1909 was the year of Gogen Yamaguchi's birth, Kyushu in Japan the place.  He was one of ten children.  He writes that his father sold miscellaneous goods, and later opened up a private school, so it seems as if there was no recent tradition of martial arts in the family.  However, from an early age Yamaguchi was fascinated by judo, kendo, and the other martial arts.

In his second year of primary school, he began learning Jigen-ryu Kenjutsu (a famous school of Japanese fencing).  Later he met a Mr. Maruta, a carpenter from Okinawa, who taught him the basics of karate.  Young Yamaguchi practiced fencing during the day, and karate at night.  His only interest was in getting stronger and stronger, and he was well pleased with the results of his karate training: "I found my physical condition entirely changed after a few years of karate training.  My legs and loins became stronger and my muscles and bones were greatly developed.  Above all, I found myself ready to defend and counterattack at any instant."

After finishing school, he went on to Ritsumeikan University in Kyoto, which in the 20's and 30's was more or less a college for training administrators for Japan's "conquered territories."  Evidently, Yamaguchi had previously been expelled from Kansai University because of "roughness."

In Kyoto, he began teaching karate in his spare time and later, in 1930, (age 21) opened a karate club at Ritsumeikan University.  Judging from his book, trouble seemed to follow Yamaguchi around in those days.  He and his karate group had various physical confrontations with other martial artists, and gangs of toughs.  When "leftist" groups started causing trouble at the University, Yamaguchi and his friends drove them off the Campus.  "I was rough and thoughtless," he remembers of these times.

In 1928 Chojun Miyagi had visited Japan to teach his style of karate, the Goju style.  (He had taught in the Judo Club of Kyoto University).  He came back to teach in Japan on other occasions, and in 1931, Gogen Yamaguchi was introduced to him.  In his autobiography, Yamaguchi puts these words into Chojun Miyagi's mouth: Ô"Mister Yamaguchi, you are well qualified to be the successor of Goju school karate.  I have nothing more to teach you."  Thereby, we are led to believe, Yamaguchi was designated as Miyagi's successor in Goju ryu.

Whether Miyagi ever said this is something we can hardly prove or disprove.  However, it irritates some of the Goju men on Okinawa to hear Yamaguchi described as Chojun Miyagi's karate successor, since Miyagi was never in Japan for periods of longer than two or three months.  By far the larger part of his teaching was carried out in his native Okinawa.  In view of this it may be doubted whether Yamaguchi ever learned the whole of the Goju system from Miyagi; and it may well be, as some say, that he picked up the complete range of Goju kata later from students of Miyagi such as Meitoku Yagi.

When Yamaguchi first began teaching karate, his training was regarded as pretty wild.  Some of the other schools thought it was like "street fighting," and according to his son, Gosei Yamaguchi, he (Gogen) more or less "invented his own way of working out"  Gogen Yamaguchi also claims the credit for inventing karate free-sparring, so maybe this has something to do with it.  The senior karate masters of the time emphasised kata training and were not very enthusiastic about free-style kumite.  But anyway, whatever his early methods, it is a fact that the development of Goju in Japan was the work of this man, Gogen Yamaguchi.

When Yamaguchi realised his position as the senior Japanese student of Goju-ryu, he began to take the responsibility seriously.  When he could, he would go up to Mount Kuruma for austere training.  He became acquainted with a group of Shintoists who were engaged in spiritual training, and was able to learn several things from them.  He began to fast.  He sat up in meditation through the night, and stood under a waterfall in sanchin stance to try and unify his mind and body.  "I was surprised to learn," he writes, "that this (ascetic training) greatly influenced my karate.  I found I was able to move without thinking in a natural and mysterious way while I practiced.  Moreover, I attained a perception and could quickly see things before they occurred.  I could anticipate what was going to happen."

The 1930s were an ominous time for the whole world.  In the East, Japan was on an expansionist course which was to lead to Pearl Harbour, and World War II.  In 1931, the Manchurian Incident occurred.  Following this, Japan seized Manchuria and in 1932 established the Republic of Manchu-kuo, actually a slave state of Japan.  Concerning the Manchurian Incident, Yamaguchi writes only that Kanto (Kwantung) troops destroyed anti-Japanese troops led by General Cho Gaku-ryo.

