Complementary Texts

A Practical Reading of Karatedō

The question raised in this essay does not belong solely to the realm of philosophical reflection. Throughout the essay, we have seen how the difference between a representation and what it represents can manifest itself in everyday actions. Karate offers a concrete context in which this question can be examined in greater detail: the mental representation of movement, of the adversary, or of the action may come to replace the experience itself.

“Every conflict begins long before the first blow. It begins at the moment when a representation ceases to be recognized as a representation and comes to be confused with reality.” This statement, introduced in the section devoted to ethics, serves as a starting point for exploring how this confusion may manifest itself in the practice of karate.

From this perspective, we can reread one of the best-known sayings of traditional karate, Karate ni sente nashi (“There is no first attack in karate”), which is usually understood as a moral rule not to be the first to initiate a fight, or as an injunction not to have offensive intentions.

Throughout this essay, it has been proposed that conflict begins when certain representations cease to be recognized as representations. Central among them is the experience of a self separate from an other. When this representation comes to be experienced as reality itself, opposition appears almost inevitably; if this confusion ceases to occur, the way in which we experience what happens also changes.

Let us consider the interpretation that Master Shigeru Egami gave to the words of his teacher Gichin Funakoshi in his book Karatedo for the Specialist:

“If instead of opposing your adversary’s movements you were to move naturally with him, what would happen? You would find that he and you are as one, and when he moves to strike, your body will move naturally to avoid the blow. When you are able to do this, you will discover an entirely different world, a world whose existence you had not known. Being one with the adversary and moving naturally with him, without opposition, there is no point in striking first. The meaning of ‘Karate ni sente nashi’ cannot be understood until this state is attained.”

If we interpret these words from the perspective of the hypothesis developed in this essay, this “state” can be understood as the consequence of ceasing to experience as real the representation of a self separate from an other. As long as this representation is lived as reality itself, opposition is inevitable. Conflict can arise only when its representational character has been forgotten.

Therefore, “there is no first attack in karate” would no longer point solely to a way of behaving, but toward an experience of the world in which the representation of a self separate from another self ceases to be lived as reality itself. From within that experience, a “first attack” ceases to be a real possibility. Not because bodily movements disappear, but because the very notion of “first” belongs to the realm of the representations through which thought organizes experience. It is not part of the facts, but of our interpretation of them.

Where the separation between a self and an other ceases to be experienced as real, the succession through which we speak of a first and a second attack also ceases to be experienced as real.

Separation and succession constitute two fundamental ways in which thought organizes experience. If both cease to be confused with reality, the expression “there is no first attack in karate” ceases to be a moral recommendation and becomes the natural consequence of this way of seeing.

Perhaps this is the depth of Karate ni sente nashi. It does not merely describe the way of acting of someone who has ceased to confuse thought with reality; it also points toward the horizon to which the entire practice of karate is directed. It does not simply say “do not strike first,” but something far more demanding: practice until that phrase ceases to be a rule and becomes a description of your experience of the world.