El Aikido no es nada mas que Daito Ryu (click amplia)

Este articulo de Pranin, hecha luz sobre un punto crucial acerca de la naturaleza del Aikido. Creemos que queda claro que el cumulo de conocimientos de Morihei Ueshiba antes de su contacto con la Daito Ryu no alcanzaba para crear un arte marcial nuevo y diferente al Daito Ryu (sobre este punto ahondaremos en el futuro), por lo que se sostiene que el Aikido tecnicamente no es nada mas que Daito Ryu, con modificaciones despreciables, siendo el principal añadido de Morihei al arte Daito, solamente la confusa filosofía del Omoto Kyo.

Otro punto que toca el autor, es denunciar la presencia de una posición fundamentelista dentro del mundo del Aikido que no tiene contemplaciones en falsear la información con tal de no empañar la imagen divinizada de Ueshiba.


"Sokaku Takeda and the Daito-ryu Tradition
by Stanley Pranin
Aiki News #71 (June 1986)

Recently, AIKI NEWS has
enlarged ampliado the scope alcance of its research effort esforzandose to include
regular examination of the subject of Sokaku Takeda
and the Daito-ryu tradition. Readers will have noted
that articles on Daito-ryu have appeared on a regular
basis fundamentos in the last several issues and we plan to
continue this practice for the indefinite future. As
is predictable our venture into the world of Daito-ryu
has not been met with universal approval aprobación. For some the
Sokaku Takeda
(1859-1943) character of Sokaku Takeda does not represent a model
to be emulated.

Certainly, those who attach importance to the ethical
nature of Aikido will not find attractive a man who
engaged in actual combat and killed many over the
course of his long lifetime.

On the other hand, there seems to be unanimous
agreement on the part of those who knew Sokaku Takeda
that he was a true martial genius possessed of amazing
skill and keen perceptive powers. Sokaku's martial
prowess was without doubt the product of incredible
self-discipline and a continuing concern preocupación for technical
excellence.

Yet, these considerations are, in one fundamental
sense, beside the point. As we are first and foremost mas destacado
historians, we do not choose who to research or who to
ignore. History mandates that we systematically
examine all events and persons relevant to the
creation of O-Sensei's Aikido. The fact that a certain
aspect of our work displeases desagradar a given individual or
organization is, I suppose, inevitable. There is
clearly no other approach to be followed if we wish to
do justice to the focal points of our study, Morihei
Ueshiba and Aikido. The information we have so far
uncovered concerning Daito-ryu has served to greatly
enrich our understanding of Aikido's technical roots
and we hope that readers too have found material of
interest.

All of this raises the major question of the extent to
which Aikido was influenced by Daito-ryu. To be sure,
Morihei Ueshiba studied a number of traditional
martial arts during the years of approximately 19O1 to
1922. Written documentation and the testimony of
Kisshomaru Ueshiba and others confirm that, later on
in the late 1930s, the Founder was also influenced by
the Kashima Shinto-ryu sword. Yet, of all of the arts
Morihei Ueshiba studied, technically speaking, the
impact of Daito-ryu on Aikido is by far the strongest
and I would like to provide support for that claim
here. We feel it is necessary to stress this point
because in recent years there has been a marked tendency in the orthodox Aikido world to portray Daito-ryu as merely one of a number of technical influences on O-Sensei's art or even to assert that "Goto-ha Yagyu-ryu" has left the strongest impression on Aikido. This practice has even been carried to the unfortunate and ethically questionable extreme of the alteration of published historical documents in an effort to obscure the deep relationship between Daito-ryu Aikijujutsu and the early stages of development of Aikido.

Although it has of late been stated that Morihei
Ueshiba's study of Daito-ryu was limited to a few
short weeks, documents in the possession of Sokaku
Takeda's, son Tokimune, bearing llevando O-Sensei's personal
seal sello tell quite a different story. All in all,
available records show that the Founder of Aikido
studied for more than 200 days in the form of
intensive seminars starting in 1915 until at least
April 1931, the date of the last entry in the student
enrollment log of Sokaku Takeda. In addition, Morihei
accompanied Sokaku Takeda as an assistant on numerous
occasions when the latter travelled about Hokkaido
giving seminars during the period of 1915 to 1919. He
was awarded a formal assistant instructor's
certificate in Ayabe in 1922. A photograph published
in the biography of the Founder also dated about the
same year shows O-Sensei seated in front of a plaque
which reads "Daito-ryu Aikijujutsu". This plaque
apparently appeared in the "Ueshiba Juku" dojo where
he taught primarily Omoto followers from the years
1920 to the first part of 1924. Moreover, the
certificates of proficiency awarded by Ueshiba
subsequently to his students in the pre-war years were
"Daito-ryu Aikijujutsu" scrolls. The was certainly the
case through the early 1930s, however, as of this
writing we do not know until what year this practice
continued. In the middle 1930s to the early 1940s the
art was usually referred to as "Aiki Budo" until its
official name change to "Aikido" in 1942."