Ancient Martial Arts resurrected?

[Himokiri Karate]

The three 'K's', Kata being one of them, by themselves are ineffective. A three legged chair is unstable because it's missing one or more of its important legs. Alas, Kata, being a tool, the tool isn't effective without the other two...Kihon and Kumite!! Concentrating on one, Kata for example, and not the other, leaves one quite unstable.

Imho!!

I am curious, as a martial artist, do you consider shadow boxing a form of kata similar to kung fu and forms?

Every now and then, I wonder what a martial artist perception of boxing is.

[Alan Armstrong]

From a JKD and kick boxing perspective, boxing is a part of martial arts.

There is a type of shadow boxing practiced in the Chinese kung fu style "Yi Chuan" difference is that a shadow is not required, only imaginary opponents in the plural sense, as boxers shadow boxing in the singular.

[sensei8]

The three 'K's', Kata being one of them, by themselves are ineffective. A three legged chair is unstable because it's missing one or more of its important legs. Alas, Kata, being a tool, the tool isn't effective without the other two...Kihon and Kumite!! Concentrating on one, Kata for example, and not the other, leaves one quite unstable.

Imho!!

I am curious, as a martial artist, do you consider shadow boxing a form of kata similar to kung fu and forms?

Every now and then, I wonder what a martial artist perception of boxing is.

Yes I do. After all, shadow boxing is a solo training tool, just as Kata is a solo training tool, in part.

[MatsuShinshii]

Without Kata, Quan, forms (whatever your art calls them) you would not have Martial arts.

Without Kata you have no art and you have no structure for the combative elements of the art.

I disagree here. I don't think kata is a requirement or prerequisite for a Martial Art. There are many Eastern styles that do train kata, but I don't think the lack thereof means there is no Martial Art.

I understand your point of view but I must point out that without Kata, which was and still is the delivery system for passing down the art, you would not have Karate.

I understand that some arts are not passed down via Kata, Quan or even set routines.

I guess my statement should have been there would be no Karate/Gung Fu without Kata/Quan.

My point in fact is arts (lets take some modern day Karate styles) that do not teach Kata or only show their students Kata but do not explain what it is and how to extract the true intent of the art, but instead focus on Kihon (individual techniques such as blocks, strikes and kicks) and Kumite are not passing on the art but only a portion of it. Yes the argument can be made that one can learn the fundamentals through these practices but I argue that they are missing the true intent and the reason they are doing what they are doing. Kihon can only teach so much. Kumite without the foundation and understanding of the applications and how to utilize them will only teach so much. It is the Kata, and what they can and do teach us, that fills in the blanks and shows us what these other practices fall short of.

I understand where you are coming from but you show me a Karateka that does not train in Kata and I'll show you a Karateka that fails to have a true understanding in the art. I'll go one step further and say I can show you a Karateka that is lacking in skills and knowledge of all of the applications and weapons available to him. Without Kata you can not IMHO truly have a firm grasp on the art.

IMHO I will even go as far as to say without a true understanding of the Kata, one has no chance of mastering the art.

This may not be popular with some modern day styles/schools but I have trained with some of these instructors and IMO they are lacking to say the least. Yes they can execute a perfect front snap kick or a back hand but are missing the glue that ties all of these techniques together and gives a broad understanding how to utilize them and when.

Kata is like a book and Kihon are some of the individual sentences that make up the book. You have an understanding of what the sentence means but without reading the entire book they are pointless. Not to mention that you totally miss the other sentences such as the "hidden" techniques (Ti, Quan Fa, Torite, Tegumi and Kyusho) that are not readily apparent.

Without knowing the order of the sentences the book makes no sense. Do you have an understanding of the individual sentences? Yes. Do you fully understand the art as a whole? No you do not.

You are using the "no true Scotsman" informal fallacy

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No_true_Scotsman

Reality is, there is many ways to have that eureka/light bulb moment and kata is one of them but...its not the only way!

