The Moon
By Haydn Ellis, founder Brutal Training

It’s been well over a year now since I started karate training again in earnest. It was because I found Master Raoul again that I pursued the art. I have trained in many different fighting styles, under many teachers and in many systems. It’s never been the same as training under Raoul. Along with my training has come study. I have immersed myself in ancient texts and famous writings including the works of Funakoshi and Mas Oyama. It is the more recent works of Mas Oyama that I have been reading lately.

After much research I became aware of a famous book written by Mas Oyama that is very difficult to get hold of. My initial interest in it was sparked when, as I continued writing Raoul’s biography, he referred to it as his own Bible of karate training when he was initially learning the art. It is called ‘This is Karate’ and is not to be confused with the other books Mas Oyama wrote including 'What is Karate?’ As luck would have it I discovered recently that Raoul in fact owns two copies of this out of print book that now sells for around $200 on ebay. And solely due to Raoul’s generosity I now have one in my hands.

It is the philosophy contained in this great work that I find so fascinating. Credit has to given both to Oyama and the translators involved in providing such an eloquent description of such esoteric ideas. Over the years the Brutal web site has had many articles that talk about the idea of spirit in man and how man’s spirit is intimately involved in his evolution and training. It is this concept that is almost impossible to define in terms of language that results in sayings such as ‘Finger pointing to the Moon’ and so on. Unfortunately, the more I learn and begin to realise I don’t understand the more I see that so much of what has been written on this web site by many people, myself included, has been complete illusory philosophical babble about things which have a reality but one which we have little idea about. It is philosophising rather than wisdom. The only wisdom is in doing.

There is a lot of comparison being made these days between modern fighting and traditional fighting forms. And the debate can rage for as long as it likes as far as I’m concerned. People that have no idea what they’re talking about conduct these debates. There are no traditional fighting forms. There is sport fighting and there is ‘modernised’ traditional fighting. Modernised traditional fighting is not much different to sport fighting. Neither holds a candle to what I would label ‘ancient’ fighting forms. This is not a reference to the techniques or methods employed but rather to the understanding of what real fighting is, what real training is and what the human being is really capable of. Don’t get me wrong, there are great sport fighters and traditional fighting exponents but their greatness is relative to those around them. Most believe and modern scientific thinking teaches us that as time goes on man is improving on the arts of the ancients. I quote from Oyama’s book:

“Chakuriki is an intense training method. It makes things that seem impossible to ordinary common sense possible by seeking out the real ultimate limits of human strength…To the men of old, who trained for the military arts with bows, swords, and spears, and were able to down an ox, a heavy sword or long spear was as light as pair of chopsticks. Their bow was fast enough to fell a flying bird, their swords could bring to earth an enemy as fast as lightning, and their astounding technique made a spear appear to be a living thing. Their submitting themselves to the plummeting waters of waterfall for the sake of spiritual unification reveal indivisible connections between physical training and the spiritual…These men spent long years, despite wind and rain, to develop themselves into pre-eminent warriors, and the techniques they mastered are very nearly divine.

People still refer to Mas Oyama as a freak and he was. He killed bulls with punches and chopped their horns off with his hands. He smashed rocks, trees and chopped the tops off glass beer bottles with his bare hands. He could bend two pennies between his fingers and fought against one hundred men, one after the other in ‘the one hundred man kumite’. When people told Raoul that no one could be as good as Oyama he asked “Why not?” But not only did he ask this question he went on to do the work: superhuman levels of work. Modern man is but a shadow of his former self. There are some true Masters out there but they are few and far between and they don’t run gyms in your local community. Not only is modern man a shadow of the powerful being he once was, he has forgotten how powerful he used to be. And even worse, modern man claims to be at the peak of physical development, understanding and training methodologies.

The ‘chakuriki’ that Mas Oyama refers to is a Korean word meaning literally ‘borrowed strength’. The word indicates taking strength from some other source and adding to man’s natural strength. Man’s bodily power can be increased through the three methods of spiritual and physical training and the application of medicines. Mas Oyama himself performed a three-year spiritual chakuriki when he secluded himself from human society and devoted himself to a life according to Zen principles. He also performed a physical chakuriki during this time training in martial arts day and night.

The purpose of spiritual chakuriki is to become “Absorbed in meditation that brings unity to his soul and that leads him into a Zen world of impassivity. He reaches a stage of unity with the Great Spirit, where his eyes no longer see and where he is one with the Universe that bears him.”

Oyama continues:

“…this is a life exactly like that of the animals. The trainee reverts to a natural man. Spiritual chakuriki, by developing spiritual power and a physical strength like that of animals, makes man something like the ancient Sphinx with the face of a man and the body of a lion.”

Oyama then goes on to present a section entitled ‘The Martial Arts of the Sixth Sense’.

“The sixth sense… is not a direct thing it is a spiritual and metaphysical perception…”

“It is impossible to explain its more subtle content verbally. One must approach the inner meaning of the martial arts through the metaphysical workings of the sixth sense. In addition, since this inner meaning is a metaphysical matter, it is something that one must master himself. The Japanese word for this meaning is ‘gokui’, the ‘goku’ of which means an extreme limit.”

“A man whose sixth sense is dull, whatever he may choose to do, will never succeed.”

So there you have it, the Moon in all its glory. It is a spiritual, mystical, metaphysical notion only capable of being experienced by the individual and incapable of being explained. It is the key to all the powers of the Universe, man’s birthright and his true nature. It is beyond science, beyond thought, beyond rationalisation. It is beyond contemplation. So continue on your journey of ignorance with your finger pointing at the truth deceiving yourself that you know who and what you are.

Spread the insanity.