Bunbu Ryo Do: The Way of The Karate Martial Scholar
(YMAA) – In the early part of the twentieth century, when Okinawan karate teachers were first asked to provide names for their karate by the Butokukai in Japan, they struggled to come up with a name that did justice to the martial art they practiced. Many of those from the royal capital, Shuri, settled on poetic sounding names that conjured up the spirit of their homeland; Choshin Chibana (1886–1969) chose the name Kobayashi ryu, the small forest school. While other teachers with a similar lineage later chose comparable names like the young forest school, and the pine forest school, Shobayashi ryu and Matsubayashi ryu respectively, others chose to honor their teacher, or teachers, and in doing so took kanji from their names to give a name to their karate.
YMAA – March 10. 2014
