Newsletter
"The Source"
May
27th, 1996 - Michael Wedekind Interview
with Shihan Richard J. Van Donk
MW
- You are one of the highest ranking master teachers
in the Bujinkan and also have several blackbelts in other
styles. Can you tell us something about your first impression
of Sensei Hatsumi when you first met him back in your
early training?
Van
Donk- My first impression was that he was
an incredible human being. His energy was so radiant,
so full of life. From my previous experience in hard
style Karate I expected Japanese martial artists to
be more strict and rigid but I found Soke Hatsumi to
be very open and friendly and very exuberant in his
energies, almost non-Japanese like in nature. His martial
art's skill was way beyond anyone I had ever trained
with before and I had trained with a lot of really,
really good teachers. The things I learned from other
teachers were different , in a different kind of context.
What Hatsumi was teaching even back then seemed to be
more of a life giving, more open, more complete kind
of training. I was really impressed with his skills;
his ability to move, his distancing and timing, and
his ability to do so little in a fight situation and
yet accomplish so much all at the same time.
MW
- Some people say that Ninjutsu is not
a real art. They say it's mixed from other arts because
they have never heard of it before. Maybe they have tried
Judo or Karate before but they have either never heard
of Ninjutsu before or if they have heard of it all they
know of it is what they have seen on videos or at the
movies.
What can you say to this?
Van
Donk- It is impossible to know what is real
as far as how somebody trained five or six hundred years
ago, or a thousand years ago for sure because we weren't
there. Whatever a person sees or witnesses sometimes
gets filtered through whatever they have seen before
or whatever their beliefs are about it. If they have
only seen Ninjutsu in movies then they will expect to
see that kind of thing, the Sho Kasugi or Ninja Turtles
type moves, or whatever they have experienced as Ninjutsu
in the past. If they have experienced Karate before
then maybe they will see Karate type movements in it.
If they have experienced Judo before then maybe they
will see Judo type movements in it. If they have done
Ju-jitsu type movements then they will see Ju-jitsu
moves in it. If they've done Iaido then maybe they'll
see some of that in it. This is because the art that
we do encompasses a lot of all of these arts. The roots
of the schools or ryus which are the Nine Traditions
in which we train in the Bujinkan and have been passed
down to Grandmaster Hatsumi encompass the very beginnings,
the very basics of the true living Budo, and were done
in a living time. So we practice all of the aspects
from which a lot of these more modern arts came into
being. Modern Karate wasn't formalized until the 1920's;
Judo until the late 1890's. A lot of these came from
Aiki-jujitsu and Ju-jitsu type schools. A lot of those
roots come from the same schools that were handed down
to Hatsumi and we train in, like Gyokko Ryu, Koto Ryu
and some of the other schools, so there will be a lot
of similarities.
Also, there are only so many ways you can punch at somebody,
or twist a wrist or these kind of things so martial
arts wise it will look somewhat the same but one of
the things that is really different about what we do
is the way we move or the Taijutsu. The movement of
the body is not as static, it has more flow and movement
to the techniques than Karate or even a Ju-jitsu system.
A lot of the modern martial arts have become more stylized
and more formed by technique itself. Techniques, you
have to remember, even if they are 500 years old or
however old, were often written down by people
who won in a battle, maybe notes that they took to help
them remember what they did that worked. Maybe someone
came at them with a sword and they moved to one side
and hit the sword out of the hand with a stick and then
hit them on the side of the head - so then maybe they
wrote that particular move down so they would remember
it and then that became one of the techniques in their
school. Or maybe even in practice they designed particular
drills for different situations and that became their
system at their school.
Ninjutsu is not what you see in the movies even though
that is what people expect and what some people want.
Some even get all dressed up in the Ninja clothes or
wear the camouflage to keep the mystique. But inside
all the trappings is a real, true, living martial art
that hopefully helps a person to grow to be a better
human being inside themselves and doesn't just teach
them to hurt somebody or even only teaches physical
self defense.
MW
- The Bujinkan style is growing in the world very
quickly and there are those who have studied a little
bit and then left to go their own way and do some Ninjutsu
mixed up with other things but still claim it as Ninjutsu.
