Shizentai BAA

11/08/2024

A drawing of a rising dragon, by Morihei Ueshiba's teacher Onisaburo Deguchi.

Morihei Ueshiba believed the Dragon King to be the patron god of Aikido, of which he, himself was an incarnation or avatar, and had a famous portrait made of himself as the “Dragon King”, which he said represented the unification of stillness and motion, In and Yo (Yin and Yang).

He often summarized this as 天之叢雲九鬼さむはら竜王 Ama-no-Mura-Kumo Kuki Samuhara Ryu-oo, which was yet another allegorical representation of his essential technical model of Heaven, Earth, Man and the unification of In and Yo, resulting in internal power within oneself, A. K. A. the Dragon King.

Another method of representing this model were references to Fudo-myoo, the Immovable Mystery, in the form of the Kurikara Ryu-oo, the Dragon Sword of Fudo-myoo, whose edges Morihei Ueshiba said "united Heaven and Earth", describing his art as Ten-Chi-Jin Aiki no Mitsurugi - "The Divine Sword of Heaven Earth Man Aiki".

Here he would link back to his teacher Sokaku Takeda, who was deeply involved in the Esoteric Buddist traditions, which venerated Fudo-myoo, and attempted to bridge to the Shinto mythology of Kusanagi no Tsurugi (originally called Ame-no-Murakumo-no-Tsurugi).

This was typical of Morihei Ueshiba's language, which was often a "translation" of Chinese internal training language from classical literature and Esoteric Buddhist terminology lifted from Sokaku Takeda into his own version of Omoto language.

11/08/2024

Yukio Nishida, from Seibukai Kyokushin Karate, and Masahiro Shioda, from Yoshinkan Aikido, discuss striking with Aiki, and the use of the ball to demonstrate circular motion.

https://youtu.be/h1p5m87MqpY?si=2SIsZZ94Mb8i9R0d

Yukio Nishida was a long time student of both Kyokushin Karate founder Mas Oyama and Daito-ryu Aiki-jujutsu Roppokai founder Seigo Okamoto. Interestingly, Mas Oyama was friends with Morihei Ueshiba and studied Daito-ryu under Kotaro Yoshida, who was the person that introduced Morihei Ueshiba to his teacher Sokaku Takeda. Yoshida lent Ueshiba the use of his family crest for the meeting, since Ueshiba did not have the status of coming from a Samurai family - the Ueshiba family wears the Yoshida family crest to this day.

Mas Oyama was also famous for saying that Aikido would dissappear with Morihei Ueshiba's passing:

Q: There are a lot of different stories, but that’s what it really was? (laughing)

A: There were many demonstrations – from the small ones with company workers as partners to the big ones. During the time that we were giving demonstrations in smaller places Kenichi Sawai Sensei (澤井健一, the Founder of Taiki Shisei Kenpo / 太氣至誠拳法) and Masatatsu Oyama Sensei (大山倍達, the Founder of Kyokushin Karate / 極真空手) would often be there.

Q: There was that kind of interchange?

A: I often spoke to those two. I also went to visit their dojos in Meiji Jingu and Ikebukuro. I saw Oyama Sensei give a demonstration at a public hall in Asakusa where he rolled up a 10 yen coin.

Q: You saw that with your own eyes?

A: Yes, he didn’t do it in one try, he’d grunt and gradually roll it up a bit at a time. That was really something. At the time I was told “If you weighed 10 kilograms more you’d be able to fell a bull with one blow”. The two of them sometimes also came to the Aikikai dojo. Especially to visit O-Sensei.

Q: Did you ever join the conversations between the Founder, Sawai Sensei and Oyama Sensei?

A: No, I never did that. However, I heard that Oyama Sensei said “Aikido will disappear when O-Sensei dies”. I think that’s so.

