aikijutsu vs. aikido

Cliff

...so that the junior has the opportunity to learn a very very important principal, which is actually something meant to be applied to a wide variety of situations

This is exactly the way my teacher and myself train and teach.
Techniques are a means to get something across. That something is the important bit, not the technique.

It takes proper concentration, context and stylized form to get to that point (of interest). You study.
In actual combat many more aspects come into play: what is the fight about, emotion, weariness...You fight to live another day.

So proper and precise training is important. In the past I have had experiences with highly experienced students of my teacher (dojochos with decades of experience) where they 'broke connection' because my attack was not precise enough and thus adapted their technique to the new situation I had (unknowingly) created. Off course much to my confusion. They explained what happened and why.

A few years later I started my own dojo and encounter similar situations with my own students. They wonder why everything in Aikido is stylized. "That stuff won't work in combat." Nope, you are spot on: it won't. But still you will be prepared!

Many threads go on about the effectiveness of Aikido, but hardly ever consider what you concisely described. Perhaps your post should become sticky...

Cliff, I think to invite someone to attack one spot in your body is essential in any martial arts at least until mastery. The better you are the more concentrated that opening would become until uke has no other choice but to attack there and only there. Any other choices leads to a foregone conclusion, his defeat or stalemate. Most koryu seeking to defeat techniques of other schools create techniques to counter openings of the followup to the initial invitation if they can. Thus I guess... This is a never-ending path.

For uke, attacking another opening is valid if it exists... But to do this in the beginning means no one can learn anything unless you're already blessed with a fighters instinct and genius.

Cliff Judge wrote: If free sparring with full resistance was the best way to build martial skill, why wasn't kendo armor developed until the middle of the edo period? My takeaway is that free sparring is not at all the best way to develop the skills that active warriors need, which I believe include precision, relaxation in the face of stress, awareness, etc. I don't believe you can have a martial art that teaches this kind of stuff if you focus on full resistance and free sparring and "realism". Technique and principle get watered down to "whatever works." Free sparring against a fully resisting opponent can do at least as much to make technique WORSE as it can to improve or refine it.

Perhaps I didn't say what I thought well enough when talking about resistance in training.

Again, in BJJ the best exponents spend a lot of time, light rolling, that is flowing through techniques with a semi passive partner, it is understtod that to enhance your set of skills it is important to do this. But again, the fundamentals of how the art came about are based on tried and tested technique on resisting opponents - hey, all arts are different...I wasn't having a go at anyone...just saying that people need to really understand what they are doing.

Cripes I did a soft style of Aikido for 14 years or so, greatly enjoyed it, and still visit my old dojo to teach them new stuff from time to time.

Kata training in the koryu sword arts might just be a matter of common sense. Full-contact sparring would probably have reduced the soldier population a little faster than most generals would like.