How can a person who wants to train in the real art find
a good teacher and what must a teacher learn for himself
in order to bring the true art to the people?
Van
Donk- Ok, you have several questions there and I
will try to address them one at a time. The first question
I heard is that a lot of people who have trained in
the Bujinkan have now mixed it with some kind of Karate
or other system and claimed it as their own. Well, that's
ok - there's nothing wrong with that. People need to
go their own path. They need to learn what they need
to learn from someone and then move on to do something
else if that's what they want. I more appreciate someone
who has said, "Ok, I've taken a look at this, I like
these pieces of it, I'm going to go take it and do it
on my own with some other things and I'm going to call
it my own name. I'm going to call it my own system."
That's fine. That's a lot easier and a lot better to
me than someone being inside the Bujinkan and adding
all their own things and doing their own things that
are completely different than the Bujinkan training
and still calling it Bujinkan training. This gets confusing
to people who want true Bujinkan style of martial arts.
And that leads to the next question of how do
you choose a teacher to know whether or not they are
somebody who is really doing what Soke Hatsumi Sensei
is teaching or something that they have just made up
on their own. The only way I can answer that is to say
that a person needs to first of all find out if that
teacher has actually gone to train with the Grandmaster,
or if the teacher's teacher has trained a lot with Soke
Hatsumi. Ask questions such as how much time have they
actually experienced training with Grandmaster Hatsumi
themselves? Have they been to Japan? Have they got the
Grandmaster's video tapes? After they have been training
in the art a while they will find out if that teacher
is known and respected by other senior teachers in the
Bujinkan system.
You also have to choose a teacher by the gift
you are getting yourself from their training. If you
are getting a gift from that teacher it doesn't matter
what the name of the school is or what the name of the
art is. If you are getting what you need, what is giving
value to yourself and your life, this is what is most
important. Most people coming new into martial arts
have no idea what the difference is between different
arts. They are just looking for martial arts. They don't
know the names until they have been training for quite
a while. To pick a good teacher is the most important.
If the teacher is giving you the things you need then
you stay with that teacher. If not then maybe you need
to look for something else. It's easy to find out if
a teacher is really studying in the Bujinkan. It will
be disclosed in a short while after training. If the
teacher is not building Hatsumi Sensei up and talking
about the Grandmaster often in their school, givning
rank certification from Japan then that's when you might
start checking more if what you are really seeking is
true Bujinkan Budo Taijutsu.
MW
- Now you have done your first seminar in Germany.
Many people have not heard of you here before now. Why
is that and what do you plan for the future?
Van
Donk - Why haven't they heard about me in
Germany until now? Well, I was quieter than some.
Some people decided they wanted to write a lot of books.
My teacher, Grandmaster Hatsumi told me not to write
a book for a while. He said it was ok to make a few
videos which I have done. Those change over time. He
said this was because things would change over time,
the way the art was represented would change; we would
go into a new progression. And we have. It went from
Ninja to Ninjutsu now to Budo Taijutsu. And just now
he has told me it is ok to write a book now.
I didn't really want to popularize myself that
way (the old Ninja image people had in their minds)
even though I did my best to make things available to
people, putting out videos to help in training and telling
them to go to the source, to go to Grandmaster Hatsumi
and learn what the true Bujinkan way was. And also trying
to create a better community among friends. I've always
said this everywhere I've gone to all the top teachers.
Let's build a good Bujinkan community. A lot of them
didn't really want to listen. A lot of them hadn't really
trained a lot in Japan (even though they said they had)
and my first priority was my own training. I've made
over twenty different trips to Japan and been to over
15 different TaiKai's in different places in the world
to train with Grandmaster Hatsumi and spent a lot of
time with him. It was all for my own training, not to
get famous. The organization that I have (American Bujinkan)
was born out of my desire to put more true information
out - translations of books and tapes and making it
easy for people to get the Grandmaster's videos. I made
the first training syllabus so students could understand
and know more correct ways of what was expected of them
in training. I'm not perfect by any means but I'm still
doing my best to duplicate how my teacher has been teaching
me and I keep going back to the source training all
the time. I think this is very important.
