi Tada Interview, Part 2
 
Nice cliffhanger there Chris, can't wait for the next!

Chris Li 08-19-2012 10:31 AM

Re: Hiroshi Tada Interview, Part 2
 
No need to even post - I can sense your anticipation! :D

Best,

Chris

robin_jet_alt 08-19-2012 03:23 PM

Re: Hiroshi Tada Interview, Part 2
 
I'm intrigued as to what the original Japanese word for "telepathy" was. It wasn't 以心伝心 was it?

Chris Li 08-19-2012 08:07 PM

Re: Hiroshi Tada Interview, Part 2
 
Quote:

Robin Boyd wrote: (Post 314524)
I'm intrigued as to what the original Japanese word for "telepathy" was. It wasn't 以心伝心 was it?

Actually, he said "telepathy" (テレパシー) in katakana.

Best,

Chris

robin_jet_alt 08-19-2012 08:12 PM

Re: Hiroshi Tada Interview, Part 2
 
Quote:

Christopher Li wrote: (Post 314541)
Actually, he said "telepathy" (テレパシー) in katakana.

Best,

Chris

Thanks. I'll be interested to read what he says about it.

JJF 08-20-2012 03:15 AM

Re: Hiroshi Tada Interview, Part 2
 
News to me that O-sensei was associated with extreme right-wing people. Would have expected otherwise..

grondahl 08-20-2012 04:30 AM

Re: Hiroshi Tada Interview, Part 2
 
Quote:

Jørgen Jakob Friis wrote: (Post 314554)
News to me that O-sensei was associated with extreme right-wing people. Would have expected otherwise..

Why would you have expected otherwise?

Alex Megann 08-20-2012 04:52 AM

Re: Hiroshi Tada Interview, Part 2
 
Quote:

Jørgen Jakob Friis wrote: (Post 314554)
News to me that O-sensei was associated with extreme right-wing people. Would have expected otherwise..

Given that most of his sponsors (as well as many of his early students) were high-ranking military officers, perhaps not too surprising...

Also, he was an avid scholar of Japanese Shinto literature, which does somewhat elevate the position of the Japanese nation in the world (though Omoto-Kyo tended to have a slightly more internationalist view).

Alex

Chris Li 08-20-2012 09:26 AM

Re: Hiroshi Tada Interview, Part 2
 
Quote:

J�rgen Jakob Friis wrote: (Post 314554)
News to me that O-sensei was associated with extreme right-wing people. Would have expected otherwise..

The Black Dragon Society mentioned in the article actually had meetings in the pre-war Kobukan.

Anyway, as Alex noted, O-Sensei had strong ties to the military and the ultra-right wing nationalists.

Best,

Chris

Rob Watson 08-20-2012 01:05 PM

Re: Hiroshi Tada Interview, Part 2
 
Quote:

Jørgen Jakob Friis wrote: (Post 314554)
News to me that O-sensei was associated with extreme right-wing people. Would have expected otherwise..

This is why the work of Stan Pranin, and others, is so critically important. A baseline understanding of the historical facts (con-o-worms that phrase is) helps frame ones understanding.

Finding the pedastal is made from pudding can be a bit disconcerting for some.

Ellis Amdur 08-20-2012 02:14 PM

Point of Fact
 
The Black Dragon society did not have meetings in the Kobukan. The Sakurakai (Cherry Blossom Society did). A very different group - (equally radical, even with some of the same personages, but with somewhat different tactical goals).

Ellis Amdur

Chris Li 08-20-2012 02:39 PM

Re: Point of Fact
 
Quote:

Ellis Amdur wrote: (Post 314631)
The Black Dragon society did not have meetings in the Kobukan. The Sakurakai (Cherry Blossom Society did). A very different group - (equally radical, even with some of the same personages, but with somewhat different tactical goals).

Ellis Amdur

Ohh, that's right - Ueshiba was connected to the Black Dragon's through Yoshida Kotaro, IIRC.

Best,

Chris

Ellis Amdur 08-20-2012 06:18 PM

Re: Hiroshi Tada Interview, Part 2
 
Chris -
It's quite a bit more complicated than that. There were myriads of political action groups. It is unclear to me if they were formed, one after another, often by the same personages, because:
1. Each had a specific goal
2. The leaders thought that the group had become "played out" with too many hangers-on, so they would create a newer more exclusive group, which would, in their view, fall prey to the same issues.
3. Different personages each wanted their own group to lead.

Anyway, they were as common as mushrooms on the forest floor.

I doubt that Yoshida Kotaro had much influence on Ueshiba in this area. I've not been able to find any information that Yoshida was a very significant figure in the Kokuryukai. First of all, he was a newspaperman and pamphleteer, and secondly, surprisingly, he was a Christian (IIRC). This latter would make him quite an eccentric in those circles, and it's doubtful he was more than one of many members/hangers-on intellectuals in those circles. He was not, apparently, a man-of-action, despite his martial arts interests.. His writings are certainly not cited in any texts I've seen about influential right wing figures. There certainly may be more of a story than we know regarding the relationship between Yoshida and Ueshiba. But even so, the Kokuryukai was an "old school" organization by that point in time, supplanted by all sorts of newer organizations. I think we only know the name because Western journalists seized upon it as sounding so "yellow peril." As folks probably know, it really stood for the Black Dragon River - the Amur - the idea being that the destiny of Japan was across that river, striking into what they considered the greatest threat to Japan, Russia. It was not about any sort of mythic, demonic "black dragon" which was to strike terror in the hearts of the West or the slackers among the Japanese.

