正射必中 seisha hitchū The Correct Shot Surely Hits

正射必中 (seisha hitchū): shoot by the correct method and the arrow surely hits, a maxim of kyūdō, Japanese archery.

正射必中 is a maxim of kyūdō: an arrow shot by the correct method will surely hit. The All Nippon Kyudo Federation gives the phrase that meaning. The phrase also appears in the titles of business magazines. Whether it is for the archery hall or for a working life is yours.

A former pupil remembered a teacher who taught the maxim with its converse: a hit is not necessarily a correct shot. The kyūdō federation's manual of 1978 makes the same point. What is generally called a hit, it says, is possible without correct shooting. Before the shot, the maxim says where to look: at the form rather than the target.

A manual on holding the brush asks whether the art of writing is not akin to archery. It goes on to give a calligrapher's saying: the mind correct, the brush correct. The Edo lord 松浦静山 copied the passage into his talks on the sword. In English the maxim has been rendered true shooting, certain hitting, and written seishahichu and seisha hicchū.

A Japanese kyūdō maxim of the twentieth century, in the National Diet Library's full text from 1942 (正射正中, the other written form, from 1936), naming the teaching that the archery master 本多利実 (1836–1917) put in his own words and that the Record of Rites and 揚雄's 法言 state in Chinese.

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

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The scrolls are 12 1/4" W × 43" H (31 × 109 cm) with real silk borders and Japanese paper that are layered so the scroll hangs straight and will not warp over time. The scrolls themselves are made by Sankō (株式会社三幸) in Gifu prefecture, which has been making high quality scrolls since 1947, and we have worked with Sankō 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