As far as the future, I think more people in Europe
will know me now because I am going to more TaiKai's
in other countries, not just the USA. Word spreads quickly
when people enjoy what you have to offer. People were
very, very happy with the seminar we just did. They
saw things they had never seen before and so I am happy
about that.
MW
- You just now trained 3 days with some of the Germans.
What is your impression of the training in Germany and
do you have anything to say to the people training in
Germany?
Van
Donk - Yes - Keep training! And keep training with
good teachers like yourself. I saw students who were
very hungry to learn, really wanted to learn and were
very open and friendly. I was really happy to see that.
Everyone got along well with each other and were willing
to try new things, even when they were very different
from what they were used to doing. When I teach a seminar
I like to do things differently than what the teacher
normally teaches because you have good teachers here
and the students already get that. So I do some wild
and crazy things to get them to think in a different
way, to explore movement differently. I was impressed
with the level of many of the students. I think they
need to work just a little bit more on form and posture
but their ideas and knowledge of how to move and how
to play and get down and roll was really very good.
They had a good understanding of this. They were
a great group of people to work with.
The message I have is not just for Germany but for everywhere.
This word politics always comes up and I'll just say
this straight - people need to grow up. I didn't hear
any of this from the students at the seminar we just
did but I usually do hear all the time, "Well, this
person is saying this" or "This group is doing it this
way" or "That group does it that way". I think it's
wonderful that different groups do things different
ways. Why? Maybe one teacher has been to Japan at a
different time than another teacher. Or maybe they've
seen a certain thing and they love that particular thing
because it fits their personality. Another person has
a different personality and they train in a slightly
different way. This can add (to what they know) so people
can train with different teachers at different times,
go to different seminars and learn new ideas, new aspects
in training. It's really about learning to share together,
about building a community of friends. It's not about
being Number 1 - nobody's Number 1. If anybody is Number
1 it is Grandmaster Hatsumi and it needs to always go
back to that. There are a lot of great teachers both
inside and outside of Japan now - especially since the
move to Budo Taijutsu. Soke Hatsumi has sped everything
up ten times faster than even before. This next couple
of years is a very important time of growth for students
and teachers in the Bujinkan. Teachers need to become
an example. They need to be an example for their students.
If they are always talking, talking, talking bad about
this person, bad about that person, they are wasting
their time. They are hurting their students, they are
hurting the Bujinkan - and it doesn't make them look
any better. To me it actually makes them look worse.
It means that they haven't learned the true essence
of the feeling of what my teacher is teaching all the
time. It's that feeling, that spirit, that living essence.
They've lost that and they are trying to hold on and
maintain just their little group of students and say,
"Oh look, I'm great. I have this." I think some of them
are trying to justify in their own minds even the rank
number they have been given because the ranks have gone
so fast - so they have to hold themselves taller and
say, "Oh, you don't want to train with so and so." But
they need to quit talking and train with the Grandmaster.
Many people are lost now because they haven't trained
with Soke for so long and they are trying to catch up.
If they had spent all that time they spent talking and
just trained they would be much better off now. It's
the people who didn't care who said what and just trained
that have gotten good. Even though they may not like
some of the things that other people do.
Some of the very wrong things that I've been hearing
is how people have printed up their own certificates
and are stamping them and selling them and they don't
pay Hatsumi Soke. That is terrible. Some of these people
make their whole living off of what Hatsumi Soke has
given them the ability to do. Soke has changed their
whole life and this is what they do in return. Why do
they want to steal from him? Why do they want to steal
from their students and not give them authentic ranking?
They themselves don't want a phony certificate, why
should they give one to their students? I get calls
all the time from people with this problem.
It's only fair that the money goes to the Grandmaster.
But other than that it is just up to people to get along
with each other and build community. Share training,
share ideas, share notes. I do my best and I have tried
a lot in the United States and I will continue throughout
the world, encouraging people to build a better Bujinkan.
Just train. The people who continue training will be
the ones still standing in the future. Over time ranks
change and people catch up with each other. You have
to think long term. It will work itself out in time.
That's why I didn't write a lot of things for a while.
All I did was train and stay out of those kind of things.
People can say whatever they want, but I keep training.
And I have a great relationship with the Grandmaster
so I'm where I want to be. Have the courage to do it
for yourself.
See
you next time.
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