Talk:Traditional Kendō

Can you explain why you think this should be separate from the main Kendo page?
Kendo, as codified in the current practice, only really started in 1895, and was renamed Kendo on 1920. It is therefore basically a modern martial art (or way if you prefer). Within Kendo, there are those who concentrate on it as a sport (normally called "sports kendo") in Japan, but I believe the mainstream opinion is that real Kendo is all about self discipline and growth.

I would question your claim that there is any Kendo that emphasizes "combat readiness with the sword". We train to fight as though we were using a sword, but there is no question of actually using one in combat. This sentence is also a bit wierd "Traditional Kendō stresses training with the shinai and is concerned with combative realism with the sword exercised in the form of kata training"  Kata training is done with the bokken, not the shinai.

Finally, I think the number of people who combine Kendo with poetry, song and formal dance are vanishingly small: can you add some more information about the position of "traditional kendo" within the mainstream, how many people you would say are practitioners, and how they are identified (or self identified)?

Also, can you not go through the other Kendo pages and add "modern" all over the place. I think a discussion of different attitudes to Kendo, and the tension between the "sports" school of though and the "martial" school of thought (properly cited), would be a great addition to wikipedia, but I am afraid that this article and your edits gives the misleading impression that there are two somewhat equivalent groups: "modern kendo" and "classical kendo", and I think that that is just wrong. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Ffbond (talk • contribs) 02:44, 1 February 2009 (UTC)


 * Kendo was NOT started in 1895. The modern kendo was established after the Meiji Restoration but the term and practice of kendo was known before the Meiji Restoration - also before 'gekken'. I will like to write more about traditional (classical) kendo but the discussion must be based on literature. Further information on my 'User talk' [].


 * --PublicLibrarian (talk) 09:04, 3 April 2009 (UTC)

Warrior Ancestry
Sounds great, in a sales thing, but is dubious unless we are talking looking a family trees etc, and a rather sweeping statement about all practitioners. --Nate1481 12:24, 13 February 2009 (UTC)

Definition
Can someone make clear exactly what the boundaries of of this "Traditional Kendo"? So far all the citations involving it seem to come from one thesis. How many people practice it, how are they identified, how is it different from Kenjutsu and so on. In particular, I believe that most of the Draeger quotes are describing groups who refer to themselves as Kenjutsu.

For example, I have trained with a Kendo club in Totsukawa in Nara, who proudly claim that their club is descended from the remnants of the Shinsen-gumi when they fled Kyoto after the Meiji restoration, and I believe that they can document this. Are thy practioners of "Traditional Kendo"? If not why not? If so why so? Francis Bond (talk) 13:51, 6 April 2009 (UTC)


 * Dear BOND,


 * Please visit the library and read about the Japanese history. When you have obtained enough serious knowledge you are welcome to supply to this article with further constructive information with references.


 * The article is about 'Traditional Kendo' and the article is based on serious references (literature). The article is NOT about travles to Japan or 'I am thinking' or 'I am sure that they are thinking' or 'the Japanese is doing' or 'I am practising kendo' or 'my uncle is master in kendo' or 'I am master in kendo', etc.


 * Further information on my 'User talk' [].


 * --PublicLibrarian (talk) 15:04, 6 April 2009 (UTC)

G'day.

You have not answered my question "what exactly are the boundaries of Traditional Kendo". Unless you do that, it is impossible to judge the accuracy of what you are saying. In the literature which I have available, there is no well defined school called "traditional Kendo". The term Kendo is normally used to describe the modern martial art that developed from the Dai Nippon Butoku Kai and was named Kendo in 1920. This is very well documented. Within Kendo, there are different styles, with traditional groups placing more emphasis on Kata and self-discipline and "sports kendo" placing more emphasis on competition. The official policy is that self discipline is most important, but that competition helps both to test ones skills and to make the art more interesting to young people. I train in Kendo (and teach children) in Nara, and I trained for five years in the Takano-dojo in Yokohama, where they carry on the tradition of 中西派一刀流 (Naknishi-ha Ittou-ryuu), so I have some experience beyond just traveling in Japan :-).

You seem to be claiming that there is a separate school, descended from Abe-ryu (安倍流) that should be called 'Traditional Kendo'. If so, the references I have consulted contradict this. According to 上野 靖之 (1966) 剣道教典 (Educational Model Fencing) 尚武館刊,  the combination of characters 剣道 first appeared in Chinese style Japanese text (Kanbun) sometime in the 12th century. It's first use to describe a school of swordmanship was in 1667 (寛文7年）in the 安倍立伝書. However, there is no exclusive link between this school and modern Kendo, which is mainly based on Itto styles, although with input from many schools, notably Yagyu-ryu.

So my question is: what is the thing that you call "Traditional Kendo" --- is it the group within Kendo that favors more kenjutsu like teachings, or is it a well defined school (流), or is it something else? In the first case, Ueno contradicts the claim that "traditional kendo was taught by the founder of Abe Ryu in the seventeenth century." Could you please cite the entire passage in Kendo Gohyakunen Shi that supports? In the second case, can you be more explicit as to what you mean by "Traditional Kendo"? Do you mean the International Classical Kendo Federation, in which case it is a sub-school of Sakurai-ha Kogen Itto Ryu Kenjutsu, and has nothing do with Abe-ryu. In the third case, please say exactly what you mean.

