Muso Gonnosuke Jinja & Kamado Jinja at the foot of Mount Homan, near Dazaifu, Kyushu Japan

Musō Gonnosuke – Founder

Japan’s Warring States period (1467–1615), which had scarred Japan for almost 150 years, came to an end with the establishment of the authoritarian Tokugawa shogunate. This in turn ushered in an era of peace that would last for over 260 years, and ended with the overthrow of the shogunate in 1868.

The relatively peaceful Edo period took away the means of the samurai to fully develop and test their skills in actual battlefield combat. The role of the samurai would eventually change from being warriors, constantly fighting battles for their liege lord (daimyo), into the role of providing internal security with increasingly more bureaucratic duties.

Instead of fighting the frequent wars and battles of the old days, with the exception of the siege of Osaka in 1615 and the Shimabara Rebellion in 1637, many samurai resorted to duelling other samurai, with others going on the road as a wandering swordsman to test their skills against other swordsmen such as bandits and ronin. And still others would train in far away schools (ryu) to hone their skill.

One of the men who went on a warrior’s pilgrimage (musha shugyo) was Muso Gonnosuke, a samurai with considerable martial arts experience. It was said that during his musha shugyo he was never defeated until he met and challenged Musashi Miyamoto (more below).

Gonnosuke used his training in the arts of the sword (kenjutsu), glaive (naginatajutsu), spear (sojutsu), and staff (bojutsu), which he acquired from his studies in Tenshinsho-den Katori Shinto-ryu[4] and Kashima Jikishinkage-ryu, to develop a new way of handling the jo in combat.[5]

Gonnosuke was said to have fully mastered the secret form called “The Sword of One Cut” (Ichi no Tachi), a form that was developed by the founder of the Kashima Shinto-ryu and later spread to other Kashima schools such as Kashima Jikishinkage-ryu and Kashima Shin-ryu.[1][6] His experiences, which would climax in his duels with the famous swordsman Miyamoto Musashi, led him to create a set of techniques for the jo and establish a new school which he named Shinto Muso-ryu.[1][2]

The techniques were intended to be used against an opponent armed with either one or two swords. Among the advantages of the Jo is its superior length when matched against a sword. The extra length enables the wielder to keep the swordsman at a disadvantage and this is frequently applied in SMR.[1][2]

Miyamoto Musashi [10]

Fuchi no Kutsu 普池の窟 (Fuchi Cave) on Mt. Homan, where Gonnosuke engaged in austere practices.

Permanent sign of historical information outside of Fuchi no Kutsu. Click images to expand.

The Secret Art of the Kuroda Clan (1614 – 1871)

After Gonnosuke’s death, his jojutsu would become a closely guarded secret (oteme-waza) of the Kuroda clan, and forbidden to be taught anywhere but within its domain and only to specially selected people within the warrior-class.[1] This was not an unusual practice in the Edo period. 

The main students of Gonnosuke’s art were the men charged with policing the Kuroda clan’s domain (Kuroda-han). During this period other schools (ryu) were created and taught in the Kuroda-han, and in the various branches of the Shinto Muso-ryu system.[1]

During this period, two newly created schools which included the art of the police baton (jutte), and the art of restraining a man with rope (hojojutsu), were taught within the branches of the Shinto Muso-ryu as a complement to the arresting arts (tori-te).

After Gonnosukes death the art was mainly transmitted by the “Dangyo-shiyaku” (men’s arts instructor[1]), though not all branches of the Kuroda staff-traditions used the title of Dangyo-shiyaku.[1]  The Dangyo-instructor position was, unlike the swordsmanship instructor (kagyo) a non-hereditary position[1] within the hierarchy of the Samurai.

The Dangyo-instructor in the Kuroda-domain was the charged with teaching the lower ranking warriors (ashigaru) in the arts of the staff (Jo), capturing/seizing/escaping (torite), gunnery (hojutsu) and rope (nawa)[1] among other martial arts. The position of Dangyo-instructor lasted until the abolishment of the Samurai and the feudal system in the 1860s-1870s.

