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Old 01-31-2010, 11:35 PM   #27
Erick Mead
 
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Dojo: Big Green Drum (W. Florida Aikikai)
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Re: "Hidden in Plain Sight" - Shinkage ryu menkyo

Quote:
Ellis Amdur wrote: View Post
Erick - last try....
Note: There's nothing more to say here, Erick. Unless you have a primary source (not a website of non-practicing, "web-experts") which establishes some of what you are asserting, I've got nothing more to respond.
Takeshita's diary is what? Disproving that he really meant that Aiki is love simply because it can make people do what you want? -- Proving, I suppose, that I cannot love my children because I, occasionally with some less than pleasant insistence, make them "do what I want" when they misbehave?

You have not addressed the timeline of the Gejo/Tomiki asociation sometime after 1926 -- postdating the observation about "the old form of the posture in kenjutsu" -- which he claims was revealed to him as aikido ca. 1923 -- That seems to refer to Shinkage -- unless you really think the man was feeble or dishonest. You seem to think he is confabulating on the vision(s) -- but on the date?

But even if you conceive that the vision was confabulated later, why would he place it so distinctly in time ? Why would the date of the vision be significant enough to point out his age that much later ? Makes no sense unless he just reported what he remembered. Maybe confabulated even so -- but none of that changes the "old form ... of kenjutsu" being deemed particularly significant three or so years before the YSR experience with Gejo . None of the other chronologies I have seen place Tomiki before the vision. Regardless of exact date he is unlike to have reversed their order of occurrence in memory.

I am simply looking for something to explain the timeline -- taking the man at his word -- and which you have NOT addressed --IF you accuse him of making it up post facto -- what is your evidence that we should doubt it -- not the subjective experience itself -- but the objective association with "the old form" that he plainly made ?

Josh, the earliest version of the YSR wikipedia page associates Nakai with both arts -- and a source out of Japan seems to predate that as a web resource -- http://www.samuraispirit.org/Budosca...yu-English.pdf I can't check the nihongi version http://www.samuraispirit.org/Budosca...hinkageryu.pdf for correspondence because my Acrobat got indigeston on whatever character set is used -- Not saying its right -- just that it is not from Wikipedia but it ended up there.

I am not and have never tried to "prove" anything from any source on those points (much less the one noted) -- I am simply convinced that Shinkage influence had an earlier date because of the man's own statement. I went looking therefore for any suggestion of such a source. Aikido Journal's entry on Nakai's Goto-ha Shingan reports that "The technical content of this school is unknown but certainly included jujutsu techniques and the study of various weapons." Do you or Josh know something about the technical content of Nakai's school you are not telling that rules out any pastiche of Shinkage from him or Tsuboi ? The Shingan scroll from Nakai was seemingly not sealed and according to Miek Skoss (who shares your doubts about YSR connections) there is some thought Nakai was not authorized to issue densho -- this does beg a question whether he was completely orthodox in his training ? 'Cause ya know that NEVER happens in the martial arts, now does it? Again, though interesting, it is hardly critical either way.

The timeline is critical -- to your argument on Gejo, Tomiki and the later YSR influence -- without which we are back where we started with no clear YSR connection -- assuming you are correct and these Nakai associations and some informal YSR exposure are spurious. Why you resist the very possibility of the idea (vice the plainly loose nature of suggestive evidence for it ) is unclear to me -- since you essentially lay out a very similar informal exposure to YSR ( which is not disputed) through Gejo -- and which is wholly in keeping with Ueshiba's overall cafeteria style of learning.

Could we answer a simple question? -- The point of this whole issue in my raising this to YOUR attention (before, and again now):

WHAT do you contend was the intended reference of "the old form of the posture in kenjutsu" which IS aikido, according to Morihei Ueshiba (if not found in Shinkage, mu-to, or otherwise) ?

What is your answer ?

Cordially,

Erick Mead
一隻狗可久里馬房但他也不是馬的.
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