Half a century ago, my parents took me a talk by Rabbi Abraham J. Twersky. Twersky was a descendent of the Chernobyl dynasty of Hasidic Rabbis. Over the decades I have seen the name Twersky elsewhere: always on attorney or doctor’s offices or on academic papers – beyond religion, they have been a dynasty of intellect. Rabbi Twersky, a psychiatrist, merged Mussar (Jewish ethics) with elements of the Twelve Step Program, becoming a profoundly important figure in the field of the treatment of substance abuse. Despite his incandescent intellect, he was a down-to-earth man, who worked with those suffering from addiction disorders from any walk of life, and who wrote books whose profundity was encased in simple accessible prose and images.
I do not remember the overall theme of his talk that evening, but part of it concerned his upbringing, which he told in the third person, in a charmingly lyrical Yiddish accent. “Twersky was a brilliant boy, a chess prodigy. He was crazy for chess, and would seize any moment to go and have a game. It became a kind of addiction. And one day, there was a chess tournament, and Twersky, only ten years old, had to go. Twersky had to go! He would be playing against much older boys, even adults, because chess is a game of intelligence, and winning and losing is based on the merits of the mind and the will. But it was the Sabbath, the most Holy day of the week, when G-d descends to earth to unite on that one day with the Sabbath bride, the Shekinah, the divine feminine presence of G-d. Think of that! G-d loved humanity so much that He exiled a portion of Himself so that creation could occur. It is on the Sabbath that G-d’s sacrifice is redeemed, that G-d in His Fullness is reunited. Our celebration of the Sabbath is in gratitude for G-d’s sacrifice for us. It’s that important!
But Twersky could not resist his desire for chess, and he climbed out of the window, ran down the street to the chess club, and spent the morning and the afternoon in game after game. Finally, it was over and Twersky returned home, once again climbing into the window of his room where he should have been studying. Twersky thought he had escaped when his mother came to his doorway, and told him that his father wished to speak to him.
Twersky, it must be said, was frightened of his father. Not because he was a brutal man, but because he was a holy man, a man of G-d. Through his prayers, he brought his Hasids closer to the Divine Presence, and every commandment was equally sacred to him. He was sitting behind his massive desk, reading a tract from the Talmud, a book almost as big as the span of Twersky’s arms. And Twersky stood there, trembling. And his father raised his eyes and spoke. Twersky’s father spoke powerfully, in outrage, as Twersky had never heard him before. He said how the Lord G-d himself bequeathed the Sabbath to humanity out of mercy, that we had been cast out of Eden to toil and suffer, yet on the seventh day, we were encouraged to rest. But rest did not mean leisure, amusement . . . games. Rest, he said, meant that the burdens of survival were lifted, so that for one day, humanity could turn our attention, without impediment, to G-d. We could, he said, rest in the presence of G-d, turn our attention to what we were born for, to worship the Lord G-d from our hearts, out of our own free will. Twersky saw his father face darken with anger, and he said, “My son, when you play chess, you do not think of G-d. You think of the thrill of defeating your fellow man, you delight in the play of your intellect. For what? For a game.” At this point, Twersky was weeping in shame, for he had not only betrayed his father, he had betrayed G-d himself.
And his father stood up, came from behind his desk and bent down, his hands gently on Twersky’s shoulders. He looked him in the eyes, he smiled softly and said, “So nu, my son. Did you win?”
So what does this have to do with martial arts? And specifically, aikido? Wasting time on the internet, yet again I read a series of debates and articles on whether aikido is a viable martial art, whether Ueshiba Morihei was a pacifist, what level of ‘combat realism’ was necessary in aikido, how much cross-training one should do, whether the attacks were unrealistic, whether aikido was too deadly for MMA, yet again, yet again, yet again. Later, talking about the subject with my training brother, Bruce Bookman, I imagined: “So, what if two of the uchi-deshi come staggering into the dojo one night, lips bloody, black eyes and clothes torn? And O-sensei comes up and says, ‘What happened to you boys?’ And one of the deshi shamefacedly says, ‘Well, we were in this bar down in Kabuki-cho, and these guys started mouthing off about aikido and we said, ‘Step outside!’ And one guy knocked out Ta-chan with a beer mug while we were walking out the door. And me and another guy squared off and he grabbed my shirt. I put a nikkyo on him and he laughed at me and punched me with the other hand. I did an atemi, which he didn’t notice, and then I reversed the wrist lock into a kotegaeshi. He punched me in the face a couple more times, and I blended with that and tried a kokyunage, and he bit my arm and spit the blood in my eyes! And then he stomped my knee and when I was on the ground, he did a tap dance on my ribs and then his friends took our keikko gi and threw them on the roof of the Queen Victoria Love Hotel, and now one of the touts outside the Sunny Life Pink Cabaret is wearing my black belt!'”