Over time there would arise seven different lineages from the main Shinto Muso-ryu system.[1] These are collectively known as “The Staff of Kuroda” (Kuroda no jo). Of these seven branches of Gonnosuke’s jojutsu, only two would survive the ending of Japan’s feudal system in 1867 and the resulting socio-economic modernization, to be informally merged into a single line that is today the modern “Way of the Gods School of Muso” ( 神道夢想流 Shinto Muso-ryu ).[1]

The first split in the SMR occurred after the death of the fourth headmaster Higuchi Han’emon.[1] The split was the result of one of his licensed (menkyo kaiden) students, Harada Heizo Nobusada, breaking away to establish the “New Just School of Muso” (新とう夢想流 Shinto Muso-ryu) (later informally known as Kansai-ryu), while another licensed student of Higuchi Han’emon continued the original “True Path” line (later known as Moroki-ryu).[1]

For several years Gonnosukes art was passed on by these two lines. The “New Just” line continued until after the death of its headmaster Nagatomi Koshiro Hisatomo in 1772.[1]

Afterwards, the “New Just” line branched off into two separate traditions.[1] The primary reason for this branching, though indirectly, was the result of a restructuring of the living and training quarters of the warriors at the Chikuzen castle. The low-ranking foot soldiers (ashigaru) and the junior officers (kashi) were relocated to two separate areas of Fukuoka, partially due to the difference in the social status of the two groups.[1]

Each group would create new centers of training in their respective areas. This led to the establishment of two new branches from the “New Just”-line of jojutsu, each under their own respective head instructor.

These new lines were named Haruyoshi, led by Ono Kyusaku, and the other Jigyo, led by Komori Seibei, respectively. The two branches were named after the two respective areas of the castle (Maizuru Jo – 舞鶴城 – see map ) in which they trained.[1]

These new branches, Jigyo and Haruyoshi, were a reality by the early 19th century, but even though separate, all three lines appear to have been very similar in terms of techniques.[1] This was demonstrated when the Jigyo Branch was broken with the death of its head instructor Fujimoto Heikichi in 1815. Because of this, the Jigyo found itself without a fully licensed headmaster, [1] and without a successor from within its own organisation the line would have died out. However, Hatae Kyuhei, who held a full license in the Haruyoshi branch, would eventually revive the Jigyo branch and allow it to continue into the Meiji period (1868–1912).[1]

Meanwhile, the “True Path” had also fallen onto hard times as the tradition was broken with the death of Inoue Ryosuke in 1831. The similarities between the various “Staff of Kuroda”-traditions were again made clear when Hatae Kyuhei (who was an exponent of the Haruyoshi-branch and had also helped revive the Jigyo branch of the “New Just line”) revived the “True Path”. The “True Path” would, however, become extinct in the Bakumatsu era (1850–1867).[1] It was not until 1871 that the ban on teaching outside the Kuroda clan was lifted.

Shiraishi Hanjiro (1821-1927) [10]

Uchida Ryohei, son of Uchida Ryogoro [12]

Shimizu Takaji era (1927-1978)

Shimizu Takaji was born in 1897 and came from humble origins, his family descending from a line of village headmen and minor officials.[1] In the aftermath of the abolishment of the samurai caste, Shimizu’s father would manage a small general store while Shimizu, after graduating from elementary school, took employment in a small factory at Hakata, where the Shiraishi Dojo operated.[1]

Shimizu started his training at the age of 17 (1914) under Shiraishi himself and quickly rose in the ranks, receiving the Mokuroku scroll in 1918 and the license of full transmission (Menkyo Kaiden) in 1920 at the age of 23.[1] Of the many students of Shiraishi there were three who became prominent in the aftermath of Shiraishi’s death. Shimizu Takaji (1898-1978), Takayama Kiroku (1893–1938) and Otofuji Ichizo (1899–1998).[1]

In the early 1920s Jigoro Kano, the founder of judo, witnessed a demonstration of SMR and made an invitation to Shiraishi come to Tokyo and teach SMR there. Due to his advanced age Shiraishi declined to come in person and sent his student Shimizu Takaji instead.

Shimizu arrived in Tokyo in 1927. After a further demonstration of SMR-jo in front of the Tokyo Police Force technical commission, a decision was made to incorporate elements of SMR-jo for police-use.[1] The new system was named keijo-jutsu and intended for use with the special police unit Tokubetsu Keisatsutai.[1]

Shimizu started training the new unit in 1931. Now a permanent Tokyo-resident, Shimizu opened up his own dojo, the Mumon (No Gate) Dojo.

