Thread: Ichi no ken ?
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Old 12-07-2010, 05:30 PM   #64
ravenest
Dojo: Way of Falling Water
Location: NSW
Join Date: Nov 2010
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Re: Ichi no ken ?

Quote:
Joshua Reyer wrote: View Post
... the whole nature of the kata has been changed, the lessons therein completely different. Which is not surprising, but rather interesting, I thought.
Yes, interesting. This can also occur by changing the bunkai of a kata while the actuall move in the kata can be exactly the same. (When a kata has a single performer but each move is demonstarted by two in a 'bunkai'.) eg. Nobudi Nogata (sic?), supposedly an empty hand defense against Bo and other attacks. One set of bunkai demonstrate, well basically, brute strength. I prefer not to try to break baseball bats with my forearm, then after kick, then after do a series of unrelated moves that dont seem to flow together. Exactly the same moves can be used in a different way if one swaps sides (ie. the attack comes in yokoman from the left instead of right, or, you reverse sides with the pattern) utalising principles I learnt in Aikido, then all subsequent moves flow together unto the next obvious set of moves ( a new bunkai).

One way you learn strength and oppostion, the other way you learn to utalise the opponnnts strength and flow one move 'economically' into the other.

I just whish teachers would spend more time explaining WHY certain moves and interpretations are required.

Quote:
Joshua Reyer wrote: View Post
Just a guess, but I'd hazard this is one of the clearer demonstrations of aikiken being about improving one's taijutsu, rather than an independent weapons system. One big part of that movement forward in old styles is training maai -- finding the point where you can strike without being struck, where the enemy most wants to strike you, and so on. Aikido is not focused on such questions of distance with long weapons, it's focusing on a much shorter maai -- initial attack and contact happening much closer than with two swordsmen.
Yes, in the above clip Sensai Sugarno stops, just as he attacks, takes the sword from his hand and grasps the others hand saying this is the correct maai
Quote:
Joshua Reyer wrote: View Post
Particularly if you're using swordwork to demonstrate a principle, it's quicker and easier to just start from the maai that can demonstrate it, rather than doing the whole closing distance thing.
Yes, its just that as soon as one picks up a sword ... thats all most of us can see - look out, he has a sword! Whereas perhaps we should view it more as ... say a boxer sees a skipping rope?
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