So, I mused to Bruce, “What would O-sensei say then?”
And Bruce said, “I know the answer! I was talking about that with Yamada sensei one time, and he said that they’d sometimes come home after a street fight, and when the boys said that they won, O-Sensei would say coyly “Oh you boys shouldn’t fight. Aikido is about being peaceful.”
“But if anyone of us ever came home having lost, O-sensei would explode! He’d start yelling how we brought shame on our dojo. He’d just go ballistic! You never wanted to come back to the dojo having lost a fight!”
Or, in other words, “So nu, my son. Did you win?”
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File under the more things change…
This is an excerpt of a biography of Shirata Rinjiro by Kaku Kōzō that I translated several years ago. You can find it on the Aikido Journal site, I believe. This is a vignette of a particular encounter at the pre-war Kobukan Dojo and is an example of Ueshiba Morihei’s public and private face as well as the standard response to dojo yaburi at the Kobukan:
• A Contest Between Different Styles
“Fold them in two,” is a good way to put it. This certainly describes Shirata Rinjirō’s attitude. He was tough on opponents who challenged him, to the point of being uncaring. It was hard not to feel sympathy for the challenger.
Of course, he had good reason for his demeanor.
Construction of the “Kōbukan” Dōjō was completed in April 1931 on the site where the present Aikikai Honbu Dōjō now stands. The dōjō held 80 tatami mats and was headed by a great master of the period, Ueshiba Morihei. At the time he was teaching a martial art called things like Ueshiba-ryū Jūjutsu or Aiki Budō. Important people such as business leaders and military commanders were drawn by his fame and lined up to be his students.
At the same time Morihei attracted young men from all over the country who came to the “Kōbukan” in an effort to meet him. But Morihei wasn’t trying to spread his personal budo across the world. Instead, his efforts were directed toward further progress and the refinement of his personal technique. He didn’t say it was a nuisance; he just did not have much interest in having many students, especially uchi deshi, or throwing his doors wide open. It could be said that for this reason he never admitted an aspiring student who asked to join without a proper introduction from a sponsor and this reinforced a mystique that covered the private confines of the Kōbukan like a veil.
Happily, Shirata Rinjirō, who aspired to be an aikidōka, was blessed with a sponsor and with the teacher’s approval became an uchi deshi in 1932. A year later he had distinguished himself among the uchi deshi.
“Hey Shirata, see who’s out front!”
Whenever there was a menacing visitor the senior uchi deshi always had Rinjirō take care of it. Indeed, he had a good physique. His height was 5’ 7”, his weight was 165 pounds and he was 20 years old. He was a son of the Yamagata “Mountain Forest King” and it showed in his countenance. His fair skin, eyes, nose and mouth projected the clear image of Momotaro, the Peach Boy, straight out of a fairy tale.
“I’ll take care of it.”
The stylish Rinjirō tied a hakama over his training uniform and on top of that wore a hatch-patterned haori coat without any identifying crest. He politely asked the visitor the purpose of their visit. No, he didn’t ask. Rather he saw what was written on the visitor’s face; they had come to fight with the school and Ueshiba Morihei.
Most of the Kōbukan uchi deshi had high ranks in kendō or jūdō. Probably for that reason uchi deshi with jūdō experience rushed to meet a visitor if it was apparent that he did jūdō. At this dōjō whoever was fastest won, but the unwritten law was that seniors had priority.
Rinjirō had been the captain of his school’s jūdō club and his strength was unsurpassed back in his home prefecture. However, he was not allowed to meet jūdō visitors; the seniors grabbed them all. Rinjirō was only chosen to take care of suspicious looking visitors when it was unclear what kind of martial art they used.
“Because I wish to enter, please give me a lesson.”
The visitor that day was a tall thin man of about thirty with thick stubble on his hollow cheeks. He had a husky voice and at first he bowed his head, but then he stared back at Rinjirō ominously through narrowed eyes as if he didn’t know how to blink.
After explaining the history and the spirit of aiki budō Rinjirō said, “A person who wishes to study aikidō should start with the spirit. If the spirit is not correct, the path will also be incorrect.” But from the start the visitor refused to listen. “What I want is the one thing at which the Kōbukan excels.” Hearing that Rinjirō resigned himself and invited the visitor into the dōjō.
