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Old 07-08-2011, 12:34 AM   #16
graham christian
Dojo: golden center aikido-highgate
Location: london
Join Date: Oct 2010
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Re: Terms: I.S., I.P., Neijin, Fajin, Aiki, etc.

Quote:
Jonathan Wong wrote: View Post
Wait, wait. The fact is he didn't use "harmonizing" or "harmonizes" at all! He used Japanese words, and you are talking about somebody's translations of that. Plus he used religious terminology. And he used references to the ancient literature. It is questionable for those of us who don't speak Japanese to say that "harmonize" is the correct translation and mix, blend, or combine are incorrect. But beyond the language issue, there is still far from a "correct answer" due to the strange terminology he used.

I don't want to put words in O-sensei's mouth. I don't have any agenda. But I really think we have a lot of work to do regarding understanding what he meant. So we do need to have these conversations. And we need to trace the kind of things that he said through a lot of mess in order to arrive at good translations.

Looking at the traditional meanings of neijin-related terms that O-sensei would have read is a good way to do it, and the cultural, historical, and religious analysis that people like Peter Goldsbury, Stan Pranin, and Ellis Amdur do is also an important and necessary task.
Sorry Jonathan but he did say. Hikitsuchi could repeat much of what O'Sensei said word for word for example. No mistranslation.
Tohei spoke good English. His son made sure of the proper translations as he was there to translate.

When it comes to religion and people trying to analyse it and compare this way and that invariably they miss what's staring them in the face. How can they analyse love and compassion and humility when they don't even know what it is in their own language? I don't know of a religion where the major enlightened people of it didn't say and preach about the power of love and compassion ans spirit, call it holy spirit, prana or whatever. The same words in many languages given over and over as lessons that few discipline themselves to understand. No mistranslation.

I could take maybe ten sentences from a thirty sentence piece and ask someone to demonstrate it. Most couldn't. I suppose all ten sentences must have had different meanings then. mmmm. Don't think so. You can relate them to whenever, whoever, however but the fact is you don't understand them.

As a famous modern seer said in music, 'don't believe the hype..'
ha, ha.

Regards.G.
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