Interview with Aikido Shihan Yoshio Kuroiwa – Part 2:

https://www.aikidosangenkai.org/blog/interview-aikido-shihan-yoshio-kuroiwa-part-2/

30/07/2024

30/07/2024

An interesting discussion of Shineitaido with Masahiro Shioda and a student of Noriaki Inoue - Morihei Ueshiba's nephew, training partner, and one time presumed successor, sometimes referred to as the "co-founder of Aikido", but who is largely forgotten today (with English subtitles):

https://youtu.be/wmVhk2N8NQw?si=jtxqglGE9FvUPOtf

The famous Karate instructor Shigeru Egami trained under Inoue for a number of years - here Inoue mentions Egami, and Yoshinkan Aikido founder Gozo Shioda:

"I also taught Gozo Shioda, but that person's body was stiff. Because he was stiff he would use atemi. There are stiff people and there are soft people. However, stiff people don't have Ki at the critical moment, their koshi won't turn. That their koshi doesn't turn means that their body is stiff and they can't use Ki.

Grab here, and then do this, that's fakery. When the opponent comes one must be able to do it freely. At the instant that they come one's Ki cannot stop. That gap in movement is a gap in Ki.

The famous Karate-ka Shigeru Egami couldn't win in Karate matches with Okuyama Tadao. That person (Egami), called the Kami-Sama of Karate, came and bowed his head to me. I don't know if I could be called a good Kami-Sama, though."

Morihei Ueshiba and Noriaki Inoue appear together here with their teacher Onisaburo Deguchi, in 1932.

09/07/2024

Admiral Isamu Takesh*ta, Morihei Ueshiba's student and patron, recalls teaching jujutsu to Teddy Roosevelt - The Hawai'i Times, April 30th 1946.

03/07/2024

「鵜呑みにしないで」 "Don't swallow it whole" (like a pelican) - in other words, "Take it with a grain of salt". There are many difficulties surrounding an examination of the history of Aikido (and history in general). The lack of ability for most people to examine original sources, for example, leads them to rely on questionable and out of context translations.

Unfortunately, even when the translations are accurate that does not necessarily hold true for the material being translated. Aside from the fact that many original sources were edited, flat statements themselves must necessarily be examined.

Here's an example that came up in a recent discussion:

"Only Aikido in the world of budo does not have a system of competition."

- Interview with Kisshomaru Ueshiba: the Early Days of Aikido, by Stan Pranin

An authoritative statement by one of the leading figures in the world of Aikido, Kisshomaru Ueshiba, widely regarded as one of the primary sources of Aikido history... and completely and categorically false.

If course, Kisshomaru Ueshiba understood this. His father learned a type of budo, Daito-ryu, that had no system of competition, and has no form of competition to this day. Many (most) Japanese martial traditions had no system of competition, and that's true of Karate as well, another modern martial art that Morihei Ueshiba was well acquainted with - Gichin Funakoshi himself was always opposed to competition. Even Jigoro Kano, contemporary to both Ueshiba and Funakoshi, was opposed to sporting competition.

However, after the war, the general public, particularly foreign audiences (who were the target audience of this interview in Aiki News) were primarily familiar with competitive Japanese arts - Judo, Kendo, Sumo, and Kisshomaru Ueshiba made a decision early on to position Aikido in the market as a "uniquely" non-competitive art.

This was also the motivation for Kisshomaru Ueshiba's urging Kenji Tomiki to rename his art, fearing that a competitive form of Aikido would rise in popularity to eclipse the Aikikai.

"Kisshomaru skillfully appropriated the image of the founder disseminated by the Aikikai in the service of the organization’s views and goals for the greater aikido community. Morihei’s image served as proof of the unquestionable legitimacy of Aikikai authority, while retaining an opaque quality that resisted close analysis or alternate interpretation. Little by little, a form of “political correctness” took hold within the Aikikai system that discouraged independent historical research and publications of findings that fell outside the scope of acceptable boundaries in the portrayal of Morihei’s life and art. "

- Kisshomaru Ueshiba's Stamp on Modern Aikido, by Stan Pranin

So...be cautious when swallowing fish stories. :-)

01/07/2024

A question was raised recently as to what is meant when I (and other people) use the term "modern Aikido". Aikido is, after all, not that old, isn't it all modern?

