Nathan,
Reading online is never as good as talking in person. We do the best we can with electrons on a screen. Maybe one of these days, I can give you a call? Or better yet, if I'm on your side of the country, I'll stop by for a visit.
Not that I'm an expert or anything, but as far as I can tell, or have seen, you can't just stumble upon aiki. So, if aiki is DR's inner teaching, then I can see where the teaching could be held back for higher level students and then taught to all once they reached that level. I don't think many of us would have any problems with that. Course, there's always some that want things handed to them now.
So, let's just set that situation aside. Now, what if a school had this aiki teaching only for the next head of the school? I dunno, but do you think there would be that many students in the school? Knowing you weren't going to get taught the whole, complete art, but only the next head of the art would get taught it? I wouldn't join, but that's just me. Course, if you didn't know that's what was happening, how would you feel when you did find out?
And then there's the last example. Where only certain people are taught aiki and it's either random, pick and choose, or a whim. Let's say some have spent 10 or more years in an art and find out someone else had been taught differently. Or that someone new was being taught differently? And this difference was some of the aiki teachings. I think most of us find ourselves in the first example. I'd not want to be part of the second, but think about what a position you'd be in if you found yourself amidst this third example. It would suck big time. Would you still hold your ideals of the koryu in this third example?
Sounds great for them, Nathan. I don't know anything about it, but if that's true, then they have something like my first example above. Good school, good teacher. But, consider this. What happens if these students should find out that they aren't really working under the auspices of example 1, but are really in example 2 or 3? That you're never going to get the whole, complete art because either a) it is reserved only for the next head of the school or b) it is only taught to certain people. It's one thing to openly declare how things are done and another to keep it hidden on purpose.
I know someone who is very well versed in things biblical and religious. He has conversed with people holding B.S., Masters, and Doctorate degrees in those fields. And he runs rings around them, knowing things they don't, understanding complexities they don't, and generally holding more knowledge. But, the thing is, he never went to college and doesn't hold a degree.
Or I know someone who is quite competent in the computer field. He works better than anyone with certifications or degrees. And, no, he has neither. He's had to redo work that people with certs and degrees have done.
So, yes, I agree. People are qualified or not. But, my point here is that you can't tell qualifications from the Internet. Which goes back to one of my more often asked questions, why haven't you gone to meet these people who are talking about aiki? Heck, Akuzawa studied in Sagawa's dojo.
Just to clarify, Nathan. I'm not one of them.
Certainly, if the aiki arts taught it, I'd wholeheartedly agree. But, what if it wasn't taught at all? Let's say the Sagawa quotes are right. That he never really taught the core skills until way later in his life when he realized that they would die with him. I don't know how the Japanese would react, but Americans? Yuck. That the head of system never really planned on teaching the core skills, and didn't teach them until way later. Imagine spending 10 plus years learning an art only to find out the head of system purposefully didn't teach important, integral skills of the art. Or even just taught those important, integral skills to one student who was chosen to take over? Now, I don't know Sagawa and I haven't read the book. I'm just creating an example here. But, that would suck big time. You're a student supposedly learning a whole, complete art throughout your lifetime. And you find out that the core skills aren't taught at all, or are only taught to one person?
Mark