守破離 shu ha ri Keep, Break, Leave

守破離 (shu ha ri): keep, break, leave, the stages of training in an art.

守破離 names the stages of training in kendō, the tea ceremony and other arts. In 守, keep, you keep faithfully to the teaching and forms of your teacher and school and make them your own. In 破, break, you weigh what other teachers and schools teach, take in what is good, and develop your mind and skill. In 離, leave, you leave a single school and create something new of your own. Whether it is for a beginner or for a teacher who has come through all three is yours.

A tea text printed in 1905 pairs the three stages with the unskilled, the skilled and the master, each not in the ordinary sense. In that text one breaks while keeping. The master, having exhausted the matter, leaves and keeps. A manual of the martial arts printed in 1895 sets out the three stages and then says one is to return to the origin.

A verse printed in 1903, closing the hundred poems of tea under Rikyū's name, reads: The rule and the manner: keep them to the end, and though you break them, though you leave them, do not forget the root. In English the word is written shuhari or shu-ha-ri. A karate manual of 1985 rendered the three stages Obedience, divergence, transcendence. In the 1905 tea text the third stage, 離, leaves and still keeps.

On the known record the word is first written in articles that the tea master Kawakami Fuhaku added, probably in Edo between 1750 and 1773, to a record of his teacher Joshinsai's sayings, and those articles say it was borrowed from military science; no text of military science is known to carry it.

We want you to be as happy with the meaning as you are with Master Takase's art. To learn more, visit Philology of 守破離.

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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