WHAT IS AIKIDO ?
Aikido is a modern Japanese martial art. It was created in the 1930's and 1940's by a Japanese martial artist of rare skill and dedication. His name was Morihei Uyeshiba. He died in 1969 at the age of 86. I never met him. All I know about him I've learned from what he wrote, from demonstration films he made, from films made about him, from books by his students, from conversations I've had with some of those he taught, and from practising the art he bequeathed. Uyeshiba was a farmer, a soldier and a master of many traditional Japanese fighting arts. He was also a very religious man who looked long and hard for an answer to life's mysteries. The answer he finally found inspired him to create aikido. He came to this answer over a long period of time, though there does seem to be one moment that was decisive for him. Accounts differ as to what happened at that moment. All of the accounts agree, however, that Uyeshiba was being attacked by a swordsman. While the attacker tried to cut him over and over again Uyeshiba found that he was able to avoid the cuts without having to fight back. This incident seems to have marked a turning point in his life. In a book later written by Uyeshiba's son there are a few sentences, by Uyeshiba himself, about that key incident. "At that moment" he writes "I was enlightened". At that moment he believed he understood the true source of every fighting art. That source he called God's love. What did Uyeshiba mean by "God's love"? From his writings, in this essay and elsewhere, it is apparent that for Uyeshiba "God's love" meant "the spirit of loving protection for all beings". Such a spirit, he said, was everywhere. For him it filled the universe. He felt that he had come to embody it himself and in doing so he felt that the whole cosmos had become his home. The earth and the moon, the sun and the stars had become his personal domain. In one luminous instant, he had felt it all. The sense of universal love, Uyeshiba said, was a uniquely liberating one. "I had become free" he later wrote "from all desire, not only for position, fame and property, but also to be strong". This freedom was not detachment. It was not the objectivity and lack of passion of someone who doesn't care. It was non-attachment, which sounds the same as detachment, but isn't. Non-attachment means objectivity minus emotional concern. Detachment means objectivity plus emotional concern. Detachment means standing off from everything, like someone aloof. Non-attachment means being free to love all beings with understanding and compassion. Using this feeling of freedom and love Uyeshiba began to synthesise all the fighting arts he knew - a synthesis so original and so compelling that it became a whole new martial art. Using his new-found awareness Uyeshiba began to research his knowledge of sword, stick, spear and unarmed fighting techniques. He began searching for natural ways to move. He 7
