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I was not content to call what i did jujutsu, as many before me have done, because i felt that as a modern budo it is not koryu, therefore did not deserve the same name as a cultural herritage. Rather i felt that a show of respect for those who practice koryu jujutsu and nihon bujutsu in general.
For many years I trained in an art that was called jujutsu but over the years of research and study I understood what jujutsu really was and that what I had been practicing was really a combination of judo, karate, aikido and a few other bits and pieces and had been inappropriately labelled.
This does not take anything away from those who practiced this or any other system like it, far from it. Some of the finest martial artists that have stood in front of me and demonstrated such modern jujutsu and impressed me greatly. But for myself i could not use this title for the above mentioned thinking. I have studied various budo for most of my life and also researched the history, tradition and mythology of the Nihon bugei; Tamanegi Ryu is the practice of everything i have done and am studying.
I am still learning and improving and it is only through regular practice and guidance that this will be achieved. I currently travel to train in koryu jujutsu, this i do for myself and i have found it considerably different to modern budo practice.
The essence of what we do is in the preservation of form and the investigation of principles.
Training is not for grade or rank, but rather for self improvement and historical study. This is not to say we do not have a ranking system or a syllabus but that we do not hold gradings and have formal assesments of that nature. Grade is simply a communication between student and teacher and from these to the other budoka. |
