There are very few "REAL" 9th or 10th Dans..

[howard]

There are Only a "Few" Real 9th & 10th Dans

...I can think of one "very irresponsible group" that has 100 "plus"
10th dans...

bruce, would you mind sharing the name of this organization?

thanks, howard

[Webmaster]

Howard, per our rules, we do not bash other organizations. Mr. Bethers is simply following our stated rules by not naming the organization.

[Tony Dismukes]

I think you waste your energy if you worry about what rank anyone has. The whole concept of belt ranking is a relatively recent one anyway from an historical viewpoint. I think it's only spread to so many martial arts due to marketing.

I've had my butt kicked by white belts and by high-ranking black belts. I've kicked the butt of white belts and high-ranking black belts. I've learned useful things from individuals with high rank, and from folks with no rank. What counts is the knowledge, ability and experience, not the rank.

You could make the argument that a consistent set of standards for ranking would enable newcomers to know who had what level of experience and ability. However, I don't believe that such consistent standards have ever truly existed. The same exact level of experience and ability may be represented by 5 different belt ranks at 5 different schools. That doesn't make any of the schools better or worse than the others. It just means that they're using the ranks to signify different things. Also, note that a rank may be given out for fighting ability, or demonstration ability, or teaching ability, or service to an organization, or theoretical knowledge, or time spent depending on the school.

If you meet someone who's trained hard in his martial art for 8 years, he might have something useful you can learn. With that much time in training, if he's a karateka, he might be 2nd dan. If he studies brazilian jujutsu, he might be a brown belt. If he's an egomaniac who's started his own system, he might be a self-promoted 15th dan grandmaster. Either way, it doesn't affect what he has to offer. I find it best not to worry about the rank, because it might influence me towards inaccurate preconceptions.

[Lord_Yong]

Well, your post is definitely very opinionated and biased, but why don't you compare your feelings about 9th and 10th dans to other areas of real life and draw some parallels? Who would make a college degree that was possible to obtain, but you had to be 70 years old to achieve? Even a Doctorate only takes 8 years of med school to obtain, and those people do all forms of surgery to save lives, yet to you, a 10th dan should require a person to be 70 years of age. What other accomplishment can you think of that REQUIRES that kind of age, and at that point in life, what are they really going to do with a 10th degree black belt? My opinion is that this is more "traditional" hogwash. I agree that some time should be spent, but if a person begins martial arts in their teens, I think 50 years of age is definitely very reasonable for a 10th degree black belt, and even then they would have spent four or five times the amount of time it takes a doctor to earn their degree. Lou Angel (who is also, not 70 but holds a 10th dan) once told me that the days of being 70 years old to achieve 10th dan went out with the horse and buggy. He said you put the power in the hands of the people that are young enough, and wise enough to use it.

If people are so uptight about the use of high degrees of black, they should cut them out altogether. If those ranks are going to require that kind of age to obtain, then they are quite useless (in my opinion.)

Maybe you really felt like you were exposing frauds or something, I don't know, but it really makes people look uptight and conceited when they make broad, sweeping proclamations like this. Bottom line, yeah there are people out there selling certificates and everything else, but if a guy is 50 years old, and has 30 years in martial arts, it's a little hard to say he's a total fraud simply because in your system, you feel that isn't proper. Try to keep in mind that if there were one best style or way, everyone would be following it, and remember to respect others who are working hard as well, even if they don't agree with your methods.

Steve Fowler

There are Only a "Few" Real 9th & 10th Dans

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

These days, martial art rank has become almost a "Bad Joke" for some...

In the Serious, Tradtional & Responsible Organizations, one is not even considered for 10th Dan until he or she is at least 70 years of age and has really made "Original Contributions" to their martial art and has been a "World Leader" helping to further their martial art at the International Level..

Yet with a simple search of the internet you will find "hundreds" of wanna-be "10th dans, sokes & phds, many 30 - 50 years old. Unfortunately, these persons are very confused about what martial art rank is supposed to represent. I can think of one "very irresponsible group" that has 100 "plus"
10th dans...

This is all a "Very Bad Joke" on the Martial arts Community. It's no wonder that the general public is so confused about the topic.

[Tony Dismukes]

"He said you put the power in the hands of the people that are young enough, and wise enough to use it."

What sort of power, exactly, do you think comes with a 10th dan?

"If those ranks are going to require that kind of age to obtain, then they are quite useless (in my opinion.)"

Making them pretty much like all the other ranks.

[DragonMind]

Steve makes a good point about comparing to other fields, but medicine is, IMHO, the wrong analogy. Getting your MD is the entry point to the field, not something you rise to. Better would be looking at fellowships, but most people are not familiar with those. Instead, let's take academic ranks. In the college world there are ranks for teaching ranging from Lecturer to Instructor to Assistant to Associate to Professor. These are achieved by longevity and advanced study and degrees. Someone can earn their Ph.D. in their twenties and get hired as an assistant professor. It will take 10-20 years (depending on the field and the contributions the person makes to the field) to achieve full Professor. That would be roughly equivalent to our Master ranks. There is one more rank in the academic world, however, that is usually not achieved until well past your prime: Professor Emeritus. That title is usually only given after a long career. In fact, it is often not given until retirement. I think 10th Dan falls in this category in many people's eyes. It is not a rank of physical skill, but one of recognition for a long and productive involvement in the art. I see the difference here (and it's the same argument with the title of Grandmaster) as being the 10th Dan as recognition for long time involvement vs. another step in a progressive ladder. Both can be correct but they are not interchangeable.