This is a phrase that became popular during discussions of Morihei Ueshiba, his teaching, and the teaching of his successors, growing into what is largely practiced today as Aikido. Stan Pranin, notably, used this phrase in his article "Is O-Sensei the Father of Modern Aikido":

https://aikidojournal.com/2015/06/11/is-o-sensei-really-the-father-of-modern-aikido/

Short summary - no, for a number of reasons. Stan usually addressed this issue through the issue of contact time with Morihei Ueshiba, which is an important issue, but another issue less addressed is the issue of the changes brought about by marketing pressures in the post-war period, and I include in this responses to rival branches of Aikido by Kisshomaru and the Aikikai.

Before the war Morihei Ueshiba was largely supported through patronage from the military and other right wing ultra-nationalist groups, including Omoto-kyo. Even then he actually only had a handful of direct students. Aikido was not yet a mass market product, and the teaching and training reflected that. He was actively involved.

This was no longer the case after the war. Morihei Ueshiba was largely retired, no longer present in the dojo regularly, and when he was there he was no longer, for the most part, actively instructing on a regular basis. This was true for both Tokyo, and (with some qualifications) in Iwama.

The pre-war sources of funding were largely gone, with the exception of funding that the Aikikai received from illegal gambling and yakuza connections via the famous right wing ultra-nationalist and fascist, Ryoichi Sasakawa. Aikikai Hombu Dojo was in disrepair - refugees were living in the dojo until 1957, and the major pre-war students had scattered, retired, or passed away during the war. Kisshomaru Ueshiba himself took employment in a trading company in order to pay the bills.

Kisshomaru Ueshiba and Koichi Tohei, who were married to sisters, together conceived of a strategy to revitalize Aikido by spreading the art first overseas, reasoning that this was would then result in in greater popularity and notoriety domestically. They turned out to be correct, in this would result in the spread and popularization of Aikido worldwide, and establish the Aikikai as the dominant organization (which was not always something that could be assumed).

For that reason, Koichi Tohei left Japan for Hawai’i in 1953, and began the move overseas.

They encountered some difficulties in transmitting Morihei Ueshiba's speeches to a non-Japanese audience, some of which are highlighted in "Morihei Ueshiba: Untranslatable Words":

https://www.aikidosangenkai.org/blog/morihei-ueshiba-untranslatable-words/

A further issue entailed changes to the marketing of Aikido, the recasting of Aikido as a group social practice that echoed some of the speeches of Morihei Ueshiba, while at the same time radically changing the actual content of his speech and training.

Kisshomaru Ueshiba himself touches on these issues in "Budoka no Kotae – Talking to Kisshomaru Ueshiba Sensei":

https://www.aikidosangenkai.org/blog/budoka-no-kotae-talking-kisshomaru-ueshiba-sensei/

As does his son, Moriteru Ueshiba:

“The techniques and way of Aikido that the founder O-Sensei left us, was not always easily understood by everyone. Doshu, my father, changed these so they would be easily understood, and he gave all of his life to spread this. For that reason he left behind many books that he had written. I grew up watching Doshu return from keiko to study and write for long hours and even with my child’s eyes I could see the importance of this work”

This was part of the impetus that resulted in a separate legacy, discussed by Mark Murray in "The Ueshiba Legacy" series:

https://www.aikidosangenkai.org/blog/ueshiba-legacy-mark-murray/

Touched on in the above series is the fact that marketing changes always result in changes in the product, both intentional and unintentional, and that those changes result in changes to the target population itself, creating something of a feedback loop.

Which results in "modern Aikido", something that is, essentially speaking, a radically different and separate creature from the Aikido of Morihei Ueshiba.

Although sometimes taken as a pejorative, this phrase itself is neither good nor bad. Change in and of itself is just change. Whether one or the other version is preferable to one person or another will depend upon that person's preferences and goals. But change is change, something that really needs to be considered, but rarely is, IMO, in any discussion of how to either (re) popularize or (re) vitalize Aikido for the general public. However well intentioned, one often ends up with something different from which they started.

