Sunday, July 14, 2019

When thinking of the Toudi that became Karate this exercise may be interesting.


I believe it would be an interesting exercise to think about how far karate  moved from it’s true traditions. I intend to re-imagine karate as an American tradition based in 1880 DC, Washington.
  
 

Not to disparage the changes that took place as karate gradually became something else, but to better understand what karate moved to, distinct from its past.

 

Using the book  “Ryuku Oke Hiden Bujutsu: Karate, Bukijutsu” that time when Toudi was focused on the groups involved the use of Toudi for each group had a particular practice.

 

The martial artists (bushi) of the Ryukyu can be divided into five distinct groups.

 

First of all, the Shuri bushi, who were in charge of protecting Shuri Castle.
Next, the
Tomari bushi, who were in charge of domestic law enforcement.
Third ,the
Naha bushi, who were in chages of protecting the Chineese envoys (Suppushi) as well as the tribute ships sent from Ryukyu to China.
Next were the
Udun bushi, who were involved in the politics of the Ryukyu Kingdom.

Finally, the bushi of Naha’s Kume Village, who were in the service of Chinese imigrants.”

 

Thinking about that by 1900 their roles evaporated on Okinawa (except perhaps for the safety of the Kume Village). A different way forward presented itself, school karate, public karate and the export of karate to Japan (and other places from the Japanese disporia). Karate was changing and it big ways, it no longer had the true traditional purpose for the tradition of the bushi.

Let’s free think about this. Putting the arts in modern context, where the purpose of toude/karate was for the specific role of more modern groups:

 

Or toudi for the Capitol Police, responsible to guard the congress.
 
Or toudi for the Police, domestic law enforcement for the district of DC.
 

Or toudi for the Coast Guard, protecting our waterways of DC
and accompanying missions to other countries.

 

Or toudi for the Secret Service,  protecting the President.

 
And the DC community having their own toudi group for community protection.

 

In those days family groups were the members of those groups, and the toudi portion of their training began at an early age. But when they completed their study and were adults they began their professions. Professions where their duties were considerably vaster than just their toudi. Toudi just a portion of their roles, probably the smallest role, but of course most vital when needed.

 

Each group charged for a specific life mission.

 

The instructor(s) for each group would be drawn from retired members of that group who had successfully navigated their careers and accepted the responsibility to prepare the young members of those groups.

 

While these varied toudi arts shared some of the same characteristics and at times they would work together, they really had very different missions and often when they used their toudi skills, they were used in different ways.

 

They were not used to train the non family members. They were not used as training for the young or adults. They did not use their training to contest with others. They did not use their training for community self defense. They did not work on understanding their Toudi for other application potential. They did not receive rank, they did not work to become instructors. They did not use their training to be their livings. There was no one who wanted members outside of their group to understand their training, or to have knowledge of what they might do with their toudi and work against that.

 

Of course the wheel of time moved on, and other things occurred. Not better or worse, just different.

 

This exercise is just to allow you to understand what might have been involved in those days before the art became known as Karate.

 

 
** Of course being American I chose this example, it can be replaced with any other city from 1880 as makes more sense to you.

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