The History of Aikido
Sokaku Takeda and Morihei Ueshiba
Daitoryu Aikijujutsu was revived in the Meiji era by
Sokaku Takeda. He was born in 1860 in the town of Aizu Sakashita in Fukushima prefecture. He grew up among people who were very enthusiastic about Bujutsu. As a child he learned Kenjutsu (Ono ha Itto ryu), Sumo, Sojutsu, Bojutsu and the like. In 1873 he became a student of Kenkichi Sakakibara, who was a master of Shin Shinkage ryu Kenjutsu. In 1880 he was initiated into Daitoryu Aikijujutsu, which at that time was a secret form of jujutsu being practiced by the Aizu clan called Oshikiuchi. His Initiator was an Aizu clan warrior of the highest rank called Chikanori Hoshina.In 1897, at Hoshina's suggestion, he began to travel on foot all over the country in order to spread this form of jujutsu. According to a list of students composed by
Sokaku Takeda he had about 30,000 pupils all told. Of these several were allowed to instruct. One of these was Morihei Ueshiba. The only student who was recognized as having achieved complete mastership of Aikijujutsu was Takuma Hisa. On the certificate of full mastership awarded to Takuma Hisa there was a list of the contents of the Daitoryu Aikijujutsu lessons taught by Sokaku Takeda. They were as follows:1) Hyakujuhachi ka Jo Ura Omote
2) Aiki no Jutsu Ura Omote
3) Hiden Ogi Sanju ka Jo Ura Omote
4) Daitoryu Hiden Nitoryu
5) Aiki Hiden Goshinyonote Hachijuyon ka Jo Ura Omote
6) Kaishaku Soden no koto Yonhyakunanajunana
7) Kaiden no koto Hachijuhachi ka Jo
We believe that Morihei Ueshiba was also taught most of them. Morihei Ueshiba met Sokaku Takeda in the town of Engaru in Hokkaido in 1916 and studied Daitoryu Aikijujutsu under him. In 1917 he received formal instruction and certification in a list of techniques called Hiden Ogi no Koto. In 1923 in Ayabe he completed another series of instruction and was formally certified in a list of techniques called Aikijujutsu Hiden Ogi no Koto and as a result, on the 15th December 1923, he was given permission to teach Daitoryu Aikijujutsu as an instructor. The certificate or rather the formal letter granting this permission to Ueshiba from Sokaku Takeda read something like this:
Instructor Morihei Ueshiba
Before taking on any pupil in Daitoryu Aikijujutsu you should first make sure that they are of sound character.
When you instruct someone in Daitoryu Aikijujutsu you should make them write their name, age, address, the place where taught and the period of instruction on the official list of your students' names along with their seal (the Japanese equivalent of a signature).
For every student to whom you teach Daitoryu Aikijujutsu you should pay the sum of three yen membership fee to Sokaku Takeda.
September 15th 1923.
The official certificate of the list of techniques specifies that Ueshiba received 22 lessons in Aikijujutsu Hiden Ogi no Koto and that he had mastered sections 1-3 of the certificate of full mastership given to Takuma Hisa. Though to be precise at this time section 2 was Sanjukajo and section 3 was Sanju Doku ka Jo. Between March 20th and April 7th, 1931, Ueshiba received instruction from Sokaku Takeda pertaining to section 5 in the town of Ushigome Wakamatsu. Therefore it would be correct to say that the bulk of the Daitoryu Aikijujutsu techniques had been passed down to Ueshiba.
Morihei Ueshiba and Kenji Tomiki Shihan
In the autumn of 1926,
Kenji Tomiki was introduced to Morihei Ueshiba in Tokyo by one of his friends from the Waseda University Judo Club called Hidetaro Nishimura (formerly known as Kubota).Tomiki was immediately impressed by Ueshiba's Aikido techniques. He recognised the techniques as having a unique excellence and immediately enrolled as one of Ueshiba's students. From then on he and his younger brother went to Ueshiba's dojo in Gotanda everyday. During the summer vacation of 1927 Tomiki went to Ayabe because Ueshiba had moved there and trained rigourously with Ueshiba for a month.
During this period, on many occasions, Ueshiba spoke to Tomiki about his own master, the Daitoryu master Sokaku Takeda. He also often spoke to Tomiki about the Omotokyo religion which Ueshiba recommended Tomiki to follow because he believed that this religion had helped to make him stronger. Although at the time Tomiki was still a graduate student at Waseda University, he still found time to read all the books he could get about Omotokyo religion (including the Omotokyo bible "Reikai Monogatari") and totally devoted himself to Ueshiba. Whenever Ueshiba visited Tokyo Tomiki would train with him and although at this time Ueshiba's uke was Yoichiro Inoe, the latter rarely came to train and therefore it was not long before Tomiki took his place.
After graduate school Tomiki became a junior high school teacher in his hometown of Kakunodate but still practiced Aikido during his vacations. In 1934 he resigned from the school and returned to Tokyo where he rented a house only a minute away from Ueshiba's Kobukan Dojo and started to train in Aikido regularly again. In that year Tomiki went to Manchuria in China, with Ueshiba's blessing, as an instructor of Ueshiba-ryu Aikijujutsu at the request of the Kanton Army, which was the regular Japanese force stationed to protect Manchuria (then a Japanese protectorate). Tomiki Sensei's techniques were highly praised by the then commander of the Kanton Army, Hideki Tojo, and this helped increase the popularity and spread of Aikido in Manchuria. In March of 1936 Tomiki became a lecturer at the Daido Gakuin University in Manchuria. In the spring of 1938 he took up yet another post as a lecturer at the newly established Manchuria Kenkoku University lecturing in 'Bugaku' (martial studies) and giving a course of physical training in 'Aiki Budo' (the name of Ueshiba-ryu at that time before adopting the name Aikido). 'Aiki Budo' had become part of the regular curriculum.
From this period Tomiki's research and practice of Aikido went from strength to strength and he wrote various books relating to Aikido such as 'The Future Of Judo and Aikibudo' (1937) in which he explained the significance of Aiki Budo in the context of Judo and Budo. As a result Tomiki received a great deal of recognition and support from many people in the field of Budo and Judo, including Jiro Nango, the second president of Kodokan Judo.
Through his favourite pupil, Ueshiba's Aiki Budo became established as a form of educational Budo. Between 1940 and 1942 Ueshiba himself visited Manchuria and demonstrated his prowess in Aiki Budo. In 1940 he adopted the 'Dan' grade system and made Tomiki Sensei his first 8th dan.