As an aside, and without examining too deeply here, I will also mention that external pressures exert and have exerted significant influence on the changes brought about to Morihei Ueshiba's practice. These, too, need to be taken into account during discussions of (re) popularization and (re) vitalization - how, why, and what pressures one responds to shapes both the marketing message and the product itself, and is another factor, IMO, that is rarely discussed or considered.

Among the changes that came about in the post-war Aikikai in response to external pressures that have become core pillars of modern Aikido are:

1) Ranking and the kyu-dan system, introduced in order to spread and popularize the art, and largely in response to the rise of the Yoshinkan under Gozo Shioda, when it appeared that they, who had already established a ranking system, appeared to be poised to become the dominant form of Aikido.

2) The cult of Morihei Ueshiba. Today the "The Founder" is a common and oft-repeated phrase in modern Aikido. This was not always the case. The cult of Morihei Ueshiba was deliberately encouraged by Kisshomaru Ueshiba for specific purposes - again, a response to the rise in popularity of the Yoshinkan, which had a large, modern, dojo and powerful financial backing when Aikikai Hombu Dojo was still in tatters, with refugees living on the mats. What did the Aikikai have that the Yoshinkan did not? The mystique of "The Founder" who, ironically, wasn't even there, having retired to Iwama. This continues today, with the idolozation of Morihei Ueshiba's "uchi-deshi", who were largely taught by Kisshomaru Ueshiba and Koichi Tohei, and not Morihei Ueshiba (to his credit, Kisshomaru later clarified this subject honestly, stating that "there were no uchi-deshi after the war, nor did did he himself have any uchi-deshi").

3) Public demonstrations, introduced from 1955, that were largely motivated in response to public demonstrations by...Gozo Shioda. This is touched upon in "Lifting the Veil: Aikido Opens to the World":

https://www.aikidosangenkai.org/blog/lifting-veil-aikido-opens-world/

3) The stigmatization and "cancelation" of rival figures in Aikido, most namely (but not limited to) Kenji Tomiki, Aikido's first 8th Dan. Kisshomaru Ueshiba's fear that a sporting form of Aikido would rise to eclipse the Aikikai as the dominant organization lead to the current entrenchment of the idea that anything practice that involved competition was "contrary to the principles of the Founder" and "not Aikido", based upon a rather shaky appeal to certain cherry picked quotes from Morihei Ueshiba, who, in actuality, rarely discussed that topic at all.

Finally, here's a look at some of the major players, from Stan Pranin's, "Who were the Shapers of Postwar Aikido?":

“What was done instead was to de-emphasize the martial pedigree of aikido’s techniques, and eschew practice conditions that led to the cultivation of a strong martial spirit.”

https://aikidojournal.com/2016/05/11/who-were-the-shapers-of-postwar-aikido-by-stanley-pranin/

29/06/2024

#塩田将大　 #合気道　 ◯2:41競技空手が主体に◯6:04心胆を練り　身体を練り西田先生の動画https://youtu.be/u_-0FGeKm4I西田先生のHPhttps://seibukai.net/●Facebook　：　https://www.facebook.co...

30/05/2024

As a pre-amble, I had a discussion with Mark and we agreed that "good" is perhaps not the best way to put it, that perhaps we should say "what skills are missing in modern Aikido and why?", which is less value loaded. A lot of folks don't care about those skills, and have differing opinions as to what "good" means, which is fine, but doesn’t have much to do with the discussion. In either case, here's an interesting essay from Mark Murray:

After 20 years, why aren't you as good as the famous pre-war students?

Stan Pranin mentions some important information about both the pre-war students and the post-war students.