The senior student Murashige Aritoshi was in the dōjō and Shioda Gō (Gōzō, later head of the Yoshinkan) entered at the same time. Neither of them appeared particularly tense; rather they looked at Rinjirō and the visitor with faces full of anticipation.
• The Aiki of One Blow, Certain Victory
“Please bow before the kami.”
While Rinjirō was showing him into the dōjō the visitor said, “Teach me with your actions.” Without warning the man unleashed a furious kick at Rinjirō, whose back was turned. Surprised, Rinjirō just managed to twist his body. The man stood with his left leg forward, deeply bent, and the back leg straight, he put his left hand straight out and his right was near his hip.
“Is he coming?”
As Rinjirō noticed him bend his rear leg to strike, the man sent out another strong kick. The movement of his body was quick. It was obviously karate. The kick is called “Crescent Moon Kick” in some karate styles, but of course Rinjirō didn’t know that.
It’s redundant, but people who have only seen aikidō after the war when it was completed harbor doubts about a situation involving an opponent using arts like karate or boxing. Would aikidō win or would they be evenly matched?
Certainly today’s aikidō gives the impression of circularity and is focused on non-aggressive defense so it is probably hard to find a response for that kind of destructive power. Nevertheless, in the aikidō of Rinjirō’s time attack and defense were simultaneous. Moreover, “aiki” was certain victory with a single blow.
Just before the opponent sent out his right kick Rinjirō’s left shoulder was pushed out a little to the side as he stood with his left foot forward. This was clearly an invitation to the opponent. The kick came flying towards his shoulder. Entering diagonally to the front Rinjirō instantly avoided it. Using his front left hand he placed a hard fist in front of the opponent’s eyes.
Normally at this point the match would clearly be Rinjirō’s. He had demonstrated a strike aimed not only at the face, but at the eyes. The opponent didn’t understand this and he jumped nimbly backwards so Rinjirō quickly closed the distance and delivered a bitter lesson.
There was a technique, “rokkajō”, that the uchi deshi used constantly in contests between schools at the Kōbukan in this period. Now it probably can be called a phantom technique. Yokomen uchi to the opponent’s front or side in response to their thrust; the same essential points are in today’s yokomen uchi no shihō nage. The points that differed the most were that the face was struck and the opponent’s elbow twisted to its limit. In the end the opponent was put on their stomach using the lever principle and their wrist held down with the knee. At the same time their spine was completely pinned.
Rinjirō was endowed with strong physical ability. People in his hometown often saw Rinjirō easily tossing large bales of rice. He grasped the elbow, or possibly the wrist, of the opponent who had been pinned with rokkajō and seizing the neck with the other hand he lifted the man up and casually tossed him backwards. It’s likely that the man’s arm was broken as he was thrown and not being able to take the fall he ended up seriously injured.
“Idiot! Can’t you go a little easier?”
Morihei, who happened to be present, thundered at Rinjirō. But this was just for the visitor, who had suffered harsh damage. After sending him away hobbling with a stick Morihei said, “Well done. That was good.”
Morihei broke into a smile and became cheerful, treating Rinjirō to some sweets. Rinjirō said, “In my own way I was going easy.” If he were asked, he would have said that his treatment of the visitor was justified. As evidence Rinjirō said that when facing visitors who had requested a match he had never actually hit anyone. However it depends how you take that. It could be said that he dared to omit strikes because ending the match with one blow would be uninteresting.
“What? That’s it? Kind of boring, isn’t it? If you had fallen I would have taken your place.” the senior student, Murashige, grumbled, looking bored. This was an outrageous dōjō and had the name, “Hell Dōjō” among the people. That doesn’t seem like an exaggeration. If one searches for strong martial arts in history, no doubt the Kōbukan uchi deshi of this period would be among the best in Japanese history.
Rick Matz
I understand that Kushida Sensei from the Yoshinkan, was a bouncer in two bars when he was a young black belt.
George Workman
Good Story! By accounts like this, it seems that the “street” or martial qualities of Aikido were present at it’s foundation. Assuming these accounts of O Sensei’s sentiments are true regarding his expectation of Aiki success in domestic battles, there seems to be something lost in the practice of Aikido in many modern dojos. Or, at least a reluctance to acknowledge the veracity of real life physical conflict. For instance, in an answer to an essay question for one dojo: “tell us about a time you had to apply your aikido training beyond the dojo”, the answer was: “I went for a walk in the woods…” (harmonizing with nature being the operative application in that case). And many of the other answers were similar. Not that modern aikidoka need to go forth and engage in meaningless conflict in order to prove the value of Aikido, but in the balance of yin / yang, my question is: can the “art of peace” be correctly understood without the equal but opposite understanding of warfare?
