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Old 03-22-2012, 04:37 PM   #14
Chris Li
 
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Re: Aikido and the Structure of the Universe - Ichirei Shikon Sangen Hachiriki

Quote:
Carl Thompson wrote: View Post
Just to be clear, I didn't intend to come across as doubting you when I said I was unfamiliar with the hachiriki outside of Omoto. I just wanted to indicate my lack of knowledge before thanking you for the research you are doing.

I imagine I haven't done anywhere near as much study into this as some of the big guns on this forum so please forgive me if I state anything obvious in my observations or get too tedious in my questions. According to an account by Hisa, it is said that Hoshina, Takeda's father and Takeda himself also learned Onmyodo from Soemon. Although I could understand that Onmyodo was the "way of yin and yang" from the Kanji (陰陽") I never came across any references to the hachiriki in descriptions of it. It is closely connected to esoteric Buddhism which Takeda later went out of his way to study.

Thanks again for your comments and the book reference in particular.

Carl
Oh no, no problem - sorry if it sounded that way.

Onmyodo in Japan is basically the Chinese Yin/Yang cosmology, usually as in divination (ala the I Ching). There's also a lot of weird mythology in modern Japanese pop culture surrounding it.

Anyway, it's all tied together with Yin/Yang, Five Elements, and the Eight Trigrams. Those things are also tied in with the Chinese martial training methodology, so the references have existed commonly in Japan for a long time (6th century, I think).

Best,

Chris

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