Might and Right

Richard Ostrofsky
(April, 2003)
Ai-ki-do (three Japanese words) can be translated, variously, as “the way of
unified energy,” “the method of reconciled wills” or “the path of spiritual
integration.” It is a martial art, strikingly different – if you'll forgive my
choice of words – from either Judo or Karate. When you watch it
demonstrated or practiced, you see men and women who are not sparring or
grappling but attacking each other by turns and getting thrown around.
Obviously, the first thing you have to learn is how to attack and be thrown
without getting hurt. So please forget everything you may have heard about
Aikido being a purely defensive art. The student spends exactly half his
time practicing attacks and if his partner does not defend himself, the one
attacking is under no obligation to fall down.
Actually, from a certain viewpoint, Aikido is among the most aggressive
of the martial arts. It is not a sport, and it has no sense of fair play. Unlike
Judo or tournament Karate, its metaphor for combat is not a contest
between equals, but an attack by one or more assassins. The theory is that
the attacker (called uke – "oohkay") has lost his self-control by entering
aggressively into his target's space. The designated target (called nage –
"nahgay") is in full control of himself and therefore – theoretically – in a
position to take control of the situation and neutralize the attack. Preferably,
harmlessly. If nage is good enough, he just takes away the knife or sword
and puts the uke in a pin until he sees the error of his ways. If uke is too
vicious to be subdued in this way, he may end up dead – not because of any
intention on nage's part, but as a natural consequence of his own
malevolence. Nage should become like a perfect mirror who reflects his
assailant's intention, accepting graciously and giving back the violence
intended for himself. He must be so much in the moment, so present to
himself and his attacker, that he responds without premeditation or
conscious purpose. The fight is over before it starts, nage does not know
what he did until it is finished, and uke does not know what hit him – rather
as if he had walked into the path of a bus or into a time warp or a tar pit.
The founder of the style, Morihei Ueshiba, who died in 1969 at the age
of 87, and was perhaps the greatest martial artist of his day, used to give
demonstrations with five Marines attacking him. Some of these were filmed
and are still available on videotape. They do not look like combat. They do
not look like any Aikido I have ever seen taught or practiced. They look like
nothing so much as a Keystone Kops routine with five agitated clowns
tripping over each other while a little old man walks scatheless in their
midst.
Obviously, one does not become that good overnight. In fact, I have
been practicing Aikido for 30 years and still don't understand most of what
Ueshiba was doing. Watching the tapes doesn't help, because they look like
he is doing nothing. Still, I think my Aikido training has been among the
best educations of a lifetime, if also among the most frustrating.
It's not easy to explain what I have learned, however, since I still have all
the vices I came in with. If some of them no longer drive me as fiercely as
they used to, it is age, not Aikido, that I have to thank for it. But beginners
are always asking me this question, and it is really high time I found an
answer for them. I have decided to write a serious piece on the subject, and
am using this column to warm up for it.
Some of what I think I've learned can be found too in any other art. For
example, what infinite richness and complexity there are in the simplest
things, as soon as you set yourself the project of doing something not just
well enough (as we usually do things), but perfectly – or, as well as you
possibly can. But there are other things that seem unique to the martial arts
at their very best, and to Aikido in particular.
When Ueshiba said that the purpose of martial arts is to keep the peace
of the world, protect all living things, and allow each person to accomplish
his mission, he was making a profound statement on at least three levels.
On the level of training, I think he was saying that the dojo (practice area) is
a place to outgrow one's fantasies of power and domination and to gain a
sense of who you are and what your life is really about. On the level of
teaching, I think he meant that the dojo is a sort of playground for adults,
where the instructor creates a space designed (as the real world
conspicuously is not) for personal growth: less ego, more Self as my own
teacher used to say. But, on a third level, I think he was making a profound
statement in theology or political philosophy or both, and one that I still do
not fully understand. Insofar as I think I catch his meaning, it strikes me as
among the most interesting ideas I have ever met.
Western tradition tends to draw a sharp distinction between Might and
Right and talks (most often unthinkingly or hypocritically) about loving
one's neighbors as one's self – as if this were something that just anyone
could resolve or organize his life to do. By contrast, Ueshiba is saying that
on some ultimate (Divine?) level, Might and Right are the same thing and
that the real warrior is kingly: a good father to his people. He is saying that
no one can love his enemies until he has gotten very good at fighting with
his siblings – so that conflicts can be resolved without doing permanent
injuries; "Amateur tactics cause grave wounds" as a martial arts proverb has
it. He is suggesting – and this is the difficult part – that in a perfect polity,
everyone finds his proper role, (his "battle station" as it were), with the
result that the community is strong as a whole, but also a very good place to
live. For this vision, the closest Western parallel that I can think of is the
legend of Arthur, the once and future king, and his knights of the Round
Table. Ueshiba believed that this is what martial arts practice was really
about and he tried to create a system to make it manifest. He was groping,
we might say, towards a curriculum for the education of true knights; a
training for Camelot. He failed in this. He did not create an enduring
synthesis of Love and Power, any more than Gandhi did, or Martin Luther
King, or Nelson Mandela or the mythical Arthur himself. But, like these
other paladins, he left a tantalizing glimpse of something we can never
forget.