In 1929 Takayama Kiroku, with financial aid from the family of the late Shiraishi Hanjiro, opened a dojo in Fukuoka [1] and was named Shihan with Shimizu named fuku-shihan or “assistant master”. Shimizu by this time, however, was on his way to Tokyo in order to teach jodo. Takayama died in 1938 and Otofuji Ichizo took over as the new master of the dojo and of the Fukuoka-jo, a responsibility he held until his death in 1998.[1]

 During the 1930s in Tokyo, Shimizu felt that the traditional way of teaching Jo was not suited for this new (and more numerous) generation of students. He realised that a better method of teaching Jo was required in order to properly teach ever increasing number of new students who had no previous experience of Martial Arts.

He took inspiration from Jigoro Kanos new Judo organisation and training-methods in order to, among other things, develop the twelve basic techniques kihon which would make SMR more appealing and approachable to the beginner-student.[1][2] These twelve basic techniques are still taught in most mainstream dojos today.

In 1940 Shimizu became the head of the Dai Nihon jodokai (Greater Japan jodo Association)[1] and he decided to rename the art from jojutsu to jodo in keeping with the trend of the time.

With the end of World War II in 1945, many martial arts were banned by the new government for fear that they might be used by ultra-nationalistic groups as a way to cause civil unrest.[2] The police-jo taught by Shimizu to the Tokyo Police force was one of the few exceptions and many other martial arts practitioners from before the war went to Shimizus dojo in Tokyo for training.[2] The police-jo were further developed in the 1960s when it was adapted for use in crowd-control with the Tokyo Riot police.

Shimizu, as had Shiraishi before him, has both been described as an SMR Headmaster due to their initiative and major contributions to SMR though neither Shiraishi or Shimizu received official appointment to such a position.[1] Shimizu would complete Shinto Muso-ryu’s transition from a localized bugei ryu to a national martial art and become the art’s greatest popularizer through his acceptance of foreign students and the establishment of jodo-organisations.[2]

Otofuji Ichizo (1899–1998) [16]

All Japan Kendo Federation – Seitei Jodo [15]

Muso Gonnosuke Jinja & Kamado Jinja at the foot of Mount Homan, near Dazaifu, Kyushu Japan

Musō Gonnosuke – Founder

Japan’s Warring States period (1467–1615), which had scarred Japan for almost 150 years, came to an end with the establishment of the authoritarian Tokugawa shogunate. This in turn ushered in an era of peace that would last for over 260 years and ended with the overthrow of the shogunate in 1868.

The relatively peaceful Edo period took away the means of the samurai to fully develop and test their skills in actual battlefield combat. The role of the samurai would eventually change from being warriors, constantly fighting battles for their liege lord (daimyo), into the role of providing internal security with increasingly more bureaucratic duties.

Instead of fighting the frequent wars and battles of the old days, with the exception of the siege of Osaka in 1615 and the Shimabara Rebellion in 1637, many samurai resorted to duelling other samurai, with others going on the road as a wandering swordsman to test their skills against other swordsmen such as bandits and ronin. And still others would train in far away schools (ryu) to hone their skill.

One of the men who went on a warrior’s pilgrimage (musha shugyo) was Muso Gonnosuke, a samurai with considerable martial arts experience. It was said that during his musha shugyo he was never defeated until he met and challenged Musashi Miyamoto (more below).

Gonnosuke used his training in the arts of the sword (kenjutsu), glaive (naginatajutsu), spear (sojutsu), and staff (bojutsu), which he acquired from his studies in Tenshinsho-den Katori Shinto-ryu[4] and Kashima Jikishinkage-ryu, to develop a new way of handling the jo in combat.[5]

Gonnosuke was said to have fully mastered the secret form called The Sword of One Cut (Ichi no Tachi), a form that was developed by the founder of the Kashima Shinto-ryu and later spread to other Kashima schools such as Kashima Jikishinkage-ryu and Kashima Shin-ryu.[1][6]

His experiences, which would climax in his duels with the famous swordsman Miyamoto Musashi, led him to create a set of techniques for the jo and establish a new school which he named Shinto Muso-ryu.[1][2] The techniques were intended to be used against an opponent armed with either one or two swords.

