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NAIBU HAKAI
THE REAL SECRET OF OKINAWAN MARTIAL ARTS
by
Dr. William Durbin
The story told is a typical one which dates from the time when Karate was first
being spread past the borders of Okinawa, and was just getting known in Japan.
Too many people think of Karate as Japanese, yet it is the genius of the Okinawans
which created the art and brought it to the pinnacle of martial arts perfection.
The story tells of a little Okinawan man who runs afoul, for any of various
reasons, of a European or American man, and must defend himself, and yet though
he is much smaller, one solid punch puts his larger antagonist away. This story
tells the appeal of Karate when it was first introduced to the west. Many a
small, young man thought if he only had the ability to punch like that, then
he would not have to be afraid. Young ladies too began to think that maybe they
could go on dates and spend more time out in public, if they knew they could
handle themselves if a young man got fresh or someone of the underside of the
city, were to attack them.
Yet it seems today that that idea, the very concept of the Ikken, one punch
knockout, has been either lost or at the very least brought into criticism.
At a demonstration of many of the worlds top martial artists, most of the forms
shown displayed a propensity for an unseemly multitude of strikes in dealing
with a single attacker. In many of the two man demonstrations, and some actually
contained five or six man demonstration teams, the scenario was for any one
person to be hit a multitude of times, before going down, and then immediately
to get up and renew the attack.
Maybe movies have become too much a part of our martial arts heritage, but it
seems that now a days when people demonstrate martial arts in public they have
a tendency to display movie antics and put entertainment above education. In
the past, martial arts organizations used to have as part of their rules that
all public displays of ability were expected to be done with good taste, discretion,
and above all a sense of honor in demonstrating the art. Yet at a recent martial
arts demonstration a street scene was portrayed, with a nicely suited gentleman
basically throwing the first punch at a couple of spiked hair punk rockers,
and then continuing to beat them for the length of the skit. During that same
demonstration, there were a host of other skits and shows which portrayed groin
attacks too immodestly and with one having the pants pulled off an attacker,
and in another skit having an attacker's underwear pulled off.
There was a time when martial arts instructors and masters were looked upon
as the most courteous of people. The feeling was that if a person learned the
most dangerous skills of the martial arts, they needed to be highly versed in
courtesy, called in Japanese Reishiki, so that they would not abuse the art.
And yet with the plethora of demonstrations today, it seems that the image of
the martial artist has gone from the refined, courteous gentleperson, to one
of a thinly coated violent fanatic just waiting for an excuse to explode. But
worst of all it seems that the new image of the martial artist is a violent
person with little power. One of the greatest criticisms leveled at the participants
of one of the currently popular fighting sports, is that the competitors punch
like children, with little real damage being done by the singular punch or kick.
Now it is true that the event is held on a mat, which keeps people from getting
good traction, and thus unable to develop proper power, but the typical viewer
of these events is not sophisticated enough to know that that is the reason,
and so the image of the martial arts takes another drop to the public eye.
What is the secret of the original Okinawan martial artist, which in those early
days allowed a small man or woman to hit with authority and knock out a larger
attacker with one blow, and maybe we also need to ask why did they have it then,
and so many do not have it now? Let's answer the second question first. Until
the 1920s, Okinawan martial arts were very much a secret. And even after the
Okinawans started revealing their arts of Karate, Kempo, and Kobujutsu, to the
Japanese, they still kept certain things to themselves. One has only to realize
that Gichin Funakoshi was Okinawan to understand that the changes he made in
the way he taught the Japanese, might have been for more discrete reasons than
simply to make the art more acceptable to the Japanese. One American who trained
in Okinawa during the 1960s said that his Okinawan instructors taught them certain
things they did not teach their Japanese students, so that when they sparred
the Americans could beat the Japanese. He also admitted that the Okinawan instructors
also taught things to their Okinawan students that they did not teach to anyone
else.
There probably is a second reason why the power generated today, by most Karate
practitioners, is less than that of the early Okinawans. To the Okinawans, their
martial arts were their security, their insurance, and their life. If they were
attacked, and unable to defend themselves, they might lose everything they had,
for they had so little. And of course if the situation was life and death, a
man would think of his family without his support, while a woman would think
of her children growing up without her. Thus Karate was serious self defense
and the deadlier the skills, the better. Training, while enjoyable, always had
an edge to it, for they were training for life and death combat.
