The Founder of Modern Karate Do.
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Gichin Funakoshi (1868-1957) On the island in the sea to the south, |
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Gichin Funakoshi - 1922 |
If there is one man who could be credited with
popularizing Karate, it is Gichin Funakoshi. Funakoshi was born in 1868 in Shuri,
then the capital city of the island of Okinawa. He started practicing Karate
while in primary school but didn't begin his mission of spreading it to the
outside world until he was 53.
Funakoshi was born into a well-to-do family of scholars in Shuri, Okinawa, in
1868. His grandfather had been a tutor for the daughters of the village
governor, and had been given a small estate and "privileged family"
status in return. Gichin's father, however, was a heavy drinker, and squandered
most of the family's wealth, so young Funakoshi grew up in a home that could
provide very few luxuries.
As a teenager, Funakoshi was sickly and weak. Fortunately, when he finally
started primary school, he happened to be in the same class as the son of
Yasutsune Azato, a renowned Karate master who had served as a military chief
for the king of the Ryukyu Islands. Azato took Funakoshi on as his only
student, teaching him late at night because of laws which forbid the teaching
or practicing of Karate.
It was from Azato and Azato's close friend Yasutsune Itosu that Funakoshi
learned most of his martial arts. From childhood until he left for Tokyo in
1921, Funakoshi studied diligently from these two masters, learning not only
shuri-te Karate, but Chinese classical literature and poetry. He also spent a
short time studying under Itosu's master, shuri-te founder Sokon Matsumura.
Funakoshi took a job as an assistant schoolteacher in 1888 at the age of 21,
and also took a wife about the same time. He supported his wife, his parents and
his grandparents on a salary of about three dollars a month. His wife, also
Karate adept, encouraged Funakoshi to continue practicing. In addition, she
took a job working in the fields during the day and then wove fabrics at night
to help make ends meet.
In 1901, Karate practice was legalized in Okinawa, and its study became
mandatory in middle schools. Securing permission from Azato and Itosu,
Funakoshi announced that he would begin formally teaching Karate. He was 33
years old.
There are many stories about Funakoshi's exploits as a youth. One thing is
certain: he found more honor in avoiding a fight than in starting one, and he
believed there was more courage in fleeing a confrontation than in defeating an
enemy. He claimed to have only used his Karate against another person one time,
during World War II. A thief tried to attack him, but Funakoshi stepped out of
the way and grabbed the man's testicles. He held the man in that position until
a constable passed by. Although Funakoshi had not started the altercation, he
later revealed that he always felt shame about that day because he had not
avoided the confrontation.
It was that "true spirit of Karate" that Funakoshi spent his entire
life trying to achieve. Mas Oyama, who later created kyoku shinkai Karate, once
trained under Funakoshi, but quit because Funakoshi's Karate was "too
slow" and seemed more like a lesson in etiquette and discipline. But this
was how Funakoshi wanted it. He taught that Karate should not be used for self
defense-even as a last resort-because once Karate was used, the conflict became
a matter of life or death, and somebody was going to get injured. Funakoshi
always remembered the proverb Soken Matsumura taught him: "When two tigers
fight, one is bound to be hurt. The other will be dead."
Funakoshi became so skillful at Karate that he was chosen to teach it to the
reigning King of Okinawa. Before Funakoshi left the island, he had already
risen to the position of chairman of Shobukai, the martial arts association of
Okinawa.
In May 1922, the Japan Education Ministry organized the first All Japan
Athletic Exhibition of Ochanomizu in Tokyo. Wanting the event to be as
comprehensive as possible, the ministry decided to include Karate. As the
province's leading practitioner, Funakoshi was the obvious choice. The Japanese
budomen, tremendously impressed by Karate, immediately set out to persuade
Funakoshi to stay and teach the dynamic martial art to Japanese youth. He
accepted the project with vigor, because he harbored a secret desire to see
Karate proliferate as kendo and judo had.
The arrival of Gichin Funakoshi was inauspicious, to say the least, and no one
seriously expected anything to come of his visit to Japan. At 51, the
mild-mannered high school teacher from Naha was already well past his prime.
But how were they to know that Gichin Funakoshi was destined to become the
Father of Japanese Karate and would set in motion the forces of a little-known
martial art which would one day sweep the world?
Funakoshi Karate was well received by the Japanese, and judo founder Jigoro
Kano asked for private lessons on basic Karate kata (forms). Funakoshi taught
Kano for several months and then arranged to return to Okinawa. Before he could
leave, however, Hoan Kosugi, a popular artist of that time, asked Funakoshi to
teach both him and his fellow artists Karate, because there was no one else in
the area who could. It was then Funakoshi realized that, if he were to spread
Karate throughout Japan, Tokyo was the place to do it.
Judo founder Jigoro Kano was so impressed with Gichin Funakoshi's Karate that
he asked for, and received, private Karate lessons from Funakoshi for several
months.
