What we now know as the Nihon Kendō Kata (日本剣道形) got their current name with the establishment of the All-Japan Kendō Federation (全日本剣道連盟 Zen-Nihon Kendō Renmei, ZNKR) in 19521. Before that, in keeping with the ultra-nationalistic spirit of the prewar times, they were called the Dai-Nippon Teikoku Kendō Kata (大日本帝国剣道形), or “the Greater-Japanese Empire Kendō Kata”. The set of ten forms were announced by the Dai-Nippon Butokukai (大日本武徳会) in October 1912, after a fierce, year-long debate by the kendō kata creation committee, consisting of twenty-five top swordsmen from fourteen different kenjutsu schools. The committee had been formed by request of the Ministry of Education and Culture (文部省 Monbushō) with the background of kendō (along with jūdō) having been included in the core curriculum for junior high-school students in July 1911.
A less well-known part of the history of kendō kata is that the Butokukai only created seven new kata in 1912. The first three kata had been created already a year before, at a seminar hosted by the Monbushō in November 1911 for the purpose of unifying kendō education. In other words, although we are used to thinking of kendō kata as the “seven tachi and three kodachi kata”, they can and should be divided also in another way: “the three Monbushō tachi kata, and the Butokukai’s four tachi and three kodachi kata”.
As can be expected, the kata formulated by the Ministry of Education and Culture for the express purpose of teaching junior high-school students have a very different approach to pedagogy compared to the kata produced by the committee of koryū representatives, and must be understood in this light. When the Monbushō tasked the Butokukai with establishing the kendō kata, the project was overseen by Kanō Jigorō, creator of Kōdōkan jūdō and previously director of primary education at the Monbushō. It is therefore safe to say that Kanō’s views on budō and education are reflected to some degree in the whole set of kata; in particular that, if one wants to learn the sword, one should first study the heart (剣を学ばんと欲すればまず心より学ぶべし).
Not all kata (primarily) teach useful techniques. As often, they are about important principles of sword fighting, where the specific techniques used to demonstrate these principles are secondary; a necessary tool for conveying something more fundamental. Indeed, most koryū are arranged in sets of kata where the first set teaches basic techniques and principles, intermediate sets dealing with more specific or difficult applications of said techniques and principles, until the student reaches the inner or secret teachings, which, to an outsider, often seem abstract, difficult to understand, and sometimes even outright strange — yet often short and simple2. Why would that be? The answer is that the inner teachings usually are meant to impart the founding principles of the school in a distilled form. Techniques, after all, are only tools for applying fighting principles in order to win.
Sasaki-sensei3 makes the distinction between sword technique (剣術 kenjutsu) and sword principle (剣理 kenri) kata. The first three kendō kata, designed by the Monbushō to impart in young students the basics of the sword, are primarily sword principle kata, while the seven Butokukai kata primarily teach techniques — although there is more than an element of both technique and principle in both sets.
This perspective explains, as we will see, various peculiarities that on the surface appear to go against the teachings of kendō, such as uchidachi leaning forwards in the first kata or cutting straight down along shidachi’s sword in the second.
There is another, oft-overlooked, aspect to the three Monbushō kata that puts them in a different light once known: created, as they were, by the Ministry of Education and Culture as a part of a junior high-school curriculum, they were meant also to instil certain moral values in students. Echoes of this thinking can still be seen today in the core principles of kendō, but the education system of early-20th-century Japan placed a much greater emphasis on love for and loyalty to the country and the Emperor, and assigned great value to the idea of what it meant to be a good Japanese citizen. It was in this mould that the country sought to shape its youth, in particular the relative few privileged enough to enter junior high school at the time. Although the times have fortunately changed since then, and we would do well to reflect on what the spirit of those times eventually led to, I believe there are still transcendental moral lessons to be learnt from the practice of kendō kata.
The three imperial regalia of Japan are the mirror (Yata no Kagami), the jewel (Yasakani no Magatama), and the sword (Kusanagi no Tsurugi). They each represent one of the three primary virtues: the mirror represents wisdom, the jewel benevolence, and the sword valour. The Monbushō, seeing the sword as an instrument of virtue according to the principles of bushidō, created each of their three kendō kata with one of these concepts in mind to serve as a lesson in morality and to build character in the students who practise them. Through proper practice of kendō kata, the student becomes not only a stronger swordsman, but a better person.
In the context of kendō kata, however, the virtue of wisdom was alternatively referred to as justice, or righteousness. The three “martial virtues” as espoused by committee member Nakayama Hakudō, founder of Musō Shinden-ryū iaijutsu4, were thus: justice, benevolence, and valour (義・仁・勇). These were the primary three among the seven martial virtues defined by Nitobe Inazō in his book Bushidō (1905), the remaining four being politeness, thruthfulness, honour, and loyalty. This idea of martial arts education as a way to instil virtue in students held strong sway at the time: the name of the Butokukai itself means “the society for martial virtues”. However, after the Second World War, the General Headquarters of the occupying powers dissolved the Butokukai and banned all mention of martial virtues in education. When kendō was finally revived as (at first) a pure sport, the deeper lessons of the kata were mostly forgotten, and it is mostly due to the efforts of the late Inoue Yoshihiko-sensei that they are remembered at all.
Nakayama Hakudō lamented towards the end of his life that kendō kata had not been transmitted correctly. Seeing the empty forms practised today, hastily reviewed as a formality in preparation for gradings, and knowing what has been all but lost in such a short time, one can but agree in his sentiment. It is my humble hope that I can contribute in some small way to keeping the will of the old masters alive by making this information available in English, and I will do my best to correctly transmit the words of Sasaki-sensei and Inoue-hanshi before him.
The explanations of the forms were revised and expanded in 1917, and again in 1933. Finally, in 1981, the manual was rewritten using modern language to make it more accessible. ↩
My favourite example is A-un (阿吽), the last kata in the Okuden (inner transmission) series of Shintō Musō-ryū jōjutsu: to an observer, it consists only of a strike to between the eyes by stepping around the sword, right after slowly crossing weapons. After learning nearly sixty kata, the last one before the secret forms is just one very basic strike, and uchidachi does nothing. In fact, the kata teaches how to time one’s attack between the enemy’s breaths, finding that opening when their reaction time is maximally long. It could be any technique; any weapon or none — the principle is universal. ↩
Nakayama-hanshi, known as “the god of kendō”, while being “only” kyōshi at the time, also had the special distinction of being the first person to be awarded hanshi in all three arts under the kendō federation: kendō, iaidō, and jōdō. ↩