Today many people train, because a movie star does. Or kids want to be Ninja
like the turtles. Some young ladies who have joined Dojo in the last few years
have said that they train, because Van Damme is so cute. In truth there have
been those who have said that they started training in the martial arts hoping
to become movies stars. These ideas do not lead to serious training, where the
thought is life and death. Many movie star hopefuls are beautiful practitioners
of motion, but that does not mean they can actually defend themselves, only
that they move well. (There are many good martial artists who have become involved
in the movies and are excellent self defense tacticians, but those who started
training to get into the movies are the ones in question.) It is wonderful that
so many people are involved in the martial arts, yet the Hollywood metamorphosis
of the arts have caused them to be taught in ways that make them less effective
than they were intended to be. In example, if one were to visit many children
martial arts classes, they would see instructors dressing up like Ninja and
chasing their young students around the mat in a silly version of tag, with
safe bases and the like. This will not prepare the young person to deal with
the playground bully they might have to deal with in elementary school.
There are many real Karate instructors today who still retain the special skills
of the ancient martial arts. Okinawan instructors have begun passing on the
secrets of their arts, now that they know true and dedicated students can come
from all countries and that the arts preservation may one day reside in such
dedicated, international students. Thus the true secret of Okinawan martial
arts can be summed up in the simply phrase...NAIBU HAKAI.
Naibu hakai simply means inner destruction. The Okinawans put it this way, there
are three ways to hit: Sun dome, one inch stop; Hyomen hakai, which means surface
destruction; and then Naibu hakai. In training it is very important to be able
to throw punches full power, full speed, and with full focus, at vital points,
but leave your training partner alive, this is accomplished by throwing the
technique Sun dome, one inch from contact, so that the fist or other weapon,
never actually touches the person. Hyomen hakai it very important to know for
those real life situations which are less than lethal. When possible, combat
should be avoided, but when it is inevitable, yet obviously not life and death,
then it is possible to impart a great deal of power in a strike, and yet only
do surface damage. A hit done Hyomen hakai will severely contuse, sometime leaving
a very quick and ugly bruise, and yet with no internal damage done. It can hurt
and sting greatly, causing a person who does not really want to fight to back
off, and yet not endanger their life. A Hyomen hakai strike to the nose will
break the bone, dislocate the cartilage, and while making a bloody mess, leave
the person alive.
Then the final striking method is Naibu hakai, which means inner destruction.
There are two ways in which inner destruction is achieved. First from the typical
western viewpoint, enough pressure is brought to bear so that an internal organ
is literally squished, that is compressed until it ruptures. Almost any strike
to the solar plexus can cause the spleen to rupture, which makes this a very
dangerous vital point.
The second cause of Naibu hakai is Ki. Basically put, when a punch is properly
focused, a Ki Shindo, energy pulse, is transmitted from the point of contact
through the body. Any vital organ that is in the path of the Ki pulse will be
damaged. A person who is hit by a Naibu hakai strike will feel the hit on the
other side of his/her body. The only really safe place to hit a person with
this type of punch, and even then it should be controlled to an extent, is the
pectoral area. (Women should never be hit in this manner simply due to the potential
of tumors forming in this area, and care should be exercised when a large man
is punching a much smaller man in that ribs can break.)
The reason this is a good location is that there is a thick muscle, covering
a flexible ribcage, over a bag of air. The force, when not too much, is easily
dissipated through the air in the lung. When practicing this punch one should
never focus more than a half an inch inside, and never hit the same person with
a Naibu hakai strike several days in a row. And never use full power, in that
the destructive force is so great, that even in this area, the safest of all,
there is the potential for serious to fatal damage being done. However, it you
do the strike correctly, and it you have generated the Ki pulse, then the receiver
will feel it against his shoulder blade. This is the type of punch that can
be a simple Ikken, one punch knockout, or Ikken hissatsu, one punch kill.
Currently, there are instructors claiming to teach secret methods of Okinawan
knockouts using pressure points from ancient Chinese texts, but the truth of
the matter is, that these people have either been taught or discovered the real
secret of Okinawan effectiveness, Naibu hakai.
It must be noted that Naibu hakai is a very dangerous principle and should never
be abused. When directed around the head it is obvious that it could do serious
damage. If any of the organs the blow is directed towards have an inherent weakness,
then the strike will cause that weakness to give. If a person has an aneurysm,
either in a vein or artery, a Naibu hakai strike could cause it to blow apart.
It is possible to rupture a kidney or even stop the heart with this type of
strike. Those who are going around experimenting with this type of striking
are taking an awful chance of hurting people and damaging the free practice
of the martial arts in order to build up a reputation as great martial artists.
There are those who would then ask, how can you develop this type of skill,
if not by striking and knocking out people? The answer is simple, do it the
same way the Okinawan masters in the past did it. In those days, with medicine
much more primitive, a teacher could not take the chance of seriously injuring
a student, there was the grave possibility that the student would not survive.
Thus the Okinawan masters developed the skill through Kata, Kihon Kumite, and
Makiwara.