Actually, the Manchurian Incident occurred when Japanese troops of the Kwantung Army faked an attack upon themselves, and used this as a pretext to seize Manchuria.  The plan was the brainchild Col. Kanji Ishihara (1889-1949) a "military genius" who spent two years planning the strategy to its last detail.

Ishihara, a follower of the Nichiren sect of Buddhism, was an idealist who foresaw harmonious unification of Asia (Japan, Manchuria and China), under the spiritual leadership of Japan.  His idea was to make Manchuria "a paradise." Gogen Yamaguchi was a friend and devoted follower of General Ishihara and shared his ideals.  "We wanted to make Manchuria the Heavenly Land, where Japanese, Chinese, Mongolians and Koreans could live together in peace and prosperity.  This idea was created by General Kanji Ishihara. He had my friend since I became a student and I supported his viewpoint together with about 200 disciples.

In the event, Ishihara's views were overridden Manchuria was oppressed and ruthlessly exploited.  For the native population, Manchu-kuo was anything but a heavenly land.

In 1938, Gogen Yamaguchi was asked by General Ishihara to go to Manchu-kuo to take up Governmental duties.  Being a patriot (with a capital P) he went, and served there until 1945.  In his book Yamaguchi is not very specific about what his duties entailed, but he comes over as something like a mixture of administrator, trouble-shooter, spymaster and undercover agent.  Throughout his time Manchuria he continued to train in karate, which just as well, since it pulled him out of tight scrapes several times.

Once, he was patrolling, by himself, the around the bridge over the Nonjan river Since the bridge was of great strategic importance, it was a prime target for "Communist Spies.  " So Yamaguchi would disguise himself as a Manchurian and keep a look-out for suspicious characters.  One evening he came across two men acting strangely, and when he began to ask them questions, they must have decided to take him out of there.  One of the men went for a gun but Yamaguchi kicked it out of his hand and then dropped him with a punch.  The other took out a knife, but with a shuto (sword-hand) strike, Yamaguchi disarmed him.  Another time, three guerillas attempted to capture him, but he knocked them all down and took them prisoner.

These were commonplace tight scrapes for Gogen Yamaguchi, but twice in Manchuria (he says) he was forced to exert himself to the utmost.

The first occasion was when he had a fight with one Ryu Kaku Rei (Japanese pronunciation), a master of Chinese boxing.  Yamaguchi had heard of Ryu Kaku Rei from one of his agents and, out of curiosity, went to look him up.  But he probably wasn't expecting much.  In 1940 Yamaguchi had led a group of martial artists, titled "The East Asia Martial Arts Mission" to give exhibitions in Japan.  Included in the group were some experts in Chinese boxing, but they didn't impress Yamaguchi.  When he took them to Ritsumeikan University to watch the karate training, he suggested that they join in, but they wanted nothing to do with it.

Anyway, Yamaguchi introduced himself to Ryu, and the two men cordially agreed to a contest.  Ryu Kaku Rei had developed his own style of ch'uan "Dragon Style."  He was aged about 67 (compared to Yamaguchi who would have been in his early 30s) and looked thin and weedy.  But Yamaguchi found out that Ryu could fight, because the best he (Yamaguchi) got was a draw.  Yamaguchi's account of the fight is somewhat melodramatic--he calls it a draw because the fight ends in a double knockdown--but obviously the older man impressed him and pushed him to his limit.

In May 1945, shortly before the end of the war, reports came in that a big attack was planned by Communists on the town where Yamaguchi was posted.  The Japanese command dismissed the reports, but Yamaguchi waited nervously.  Finally, "one thousand Communist bandits" launched their attack, and a pitched battle ensued.   Below, Yamaguchi gives this exciting account in his book:

"l looked at Mr. Suzuki. " Well, it's still uncertain' I said.  Just then we heard the sound of guns and battle cries near the castle gate.  'Here they come! Take everyone upstairs.  I'll defend down here.'

"My men followed my order as I took two revolvers and hid myself downstairs.  I heard cries everywhere as many bandits invaded the city and attacked in full force, killing many of the inhabitants.  Citizens were running and bullets were flying everywhere as the city was thrown into utter confusion.

"Bandits on horses stopped in front of our office.  I took cover as I fired my revolvers through the window, until both guns were empty.  Twenty bandits with guns and Chinese swords rushed our defense.  Five or six bandits broke the door down with the butts of their guns and rushed into the room.

"With my guns empty, I resorted to Goju school of karate for my defense.  I adjusted myself with breathing and was ready to fight.

