goju ryu karate and japanese jitsu training

[brennan the rabbit]

i was wondering would cross training japanese jitsu and karate have good benfits or would it be bad?

[Nidan Melbourne]

I believe it would have some good benefits because of the movements in both. In particular with Goju-Ryu because of its balance nature towards hard and soft techniques

[bushido_man96]

Knowing how to fight standing up and how to fight on the ground is very beneficial.

[Kusotare]

That really depends on what both classes offer.

When you say ‘Japanese jitsu’ I’m taking it you mean traditional Japanese Jujutsu? If so this is a very nebulous area!

The chances of you coming into contact with an authentic Japanese Jujutsu school are practically zero. More likely it is a school that practices basic Judo (and probably not very well). The Japanese jitsu thing is just a marketing thing.

And anyway – contrary to popular understanding, only a relatively small percentage of the curriculum in most Japanese Jujutsu systems revolve around grappling / floor work (and if they do it is usually grappling with a bladed weapon).

IMO you would be better augmenting your karate training with good quality Judo or BJJ.

K.

[Tempest]

That really depends on what both classes offer.

When you say ‘Japanese jitsu’ I’m taking it you mean traditional Japanese Jujutsu? If so this is a very nebulous area!

The chances of you coming into contact with an authentic Japanese Jujutsu school are practically zero. More likely it is a school that practices basic Judo (and probably not very well). The Japanese jitsu thing is just a marketing thing.

And anyway – contrary to popular understanding, only a relatively small percentage of the curriculum in most Japanese Jujutsu systems revolve around grappling / floor work (and if they do it is usually grappling with a bladed weapon).

IMO you would be better augmenting your karate training with good quality Judo or BJJ.

K.

Pretty much all of this...

Japanese Jujitsu is a great martial art, it is also not very common. There are very few people teaching it authentically and most of them are in Japan. Many people who claim to be teaching it are teaching poor quality Judo with other pieces bolted on to make it look like old pictures of Jujitsu.

[Alan Armstrong]

Regarding the question if the stand up fighting and ground fighting skills go together, a more profound question could be asked, why were they ever separated in the first place?

[Tempest]

Regarding the question if the stand up fighting and ground fighting skills go together, a more profound question could be asked, why were they ever separated in the first place?

For the simple reason that jujitsu was originally a battlefield and prisoner handling art. A lot of what worked on a medieval battlefield won't work on a modern street, or, if it did, you would have to worry about going to prison. For example, in the old koryu, that is the original schools of martial arts that included jujitsu, they have a kata that involves serving tea to someone, then you pull out a knife and stab them. You can see where this is not REALLY self defense.

[Alan Armstrong]

Regarding the question if the stand up fighting and ground fighting skills go together, a more profound question could be asked, why were they ever separated in the first place?

For the simple reason that jujitsu was originally a battlefield and prisoner handling art. A lot of what worked on a medieval battlefield won't work on a modern street, or, if it did, you would have to worry about going to prison. For example, in the old koryu, that is the original schools of martial arts that included jujitsu, they have a kata that involves serving tea to someone, then you pull out a knife and stab them. You can see where this is not REALLY self defense.

Great answer Tempest.

Grappling katas in the park combining tea making and stabbing scenarios might disturb the Sunday picnickers.

[Tempest]

Regarding the question if the stand up fighting and ground fighting skills go together, a more profound question could be asked, why were they ever separated in the first place?

Another thing to consider is the historical context. Unlike in a modern, mostly unarmed, and more importantly un ARMORED context, a medieval battlefield was populated with armor, weapons, and always multiple combatants. Grappling happened all the time, but ground fighting, such as the sophisticated guard game of BJJ, would be both ineffective and counter productive to good training. Most fights, in that context, ended when someone went to the ground, usually in that persons death. So, you have a number of methods of sending other people to the ground, a number of methods of finishing fights on the ground, but for most people, only a few simple methods of getting back to your feet once you are ON the ground. Partly because that is your only goal, and partly because when wearing armor there are only so many methods of getting up that work.

[Tempest]

Sophisticated ground fighting doesn't REALLY enter jujitsu, with one notable exception, till you start to mix 2 very important things together.

1. A modern, unarmored and more likely to be unarmed context for most close combat encounters. Prior to the second half of the 20th century an unarmed and unarmored grapple between 2 adults of roughly equal size was just as likely to be play as anything else and certainly would not be given any kind of serious treatment as "self defense".

2. The very old sport of Wrestling, as practiced by first the Greeks, but then by pretty much everyone. We first see this when Jigoro Kano adds 2 very important pieces of wrestling to the Jujitsu he practiced in the creation of Judo. He added several throws which involve the grabbing of the legs, and he added sparring, which they called Randori. Como Maeda, the man who taught jujitsu to the Gracies, was a student of Kano.

Prior to all of this coming together starting in the late 1870's to early 1880's, a jujitsu student would not have fared so well on the ground. But, a modern context allows ground fighting to be very relevant to a fight, and when you combine wrestling with the knowledge of anatomy and physiological weak points that was common in old jujitsu, you get a fighting system that we call Judo which eventually led to the development of BJJ, the re-popularization of catch wrestling, and post 1993, the "rediscovery" of supposedly sophisticated grappling methods in a wide variety of fighting systems.