Ueshiba's real involvement with far-right circles almost surely started with Omotokyo. Toyama Mitsuru, a founder of the Genyousha and Kokuryukai (Dark Ocean Society & Black Dragon Society) was photographed with Deguchi, along with Uchida Ryohei (among other things, a great figure in Shinto Muso-ryu jo history, the creator of a set of tanjo kata). Toyama was a major sponsor of both sword preservation societies and classical martial arts. And as Peter Goldsbury writes in such detail, Omoto was playing its own part in the incredible political ferment of right-wing politics of the time. (One of the eight members of their ill-fated journey through Manchuria was, if I recall correctly, a member of one of the radical, messianic right groups).

Deguchi was trying to play politics, playing and using such groups for his own power cravings, but because of his own grandiosity, he wasn't nimble-footed enough when the pragmatic right (Okawa Shumei) took over from the idealists (note that the idealists were incredibly murderous - but they did so for ideals that bordered on the religious rather than "realpolitik.")

At any rate, it seems clear that as Ueshiba developed his own career, first with Omoto and then, with the military figures around Takeshita in the 1920's and early 1930's, his involvement with all these various right wing - terrorist - individuals was at its peak.(And I'm not using the term "terrorist" loosely - Ueshiba was closely related with those who lead groups of assassins, and whose ideology was one of genocide). And for all the starry eyed, who want to believe that he had some kind of turning against them, like Saul on the road to Taursus, he never cut himself off from such individuals. As I've written elsewhere, he regarded his friendship with Okawa Shumei as profoundly important throughout his life, treasuring a bokken given to him by Okawa.

Best
Ellis Amdur

Chris Li 08-20-2012 06:41 PM

Re: Hiroshi Tada Interview, Part 2
 
Quote:

Ellis Amdur wrote: (Post 314660)
Chris -
It's quite a bit more complicated than that. There were myriads of political action groups. It is unclear to me if they were formed, one after another, often by the same personages, because:
1. Each had a specific goal
2. The leaders thought that the group had become "played out" with too many hangers-on, so they would create a newer more exclusive group, which would, in their view, fall prey to the same issues.
3. Different personages each wanted their own group to lead.

Anyway, they were as common as mushrooms on the forest floor.

Sure, the circles that Ueshiba ran in were actually quite small when you start tracking things down.

Toyama Mitsuru (who was, btw, connected to Tempu Nakamura) had his fingers into Manchuria before the Sakurakai came around. The Sakurakai was focused on Manchuria - and Ueshiba had his own interests there, of course.

Reminds me of one of Gozo Shioda's stories of his time in China - apparently the rumor going around in Japan was that he had been sent to China on a secret mission to assasinate a Chinese government minister.

Best,

Chris

Tim Fong 09-08-2012 02:09 PM

Re: Hiroshi Tada Interview, Part 2
 
Toyama certainly had some links to China, for example:


On the far right (no pun intended) is Chiang Kai-Shek, leader of Republican China. I have to wonder, if there were some martial arts exchanges, or discussions regarding fundamental bodyskill training. According to the memoir of one of Chiang's aides, Chen Lifu, Toyama "looked after" Chiang in Japan during a 1927 visit. Chiang was known to have had various kungfu training. In Taiwan, he had a bodyguard cadre trained by the Liu Yunqiao, a high level bajiquan practitioner.

Chris Li 09-08-2012 02:47 PM

Re: Hiroshi Tada Interview, Part 2
 
Quote:

Tim Fong wrote: (Post 315641)
Toyama certainly had some links to China, for example:


On the far right (no pun intended) is Chiang Kai-Shek, leader of Republican China. I have to wonder, if there were some martial arts exchanges, or discussions regarding fundamental bodyskill training. According to the memoir of one of Chiang's aides, Chen Lifu, Toyama "looked after" Chiang in Japan during a 1927 visit. Chiang was known to have had various kungfu training. In Taiwan, he had a bodyguard cadre trained by the Liu Yunqiao, a high level bajiquan practitioner.

Is he wearing an apron?

Tempu Nakamura also spent a significant amount of time in China, but I don't know if there were any martial exchanges or not...

Best,

Chris

Tim Fong 09-08-2012 02:57 PM

Re: Hiroshi Tada Interview, Part 2
 
Quote:

Christopher Li wrote: (Post 315642)
Is he wearing an apron?

Tempu Nakamura also spent a significant amount of time in China, but I don't know if there were any martial exchanges or not...

Best,

Chris

It's a changshan: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Changshan

You see men wearing them in the period dramas set in the 1930s, usually with a fedora. And a submachine gun.

Chris Li 09-08-2012 03:07 PM

Re: Hiroshi Tada Interview, Part 2
 
Quote:

Tim Fong wrote: (Post 315643)
It's a changshan: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Changshan

You see men wearing them in the period dramas set in the 1930s, usually with a fedora. And a submachine gun.

Ahh...

It'd look sharp with a fedora! :)

Best,

Chris


All times are GMT -6. The time now is 07:15 PM.

Powered by: vBulletin
Copyright ©2000 - 2024, Jelsoft Enterprises Ltd.