With all due respect to your point of view I stand with my statement and believe it to be true. I am sure there are plenty of ways to have a eureka moment but I am talking about understanding the art that the founder created through his training and insights. I am not sure how a eureka moment makes sense in the context of my statement. Yes we as Karateka need to discover our own way but if you are not first shown the original intent you have no foundation to build from.

Again I repeat my original statement, "if you do not understand Kata which is where the entire art is derived, you do not understand the art itself. 20 eureka moments do not add up to 1000's of proven applications.

Again with all due respect I stand on my original statement based on my years of training in both traditional, Koryu and Modern day Karate styles.

If you have a valid counter point that I have not experienced please share it as I do not claim to be an expert but merely passing on what my experiences have taught me.

I may have misunderstood your point. Just to make sure we are on the same page, what your saying is, kata is about understanding the art as oppose to mastering?

I will be honest with you, maybe my past is clouding my judgement but when I was a kid, I trained Shotokan and I remember on Friday nights, there was a very verbally abusive teacher that LOVED katas. I was not good at them and kept saying in front of the class "Are you stupid? "or he would ask if I was a slow person ( this site is very sensitive to language so I toned it down the "slow person", he used a different word which starts with R...)

My disagreement is that Kata is the only or best way of understanding the art. Boxers shadow box, some judokas only do drills and randori and they develop mastery and same with various grapplers who are mostly about drills and sparring. One thing to mention, most Okinawan karatekas train in Hojo Undo and from what I have been told, they believe that Hojo Undo is the soul of Karate and every karateka should train in it.

You are partially right in the first statement. However if you do not understand the art (what is contained within the Kata) you can not master the art as it was created. This does not mean that you can not master the physical aspects of the art. It simply means that you will not have a true understanding and therefor can not hope to master the art as it was passed down from the founder. Again just my opinion as it pertains to my years of training and the teaching passed down to me.

In the second statement above... this explains where you are coming from. It sounds like your teacher was about the competition aspects of Kata rather than the self defense/combative aspects of Kata. More focused on snap and flashy techniques.

If you had my experience you would see a different side of Kata. It's not all about hitting you mark everytime or snapping your Gi the loudest.

It's about what the individual techniques and the combined applications actually represent and how to utilize them to defend yourself.

If you are really interested find an old school teacher that is not interested in tournaments but rather passing on the art as it was passed down thru the generations as not only a "Do" but as a "Jutsu". A combative answer to an attack. I am using the Japanese terminology because that is what most understand today. (For Kusotare)

If you watch the old instructors there were no flashy snappy movements. They concentrated on the effectiveness of the technique and visualize how it is applied while performing the Kata.

In your third statement... you are partially right. Boxers and Judoka learn by more or less Kumite alone. However the techniques that are available to them are openly trained and shared with the participants. Karate is different in that each area (Shuri, Tomari, Naha) and each individual style and instructor had techniques that were unique and what they considered the soul of what made their art. These techniques for the most part in modern dojo's are long forgoten because they do not train in Kata and do not teach the Bunkai to their students.

The Kata and it's Bunkai contain the teachings of not only the Quan Fa styles that said founder learned but also their own families Ti/Di (indigenous Okinawan combative art). If all you learn is Kihon and Kumite, all you learn is half of the art (and I'm being very liberal saying half).

Yes Hojo-Undo is very important to training, however IMHO it is far from the soul. Again without Kata there is not art. If all you had was Hojo-Undo, you would be strong and have conditioned weapons without the knowledge of how to properly implement them.

And again, I mean no disrespect to your experience in the arts that has made up your points of view. This is simply my point of view based on my experiences.

[MatsuShinshii]

Without Kata, Quan, forms (whatever your art calls them) you would not have Martial arts.

Without Kata you have no art and you have no structure for the combative elements of the art.

I disagree here. I don't think kata is a requirement or prerequisite for a Martial Art. There are many Eastern styles that do train kata, but I don't think the lack thereof means there is no Martial Art.

I understand your point of view but I must point out that without Kata, which was and still is the delivery system for passing down the art, you would not have Karate.

I understand that some arts are not passed down via Kata, Quan or even set routines.

