Kanjuro Shibata XX
Encyclopedia
Kyudo
, literally meaning "way of the bow", is the Japanese art of archery. It is a modern Japanese martial art and practitioners are known as .It is estimated that there are approximately half a million practitioners of kyudo today....
teacher of the Heki Ryū Bishū Chikurin-ha(日置流尾州竹林派) tradition.
He was born in Kyoto
Kyoto
is a city in the central part of the island of Honshū, Japan. It has a population close to 1.5 million. Formerly the imperial capital of Japan, it is now the capital of Kyoto Prefecture, as well as a major part of the Osaka-Kobe-Kyoto metropolitan area.-History:...
, Japan
Japan
Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...
.
Shibata served as the Bowmaker to the Emperor of Japan
Emperor of Japan
The Emperor of Japan is, according to the 1947 Constitution of Japan, "the symbol of the state and of the unity of the people." He is a ceremonial figurehead under a form of constitutional monarchy and is head of the Japanese Imperial Family with functions as head of state. He is also the highest...
from 1959 until 1994, when his adopted son, Nobuhiro, was recognized as the 21st in the Shibata lineage and assumed the duties of Imperial Bowmaker.
He created 25 dojo in North America and Europe.
In Japan, Shibata became concerned that his students were too fixated on merely hitting the target, and were treating kyūdō as a sport rather than a meditative art. He felt they were becoming too competitive. Shibata thus represents a view of kyūdō different from the All Japanese Kyūdō Federation (ZNKR) and Japanese Budō Association. Rather than as a meditative art, ZNKR promotes kyūdō as a traditional budō
Budo
is a Japanese term describing martial arts. In English, it is used almost exclusively in reference to Japanese martial arts.-Etymology:Budō is a compound of the root bu , meaning war or martial; and dō , meaning path or way. Specifically, dō is derived from the Buddhist Sanskrit mārga...
art combining equally both physical and mental development. These differences have led Shibata to exclude his tradition from the official Japanese budō associations.
In 1980, Shibata accepted an invitation from Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche
Chögyam Trungpa
Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche was a Buddhist meditation master and holder of both the Kagyu and Nyingma lineages, the eleventh Trungpa tülku, a tertön, supreme abbot of the Surmang monasteries, scholar, teacher, poet, artist, and originator of a radical re-presentation of Shambhala vision.Recognized...
to come to the United States and teach kyūdō, and founded the Ryūkō Kyūdōjō (龍虎弓道場 "dragon-tiger archery practice hall") (now called the Zenko Iba) in Boulder, Colorado
Boulder, Colorado
Boulder is the county seat and most populous city of Boulder County and the 11th most populous city in the U.S. state of Colorado. Boulder is located at the base of the foothills of the Rocky Mountains at an elevation of...
. Since 1980, Shibata has founded over 25 kyūdōjō in the United States, Canada and Europe.
Shibata does not rank his students (i.e. there is no belt or dan
Dan rank
The ranking system is a Japanese mark of level, which is used in modern fine arts and martial arts. Originally invented in a Go school in the Edo period, this system was applied to martial arts by Kanō Jigorō, the founder of judo and later introduced to other East Asia countries.In the modern...
system), and there is no testing or contests within the school.