Milan Pejović
Good text, bravo. This is real aikido. Aikido is not ballet (I don’t mean anything bad for ballet), aikido is not a form of waving hands and jumping. I am a lieutenant colonel of the police, I also train with judokas, wrestlers, MMA fighters, I have arrested on the street and I have always used aikido and it is effective … Aikido is a skill of love, peace, union with nature, but it must also be realistic, effective. I respect the principles of Ki and they are very effective in the reality of the fight, and the reality of private life. Real aikido is effective in everything.
Keni Lynch
O-Sensei could have ushered the guest out. He could have insisted that we have no contests and left it at that. He was young, in the throes of establishing his ‘new’ martial art. Anyone running a professional dojo gets these challengers. I’ve had a few over the course of 14 years we ran our family dojo. Kickboxers, wrestlers, karateka, kendoka, boxers, ninjas, judoka and other random streetfighters. Many were respectful, some were not. They took home a broken wrist or got winded before being thrown. The nastiest challengers were fellow aikidoka. In the end, I think it’s human nature, a combination of technical ignorance and the competitive mind which fails to understand love. What would O-Sensei say..? I think it depends on which segment of his life. I would never do what I did back then. Its meaningless to contend.
Ellis Amdur
Hi Keni – You wrote: “He was young, in the throes of establishing his ‘new’ martial art. . . . .I think it depends on which segment of his life. ” You may well be right concerning your own actions – I do not know how gratuitous and brutal your actions were. Please do note that the last paragraph quotes Yamada Yoshimitsu sensei – his time as a deshi was the mid-1950’s through the 1960’s. Ueshiba was in the last years of his life . . . and he still wanted his students to win their fights – or at least viewed such fighting (and winning) as necessary for their development.
Keni Lynch
Hi Ellis, Yamada-san may well be telling the truth and if so it sounds like he kept fighting even when he was losing. In other words, he failed to follow OS’s teaching the first time. To not listen to the doctrine of peace, even when you are losing, is surely why the old man scolded him the other times. Competitive people only see winning and losing. Thus, they are prone to actively misinterpret, mishear, and generally misconstrue the teaching. It’s not about fighting, winning or losing, as OS was tireless in reiterating. Aikidoka tend not to be particularly logical though. As forTwersky, same thing. In spite of the teaching, we are also ignorant beings with our own proclivities. A caring advisor would take an interest in you, and would love to inquire into whatever moves you as a fellow human being. I have counselled murderers who justified their acts based on the dire circumstances they were under. When you listen to them give their reasons, they do make a great deal of sense, evn when we are horrified by their confessions. we all want to win, to be recognized, skilled at life and to provide safety for our loved ones. Is killing ever allowed to save lives..? Isn’t it the definition of wisdom to pay attention to the problems we face before we try to solve them..? Couldn’t we then say that Twersky was similarly curious? Interested because interested in his students lives? When interviewing crazy snipers who kill people randomly, one of the first things an invstigator would ask the gunman is ‘how did you do it?’ and the baddies are, I gather, usually obliging. Does this make the interviewer violent too? Does he endorse random violence too? I think the answer has got to be “no.”
George S Workman
Yes, there is an element of fear associated with real conflict that cannot be easily replicated inside the dojo. However, my brief experience with Chiba Sensei came very close, as well as my original Sensei (Shihan, Paul Sylvain), both were fierce warriors in their principle countenance. And there are others who might be dangerous by their lack of ability or their callous attitude toward inflicting injury. But to know a completely non-compliant adversary who is bent on your personal destruction is a lesson far beyond the dojo in most modern cases (excepting those whose work places them in harm’s way). What would O Sensei say…? By the description rendered in this article (at least) it seems obvious that he believed in the exceptional competence of his art in relation to real-world conflict. But with the subsequent focus on a description as “the art of peace”, there has become an element of dissociation with the fundamental nature of conflict and the associated trauma (and by the way, the inherent powerful strength!) brought on by visceral fear of mortal violence. Therefore it seems no wonder that O Sensei would be especially concerned with this reality beyond the dojo – after all, there is no tapping out in a real physical confrontation – so, the knowledge of effective physical application cannot be gained by a simple “walk in the woods”… But how then, can this experience be effectively taught in the dojo environment?