Joining a ryūha, a classical school of martial arts, is a big step. Fortunately, it is one that often can be taken in several small steps nowadays.

These steps are formalized to a greater or lesser extent in different traditions. In the past it was not unusual for a school to demand a students complete dedication to the art and the teacher when accessing a ryūha. Before putting a step into the dojo the student had to make promises on loyalty and the rules of the ryūha were explained to him.

These were times when these arts were still applied and most vital to its practitioners. New students therefore knew (before even asking to join a ryūha) what was expected of them and that they will walk this path until the end once their access was granted.

Although some schools still have very strict access requirements for participating in the lessons of their art today, there are also those schools that are more consistent with a modern society.

Even though this allows to lower the access threshold to a school today, it does not mean that training in a koryū can be compared to joining a modern football club.*

Joining a ryūha is a serious matter which should not be taken too lightly.

However, there are many schools allowing students to train in a particular part of the curriculum without being obliged to officially joining the ryūha.

There are cases where students have trained for 5 to 7 years in a school, stopped their training and have not gone beyond the level of a regular member of the school.

However, if a student showed persistence for many years and has acquired the substantial technical fundament, in some schools those students are allowed to officially join the ryūha. There are of course schools were this process is less formal and more gradual, but in this article I focus on the official accession.

Nyūmon 入門 literally translates as: entering the gate. Instead of Nyūmon 入門 some schools rather use the term Oku-iri 奥入. The term uses the same character for “entering” 入 but not in combination with “gate” 門 but rather with “inner part” 奥. This entering is often accompanied by a promise, sometimes this promise is signed with blood. This is called “keppan” or “kishomon”.

“A student of a ryūha must be willing to relocate in order to continue training and the head teacher must be prepared to sell his sword (read today: car or house) to support the family of the student if the student is not able to do so.”

Nyūmon 入門 is not a degree or diploma, but rather a confirmation of a previous made commitment. The commitment between (head)teacher and student is one of great responsibilities. In the past these promises were made at the gate before entering because all parties involved knew what the started. Today only a few at the “gate” will realize the commitment they give.

Due to this reason Keppan / Kishomon / Oku-iri / Nyūmon is not entirely free of commentary at the beginning (first 5 years) of training. Within some individual ryūha there is a movement which leads back to a more restrained system for official entry to the ryūha.

If everything goes well a student is able to train all his life in a ryūha. Unfortunately, it also happens that a student, after official entry to the ryūha, behaves inappropriately. In severe cases hamon 破門 will take place.

Loosely translated hamon 破門 means “breaking the gate”. It means that the student is denied access to the training; the name of the student will be removed from the registration of the school and he will be stripped of all ranks and qualifications.

It is important to remember that a ryūha is the personal property of the highest representative and not a democratic organization. Hamon 破門 is a very serious measure which is rarely used.

• It still is common practice to ask for access to a ryūha by writing an introductory letter. Sometimes you will be gained access and sometimes the school will respond by wishing you all the best along the path of martial arts and politely denying you access to the school (own experience).

The text is a personal translation of the excellent article found here: Kochōkai: Nyūmon 入門, hamon 破門. Retrieved Februar 8, 2015 from http://www.kochokai.nl/?p=3751.

by Nick Lowry

To know something you must do it one thousand times,
To “really” know something you must do it ten thousand times
And to completely realize something you must do it one hundred thousand times.
–Traditional budo proverb

As we train and practice seemingly endless repetitions of budo techniques day after day after year after year, as we pour our lives into the container of our chosen art, we inevitably find our actions and our lives being shaped and honed and turned toward an edge that transcends all that we know.
This edge is the product of the repetitive practice called renshu, and it is somewhat disconnected from “knowing,” for mere “knowing” does not even really touch what this process is aiming at—namely, mastery with the whole body and mind.

In our Western educational paradigm, it is easy to get confused here. To mistake knowing for “really knowing,” or worse yet for “complete realization,” and to do so is to stop tragically short and stay stuck in mere mental budo, to become a creature of theory and projection.

Renshu will have none of that—it is the spirit behind the famous old saying “Shut up and Train!” and at its heart is the Zen activity of shaping one’s life through action. Like the sword saint Tesshu’s famous Seigan practices— in which participants vow to train for one thousand consecutive days and have one hundred matches per day. A grueling but efficient pace, for most of us the process is more gentle, we take decades , but either way, hundreds of thousands of repetitions are required. Sweat and blood are owed. The ox must be trained. It is the non-negotiable price of admission to realization.

Renshu demonstrates that knowing with the mind and knowing with the body are two very different activities that have each their own rates of realization. To know something in the sense of understanding its basic shape and form is one thing, to know its logic and purpose, its riai, another (and there always seems to be more riai the deeper you push, the longer it goes). But to realize the essence of an activity, to embody it fully, is altogether another matter. In full realization, the self falls away, understanding falls away, and the energy of the activity itself moves through you without conscious design, without even trying—it gets a little spooky. Here, the mind , the sense of self, is along for the ride here but is only a passenger on the bus. The driver is the principle, the activity itself—the doing. Its as if you are imbued with the spirit of the thing, you become the thing. Not two. Most intimate.

When its over, the self, the mind and its mental wizardry return and it is time to reflect. This is the other turn of training; called keiko, to reflect on things past, which gives us the basis of understanding and ultimately, transmission. In keiko, riai emerges in self evident ways, your sensei’s teaching words ring in your ears, but now you hear them differently—you are caught in the net of learning the whys and the wherefores and here again there is no substitute for deepening, for burnishing our budo knowledge in this way.

Keiko unrolls the matter, reveals the secrets, for renshu alone, though it makes for radical efficiency, is not enough. It is not enough to mindlessly, selflessly, do these actions; we must know why. For budo to flourish and thrive, both internally and externally, waza must be fleshed out with knowledge and principle, or they risk becoming meaningless iteration, mistaken, misapplied, misappropriated; the proverbial hammer that looks for world of nails comes to mind.

Many of us want to jump straight to keiko and bypass the grueling renshu, but the results of such shortcuts tend to be dead and limp expressions of budo. Do not be satisfied with dead words—only live words will transmit the real dharma (the truth). It is in the spirit forging activity of renshu that we make a container, a home for real keiko to take place—and this home is built from our bones and sinews, our muscles, blood and sweat. Real Keiko is knowing and reflection with the whole body not to be confused with dry book learning or learning by rote. Only with both sides of training does the full effect take place and make way for the thunderbolt of insight and the brilliance of Bu.