Francis Takahashi Sensei wrote a very interesting column this month called
Winning vs. Not Losing. Andrew Bedford added a relevant quotation:
A true pacifist is able to kill or maim in the blink of an eye, but at the moment of impending destruction of the enemy he chooses non-violence.
Yukiyoshi Takamura
This is the interview with Yukiyoshi Takamura the quote was taken from:
http://www.shinyokai.com/Takamura%20interview.pdf. The quote is on page 9 and in the very next paragraph on the same page Takamura Sensei says:
Quote:
|
Years ago I saw an aikido instructor named Tadashi Abe in France. He was a true warrior in every way. He was a great example of a man with martial spirit flaming in his belly while the spirit of harmony was visible in his eye. He was a real credit to Ueshiba Sensei's technical and spiritual legacy. He is 100% samurai!
|
I want to make a digression here about the surprising interconnections/nexuses in aikido and budo. If you check out the site with the interview
http://www.shinyokai.com/home.htm you can see photos of Toby Threadgill who teaches Takamura ha Shindo Yoshin Ryu (TSYR) and who is a member of aikiweb. This week I saw links to a video of his battojutsu/iai and to an interview with him on a Spanish aikido forum
http://www.aikiforum.com/viewtopic.php?t=3508. I noticed it particularly because the first technique was a reverse Zatoichi grip draw and I had done a blog post about Zatoichi a week or so earlier...