I think it is due primarily to the fact that very few of O-Sensei's students trained under him for any protracted length of time. With the exception of Yoichiro (Hoken) Inoue, a nephew of Ueshiba, Gozo Shioda, the founder of Yoshinkan Aikido, and Tsutomu Yukawa, O-Sensei's prewar uchideshi studied a maximum of perhaps five to six years. (1)

and

The same can be said of the postwar period. The initiates of that period include such well-known figures as Sadateru Arikawa, Hiroshi Tada, Seigo Yamaguchi, Shoji Nishio, Nobuyoshi Tamura, Yasuo Kobayashi, and later Yoshimitsu Yamada, Mitsunari Kanai, Kazuo Chiba, Seiichi Sugano, Mitsugi Saotome and various others. Shigenobu Okumura, Koichi Tohei, and Kisaburo Osawa form a somewhat unique group in that they practiced only briefly before the war, but achieved master status after World War II. None of these teachers spent any lengthy period studying directly under O- Sensei. (1)

Finding out that many of Morihei Ueshiba's students didn't spend any lengthy time with him is a fairly critical piece of information. The pre-war students of Ueshiba came the closest to replicating his abilities. Those students were studying Daito ryu aiki. Their training was different.

Training of the pre-war era. From multiple interviews, there were official training times at the Kobukan dojo for 4 or 5 times a day. There were two morning classes, one which ran from six to seven A.M. while the other ran somewhere between nine and eleven. In the afternoon, there were either two or three classes, but at least one was from two to four and another from seven to eight P.M.(2) (3) Training times lasted one to one and a half hours.(4) According to Shirata, the amount of time spent per week in training was about seven to eight hours. (5) Of course, the students were free to train with each other. (2) We also know that brand new students spent months either watching or doing other chores before being allowed to train. (6) (7) (8) This gives us some indication of the training times per week.

But what were the total years some of the pre-war students spent training?

Gozo Shioda

1932 Began training under Morihei Ueshiba.
1941 Was posted to China, Taiwan and Borneo.

Kenji Tomiki

1926-1927 Began training under Morihei Ueshiba. Mostly either summer months or vacation time spent training. (9)
1934 Moved to Tokyo. Full time training. (9)
1936 Moved to Manchuria. (10)

Rinjiro Shirata

1931 Began training under Morihei Ueshiba.
1937 Mobilized into the Army.

Shigemi Yonekawa

1932 Began training under Morihei Ueshiba.
1936 Moved to Manchuria.

Minoru Mochizuki

1930 Began training under Morihei Ueshiba.
Late 1930s Moved to Manchuria. (11)

With most students being mobilized for the war, by 1942 when Kanshu Sunadomari began training under Morihei Ueshiba, there were very few students. Training in those days was done only for a little while in the mornings and evenings. Also, Ueshiba was spending time traveling to Iwama. (12) As you can see, the actual number of years that the pre-war students spent training was really not that long, either in duration or per day. Another important thing to realize is that Ueshiba was not at the Kobukan dojo all the time during this period.

From 1926 until the outbreak of World War II, O-Sensei maintained a heavy teaching schedule centering his activities in Tokyo. His students were primarily military officers and person of high social standing and his teaching services were in constant demand. He was obliged to travel extensively around the country and made almost yearly visits to Manchuria, then under Japanese political control. (13)

There was actually only a small amount of training in those years for the prewar students and only a few actually trained more than five years. Adding to that, Ueshiba had a very busy traveling schedule as he went to various places to train people. Morihiro Saito even mentions how busy Ueshiba was traveling before the war. (14) In fact, after Mochizuki opened his dojo around 1931 (15), he stated that when Ueshiba would travel each month to Kyoto to teach Omoto kyo followers, that Ueshiba would stop at Mochizuki's dojo to teach there for two to three days. (16) Between the actual travel times and the teaching times, Ueshiba was not at the Kobukan dojo regularly. None of this even touches upon Ueshiba's teaching style and how chaotic or confusing it had been. The actual teaching style and method used by Morihei Ueshiba will be dealt with in another chapter.

Then there is the post-war period. Some of the post-war students are listed below.

Akira Tohei (1929-1999)

1946-1956 Studied under Koichi Tohei.
1956-1963 Studied under Morihei Ueshiba.
1963-64 Toured U.S. and taught in Hawaii.
1964-1972 Taught at various places in Japan.
1972 Dispatched to America.