Taking up residence at a dormitory for Okinawan students at Keio University,
Funakoshi began teaching Karate in the dorm's lecture hall.
Funakoshi became a subject of some controversy only a few years after
relocating to Tokyo. For centuries, Karate had been written two different ways
in Japanese. One way used the characters for "Chinese hands," and the
other used the characters for "empty hands." Although both were
pronounced "Karate," they were written differently. Funakoshi agreed
with the obvious historical allusion in the "Chinese hands"
characters, but he felt that the use of "empty hands" not only emphasized
the art of self-defense without weapons, but also characterized the sense of
emptying one's heart and mind of earthly desires and vanity. When he wrote his
first book, Ryukyu Kempo: Karate, in 1922, he used the "empty
hands" characters exclusively.
Funakoshi is credited with standardizing the writing of Karate, a feat which,
though angering several martial arts masters at the time, met with eventual
universal approval.
In 1923, a massive earthquake shook Japan, and Tokyo was razed in the ensuing fire.
Although the dormitory Funakoshi called home and still taught out of was
spared, many of his students died or disappeared. For a short time he suspended
his instruction and spent the next several months assisting in the massive
cleanup.
Funakoshi's next major task was the creation of an all-new dojo (training
hall). Because he had a difficult time raising funds, the building was not
started until 1935. A year later, the world's first freestanding Karate dojo
was completed. Funakoshi named the school "shotokan" (the house of
Shoto) after the pen name he used when writing poetry. When he stepped through
the doors for the first time, he was almost 70 years old.
As he became increasingly busy with his dojo, Funakoshi began handing over his
teaching assignments at the various universities to his students. He still
conducted demonstrations, however, including regular performances before
Emperor Hirohito, who invited him to the Imperial Palace on an annual
basis.
The United States declared war on Japan on December 8, 1941, and times grew
hard in Japan. Funakoshi's third son, Gigo, who was supposed to inherit his
father's school, died of tuberculosis in 1945. A few months later, Funakoshi's
dojo was destroyed by Allied bombers. In that same year, the battle for Okinawa
began in earnest, and many people fled to the island of Kyushu, including
Funakoshi's wife, who had remained in Shuri during his residence in Tokyo. The
couple were reunited at a refugee camp on Kyushu, and Funakoshi stayed with his
wife until her death in 1947. He then boarded a train for Tokyo to start all
over again.
More than just the buildings had been demolished in Japan during the war;
national spirit had been eroded as well. The occupying forces disallowed
martial arts instruction. Fortunately, because of Funakoshi's association with
the Ministry of Education, Karate was classified as physical education, not a
martial art. He therefore began teaching again, and within a few years was
drawing martial artists from other disciplines, all of whom were longing for a
place to practice. Included among these new recruits were American servicemen,
who were amazed at this form of exercise. For every GI who returned to the
United States with a Karate tale, Funakoshi received two more letters from Americans
who wished to become students.
Funakoshi, approaching his mid-80s, found a new task. He had spread Karate
throughout Japan, now it was time to spread it throughout the world. In 1953,
after several requests from Americans for qualified Karate instructors, he
began sending some of his finest students to the United States to begin
teaching martial arts. These men, who included Masatoshi Nakayama, Hidetaka
Nishiyama and Tsutomu Ohshima, were America's Karate pioneers. Funakoshi
eventually organized his students and their schools into the Japan Karate
Association in 1955, one of the first international martial arts associations.
Two years later, at age 89, Funakoshi died in his sleep, leaving behind a
legacy so huge that its shadow stretched from the shores of tiny Okinawa across
the Pacific Ocean to the United States. Funakoshi took little credit for
Karate's immense popularity, but few denied that he had almost single-handedly
brought the art to Japan and subsequently sent it overseas.
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Funakoshi's Teachings |
Funakoshi concentrated almost entirely on teaching kata.
He brought 15 kata compiled from various styles, and developed some himself.
Although he taught a little kumite, his approach to Karate was based on the
following precept: "Once you have completely mastered kata, then you can
adapt it to kumite." The closest thing to Karate in Japan when Funakoshi
arrived was the atemi (technique of striking the vital parts of the
body).
Funakoshi also stressed the importance of toughening each part of the body
until it was as hard as iron. He constantly beat himself with an oak staff to
drive home his point to his students! A makiwara (straw-padded pole) was used
to toughen the hands and feet.
Even in his 50s and 60s Funakoshi was agile and
unusually strong, especially in defense. Funakoshi's defense was very difficult
to penetrate during training, no matter how hard his students tried.