Among the advantages of the Jo is its superior length when matched against a sword. The extra length enables the wielder to keep the swordsman at a disadvantage and this is frequently applied in SMR.[1][2]

The Secret Art of the Kuroda Clan (1614 – 1871)

After Gonnosuke’s death, his jojutsu would become a closely guarded secret (oteme-waza) of the Kuroda clan, and forbidden to be taught anywhere but within its domain and only to specially selected people within the warrior-class.[1] This was not an unusual practice in the Edo period. 

The main students of Gonnosuke’s art were the men charged with policing the Kuroda clan’s domain (Kuroda-han). During this period other schools (ryu) were created and taught in the Kuroda-han and in the various branches of the Shinto Muso-ryu system.[1]

During this period, two newly created schools which included the art of the police baton (jutte), and the art of restraining a man with rope (hojojutsu), were taught within the branches of the Shinto Muso-ryu as a complement to the arresting arts (tori-te).

Fukuoka Castle [11]

After Gonnosukes death the art was mainly transmitted by the “Dangyo-shiyaku” (men’s arts instructor[1]), though not all branches of the Kuroda staff-traditions used the title of Dangyo-shiyaku.[1]  The Dangyo-instructor position was, unlike the swordsmanship instructor (kagyo) a non-hereditary position[1] within the hierarchy of the Samurai.

The Dangyo-instructor in the Kuroda-domain was the charged with teaching the lower ranking warriors (ashigaru) in the arts of the staff (Jo), capturing/seizing/escaping (torite), gunnery (hojutsu) and rope (nawa)[1] among other martial arts. The position of Dangyo-instructor lasted until the abolishment of the Samurai and the feudal system in the 1860s-1870s.

Over time there would arise seven different lineages from the main Shinto Muso-ryu system.[1] These are collectively known as “The Staff of Kuroda” (Kuroda no jo). Of these seven branches of Gonnosuke’s jojutsu, only two would survive the ending of Japan’s feudal system in 1867 and the resulting socio-economic modernization, to be informally merged into a single line that is today the modern “Way of the Gods School of Muso” ( 神道夢想流 Shinto Muso-ryu ).[1]

The first split in the SMR occurred after the death of the fourth headmaster Higuchi Han’emon.[1] The split was the result of one of his licensed (menkyo kaiden) students, Harada Heizo Nobusada, breaking away to establish the “New Just School of Muso” (新とう夢想流 Shinto Muso-ryu) (later informally known as Kansai-ryu), while another licensed student of Higuchi Han’emon continued the original “True Path” line (later known as Moroki-ryu).[1]

For several years Gonnosukes art was passed on by these two lines. The “New Just” line continued until after the death of its headmaster Nagatomi Koshiro Hisatomo in 1772.[1]

Afterwards, the “New Just” line branched off into two separate traditions.[1] The primary reason for this branching, though indirectly, was the result of a restructuring of the living and training quarters of the warriors at the Chikuzen castle. The low-ranking foot soldiers (ashigaru) and the junior officers (kashi) were relocated to two separate areas of Fukuoka, partially due to the difference in the social status of the two groups.[1]

Each group would create new centers of training in their respective areas. This led to the establishment of two new branches from the “New Just”-line of jojutsu, each under their own respective head instructor.

These new lines were named Haruyoshi, led by Ono Kyusaku, and the other Jigyo, led by Komori Seibei, respectively. The two branches were named after the two respective areas of the castle (Maizuru Jo – 舞鶴城 ) in which they trained.[1]

Fukuoka Castle & Haruyoshi Gate/Area [13] – click for larger image

These new branches, Jigyo and Haruyoshi, were a reality by the early 19th century, but even though separate, all three lines appear to have been very similar in terms of techniques.[1] This was demonstrated when the Jigyo Branch was broken with the death of its head instructor Fujimoto Heikichi in 1815.

