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FOUNDATION OF AIKIDO
Aikido's founder, O
Sensei MORIHEI UYESHIBA, was born in Japan on December 14, 1883. As a boy,
he often saw local thugs beat up his father for political reasons. He set
out to make himself strong so that he could take revenge. He devoted
himself to hard physical conditioning and eventually to the practice of
martial arts, receiving certificates of mastery in several styles of
jujitsu, fencing, and spear fighting. In spite of his impressive physical
and martial capabilities, however, he felt very dissatisfied. He began
delving into religions in hopes of finding a deeper significance to life,
all the while continuing to pursue his studies of budo, or the martial
arts. By combining his martial training with his religious and political
ideologies, he created the modern martial art of aikido. Ueshiba decided on
the name "aikido" in 1942 (before that he called his martial art
"aikibudo" and "aikinomichi").
 On the technical side, aikido
is rooted in several styles of jujitsu (from which modern judo is also
derived), in particular daitoryu-(aiki)jujitsu, as well as sword and spear
fighting arts. Oversimplifying somewhat, we may say that aikido takes the
joint locks and throws from jujitsu and combines them with the body movements
of sword and spear fighting. However, we must also realize that many aikido
techniques are the result of Master Ueshiba's own innovation. He developed
and synthesized it from various martial arts which he learned as a young
man. His practical experience in these arts is one of the richest and most
thorough of any Sensei. Many of the arts and techniques which are found in
Aikido date back, in fact, more than 700 years to the time of the Genji and
Heike regimes. A number of the Masters under whom O Sensei Uyeshiba studied
died without revealing their arts to any other disciple.
Short Video Clip of O'Sensei
(192Kb)
On the religious
side, Ueshiba was a devotee of one of Japan's so-called "new
religions," Omotokyo. Omotokyo was (and is) part neo-shintoism, and
part socio-political idealism. One goal of omotokyo has been the
unification of all humanity in a single "heavenly kingdom on earth"
where all religions would be united under the banner of omotokyo. It is
impossible sufficiently to understand many of O Sensei's writings and
sayings without keeping the influence of Omotokyo firmly in mind.
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