Mike Murphy says, that all too often we ear that kata have hidden movements.Personally, he avers, I think it is all crap.
He says no offense to people who believe this bs.
Mike, Mike.Shame on you.If you really believe what you say, for shame.
This column exists because partly, of a person who for twenty years studied the hidden applcations of kata, though e began in Jiujitsu four years and then went to Judo for four and a half, long ago in the Sixties and Seventies.
This person helped irritate many Uechika into studying Jiujitsu, because they oherwise had a terrible gap in their training.
But this individual also had studied , as have I, Okinawan karate, in which I have honor of being sixth dan these days, for many years.
Okinawan karate of severalstyles studied this individual, and in all of those styles, applications of kata, and principles of analysis of applications , were studied and taught.
Yerse, they were.:-)
The styles this individual studied included one which I too study known as Shorin ryu.
Yerse, applicateions were taufght here, but not applications alone. Principles of power and speed and what was called atemi, sharp striking power, your estimable sensei would call it explosive power and so forth, ripping strength, and other things, as well as escaping and evasive footwork, for we of Okinawan karate of shorin branch believe in getting way away from an attack quickly, but also in getting to a weak side of the attacker.
Strong fundamentals were also taught, such that 'blocks ' were understood to hurt attacking limbs, or unbalance people using softer movements so to control.
One block in this system is called torite uke, meaning seizing hand receiving, which actually grasps the hand as it receives.
Other such blocks are the wrapping and seizing(magetori) shuto uke, which eplains itself with its name, and there are still others.
Striking training is conducted with such precision as to smack with accuracy areas of the size of a quarter, which are the size of the activation areas of the kyusho.
Shocking power is trained through a series of foundation excercises so as to deliver maximum damage in all techniques.
When ones foundation training is thus, the applications of the kata moves are hardly 'secrets.'
They are merely techniques one is already taught as basics, including locking and throwing,which are esily enough derived in the kata.
If you still do not believe me, refer to a copy of Funakoshi's Karate Do Kyohan,wherein he gives A: A chart of forty four jintai Kyusho .
B:A list of nine karate torite throws, and states that they come from the kata and for more, refer to the basic kata.
C: A List of seated techniques including jointlocks and groundfighting waza also from the kata.
D: Clearly states that kata and karate contain the techniques of throwing and jointlocking, and that these are in the kata, and shows some wrapping and locking apps of 'blocks"(actually receiving techniques) in his basics section.
E:Also states that the vital oints of karate are the same as used n Judo and acupuncure and moxibustion.
Now, what was that about there being n hidden movements in the katas?
A secret, my friend, is something you don't know.
Many people do not know these things I state here, but Funakoshi did. Did Kanbun Uechi? I thinkhe did, but perhaps he did not teach them. He was supposed to have killed a man in China with a thrust once, to a vital point.Perhaps he dd not want to be responsible for others doing so.
I understand he was most reluctant to teach his art.
Did Kanei know the kata apps? Perhaps not. Certainly he knew the kata, certainly he knew karate in many ways, but perhaps he was not shown all of it.
Perhaps Kanbun was not. Three katas, in a series of kata that ther styles also have similar ones of, but more like nine?
And those related styes all teach grappling, locking and breaking apps for kata moves in addition to kick and strike and punch.Goju ru, Ryuei ryu and ****o ryu, all do.
But, more importantly, so does Shorin ryu, at least the type I do.So doea salso Isshinryu.
The names for these are called as himitsu(secret techniques) , as kaku****e(hidden hands) and so forth.
One does not believe all is in kata. One believes that the mnemonics for all types of techniques are there.Throws must be learnt apart from kata, as locks, punches and kicks, deflections, and points must also be learnt separately. But once learnt , the practice of them is plowed back into the katas.
Jake also says(Jake, Jake-better you dsould know than this) that one believing all is in kata is disrespecting the other arts big time.
Not so, Jake. It was not thought of in those days, and I know because I was there for some of them, that one ids training in a particular style, but that one was training to defend oneself.One used what techniques one could, and learned from anyone who would teach, what they had to teach.
In the sixties and seventies,we cared naught about styles, we thought that was silly. Everybody learned everything they vculd abut everyone elses techniques and no one disrespected anyones art. In fact the word disrespect as a verb did not even exist before the Eighties that I know of.
To resume my theme(Kusanku's thin and piping voice continues in a calm tone:
Jiujitsu once was the same with Kemo, the early karate. On Okinawa even today, many systems exist which teach a sysem of either jiujitsu or torite or Ti as it is called(sort of an Okinawan Aikijutsu) along with the kihon and kata of karate, and state that these are the hidden meanings of the moves in the kata.
Some study only the grapppling parts, but even they have strikes and utilize karatelike kata(like sanchin) as training methods.
I can give details in vast depth here but this should serve for now.
One of the secret teachings in Okinawan karate styles, is that in China, Jiujitsu and karate were one art, which had fou parts, subdivided further into other parts.
This art was c'uan fa or Kempo, and the four parts are kicking and use of the legs, or ti,striking and the use of the hands, or da,throwing or felling or shaui, and controlling through locking, dtriking or pressing vital points or na.The mnemonic is ti, da, shuai , na.
Each of these has other parts. Chinese manals even from the early nieteen hundreds contain such statements.Thes manuals have even got photographs and translated text in them.
One such manual is the Bubishi, used by many Okinawan karate masters. It contains vital points and many kata applications, and a forward by about ten or so Okinawan Tenth Dans from a whole bunch of styles and some Chinese asters, allsayint that tuite and kyusho jutsu are the real secret of the applications of the kata.
not an Uechi master among them, but White Crane, Goju ryu, Tomarite, and Shorin ryu masters, inclding the one who founded the style I practice currently of Matsubayash ryu,Shoshin Nagamine, who clearly states these things.
Things I was taught by a man who had studied from his (Nagamine's) American former son-in-law, as early as 1972.
Things most people stil don't know.
Things that work very well if the basics as I said, are mastered first.
Did you know it is possible to render a man unconscious who attempts to attack you straight in by doing an evasive maneuver as you pull three inches straight up on a piece of hair just above the front of the ear?Using a movement concealed in the Shorin ryu version of a basic kata called Pinan Sandan?
Most people don't.
One should not mock at what one does not know.Nor should one be arrogant in ones'knowledge, for there is always more to be learned.
Wa uke, forinstance, we call tomoe uke(circular receiving ) in Shorin ryu, is the most advanced hand technique in all karate, containing as it does the seeds of all the other techniques.
Principles indeed.As one on here spoke so truly.
Can it be an arm break? The Goju and ****o people teach that as one of its meanings, but only one.
Did the kata inventors mean this to be?According to the Chinese and many Okinawans they did.
But may Okinawans did not learn the whole art, either, and many still do not know this.At least a few do, though , as witnessed by Funakoshi and Mabuni's books, and by the intro to the Bubishi, and by a few small nsignificant souls such as my own self to whom the keys of these techniques were handed in their entirety, possibly as a token of pity on the part of my teachers, who may have thought their student had no chance in life without them.
But Mike, don't be so harsh towards those who believe these things to be true;it may be all we have.:-)
Or maybe not.:-)
Kusanku
I would say no. If you mean a kata gatame, a shoulder wheel, yes, you can derive one from wa uke but I do not believe that, as presently taught in judo, to be one of the original applications of wa uke; the body positioning is wrong.