Perhaps the most important work Funakoshi accomplished was during the 30's when
he systematized Karate kata and techniques, incorporating a code of ethics and
discipline found in the other Japanese martial arts. This codification forged
the bonds that would one day transform Karate into a mental and physical
discipline which would rival judo in "finding the way." He published
three books on the subject-the second and the most important one of which, Karate-Do
Instructions, was published in 1939. Aided by his son Yoshitaka, Funakoshi
continued teaching Karate throughout the rest of the decade at the Mejiro dojo as
well as at the college clubs he had organized. When the war broke out, the
number of students gradually decreased because of the draft.
Most of Funakoshi's former students remember him as a mild, gentle and friendly
person. The Okinawan master always shook hands and put his arm around them when
they met. He wasn't bossy, but when he was teaching Karate, he was very
strict.
He didn't drink, smoke, gamble or play around with women. He was the kind of
man who never made enemies. Outside of Karate, his two main interests were
calligraphy and composing Chinese poems. He was convinced that living a good,
clean life created a character best suited for the study of Karate. He educated
his students by trying to get them to fulfil their own potential.
Before he brought Karate to Japan from Okinawa, it was just a local system in
Okinawa. Upon bringing Karate to Japan and seeing Japan's traditional martial
arts, such as judo and kendo, Master Funakoshi patterned Karate after these
arts to a large degree and made Karate popular. He had the technical and
philosophical ability to do this and got people to accept his ideas about
Karate rather easily. This was one of his biggest contributions to the martial
arts. That's why it is often said that Master Funakoshi was a great philosopher
and a great technician. On Karate's spiritual side, too many people look on the
surface of Karate and only see violent techniques: kicking, punching and
striking. They see Karate as something that's only very dangerous. But Master
Funakoshi combined Karate techniques with traditional budo (the martial way) to
put the essence of budo into Karate-a real way of the martial arts. That's why
Master Funakoshi's students did not have any violent ideas. He taught that
Karate is defensive, never offensive. When Master Funakoshi studied in Okinawa,
you couldn't publicly practice Karate. It wasn't for everybody and was secret.
Karate practitioners were like a secret society. But Master Funakoshi opened
Karate to the public and proved that its techniques are effective. And yet,
Master Funakoshi not only stressed the technical aspects of Karate, he
emphasized that Karate has a philosophical background. To him, Karate had a
philosophical essence that carried over into other parts of students' lives. In
other words, Karate was a way of life: Karate-do. Otherwise, you only have
Karate-jutsu, which is just the art of fighting. Master Funakoshi made this
distinction.
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When you first met him, he looked very old. Nobody would guess that he was a
real grandmaster. That's how humble he was. He always felt he needed more
study, and was a great example of a genuine martial artist. Some masters, once
they reach a certain point, like to show off. "I'm a fifth-degree black
belt; I'm the strongest man in the world," they spout. Such behavior had
nothing to do with Master Funakoshi's philosophy. He felt no need to show off.
Once he put on a gi (Karate uniform), however, and went into the dojo, he was
different- right away. He still didn't show off, but he changed. When he stood
in the dojo, he looked as though one of his movements could destroy anything.
That's how good his techniques were. Then, when he finished training, he again
became very humble. Master Funakoshi always said that the martial artist's
etiquette was very important, and that etiquette was the sign of the true
martial artist. That's why Master Funakoshi didn't look like a so-called
"real" grand- master. He didn't show that kind of thing except in the
dojo.
Master Funakoshi was very wise and had a broad mind. He felt that Karate should
be open to everybody; he wanted everybody to know the art. If you have some
nice medicine, he felt you should share it with everybody. That's why he agreed
to form an association, and that's why he created the JKA. He never said
anything about any one particular style. For instance, some had goju style,
while others had wado style. But he never taught the need for styles.
Funakoshi always believed kata was the secret to becoming skilled in Karate. He
made students practice the pinan and naihanchi forms for at least three years
before he allowed them to progress to the more advanced kata. The repetitious
training paid off, though, because his students developed the most precise,
exact Karate taught anywhere.
Funakoshi was a man of Tao. He placed no emphasis
on competitions, record breaking or championships. Instead, he emphasized
self-perfection. He believed in the common decency and respect that one human
being owed another. He was the master of masters.
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Some final words
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As Karate legends go, Gichin Funakoshi's life was not terribly exciting. He
never challenged anyone to a sword duel, never attempted to dismantle a bull's
horn, never had a presumptuous nickname and, in fact, never left the islands of
Japan. He was a poet, and a schoolteacher, and the closest he ever came to
seeing battle was when he mediated a dispute between two neighboring
villages.
Yet Funakoshi is one of the most honored, cherished and memorable martial
artists in history. His innovations left indelible marks on the art form we
know today as Karate. Not only was shotokan Karate, the style he founded,
influenced by Funakoshi, but dozens of other styles as well.
Funakoshi died in 1957 at the age of 88, after humbly making a tremendous
contribution to the art of Karate.
From http://www.fightingmaster.com/masters/funakoshi/index.htm