Iain Abernethy - The Practical Application Of Karate

In this podcast we will be examining Anko Itosu’s 10 precepts of karate! In 1908, Itosu – who was the creator of the Pinan (Heian) kata – wrote a letter outlining his views on karate and explaining why he felt karate should be introduced on to the Okinawan school system. It is this letter, and the 10 precepts recorded within it, that is the subject of this month’s podcast. There are many English translations of this important document; but unfortunately they vary quite a bit and in some instances express very different sentiments. There is a 1938 book called ’Karate-Do Taikan’ which contains relatively good quality photographs of Itosu’s 1908 letter. To get the translation discussed in the podcast, I scanned the pictures of the original Itosu document from the book and sent those scans, without any background information, to one of the UK’s leading translation companies. As non-karateka and professional translators I felt that they would be able to give an accurate translation. The translation company infor