No.1 Karate is Aloha

Kawaguchi Sensei is 81 years old.. He says, “Karate is Aloha.
Aloha is Karate. Aloha is Love.”


Souke Hirano extrapolates on this and says, "Aloha is courtesy.
Aloha is manners. Aloha is to honor."

Traditionally in Japanese history, when you honor someone or
something, everything about that person, the attitude, the good parts,
the whole being is embraced. This is what it means to treat someone
with Aloha.. It is not just a friendly welcome to Hawaii.

The Karate Attitude is exactly the same.

Basically courtesy or manners is the oil or lubricant between people.

We also have the same attitude of honor, acceptance and courtesy
towards Nature (trees, fish, birds, etc.)

The Japanese (or Zen) Way is like this. When you eat you say thank
you to that which you are eating (the fish or vegetable, etc.) You
accept their gift of themselves (their lives) to nourish yourself and
sustain your Life. Then you do the the best you can to use your
life to help others. This way you transform the life of that which
you ate into a positive force to help others. This is how you
honor your food.

Nowadays in Japan they don’t have this kind of attitude of caring,
honoring and embracing as much as they did in the past. It has
become more and more about serving oneself.

Like before in Japan when you caught fish, you let go the babies.
This was not being greedy for themselves to keep their stocks of
food high, but it was like this because the they respected and honored
the fish that gave itself to feed them.

This is true Aloha. This is Karate.


By Souke Kiyohisa Hirano.

Translator;　Mark M..Shigeoka.
Assistant Teacher & Fully Ordained Priest.