In Kata, this skill will naturally develop if the practitioner has progressed
to the point that each move has Ki in it. Then in the visualization of techniques,
the student must see the opponent and then focus the Ki into the body with each
technique performed. When one has reached this level, the Ki gets stronger and
stronger, the more the Kata is practiced. This is why Kata was always thought
of as the highest level of training, in that the deadliest of techniques and
the aspect of Naibu hakai could be practiced safely, since no one was around
to be injured.
In Kihon Kumite the same idea is used in regard to the focus of Ki, the only
difference is that the practitioner should Sun dome, stop the techniques short
by one inch. But the mental concentration, so that the Ki is totally focused,
is considered essential for good training. Proper Kihon Kumite should always
have techniques fully focused, and practiced at a speed that allows the student
control of the techniques. Martial artists must never do a move faster than
they can control. With practice and repetition will come control, until then
for the safety of all training partners it is essential to go slow. For if a
fully focused technique happens to land on a vital point, the result could be
disastrous.
It is necessary to actually hit something to develop the ability to focus the
energy into a target. The Makiwara, literally wrapped straw, was the item of
choice for the Okinawans of the past, but any of the striking pads or heavy
bags of today can be used for the same purpose, if the mental attitude and the
focus of Ki is emphasized. Just hitting something does not guarantee the development
of Naibu hakai, thought it will allow the development of Hyomen hakai, which
works fine for large and strong people, but for most martial artists, the highest
level is sought in technical skill and thus the development and use of Ki. Each
blow must be executed with focus, with contact being made and a mental effort
of Ki pulsing into the target, when this is done, the strike will be powerful,
even if the muscles and person are not. This is the secret of Naibu hakai, and
like all martial arts secrets, it comes back to the willingness to work hard.
Many have developed this ability through hard work, without ever knowing that
there was a name for it or that is was an ancient martial arts principle. How
much easier will it now be, knowing it exists, that it can be developed, and
how. Maybe in the years ahead the stories of the Okinawan martial arts of Karate,
Kempo, and Kobujutsu, will once again resound with the stories of masters who
have the devastating punch and kick of those of old.
To conclude this article let me issue a warning. What was described in this
article is real, the masters of Okinawa had it in the past, it is a part of
Karate's heritage. It is dangerous when used foolishly, this skill was never
intended for sports or challenge fights, but only for serious, life and death
combat. There are three stories which might best illustrate this point. First
of all, Choki Motobu was a great Okinawan Karate master who was the first Karateka
to ever fight a professional boxer. When he first entered the ring, he simply
used Taisabaki, body movement, to outmaneuver his opponent, but then he realized
that the man was thinking him a coward because he was non-combative, so according
to some accounts, he hit the boxer one time. The man was carried out of the
ring and died before he reached home again.
Ankichi Arakaki, being a young aristocrat whose ancestry was no longer honored,
since the end of the feudal era of Japan, many times became embroiled in confrontations
due to his frustrations. Once this took the form of running afoul of a Sumo
wrestler, who was much larger and stronger than the young and slightly built
Okinawan Karateka. One kick to the abdomen of the Sumo ended the fight, and
unfortunately, due to complications caused by the strike, his life.
Finally, Ishimine though an Okinawan warrior, was of very small stature and
extremely skinny, especially of limb. He became involved in a confrontation
with a much larger opponent, over trivialities, and when the man tried to punch
him responded by kicking him in the ribs. The man immediately passed out and
so Ishimine carried him home. When the man came to he was extremely ill, beyond
what the medicine of the time could cure, and while he accepted all blame for
the fight and told Ishimine not to feel guilty, the man was heartstricken when
his assailant died a few days later.
If those stories scare you, they should. The martial arts have never been a
game, they have always been serious methods of self defense. Under controlled
conditions it is possible to have certain types of competition, but there is
still an element of danger if one has been taught correctly. Not too long ago
a young man was rushed to a hospital from a sparring match, it seems his opponent
'accidentally' ruptured his spleen with a front kick. (Thank God that happened
today, if the young man had lived in ancient Okinawa, he would have died.) On
the street, one should never engage in a fight unless there is absolutely no
other option. It is so easy to hurt someone, that unless one's life or the life
of an innocent, is actually endangered, fighting just simply is not worth it.
If you kill someone, and if you don't go to jail, you still have to live with
it.
At the same time, it would be a shame if someone you loved died because your
art did not work, or you were crippled because you could not really defend yourself.
This article tells the true power of the Okinawan martial arts, something available
for you today. It is a strength which can protect your life, but as with all
methods of great strength, there also comes a great responsibility. Learn to
have the power of Naibu hakai, inner destruction, and then have the courage
to walk away from the loud mouth idiot who is trying to provoke you into a confrontation.
Save the power for when you really need it, and leave the cretins to themselves.