I guess my statement should have been there would be no Karate/Gung Fu without Kata/Quan.

My point in fact is arts (lets take some modern day Karate styles) that do not teach Kata or only show their students Kata but do not explain what it is and how to extract the true intent of the art, but instead focus on Kihon (individual techniques such as blocks, strikes and kicks) and Kumite are not passing on the art but only a portion of it. Yes the argument can be made that one can learn the fundamentals through these practices but I argue that they are missing the true intent and the reason they are doing what they are doing. Kihon can only teach so much. Kumite without the foundation and understanding of the applications and how to utilize them will only teach so much. It is the Kata, and what they can and do teach us, that fills in the blanks and shows us what these other practices fall short of.

I understand where you are coming from but you show me a Karateka that does not train in Kata and I'll show you a Karateka that fails to have a true understanding in the art. I'll go one step further and say I can show you a Karateka that is lacking in skills and knowledge of all of the applications and weapons available to him. Without Kata you can not IMHO truly have a firm grasp on the art.

IMHO I will even go as far as to say without a true understanding of the Kata, one has no chance of mastering the art.

This may not be popular with some modern day styles/schools but I have trained with some of these instructors and IMO they are lacking to say the least. Yes they can execute a perfect front snap kick or a back hand but are missing the glue that ties all of these techniques together and gives a broad understanding how to utilize them and when.

Kata is like a book and Kihon are some of the individual sentences that make up the book. You have an understanding of what the sentence means but without reading the entire book they are pointless. Not to mention that you totally miss the other sentences such as the "hidden" techniques (Ti, Quan Fa, Torite, Tegumi and Kyusho) that are not readily apparent.

Without knowing the order of the sentences the book makes no sense. Do you have an understanding of the individual sentences? Yes. Do you fully understand the art as a whole? No you do not.

You are using the "no true Scotsman" informal fallacy

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No_true_Scotsman

Reality is, there is many ways to have that eureka/light bulb moment and kata is one of them but...its not the only way!

With all due respect to your point of view I stand with my statement and believe it to be true. I am sure there are plenty of ways to have a eureka moment but I am talking about understanding the art that the founder created through his training and insights. I am not sure how a eureka moment makes sense in the context of my statement. Yes we as Karateka need to discover our own way but if you are not first shown the original intent you have no foundation to build from.

Again I repeat my original statement, "if you do not understand Kata which is where the entire art is derived, you do not understand the art itself. 20 eureka moments do not add up to 1000's of proven applications.

Again with all due respect I stand on my original statement based on my years of training in both traditional, Koryu and Modern day Karate styles.

If you have a valid counter point that I have not experienced please share it as I do not claim to be an expert but merely passing on what my experiences have taught me.

I may have misunderstood your point. Just to make sure we are on the same page, what your saying is, kata is about understanding the art as oppose to mastering?

I will be honest with you, maybe my past is clouding my judgement but when I was a kid, I trained Shotokan and I remember on Friday nights, there was a very verbally abusive teacher that LOVED katas. I was not good at them and kept saying in front of the class "Are you stupid? "or he would ask if I was a slow person ( this site is very sensitive to language so I toned it down the "slow person", he used a different word which starts with R...)

My disagreement is that Kata is the only or best way of understanding the art. Boxers shadow box, some judokas only do drills and randori and they develop mastery and same with various grapplers who are mostly about drills and sparring. One thing to mention, most Okinawan karatekas train in Hojo Undo and from what I have been told, they believe that Hojo Undo is the soul of Karate and every karateka should train in it.

You are partially right in the first statement. However if you do not understand the art (what is contained within the Kata) you can not master the art as it was created. This does not mean that you can not master the physical aspects of the art. It simply means that you will not have a true understanding and therefor can not hope to master the art as it was passed down from the founder. Again just my opinion as it pertains to my years of training and the teaching passed down to me.

In the second statement above... this explains where you are coming from. It sounds like your teacher was about the competition aspects of Kata rather than the self defense/combative aspects of Kata. More focused on snap and flashy techniques.

