Quote:
Thomas Campbell wrote:
hi Mark:
I'm wondering if Hikitsuchi is quoted correctly here, saying that both yang and yin are heaven. Yin is more typically characterized as earth.
Hey, it looks like you've found the time to do some research.  I'm particularly interested in the idea about how Ueshiba used kiai. I think it would have been very interesting for Ueshiba to have compared notes with Wang Xiangzhai, found of the Chinese martial art of yiquan. Yiquan trains a practice called shisheng, or "test of the sound," which sounds (pun intended) like a "quality-assurance" version of Ueshiba's use of kiai. |
Hi Tom,
I thought about that, too. Probably a transcription error. I would have guessed heaven and earth, but given that it's Hikitsuchi, I really wouldn't know. Maybe he wanted to say heaven and earth and it came out heaven and heaven? Or maybe he meant it that way. I don't have the original, just the online reprint of the BB article.
There really isn't a whole lot about Ueshiba's kiai out there. People make mention of it, but I have yet to find anything in detail.
Really, though, is the sound itself important? Or the energy prior to the sound? Can one have a "silent" kiai?
If sounds are important, then they have vibration and wavelengths. Is one important or both?
Intent drives the movement and for different people, they use different images, but can accomplish the same things. Is it a similar process for kiai?
Just as Ueshiba correlated physical aiki body skills to spiritual idealogy, did he marry sounds to his physical aiki body skills? IMO, yes. The important question is, did he choose which sounds (in which it didn't matter, it was a personal preference) or did he find that specific sounds mattered (in which case it could be that they mattered for *him* but not for everyone)?