Without this, No Aikido

Rob:

Thanks for the list. I'm not trying to give you a hard time either. I've only seen videos of any really high ranking Karateka like Mas Oyama and Ed Parker, and just wanted some names so I could look them up and see for myself what they are doing. I see a clear distinction in the initial moves of Karateka as opposed to an Aikidoka or a Judoka, and it's odd that no one else does.

It's hard to write down what exactly I'm trying to say about an initial reactions, but I know it when I see it. So until I can articulate it better, there's no use in continuing with this idea.

thanks for your input.

Szczepan:
All I can say is re-read my post. It seems like you didn't read it or understand it. I think what I said was pretty clear.

I see a clear distinction in the initial moves of Karateka as opposed to an Aikidoka or a Judoka, and it's odd that no one else does.

There is a difference, but evident if you look at low-mid level or at different circumstances (competition / teaching etc.) At very high levels, It's the principles that come forward, and these are almost the same.

Amir

Rob Liberti wrote: ... Japanese Budo which is a subset of Zen Arts, which is a subset of ...Rob

Actually, most budo has more in common with Shinto and/or esoteric (e.g. Mikkyo) Buddhism than with Zen. Aikido, especially, is more deeply Shinto-rooted than Buddhist, despite the efforts of many folks who'd love to equate Ueshiba's teachings with Zen ... in fact, he himself is reported to have had a real chip on his shoulder about Zen.

Chuck

Chuck Gordon wrote: Actually, most budo has more in common with Shinto and/or esoteric (e.g. Mikkyo) Buddhism than with Zen. Aikido, especially, is more deeply Shinto-rooted than Buddhist, despite the efforts of many folks who'd love to equate Ueshiba's teachings with Zen ... in fact, he himself is reported to have had a real chip on his shoulder about Zen.

I did a brief re-read last week on some of the stuff John Stevens compiled about O-Sensei's religion, philosophy, etc., and I got the impression that it was pretty much along the lines of a typical Japanese religion variant with a lot of Chinese roots/borrows peeking through. When you get to O-Sensei's chants with sounds, which is big in Chinese, Japanese, Indian stuff, the coincidences are too much to just shrug off... the probability of direct Buddhist borrowing at some stage looks a little too probable to shrug off, whether it came through Shinto or whatever. Insofar as the borrowing being particularly Zen Buddhism, probably not. Too many westerners focus on Zen and picture it as being more of a singular contributor that it probably was.

There was a DNA survey made of the Japanese a few years back and the unavoidable conclusion is that they are originally Koreans (remember, Korea had about 6 base-languages at one time and we don't have records of all of them... proto-Japanese could well have been one of these that got pushed out due to war, etc.) "Land of the Rising Sun" is what Japan could well be to a Korean. The Ainu are quite possibly the original inhabitants of the Japanese islands, pushed into the northern hinterlands by the inflow of Koreans. The point of this digression is that I always think of the Korean fixation on religious philosophy and extended intricacies using diagrams, etc., when I look at the ideas promulgated by Ueshiba. Religious mysticism is almost a stereotype of those areas and it's easy to get bogged down in attaching reason and sources that have little to do with the true martial theme of the art. Often the religious and philosophical trappings are separable, for all practical purposes. MO, FWIW.

Mike

Tim, I was thinking about this and I would consider Mas Oyama a "master", and Ed Parker an "expert". My personal definitions are that teh masters have taken things to the "next level" - like being able to punch a bull and kill it. The Karate man I mentioned, is an expert working towards mastery. I could name several other experts, but not many masters. I'm not sure what you are seeing, my guess is that it would be the manifestation of intention. Tieing this back together with the other aspects of the thread, I suppose that's why the religious compnents come in. Not so much for another thing to distract us from the real martial aspects, but that was the known model for developing people's intentions towards higher ideals.

I appreciate the clarity I got from this thread about my ideas concerning the supersets of aikido. I also see that it is impercise to say that Zen is a superset or budo. David, your choice of expression was much better. Also, I certainly agree that shinto is going to be one of the main supersets.

Rob

Also, Peter R, I meant to also acknowledge your clarity about contributing as opposed to enveloping. That helped me change my mind. Thanks - Rob