Finally, can you also make clear the difference between Kenjutsu and "Traditional Kendo".

Thanks in advance Francis Bond (talk) 02:37, 8 April 2009 (UTC)


 * Dear BOND


 * First of all you must read the article carefully. You are asking about matters that I have written in the article. Perhaps you have problems with the understanding because people are changing the original text so much?


 * Sorry, I have to explain you again:
 * The article is about 'Traditional Kendo' and the article is based on serious references (literature). The article is NOT about travles to Japan or 'I am thinking' or 'I am sure that they are thinking' or 'the Japanese is doing' or 'I am practising kendo' or 'my uncle is master in kendo' or 'I am master in kendo', etc.


 * --PublicLibrarian (talk) 21:20, 8 April 2009 (UTC)

Dear PublicLibrarian,

(1) I have read the article, but it is still not clear to me what you mean by Traditional Kendo. As the purpose of a Wikipedia article is to explain things, it is important to make the article clear.


 * Read the literature
 * --PublicLibrarian (talk) 08:47, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

(2) You have not addressed my question, which is based on a serious reference. Could you please do so? Could you also cite the passage in Kendo Gohyakunen Shi that talks about Abe-ryu? Are you actually citing Kendo Gohyakunen Shi directly or are you citing someone else citing it? It is easy for passages to lose their original meaning if they are cited in this way. For example, the way you have changed my citation is currently inaccurate: Ueno does not state that "this koryū was also practised Kenjutsu." He says that Abe-ryu is kenjutsu, but in the 17th century terminology was not standardized, and they called their school Kendo. He also goes on to say that this is not directly connected to modern Kendo.


 * OOOHHHHH dear, it was YOU who have changed my citation in an inaccurate way - have you forgot that?.

I wrote: The first sword fighting school to call what they taught Kendo rather than Kenjutsu was Abe Ryu in the seventeenth century,[3][4] although the term had appeared earlier than that.[5] Revision as of 2009-04-06T13:43:58 You can see the history by clicking history

You changed it to Historical the Traditional Kendō was taught by the founder of the sword fighting ryu Abe Ryu in the seventeenth century.[3][4]Beside the classical Kendō this Ryu also practised Kenjutsu.[5] Revision as of 2009-04-06T14:24:33

This is accurate according to Ueno. Can you please provide the full evidence of a citation that contradicts this, as I have asked you? Otherwise I will correct the article again based on the evidence in Ueno.


 * If you are dissatisfied with you own reference you are welcome to delete this sentence:


 * 'Furthermore this koryū was also practised Kenjutsu.[5]'


 * You have many questions but I have only one question to you:


 * Why are you not write the information about the link between the term 'kendo' and 'Abe Ryu' in the article 'kendo'?
 * --PublicLibrarian (talk) 08:47, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

Because the fact that Abe-ryu called their style of Kenjutsu 剣道 Kendo is not relevant to the practice of modern Kendo, which was named 剣道 kendo to show the development of 剣術 kenjutsu　to a way of spiritual discipline rather than a survival skill in analogy with with 柔道 judo coming from 柔術 juujitsu. It may be worth adding as a footnote in the Kendo page (as it is in the Japanese page), but I don't consider it particularly important.

(3) Finally, I think that direct instruction from the head of a recognized kenjutsu school is relevant in discussion of traditional Japanese martial arts. To cite the Traditional Kendo page "The classical martial arts and ways are not typically organised in national or international federations, but organised around autonomous local social units which refers to an unbroken transmission of teaching down through successive generations, the ryū (ryuha)". For a wikipedia article, citations are important, but knowledge gained in other ways is also relevant.


 * I do not care about what you believe (you call this knogledge) because this article is based on serious references (literature). The article is NOT about travles to Japan or I am thinking or I am sure that they are thinking or the Japanese is doing or I am practising kendo or my uncle is master in kendo or I am master in kendo, etc.

Then, in my humble, and to you no doubt worthless opinion, you have not yet understood the spirit of traditional kendo.
 * If you say so...--PublicLibrarian (talk) 14:17, 9 April 2009 (UTC)


 * You 'knowledge' based on 'believe' is not welcome in this article. You may write your 'thinking' in additional articles but not in this article.


 * Read the literature to the reference concerning this subject and you will get further answer on you question.


 * --PublicLibrarian (talk) 08:47, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia articles do not belong to anyone, as a wiki user I try and improve all articles. However, I now judge that discussing things with you is not a productive use of my time, so I will just correct inacuracies as I find them and not spend further time discussing them here.

Abe Ryū
I made soem changes to the wording not intending to alter the meaning. you pointed out that a specific sentence didn't work like that and on reading I could see how it implied something different, so changed the rest back and left that alone. There are other editing options than a revet. --Nate1481 15:21, 7 April 2009 (UTC)


 * Dear Nate


 * You are changing the meaning when you are changing the wording and in this way the references will not be valid any longer. Please read 'Modern Bujutsu & Bodo', p. 77. Here you will find the classical kendo was designed by Abe Ryu'. I have not wrote the Japanese history I am just refering the literature.--PublicLibrarian (talk) 21:45, 8 April 2009 (UTC)