Fumio Toyoda (1947-2001)

1957 (age 10) Studied under Koichi Tohei
1964 Shodan by Saito (Tohei was in Hawaii).
1965 Ichikukai dojo as resident for 3 years. After completing this harsh training, he continued to attend Hombu classes for 3 hours each day.
1969-ish – Uchideshi under Kisshomaru Ueshiba (Morihei had died) (sandan).
1971 Yondan.
1974 Dispatched to America (godan).

Mitsunari Kanai (1939-2004)

1959-1966 Uchideshi at Hombu.
1966 Dispatched to America (yondan).

Seiichi Sugano (1939-2010)

1957 Started training at Hombu.
1958-59 Studied under Morihei Ueshiba.
1965 Dispatched to Australia.

Yoshimitsu Yamada (1938-)

1955-56 Uchideshi at Hombu.
1964 Dispatched to NY Aikikai.

Kazuo Chiba (1940-)

1958- Uchideshi at Hombu.
1960 – Sandan. Assigned to Nagoya.
1962 Yondan and teaching at Hombu.
1966 Dispatched to England.

Mitsugi Saotome (1937-)

1955 Started Aikido.
1958 Uchideshi at Hombu.
1960 Teaching at Hombu.
1975 Departed to America.

Shizuo Imaizumi (1938-)

1959 Started Aikido.
1965 Apprentice Instructor at Hombu (sandan). Frequently trained under Koichi Tohei,
1975 Moved to America.

During the post-war period, the students of Morihei Ueshiba actually had more total years training than the pre-war students. A closer look at how much time was spent training directly with Morihei Ueshiba shows that the actual time is significantly less than what it appears. There is relatively little difference between pre-war and post-war in the actual amount of hands-on time with Ueshiba.

Ueshiba moved to Iwama for about ten years from around 1942 to 1952. (17) During this time in Iwama, his actual training schedule with students appeared to be limited to twice a day.

Morihei's daily schedule in Iwama in those years:

7:00-9:00 A.M.: Aikido training followed by a simple breakfast.
4:00P.M.-6:00P.M. Aikido training.(18)

For those ten years in Iwama, the students did not train extensively. It would appear that, at most, there was 4 hours of training each day. While four hours a day is not something to easily dismiss, it is nowhere near an extensive training schedule. We also have to take into consideration whether the students in Iwama trained every day. Even at that, Ueshiba's teaching style was still confusing and at times, chaotic. Saito did mention that the training was severe. (19)

Ueshiba split his time between the Tokyo hombu dojo and Iwama for a short period. Stan Pranin notes that Ueshiba actually lived in Iwama for 15 years after the war ended. (20) Kanai responds that after he started at hombu around 1958, Ueshiba split his time between Iwama and Tokyo. (21)

Until 1955, hombu dojo was not very active. Between 1955 and 1959, more students started coming to the dojo to train, including foreign students. Even then, Ueshiba was not a regular teacher there. He would show up whenever he wanted. (22)

Nishio remarks that when he started, around 1951, it was six months before he saw Ueshiba. (23) In fact, Nishio goes on to note that there weren't many students and that Kisshomaru Ueshiba and Koichi Tohei were the teachers. (24)

Robert Frager remarks that he only saw Ueshiba occasionally during his first year, which would be sometime in the mid 1960s. (25) Walther Krenner also notes that Ueshiba wasn't teaching regularly around 1967. (26)

Kisshomaru Ueshiba states that his father was "besieged by visitors starting from early in the morning and he spent large amounts of time in receiving them". Kisshomaru also notes that his father traveled often. (27)

Taking a closer look when Ueshiba was at the Tokyo hombu dojo, what time, or times, did he teach?

The uchideshi's day begins around 6 a.m., when he cleans the dojo and the grounds outside. The first class of the day starts at 6:30. This class is usually taught by Uyeshiba himself, the Osensei, which means the old teacher. The young uchideshi sit on their knees during this hour, which can be an uncomfortable and tiring experience.

The first class is usually taken up mostly with discussions about God and nature - Uyeshiba doing the talking and the uchideshi listening. It is in this hour that the young uchideshi is exposed to Zen philosophy and the deeper meanings of aikido - its nonviolent and defensive perfection and understanding.

