I grew up living on the tallest hilltop in Johannesburg, South Africa – Melville Kopje. I used to ride down the hill to take Judo lessons; and remember every time I entered the dojo, or passed another school as a special time – steeped in the mystery and respect that surrounded these places. On occasion I would travel with my family into the center of Johannesburg, Hillbrow; we used to enjoy visiting ‘Exclusive Books’ a late night bookshop, and one evening I bought the first book on Martial Arts I’d ever seen: ‘The Martial Arts’ by Michel Random.
The book is worn, even with years of careful preservation – it is still one of my favorite books. What lies below is a small sample from the introduction to this work; the book was published 1977, try to hold this in mind as you read. I hope it inspires those in search of learning connected to the martial path.
“A book, even a film, cannot accurately portray a life lived. Rather, they provide an invitation to cross the threshold of visible techniques and definitions, for every practical experience in life leads to spiritual unity, or a simplification and clarity unifying the person, his knowledge and his power.
By that very fact, one can only speak of such unity in terms of its expression in the form of revelation and a gift from within, all the more unfailing because the ego has been effaced and the essence of the being has become in a way eclipsed, freed from fear, constraint, reason, all the average mans’ many restraints.
Budo, like all wise things, constitutes the application of the basic energy of the universe. This energy is one and knows no bounds. To be part of it, even a very small part, enables one to understand this energy is also an alchemy, transforming, and transmuting everything it touches.
It is well known that Westerners have always needed to understand, reason and analyze things with a critical approach. Qualities which quickly become unyielding obstacles when one is restricted by them. How can a man who is always agitated inside, hear the silence? What is there left to learn if one believes a certain discipline is in itself the finality of everything, or if one’s body and soul, the practical and the spiritual are opposed, if one believes in keeping for oneself all that is given, if an idea received is like a wall obscuring the horizon?
All teaching presupposes a gradual progression by degrees and stages, but it leads nowhere. The object is to reach the point where the mutation occurs, where movement generates movement, where man becomes his own master. That is why all traditional education puts the emphasis on the practical, avoiding verbal explanation for quite understandable reasons.
In this case, what is the meaning of the search for efficiency at all costs? Such debates in which black and white are opposed – overlook the fact that, the body is one and that one cannot speak of real efficiency without true mastership of body and soul. As soon as this mastership is more or less achieved, the person realizes for himself the sense of the journey and the search. All discussions are superfluous.
Modern myths about superman, the invincible wrecker, constitute a dangerous temptation to stretch the energy bow to the point at which the string snaps, where the being literally explodes within. Even if such beings become commercial idols, objects of public acclaim, they are nevertheless still inarticulate puppets brought to light with artificial power and energy, who inevitably turn on each other because they have not been assimilated in real terms.
Energy is what one makes of it. It can be a source of life or death, of creation or destruction. There is no wisdom exclusive to budo and budo does not escape universal wisdom, which in finality is neither retraction nor the drying up of the intellect but its totality and harmony. To be in this sense means to know, and to know is to add energy to energy, life to life, love to love. Such is the way of the universe.”