KANTOKU (To Perceive Virtue)

 by Phillip Starr

I once read about a well-known instructor of kenjutsu who was introduced to the art of chado (the Way of tea ceremony) by his teacher and wife, who were both avid practitioners of the art. In the traditional Japanese tea ceremony, there is MUCH more involved than simply pouring someone a cup of tea and drinking it. Much. More. Everything, every tiny thing, must be done just so. There are even actual kata that must be mastered...

One day, his teacher was showing him variations on the “temae” (the movements, the kata, of chado). He was explaining the “ kinin kiyotsugu usucha”; the proper term to be used for serving tea to a person of nobility or an aristocrat. The young student asked why he was to learn this; the feudal days of Japan had ended long ago. It was a fair question and his teacher nodded. “Yes, but you can learn to use the sense of “kantoku” that serving tea like this can teach you. And you can use that many times in your life.”

“Kantoku” is a very old-fashioned word in Japan. The young student tried to find it in a half dozen Japanese dictionaries, but to no avail. It means, literally, “to perceive virtue” and if and when it is heard at all nowadays, it's likely in a martial arts school or in another of the “do” forms such as the tea ceremony or ikebana (flower arranging). It has no English equivalent; grace, composure, awareness, and controlled vigor are all components of kantoku.

Its martial origins are to be found in kyujutsu (the feudal art of the bow and arrow). The founder of kyujutsu, Morikawa Kozan, wrote that an archer has two goals. The first is, of course, to hit the target. The second was the development and perfection of kantoku. Nowadays, kyudo (as it is called) is largely a matter of shooting at a fixed target. Mastering the etiquette, poise, mental focus, and kata are of paramount importance. But in the feudals days, training was very severe and shooting from atop a galloping horse (called yabusame) was critical. Today, this can be seen in special demonstrations and it's really quite remarkable.

Of course, the sword overtook the bow as the primary weapon of the samurai. Near the end of the feudal era, archery competitions were often held and this contributed to a decline in the art. Hinatsy Shigetaka wrote in 1716 that archery had devolved from a true martial art into “mere gambling for the sake of amusement.” “If only those conversant in the old ways would show us the etiquette and decorum of former times”, he said. “Nothing more important could be done to restore the true Way of the bow.” What he was decrying was not entirely the loss of kyudo's purely martial applications, but the loss of kantoku.

Kantoku became a component of archery because so many of the art's ceremonies, were conducted before higher-ranking samurai and the aristocracy. It was grace and calmness and energy exercised under the intense stress of performing in front of one's superiors. It vanished when the ceremonies were replaced with sports and other shallow diversions, viewed by audiences unable or unwilling to discriminate the finer points of the art and who were more concerned with the production of a “champion.”

I realize, of course, that contestants in any form of competition (from a sports championship to an audition) are under pressure to perform well. But amongst the spectators watching the performance, how many can appreciate real technique and virtuous behavior as opposed to mere artifice or displays of ego? How many can genuinely appreciate the attributes of kantoku that might be present in a particular performer? It's hard for us to imagine the sort of pressure the lords and masters brought to bear on the samurai in the days of feudalism just as it is difficult to imagine the tension experienced by the practitioner of chado who was engaged in making and serving tea before the nobility. Certainly, there are lessons to be learned from contemplating such things, for within the dynamics of those ancient pressures lay the essence of kantoku. Can we revive it?