The ultimate aim of the art of Karate lies not in victory or defeat, but in the perfection of the character...

Question

of its Participants.

Gichin Funokoshi wrote this. For those of you familiar with his work what do you think he is saying in your opinion? I will tell you mine after. I am just curious to see if many Shotokan artists have several meanings or not.

THANKS and I NEVER THUMB DOWN unless your swear or are cruel so if you get one I promise it is not me.

"Sensei" - I know that proverb too, it is a great one.

All good responses so far thank you!!

Yes he was the greatest Karateka amongst others though such as Miyagi, Yamaguchi. All were Giants of Karate.

Answer 1

Funakoshi Sensei was a literary giant. The most educated of Karateka.

IMO, he meant exactly what it says.

The proverb "Karate Ni Sente Nashi" literally translates to "not hitting or striking first".

This also reflects the same idea as Funakoshi Sensei. It represents someone who prefers peace and scholarly pursuits to violence and strife.

Answer 2

Funokoshi was correct in the fact that the development of character is extremely important, especially in fighting arts. If you are learning to hurt people, then you better have the knowldge of when to use it and the strength of character to wait till then. However, it is hard to develop character if you get stabbed and killed the first time you have to defend yourself. All character building and no combat leads to just as bad a place as all combat, although you may feel better about it.

Funokoshi was in a country that had been devided by the Meiji Restoration. He was trying to preserve the spirit and life of a great nation. I believe he eventually did not succede, as you can see the militaristic view that the country took in WWII. I believe that if he were alive today, he would advocate a balanced program, not just a character building program.

Answer 3

Well this can be sayed for absolutely anything, the goal of all activities should be to move your excistance up to another level of being, weather you walk through life with more confidence or more humility or more grace, you can get those from danceing or singing and not just martial arts, but martial arts seem to develop everything or alot of things anyway

Also if you perfect your character then your actions will be the best thing you can do in any moment, so even if you loose, you would have done your best, for example, if you loose a competitions but you have perfected your character, you would have trained as hard as you could have because lazyness would not be in your character, you would have had confidence and concentration because you would have developed it, and whatever made you loose would not be due to your lack but just fate I guess, but if you have a developed cahracter you will win most of the time

Answer 4

I don't believe that sentence is practical in today world. Karate is for self defense, a practical goal that most people who take karate today want. To achieve perfection of character it will take 20+ years of training, who has that kind of time in today busy world. What was practical years ago is obsolete in the present.

Answer 5

He is talking about the very essence of martial arts.

We go in thinking our primary goal is to learn to defeat others. As time passes, that goal becomes secondary and we come to realize that the ultimate goal becomes the perfection of the self. The respect we pay to the techniques we learn can eventually spread to our entire lives and we learn to pay the same attention to all aspects of it.

Answer 6

I think it lies a bit in the same direction as this one from
Morihei Uyeshiba
There are no contests in the art of peace.
A true warrior is invincible because he or she contends with nothing.
Defeat means to defeat the mind of contention that we harbor within

Answer 7

to be honest i do not know what he could be saying maybe the meaning will come to me when i get a bit older and hopefully wiser.