Because of this, the Jigyo found itself without a fully licensed headmaster, [1] and without a successor from within its own organisation the line would have died out. However, Hatae Kyuhei, who held a full license in the Haruyoshi branch, would eventually revive the Jigyo branch and allow it to continue into the Meiji period (1868–1912).[1]

Meanwhile, the “True Path” had also fallen onto hard times as the tradition was broken with the death of Inoue Ryosuke in 1831. The similarities between the various “Staff of Kuroda”-traditions were again made clear when Hatae Kyuhei (who was an exponent of the Haruyoshi-branch and had also helped revive the Jigyo branch of the “New Just line”) revived the “True Path”.

The “True Path” would, however, become extinct in the Bakumatsu era (1850–1867).[1] It was not until 1871 that the ban on teaching outside the Kuroda clan was lifted.

Shiraishi Hanjiro (1821-1927) [10]

Uchida Ryohei, son of Uchida Ryogoro [12]

Shimizu Takaji era (1927-1978)

Shimizu Takaji was born in 1897 and came from humble origins, his family descending from a line of village headmen and minor officials.[1]

In the aftermath of the abolishment of the samurai caste, Shimizu’s father would manage a small general store while Shimizu, after graduating from elementary school, took employment in a small factory at Hakata, where the Shiraishi Dojo operated.[1]

Shimizu started his training at the age of 17 (1914) under Shiraishi himself and quickly rose in the ranks, receiving the Mokuroku scroll in 1918 and the license of full transmission (Menkyo Kaiden) in 1920 at the age of 23.[1] Of the many students of Shiraishi there were three who became prominent in the aftermath of Shiraishi’s death. Shimizu Takaji (1898-1978), Takayama Kiroku (1893–1938) and Otofuji Ichizo (1899–1998).[1]

In the early 1920s Jigoro Kano, the founder of judo, witnessed a demonstration of SMR and made an invitation to Shiraishi come to Tokyo and teach SMR there. Due to his advanced age Shiraishi declined to come in person and sent his student Shimizu Takaji instead.

Shimizu arrived in Tokyo in 1927. After a further demonstration of SMR-jo in front of the Tokyo Police Force technical commission, a decision was made to incorporate elements of SMR-jo for police-use.[1] The new system was named keijo-jutsu and intended for use with the special police unit Tokubetsu Keisatsutai.[1]

Shimizu started training the new unit in 1931. Now a permanent Tokyo-resident, Shimizu opened up his own dojo, the Mumon (No Gate) Dojo.

In 1929 Takayama Kiroku, with financial aid from the family of the late Shiraishi Hanjiro, opened a dojo in Fukuoka [1] and was named Shihan with Shimizu named fuku-shihan or “assistant master”. Shimizu by this time, however, was on his way to Tokyo in order to teach jodo.

Takayama died in 1938 and Otofuji Ichizo took over as the new master of the dojo and of the Fukuoka-jo, a responsibility he held until his death in 1998.[1]

 During the 1930s in Tokyo, Shimizu felt that the traditional way of teaching Jo was not suited for this new (and more numerous) generation of students. He realized that a better method of teaching Jo was required in order to properly teach ever increasing number of new students who had no previous experience of martial arts.

Shimizu took inspiration from Jigoro Kano’s new Judo organisation and training-methods in order to, among other things, develop the twelve basic techniques kihon which would make SMR more appealing and approachable to the beginner-student.[1][2]

These twelve basic techniques are still taught in most mainstream dojos today. In 1940 Shimizu became the head of the Dai Nihon jodokai (Greater Japan jodo Association)[1] and he decided to rename the art from Jojutsu to Jodo in keeping with the trend of the time.

With the end of World War II in 1945, many martial arts were banned by the new government for fear that they might be used by ultra-nationalistic groups as a way to cause civil unrest.[2]

The police-jo taught by Shimizu to the Tokyo Police force was one of the few exceptions and many other martial arts practitioners from before the war went to Shimizus dojo in Tokyo for training.[2] The police-jo were further developed in the 1960s when it was adapted for use in crowd-control with the Tokyo Riot police.

Shimizu, as had Shiraishi before him, has both been described as an SMR Headmaster due to their initiative and major contributions to SMR though neither Shiraishi or Shimizu received official appointment to such a position.[1]

Shimizu would complete Shinto Muso-ryu’s transition from a localized bugei ryu to a national martial art and become the art’s greatest popularizer through his acceptance of foreign students and the establishment of jodo-organisations.[2]

All Japan Kendo Federation – Seitei Jodo [15]