If you had my experience you would see a different side of Kata. It's not all about hitting you mark everytime or snapping your Gi the loudest.

It's about what the individual techniques and the combined applications actually represent and how to utilize them to defend yourself.

If you are really interested find an old school teacher that is not interested in tournaments but rather passing on the art as it was passed down thru the generations as not only a "Do" but as a "Jutsu". A combative answer to an attack. I am using the Japanese terminology because that is what most understand today. (For Kusotare)

If you watch the old instructors there were no flashy snappy movements. They concentrated on the effectiveness of the technique and visualize how it is applied while performing the Kata.

In your third statement... you are partially right. Boxers and Judoka learn by more or less Kumite alone. However the techniques that are available to them are openly trained and shared with the participants. They are also limited by these set techniques/applications to an extent. In Kata there are Bunkai. Bunkai meaning to disassemble - the Kata is disassembled into individual techniques and combined applications as handed down by the founder. The student learns the original Bunkai and then the student is allowed to analyze the techniques and applications with the guidance of the instructor (Bunseki) and then allowed to apply them to different scenarios (Oyo). This gives the student an unlimited amount of techniques, applications and combinations with which to answer different attacks.

Karate is also different in that each area (Shuri, Tomari, Naha) and each individual style and instructor had techniques that were unique and what they considered the soul of what made their art. These techniques for the most part in modern dojo's are long forgoten because they do not train in Kata and do not teach the Bunkai to their students.

The Kata and it's Bunkai contain the teachings of not only the Quan Fa styles that said founder learned but also their own families Ti/Di (indigenous Okinawan combative art). If all you learn is Kihon and Kumite, all you learn is half of the art (and I'm being very liberal saying half).

Yes Hojo-Undo is very important to training, however IMHO it is far from the soul. Again without Kata there is not art. If all you had was Hojo-Undo, you would be strong and have conditioned weapons without the knowledge of how to properly implement them.

And again, I mean no disrespect to your experience in the arts that has made up your points of view. This is simply my point of view based on my experiences.

[MatsuShinshii]

Something to consider on the subject of Kata and how they relate to Koryu arts...

When referring to 'Koryu', it is generally accepted it pertains to (mainland) Japanese martial systems that were founded prior to the Meiji restoration.

To be pedantic, strictly speaking, there is no such thing as a karate 'Koryu' although some make an interesting case for Goju-ryu.

Interestingly however most of the Japanese Koryu use a different kanji for the word kata to that used by Okinawan karate.

Typically most Okinawan karate utilise the kanji 型 (Kei).

Whereas Japanese Koryu use 形 (Gyou).

They both read as Kata but the meanings vary slightly (but enough to be important to understand why).

In a nutshell, the Okinawan reading of kata 型 (Kei) comes to represent a template or prototype, whereas the Japanese 形 (Gyou) means form or shape (it is found the Japanese word for a wooden doll 'ningyou' which means human form).

These are important distinctions in terms of the pedagogical approach between the two.

Okinwan karate kata are used as a way to generate possibilities and variations, whereas the Japanese approach is to use the kata to develop good focus, form strength and principles of movement - augmented with paired kata.

K.

Agreed.

However when talking to most modern martial artists they only understand the more modern day terminology which happens to be Japanese in terms of Karate.

Most no longer utilize the Hogan dialect of old to describe something and even some natural born Okinawans do not understand their original language.

If I said that I practice Todi or Toudi or Suidi, most would have no idea what this meant. I would loose most modern day Karateka due to translation.

I am utilizing "Koryu" in terms of those arts that were not swallowed up and changed by the modern Japanese machine and forced to conform to their ideal of the art. Basically dumbing down the art to be able to be taught to school children. I refer to the arts that still practice the original Toudi and Ti techniques and incorporating them into everyday practice.

I use this term because most understand this to mean old or original.

I guess I could use the term traditional but this term means different things to different people. Depending who you talk to traditional could mean that the school still teaches Kata. As many McDojo's that are out there these days, this term could represent any school teaching the art without the incorporation of everything but the kitchen sink to make more money by incorporating "extra" to create more belts and thus make more money.

