What is Rakushinkan?

Budo as “Onko Chishin” — Inheriting and Bringing Forth
At Rakushinkan, training is rooted in onko chishin — “to seek the old and understand the new.”
Daitō-ryū Aiki-jūjutsu contains body movements grounded in real combat and profound principles that are deeply tied to kenjutsu. In particular, within the lineage of Yamamoto Kakuyoshi, who lived with and trained under Takeda Sōkaku, the living sense of true aiki — unbound by fixed kata — remains vividly preserved even today.

However, the techniques of the old schools are often highly intricate, and at times painful. As they are, they can be difficult to pass on safely to children and those new to martial arts.

That is why, at Rakushinkan, we integrate the wisdom and body principles of the old schools into the framework of Aikidō. We restructure training methods so that anyone can engage safely, while still touching the essence of the art.

Breath, posture, the body’s centre:
By emphasizing such fundamentals, training is not about merely imitating movements.
Rather, it is about directly experiencing and learning: “Why does balance break?” “Why does a technique succeed?”

What we practice is not preserving old techniques as rigid forms.
Instead, we re-examine the essence within the old schools, and transmit it in ways that modern people can readily understand and apply.

This is onko chishin itself — the very way of learning budō that Rakushinkan holds most dear.

Budō as a Way

The true purpose of practicing budō is to cultivate a compassionate heart and supple body.

Techniques are no more than tools. If guided by mistaken thought, they become nothing more than violence.

Through Aikidō — where there is no winning or losing, no comparison with others — we reflect on the path by which we live our own lives.