Goju-Ryu, (Japanese for "hard-soft style") is one of the main traditional Okinawan styles of karate, featuring a combination of hard and soft techniques. Both principles, hard and soft, come from the famous martial arts book Bubishi, used by Okinawan masters during the 19th and 20th centuries. Go which means hard, refers to closed hand techniques or straight linear attacks; Ju which means soft, refers to open hand techniques and circular movements.
Major emphasis is given to breathing correctly in all of the katas but particularly in the Sanchin kata which is one of two core katas of this style. The second kata is called Tensho, meant to teach the student about the soft (ju) style of the system. Goju-ryu practices methods that include body strengthening and conditioning, its basic approach to fighting (distance, stickiness, power generation, etc.), and partner drills. Goju-ryu incorporates both circular and linear movements into its curriculum. Goju-ryu combines hard striking attacks such as kicks and close hand punches with softer open hand circular techniques for attacking, blocking, and controlling the opponent, including locks, grappling, takedowns and throws.
History
The development of Goju-ryu goes back to Kanryo Higashionna, (1853–1916), a native of Naha, Okinawa. Master Higashionna began studying Shuri-te as a child. He was first exposed to martial arts in 1867, when he began training in Monk Fist Boxing (Luohan Quan) under a master named Aragaki Tsuji Pechin Seisho, a fluent Chinese speaker and translator for the Ryukyu court. In 1870, Aragaki had to go to Beijing to translate for Okinawan officials. It was then that he recommended Higashionna to another master named Kojo Taitei, who he began training under. With the help of Taitei and a family friend, Higashionna eventually managed to set up safe passage to China, lodging, and martial arts instruction. In 1873 he left for Fuzhou in Fujian Province, China, where he began studying Chinese boxing under various teachers. |
| Kanryo Higashionna |
In 1877 he began to study under a kung fu master called Ryu Ryu Ko. Tokashiki Iken has identified him as Xie Zhongxiang, founder of Whooping Crane Kung Fu. Zhongxiang taught several Okinawan students who went on to become karate legends.
Higashionna returned to Okinawa in 1882 and continued in the family business of selling firewood, while teaching a new school of martial arts, distinguished by its integration of go-no (hard) and ju-no (soft) kempo into one system. Higashionna's style was known as Naha-te. Gojukai history considers that Chinese Nanpa Shorin-ken was the strain of kung fu that influenced this style.
Higaonna Morio noted that in 1905, Higashionna Kanryo sensei taught martial arts in two different ways, according to the type of student: At home, he taught Naha-te as a martial art whose ultimate goal was to be able to kill the opponent; however, at Naha Commercial High School, he taught karate as a form of physical, intellectual and moral education.
Higashionna's most prominent student was Chojun Miyagi (1888–1953), the son of a wealthy shop owner in Naha, who began training under Higashionna at the age of 14. Miyagi had begun his martial arts training under Ryuko Aragaki at age 11, and it was through Aragaki that he was introduced to Higashionna. Miyagi trained under Higashionna for 15 years, until Higashionna's death in 1916.
In 1915 Miyagi and a friend Gokenki went to Fuchou in search of Higashionna's teacher. They stayed for a year and studied under several masters but the old school was gone. Shortly after their return, Higashionna died. Many of Higashionna's students continued to train with him and he introduced a kata called Tensho which he had adapted from Rokkishu of Fujian White Crane.
Higashionna's most senior student Juhatsu Kyoda formed a school he called Toon-ryu (Toon is another way of pronouncing the Chinese characters of Higashionna's name, so Toon-ryu means "Higashionna's style"), preserving more of Higashionna's approach to Naha-te.
In 1929 delegates from around Japan were meeting in Kyoto for the All Japan Martial Arts Demonstration. Higashionna asked Miyagi to go as his representative; Miyagi was also unable to attend, and so he in turn asked his top student Jin’an Shinsato to go. While Shinsato was there, one of the other demonstrators asked him the name of the martial art he practiced. At this time, Miyagi had not yet named his style. Not wanting to be embarrassed, Shinsato improvised the name hanko-ryu ("half-hard style"). On his return to Okinawa he reported this incident to Chojun Miyagi, who decided on the name Goju-ryu ("hard soft style") as a name for his style. Chojun Miyagi took the name from a line of the poem Hakku Kenpo, which roughly means: "The eight laws of the fist," and describes the eight precepts of the martial arts. This poem was part of the Bubishi, a classical Chinese text on martial arts and medicine. The line in the poem reads: Ho wa Goju wa Donto su "the way of inhaling and exhaling is hardness and softness," or "everything in the universe inhales soft and exhales hard."
In March 1934, Miyagi wrote Karate-do Gaisetsu ("Outline of Karete-do (Chinese-hand)"), to introduce karate-do and to provide a general explanation of its history, philosophy, and application. This handwritten monograph is one of the few written works composed by Miyagi himself.
Miyagi's house was destroyed during World War II. In 1950, several of his students began working to build a house and dojo for him in Naha, which they completed in 1951. In 1952, they came up with the idea of creating an organization to promote the growth of Goju-Ryu. This organization was called Goju-Ryu Shinkokai ("Association to Promote Goju-Ryu"). The founding members were Seko Higa, Keiyo Matanbashi, Jinsei Kamiya, and Genkai Nakaima.
There are two years that define the way Goju-ryu has been considered by the Japanese establishment: the first, 1933, is the year Goju-ryu was officially recognized as a budo in Japan by Dai Nippon Butoku Kai, in other words, it was recognized as a modern martial art, or gendai budo. The second year, 1998, is the year the Dai Nippon Butoku kai recognized Goju-ryu Karatedo as an ancient form of martial art (koryu) and as a bujutsu. This recognition as a koryu bujutsu shows a change in how Japanese society sees the relationships between Japan, Okinawa and China. Until 1998, only martial arts practiced in mainland Japan by samurai had been accepted as koryu bujutsu.
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| Chojun Miyagi |
Miyagi believed that "the ultimate aim of karate-do was to build character, conquer human misery, and find spiritual freedom".
He stated that it was important to balance training for self-defense with "training the mind, or cultivating the precept karate-do ni sente nashi ('there is no first strike in karate')"; he also emphasized the importance of "cultivating intellect before strength".
Miyagi chose the name Goju-ryu ("go" meaning "hard" and "ju" meaning "soft"), to emphasize that his style integrated both "hard" and "soft" styles. Goju applies not just to karate, but to life in general; only hardness or only softness will not enable one to deal effectively with the fluctuations of life. When blocking, the body is soft and inhaling; when striking, the body is hard and exhaling.
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