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Birth of Judo
Author: Brian Jacobs
In the three centuries prior to the 1600s, Japan existed in a state of turmoil. The various arts of war were defined and refined in training halls and battlegrounds from one end of the island nation to the other.
In 1575 the combined armies of Oda Nobunaga and Ieyasu Tokugawa used firearms against the heavy cavalry of the Takada clan, killing 15,000 of them. In 1588 Emperor Hideyoshi ordered a “sword hunt” in which all classes except the samurai were disarmed. In 1600 Tokugawa defeated Hideyoshi and opened a new era in history: the Edo period (1603-1867). During the next 250 years, the country enjoyed relative peace, which was imposed with force by the new shogun. The period was characterized by individual encounters, with mass battles being rare. As such, the masters of the different methods of combat—sword, spear, bow and others—were able to delve deeply into all aspects of weaponry and perfect their techniques. Man-to-man combat was the testing ground for their methods, and the less effective ones were weeded out when those who tried them died.
Japan had experienced its first contact with European culture and religion in the early 1600s. Tokugawa saw the influence as a threat to the stability of the newly forged nation and decided on a closed-door policy. He prohibited virtually all cultural and diplomatic contact with the outside world. Most of those who dared to venture abroad were executed upon return to prevent “cultural contamination.” From that time forward, Japan was successful in limiting interaction with the outside, with the exception of the open port in Nagasaki harbor, which was controlled by the Dutch.
It was successful, that is, until U.S. Commodore Matthew Perry sailed into Edo Bay with his four Black Ships in March 1854. Under orders from President Millard Fillmore to establish trade and diplomatic relations with Japan, Perry arrived with warships far superior to those of the Japanese shogun, thus ending that nation’s policy of isolation. There ensued a turbulent period of jockeying between forces that wished to maintain the status quo and those that saw the need for Japan to modernize to meet the foreign powers on their own terms.
In 1867 the last shogun, Yoshinobu Tokugawa, resigned and a teen-aged emperor named Meiji assumed power. The transfer was followed by a civil war that began in Kyoto in January 1868 and ended with the siege of Hokkaido in 1869. As before, the battles were mostly fought by sword-bearing samurai, this time under Tokugawa leadership against an imperial army that used rifles and cannons. The Tokugawa lost power as they had gained it: by gunpowder. To symbolize the regime change, the capital was moved from Kyoto to Edo, which was renamed Tokyo. The days of feudalism were over, and the new centralized government was left in the hands of those in favor of Westernization.
End of an Era
One of the first edicts of the new Meiji government was the Haitorei, or the Sword Abolishment Act of 1876. The government passed a law prohibiting the people of Japan, even former members of the warrior class, from bearing arms in public unless they were members of the military or policemen on duty. This prohibition had two effects: It humiliated the samurai by taking away their badge of honor, and it delineated the old ways of the sword from the new ways of gunpowder. From that point on, many schools of old-style martial arts such as iaido and jujutsu began to wane as their main justification for existence ended. The result is what we see nowadays in Japan: small schools that carry on the traditional ways of the samurai in a philosophical and historical manner, rather than huge establishments dedicated to training warriors. The samurai position as a special class ended after almost 1,000 years.
The emperor made Shinto the state religion, thereby establishing himself and his heirs as living gods. He also set out to create a modern, industrialized country in a fraction of the time it had taken the nations of the West to do so. Western styles were hurriedly adopted and traditional ones often abandoned. Germany’s army and Britain’s navy were emulated, resulting in a strong military that could project power outward for the first time in many centuries. With that surge of development and change came an increased desire to dominate the rest of Asia. Successful campaigns in the Sino-Japanese War (1894-1895) and Russo-Japanese War (1904-1905) and the annexation of Korea (1910) certainly made Japan the major force in the region at the beginning of the 20th century.
It was in this martial context that judo’s precursors were formed and refined. Most of them were devoted to weapons skills, with hand-to-hand combat taught as a failsafe. Even though a warrior who lost his weapon during battle was at an almost-always-fatal disadvantage, unarmed combat was included in every school’s curriculum.
Jujutsu
Jujutsu, which means “gentle skill,” is a system of combat in which a smaller person can defeat a larger assailant. The literal meaning of the term doesn’t imply that it’s a gentle, dainty art, for it was the primary unarmed combat method of the samurai. Both aikido and judo are modern-day descendents of jujutsu.
According to Bujutsu Ryu Soroku, a set of biographies of the founders of various systems, there existed some 20 ryu (schools) of jujutsu. The differences between them were chiefly attributable to the teachers’ specialization in certain techniques. More than 725 official documented systems of jujutsu were developed over the years, all of which concentrated on situations in which no major weapons were involved.
The vital issue in jujutsu was effectiveness in combat. Methods were tested in duels and public competitions among members of various schools. The battles were frequently lethal. Such testing not only improved weapons and ways of employing them, but also established the reputations of the survivors.
The deep secret of ancient jujutsu was embodied in a two-part saying: “True natural posture is the manifestation of mushin. Control strength through gentleness.” Jigoro Kano (1860-1938), the founder of Kodokan judo, explained the subtleties behind it when he formulated his Principles of Judo so that the original jujutsu concept would be understandable to the people of the day. He did that by analyzing the principle quoted above and dividing it into three sections:
• The principle of natural body, or shizentai no ri, concerns posture. It’s a natural, unrestricted posture from which one can attack and defend and adapt to any kind of assault.
• The principle of gentleness, or ju no ri, concerns the position of defense. It holds that one should not oppose the offensive power of an antagonist. Rather, one should render that force ineffective by moving his body out of the way.
• The principle of breaking balance, or kuzushi no ri, concerns the position of attack. It says that one should increase his chances of winning by breaking his opponent’s balance or adhering to his body.
The moniker “gentle skill” is really a description of the principles and techniques that form the foundation of the art. The smaller person cannot rely on brute force and strength to overcome someone who’s bigger and stronger. The smaller person must instead use his opponent’s strength and momentum to add to his own technique to achieve victory. When the opponent pushes, the defender pulls. When pulled, the defender pushes. This is the principle of ju.
Jujutsu is often called the “art of flexibility” because it doesn’t rely on strength to win. It’s opposed to rigidity, which leads one to use strength against strength. Instead, the practitioner employs strategy—luring his opponent to attack first, then avoiding the attack and making him lose balance. Afterward, he counters with a throw, strike or joint lock.
The art of the samurai is usually called ko ryu jujutsu, or “old-style jujutsu,” to differentiate it from the modern style, which is often referred to as gendai budo jujutsu. All styles of jujutsu founded after 1868 fall into the modern classification, but it’s widely acknowledged that even the newest ones employ principles and techniques that are similar to those of the old styles.
Before the name “jujutsu” was adopted, the art had various appellations such as kumu-uchi and yawara because the training was dependent on the school, which was allied with various feudal families. Kano traced the roots of jujutsu to the early 1600s. The oldest progenitor was takenouchi-ryu, reportedly originated by Takenouchi Hisamori in 1532. This branch taught kogusoku, or the art of seizing, which is different from pure jujutsu. The takenouchi-ryu may be regarded as the primal system for the teaching of arts similar to jujutsu.
Jujutsu was taught mainly to enable the samurai to defend themselves in situations where they were disarmed or not allowed to carry their long swords because they were in the presence of a feudal leader. It experienced a decline after the Tokugawa Era, and on July 24, 1905, 18 masters representing the leading Japanese ryu gathered at the Butokukai, where they joined Kano’s Kodokan judo. ...