What's the difference between jiu-jitsu and judo?

[Andrew_Patton]

Well, most martial arts have limited theirselves due to restrictive competition, I'd say the majority (I know, assumptions) of say, karate schools teach point fighting as their main goal, even though karate's more like a mix of kickboxing and competition judo.

When I last was doing judo we'd focus on approximately a third of the class focused on throwing techniques, a third on ground work, and the rest was usually randori.

If you get a good book on judo, I'd say look at Dr. Kano's book, (should be in any barnes and noble, if you just wanna browse ) and you'll see many groundwork positions shown, such as scarf hold, side-control, north/south position, other than that you'll see some submisisons such as standing arm-locks, and newaza armlocks, triangle chokes, lapel chokes and the like, techniques people often attribute to being a BJJ thing.

BJJ is to judo, as Goju Ryu is to Shorin-Ryu. They'll teach the same things, principles, applications, self-defense, and those are mainly the same thing, it's just that one person's view of what they wanted is different.

Helio Gracie for example was always very frail and as such when he'd spar he'd always end up on the bottom, as such Helio's 'brand' of Ju jitsu has more focus on getting the best out of your guard. Now, Carlson Gracie on the other hand always tended to be a bit bulky, and would usually get the top position, as such Carlson's brand of ju jitsu has more focus on staying out of the bottom position and using your body weight to your advantage. Dr. Jigoro Kano however believed that for the most part the biggest focus in self defense would be to execute a perfect throw, which in many cases a good strong throw will disable the average person, and if need be work on your ground game, for the most part in Kano's take on Ju jitsu/Judo (same thing, more on this in a second) meant that you wanted to spend as little time on the ground as possible and get your opponent neutralized.

Now, before this get's too long, I'll just state that the Japanese words do and jitsu mean virtually the same thing, path or way, but Do applied to a word usually means something that's artful or peacefull, and jitsu means something that's mainly a war-time craft

[bushido_man96]

That is a very nice and very informative explanation, Andrew_Patton. You are right about all of the arts limiting themselves because of competition.

I do have Kano's book, and I love it. Me and my brother began practicing the throws at one point, and we had a blast. I would love to be able to learn the art as a whole.

As far as BJJ is concerned, since the advent of the UFC's, everyone thinks it is the end-all, be-all of ground fighting systems. It is important for people to realize that these other styles encompass much of the same concepts.