Hopefully you understand that I merely use the word because this is the most accepted term to describe old ways.

By the way excellent descriptions and explanations of the two meanings of Kata. I really appreciate your knowledge and learned something new today. Excellent post.

[MatsuShinshii]

The three 'K's', Kata being one of them, by themselves are ineffective. A three legged chair is unstable because it's missing one or more of its important legs. Alas, Kata, being a tool, the tool isn't effective without the other two...Kihon and Kumite!! Concentrating on one, Kata for example, and not the other, leaves one quite unstable.

Imho!!

I respect your view point and I somewhat agree with you because I understand where you are coming from. However I somewhat disagree with you as well.

Coming from an Okinawan back ground you must know that the Kata was the fundamental means of transmission of old. Kihon was all but non-existent in terms of today's meaning of the word. Kihon was utilized to focus on a singular technique in terms of conditioning and learning the proper body mechanics in order to learn to gain full power potential.

The original practitioners did not stand in a line and practice Kihon for half of the class. Furthermore Kihon comes from the Kata itself. The individual techniques are extracted to teach the student, again, how to gain full power when using the technique. But they were also not typically implemented as a singular technique but a group of techniques combined to allow the student to understand how they are used in conjunction with others such as blocks, grabs, kicks, sweeps, etc. etc.

Kumite is essentially applying the techniques and combination of applications found within the Kata in a more free interpretive way. This was a way to allow the student to learn how to apply the techniques in motion by drawing from what they had learned and to teach them that unlike Kata, real life is ever changing and not confined to a set group of techniques and applications. This also teaches the student to analyze and utilize what they have been taught in different ways and to combat a wide range of attacks.

Kumite was taught in stages in some schools and more free and non-restrictive in others but if you look at the applications themselves, they come from the Kata.

IMHO Kata is the foundation and Kihon and Kumite are the walls and the roof. Take one away, as you say, you no longer have a complete structure. So again a somewhat agree with your premise and somewhat disagree with it. I guess its all in the way you look at it and how you were taught.

[sensei8]

The three 'K's', Kata being one of them, by themselves are ineffective. A three legged chair is unstable because it's missing one or more of its important legs. Alas, Kata, being a tool, the tool isn't effective without the other two...Kihon and Kumite!! Concentrating on one, Kata for example, and not the other, leaves one quite unstable.

Imho!!

I respect your view point and I somewhat agree with you because I understand where you are coming from. However I somewhat disagree with you as well.

Coming from an Okinawan back ground you must know that the Kata was the fundamental means of transmission of old. Kihon was all but non-existent in terms of today's meaning of the word. Kihon was utilized to focus on a singular technique in terms of conditioning and learning the proper body mechanics in order to learn to gain full power potential.

The original practitioners did not stand in a line and practice Kihon for half of the class. Furthermore Kihon comes from the Kata itself. The individual techniques are extracted to teach the student, again, how to gain full power when using the technique. But they were also not typically implemented as a singular technique but a group of techniques combined to allow the student to understand how they are used in conjunction with others such as blocks, grabs, kicks, sweeps, etc. etc.

Kumite is essentially applying the techniques and combination of applications found within the Kata in a more free interpretive way. This was a way to allow the student to learn how to apply the techniques in motion by drawing from what they had learned and to teach them that unlike Kata, real life is ever changing and not confined to a set group of techniques and applications. This also teaches the student to analyze and utilize what they have been taught in different ways and to combat a wide range of attacks.

Kumite was taught in stages in some schools and more free and non-restrictive in others but if you look at the applications themselves, they come from the Kata.

IMHO Kata is the foundation and Kihon and Kumite are the walls and the roof. Take one away, as you say, you no longer have a complete structure. So again a somewhat agree with your premise and somewhat disagree with it. I guess its all in the way you look at it and how you were taught.

Solid post!!

And in short, yes, to me, of the three, Kata is far and away the most important. Without Kata, the basis of the other two, can't stand alone. Movements and its like, as they're found in Kumite and Kihon, are derived from the Kata.