Eri's Choice · VD5J
Eri's Choice is a design that does not keep strictly to one style; it is Master Takase's own artistic choice.
法剛柔呑吐
hō wa gōjū o donto su
Hard and Soft, Taking In and Giving Out
The method: hard and soft, taking in and giving out, a maxim of the fist from the Okinawan Bubishi.
Master Takase creates this beautiful scroll when your order is placed, personally preparing the ink and brushing your art, which proudly bears her signature and seal. This is an original work of art.
Description
法剛柔呑吐 (hō wa gōjū o donto su) is five characters: 法, a method or principle; 剛柔, hardness and softness; and 呑吐, swallowing and spitting out. Its words are plain, but the line has been read three ways.
Gōjū-ryū karate, by the school's own account, took its name, 剛柔, hard and soft, from this line. The tellings of that naming disagree on the year and the place.
In one printing, the marks that guide a Japanese reading set the line as a subject and two pairs. The pairs are hard and soft, and swallowing and spitting. The school reads it 法は剛柔を呑吐す, good Japanese in which the method takes in and gives out hard and soft.
A third reading is breath. Higaonna Morio's Traditional Karate-do (1985) renders the line The way of inhaling and exhaling is hardness and softness. Patrick McCarthy and Hokama Tetsuhiro give it a direction: softness with breathing in, hardness with breathing out.
Satō Kinbee's book of 1991 argues from the order of the characters that the school's reading would need the line written 法呑吐剛柔. He reads the line as two pairs, and 呑吐 as breath. The romaji on this page is the school's reading, said by the people who, by their own account, took their name from the line.
The third of the eight maxims of the fist (拳之大要八句) in the 武備志, the Chinese boxing manual handed down in Okinawa; the earliest printing read is Funakoshi Gichin's 『琉球拳法 唐手』 of 1922, and the reading 法は剛柔を呑吐す is first found in print in 1968.
We want you to be as happy with the meaning as you are with Master Takase's art. To learn more, visit Philology of 法剛柔呑吐.
Delivery
Your scroll is brushed when you order it and completed within 1 to 3 business days. It ships by USPS Priority Mail from Master Takase's studio in Washington State, boxed and ready to hang, with a printed page giving the art's English, romaji and Japanese.
Sending it as a gift? Add your message at checkout and we will include it.
Shipping is calculated at checkout from your address; within the United States it is $13 to $23. We ship worldwide, and any import charges for your country are shown at checkout before you pay.
Every order is covered by our 30-day money-back guarantee. If your scroll arrives damaged, or we made an error, we replace it or refund you in full, including shipping. Refund policy
About Our Scrolls
Master Japanese Calligrapher Eri Takase brushes your scroll by hand when you order it. Each scroll bears her red seal, 英利, and her signature.
The scrolls are 12 1/4" W × 43" H (31 × 109 cm), with woven damask borders and layered Japanese paper, designed to last generations. The scrolls themselves are made by a scroll maker in Gifu, Japan, and we have worked with them for over two decades.
Eri Takase was born and raised in Osaka, Japan, and holds the rank of Shihan, the highest rank in Japanese calligraphy, from the Bokuteki-kai and the Bunka-shodo. About Master Takase