If this all sounds rather remote and difficult to grasp for a Western reader, he may be interested to know that the young Japanese uchideshi often feels the same way. The 83-year-old Uyeshiba many times speaks about highly abstract topics, lapsing usually into ancient Japanese phraseology, so that his listeners often find it difficult to follow him.

When this long hour is over, the young uchideshi exuberantly spill out onto the dojo floor for a half-hour exercise break. All the restless energy pent up within seems to come out and they throw themselves into the practice of their techniques with each other.

At 8 a.m. begins the real study of aikido techniques. This class is taught by a different instructor every day, and is attended by a large number of persons from outside the dojo. Sometimes this hour is taught by Uyeshiba's son, or Waka sensei as he is called. Sometimes Tohei sensei, the greatest of Uyeshiba's followers, instructs the class. (28)

When Ueshiba did teach, he often spent a large amount of time talking and the students just wanted to practice techniques. (28) (29) Ueshiba traveled often. He also entertained visitors. He only taught the morning class at hombu dojo when he was there. From the mid 1940s to the mid 1950s, he was rarely in Tokyo. From the mid 1950s to the mid 1960s, he split his time between Iwama and Tokyo and still traveled occasionally to various other places. In the late 1960s, Ueshiba's health was declining and he rarely taught. Not even getting into the subject of just how confusing Ueshiba's teaching style was, the students of Ueshiba never had extensive training time with him, either pre-war or post-war. What time there was, the post-war students focused on techniques and throwing each other around. The exceptions here would be Kisshomaru and Saito. Both seem to have had more access to Ueshiba than most other students.

With everything mentioned, it is very plausible that many of the people training in Tokyo were actually students of Kisshomaru and Tohei. When Ueshiba retreated to Iwama, he left hombu dojo in the care of Kisshomaru. It also explains why Saito was able to develop the curriculum that he did since he had more time with Ueshiba.

This isn't to say that all the students of aikido never trained with Morihei Ueshiba or that they did not learn from him. This is only to show that the actual hands-on training time with Ueshiba was not extensive. Ueshiba was not really focused on teaching so that whatever the students could glimpse was done so by a very dedicated effort on their part. Ueshiba must have, in some manner, given out certain aspects for training aiki in the pre-war period. Those students stood out.

After 20 years in aikido why aren't you at least close to the pre-war students?

There is an interview with Henry Kono in an Aikido Today magazine that sheds light on the answer.

ATM: When you had conversations like these with O'sensei, what would you talk about?

HK: Well, I would usually ask him why the rest of us couldn't do what he could. There were many other teachers, all doing aikido. But he was doing it differently - doing something differently. His movement was so clean!

ATM: How would O'sensei answer your questions about what he was doing?

HK: He would say that I didn't understand yin and yang [in and yo]. So, now I've made it my life work to study yin and yang. That's what O'sensei told me to do.

The answer is Aiki. Daito ryu aiki. Specific training (not techniques) for aiki. Heaven-Earth-Man. Yin/Yang. Have you found what those training methodologies were?

1. Aikido Journal Issue 109
2. Aiki News 047
3. Aiki News Issue 035
4. Aiki News Issue 062
5. Aiki News Issue 062
6. Aiki News Issue 062
7. Aiki News Issue 035
8. Aiki News Issue 035
9. http://www.aikidojournal.com/article?articleID=70
10. Aiki News Issue 128
11. http://www.aikidojournal.com/article.php?articleID=505
12. Aiki News Issue 064
13. Aiki News Issue 027
14. Aiki News Issue 013
15. http://www.yoseikanbudo.com/eng/minorumochizuki.shtml
16. Aiki News Issue 054
17. Aiki News Issue 031
18. The Shambhala Guide to Aikido by John Stevens
19. Aiki News Issue 027
20. Aiki News Issue 038
21. Aiki News Issue 038
22. Aiki News Issue 070
23. Aiki News Issue 060
24. Aiki News Issue 060
25. Yoga Journal March 1982
26. Training with the Master by John Stevens
27. Aiki News Issue 031
28. Black Belt 1966 Vol 4 No 5
29. Yoga Journal March 1982