[Lee82mark4]

I'm from the school of "Youth is wasted on the Young." If you think on it, high dan grading, or, in fact, all grading is honorary. What good would a 10-dan on a person of fifty yr. do? To throw it back in your face a bit, what possible meaning does a 4-dan have that a 3-dan does not have, or, in fact, a 5-dan? Insofar as the Kodokan Judo Institute is concerned, not much as most students up to 4-dan or 5-dan are Judo shugyosha while a 6-dan may, not always, buy may be called judoka, implying expertise. But it isn't only expertise recognized. In Vince Tamura's case, I have the feeling the USJF doesn't want to wait until two months before his death as the did with Kenneth Kuniyuki, who was 92. The funny thing is that there was a question of Kuniyuki Sensei, one of my seniors coming up, not having "time in grade" as 6-dan. Roy Moore, Jr., son of "Pops" Moore, received his 6-dan last year at the age of 82. He is now 83. This for a guy whose father knew such men as Jigoro Kano, Sumiyuki Otani and the author of "Canon of Judo" Kyuzo Mifune. "Pops" Jr, even played with these men when a toddler. So should he be 8-dan by now? Probably, but after four decades in Kodokan Judo myself, I've figured out the games and how the end and how they don't.

In most systems using the dan-I system, 10-dan implies perfection, nothing more. But most consider this an impossiblity, as in the past several of the few 10-dan were given posthumously. This implies an imperfect life but perfection in death. The judoka has crossed the last line of imperfection. He was perfect, but also dead. He still did achieve 10-dan, eg, Yoshitsugu Yamashita. It is simply a shame human beings can rarely be called perfect, and is probably always wrong. When Kenneth Kuniyuki-Sensei was graded to 9-dan at the Kodokan and the USJF, he was only the second person in the US to achieve a grade so high (and know, the other was not Phil Porter). Since, Keiko Fukuda, herself 91, has also been graded to kyudan. She was an early and direct student of Kano-Sensei and the only woman to be graded that highly anywhere, ever. The Kodokan has announced, again, that no more 10-dan are to be given, but then they also said that right before making Sumiyuki Otani 10-dan, who passed away in the early 1990s. So who knows. BTW: Wally Jay isn't really interested in all this. In a story told to me by Bernie Lau, when Bernie and Neil Yamamoto, as Lau's uke, made the cover of Black Belt Magazine, Bernie received an email from Wally. "Hey Brah. How come you make the covah? I never make the covah." Well, I thought it was funny."
********

At any rate, as Jigoro Kano converted to the dan-i system, one he, himself started by awarding beginning students shodan densho, with two kyoju dairi or equivalent in Kito Ryu (or Jikishin ryu, the old school of Kito) and tenshin shin'yo ryu, with a lot of experience in yoshin ryu, his words as to why or for what purpose are probably the ones to examine. But please, do your own research.

Originally posted by Bruce Bethers
...I can think of one "very irresponsible group" that has 100 "plus"
10th dans...

Just one more comment. I think, instead noting a group as being irresponsible, and not naming said group, perhaps a decaffeinated statement of "The So and So Association has over 100 10-dan," is better said. Most of us know which group it is, so is it impossible to have decent, perhaps a little heated, conversation that includes this group with all the others which cannot be named?

It sure puts a damper on my ability to light a fire. Of course, I would never do that. I have all ready been there, done that, said a lot, and flamed most. And I was punished by having to be a moderator on another site some years ago. However, I am not here.

Robert reading my post waiting for me to say something out of line...

[Ellis Amdur]

The dan system is its own can of worms - and one achieves rank for one's significance, history and role in the organization, as much as anything else (a young competitive 3rd dan in judo can beat the 8th dans who are old, out of shape, albeit knowlegeable). The menkyo system for old martial arts is different. Contrary to the claims of many, the idea that there was one soke/menkyo kaiden in the old ryu is not necessarily true. (Although this is the way most of the "living treasures" are maintained now). The majority of ryu permitted multiple menkyo kaiden, each of whom had a teaching license. In many traditions, there was no central authority - with menkyo kaiden, one was permitted to go off on one's own and teach. I read one compendium of menkyo kaiden in the Meiji period, and the average length of study was 5-7 years. (A quite full 5-7 years - not training one-twice a week for a few hours). Meiji was an interesting time - lots of wars, lots of civil disorder. The ryu were still considered living rather than antiques. One could actually guage how peaceful or full of conflict Japanese society was by the length it took to get menkyo. (Now it can take 20-30-40 years in many schools - indicative of societal issues as much as anything else).

A menkyo kaiden was, as one of my teachers put it, a license no different from a driving license - you were suitable to go on the road and make your own way. Another way to think of it was that it was "basic training." This idea that one was a "master," in some kind of superhuman way, is comic book - all you "mastered" was the curriculum of the ryu, and it was assumed, you would continue to improve by testing it, using it, teaching it - there was nothing much more that one's teach could offer except, perhaps nuance.

Best

[Cliff Hargrave]

That was a great post, thanks for the information. I never really understood what menkyo kaiden was.