Oyama Karate Juku-USA

These are the masters of our karate. Without whom, there would not be Kyokushin Karate and Kenka Karate Juku.

    "Courtesy should be apparent in all our actions and words and in all aspects of daily life. But by courtesy, I do not mean rigid, cold formality. Courtesy in the truest sense is selfless concern for the welfare and physical and mental comfort of the other person."
~Mas Oyama~

Masutatsu Oyama was born in 1923 near Seoul in South Korea. He studied Chinese Kempo at 9 years of age. When he was 12, he went to Japan to live and enrolled at University. After mastering Judo, he became a pupil of Gichin Funakoshi himself making such rapid progress that at 17 he was 2nd Dan and at 24 became 4th Dan. Deciding that he wanted to devote the rest of his life to spreading the knowledge of Karate, he spent the next year in seclusion from human society, living in temples and in the mountains; subjecting himself to the physical rigours of martial arts training day and night and meditating on Zen precepts, seeking enlightenment. In 1951 he returned to civilisation and started his own training hall in Tokyo.

In 1952, he travelled the United States for a year, demonstrating his karate live and on national television. During subsequent years, he took on all challengers, resulting in fights with 270 different people. The vast majority of these were defeated with one punch! A fight never lasted more than three minutes, and most rarely lasted more than a few seconds. His fighting principle was simple — if he got through to you, that was it.

In 1953, Mas Oyama opened his first "Dojo", a grass lot in Mejiro in Tokyo. In 1956, the first real Dojo was opened in a former ballet studio behind Rikkyo University, 500 meters from the location of the current Japanese Honbu dojo (headquarters). By 1957 there were 700 members, despite the high drop-out rate due to the harshness of training.

Sadly, Sosai Mas Oyama died, of lung cancer (as a non-smoker), at the age of 70 in April 1994, leaving the then 5th Dan Akiyoshi Matsui in charge of the organisation. This has had many political and economic ramifications throughout the Kyokushin world, which are still being resolved. In the end, the result may well be a splintering of Kyokushin, much like Shotokan now appears to have done, with each group claiming to be the one-and-only true heir of Mas Oyama's Kyokushin, either spiritually or even financially.  It is however reasonably certain that all Kyokushin groups, regardless of their ultimate allegiance, will still maintain the standards set by Mas Oyama.

The Ultimate Tribute to the Ultimate truth 

"True Karate is this: that in daily life one's mind and body be trained and developed in a spirit of humility, and that in critical times, one be devoted utterly to the cause of justice."

~Gichin Funakoshi~

Founder of Shotokan Karate-Do

Gichin Funakoshi, the man that Mas Oyama once said;  "Funakoshi was my one and only true Sensei". 

Gichin Funakoshi was born in Shuri, Okinawa in 1868. As a boy, he was trained by two famous masters of that time. Each trained him in a different Okinawan martial art. From Yasutsune Azato he learned Shuri-te. From Yasutsune Itosu, he learned Naha-te. It would be the melding of these two styles that would one day become Shotokan karate.

Funakoshi-sensei is the man who introduced karate to Japan. In 1917 he was asked to perform his martial art at a physical education exhibition sponsored by the Ministry of Education. He was asked back again in 1922 for another exhibition. He was asked back a third time, but this was a special performance. He demonstrated his art for the Emperor and the Royal family! After this, Funakoshi-sensei decided to remain in Japan and teach and promote his art.

Gichin Funakoshi passed away in 1957 at the age of 88. Aside from creating Shotokan karate and introducing it to Japan and the world, he also wrote the very book on the subject of karate, "Ryukyu Kempo: Karate-do". He also wrote "Karate-Do Kyohan" - The Master Text, the "handbook" of Shotokan and he wrote his autobiography, "Karate-Do: My Way of Life". These books and his art are a fitting legacy for this unassuming and gentle man.