"The room was dark and the bandits could not use their guns freely without possible injury to each other.  I had trained myself to see in this amount of light and knew I would be able to withstand the onslaught of four or five people at a time.  Under such a situation, I had to dispatch the enemy, one by one.

"I avoided the first bandit who tried to strike me with his gun, and turning quickly to the right, struck him between the thighs with a roundhouse kick.  He cried and fell to the ground.  Another fired his gun at me from behind, but he missed.  My elbow found the pit of his stomach with great force.  A bloody Chinese sword slashed at me as I struck, with my right fist, the man who was wielding this sword.  The fighting was confused but the narrow room was to my advantage.  They rushed at me in the close quarters, which made it easy for me to fight them.  When they drew near, I knocked them out using nukite (finger strikes), hijiate (elbows), shuto (sword hand) and seiken (fists), against the guns, I used tobi-geri (jumping kicks) and yoko-geri (side kick). I was able to fight more freely than in practice because I did not have any regard for my opponent's welfare.

"Some of the bandits started up the stairs but were shot by my men who were protecting the women and children.

"I attacked the bandits, aiming at their eyes or between their thighs, moving quickly as I fought.  Fighting hard, I hoped we could last until help arrived.

"Soon there were cries at the front door and the bandits started to scatter.  It appeared that they had been ordered to retreat.

"My men came down the stairs, asking if I was injured. Luckily, only my left arm had been injured by the slash of a dagger.  I went upstairs to obtain a better view and observed the bandits fallen back with stolen weapons, gun powder and supplies.  It was now 7 o'clock in the morning.

". . . When I discovered the bandits had gone, I suddenly lost all my strength and had to sit down.  I had fought with them, hand to hand, for forty minutes."

"In 1945, even though Russia's war with Japan didn't last three weeks, great numbers of Japanese war prisoners were raked in for urgent construction projects in Siberia and central Asia".  At the end of the war, Russian troops moved into Manchuria.  Thousands of Japanese were taken prisoner, Gogen Yamaguchi being one.  After spending several months in a prisoner of war camp, he was moved to a labour camp in Mongolia where he spent two years, and there can be no doubt about it: it was grim.

Solzhenitsyn and others have told us all about life in the Russian labour camps and the regime Yamaguchi mentions is familiar--the interminable roll calls, the terrible rations, and the reduction of rations if work norms were not filled, the "Prayer at Dawn", etc. etc.  Thousands of Japanese died in these camps.

In 1947, Gogen Yamaguchi was released from captivity and repatriated.  On November 18th, 1947, he saw the coastline of his beloved Japan, and by December, he was back in Tokyo.  He was profoundly shocked by the state of post-war Japan, and not so much by the physical destruction, as by what he saw as its drastic spiritual decline.  It was too much for him to bear.  Accordingly, he wrote his will, and at midnight on January 12th, 1948, walked to the Togo shrine at Harajuku.  Because he had made up his mind.  He was going to commit harakiri (ritual suicide by disembowelment).
Reaching the shrine, Yamaguchi sat beside a quiet pond with his dagger laid before him, and offered a prayer.  He fell into a deep introspection, and then, like a bolt from the blue he experienced "a divine revelation" that changed his life.

". . . In the course of time I lost all feeling and had a sense of walking amidst the clouds, floating in the sky with no existence of my own.  Such feelings are beyond my ability to describe.  All past troubles were forgotten and I felt as if my soul was floating in a world of glory and peace.

"Then I found myself stretched out face down on the floor.  How long I had been there I didn't know.  Coming to my senses I found everything appeared to be shining brightly as if the whole world was living in happiness.  Never will I forget my mental state at that moment."

When Yamaguchi had this mystical experience a realization crystallized in his mind: that to commit suicide would be a waste of his life, and besides, that he had responsibilities, to his family and to Japan.  He realised that his mission in life was to teach and spread the martial arts, to teach the youth of Japan, (as one writer put it) "the flavour of combat - or simply of life."  Accordingly, in 1948 he opened his first dojo, and in May 1950 established the All Japan Karate-do Goju-kai.

Another effect of his divine revelation was to turn Yamaguchi's mind once more to religion and mysticism  (I would guess that it was from this time, too, that he began to grow his hair long).  He visited the Reverend Tadaki Yoshimura, the Chief Reverend of the Shin-shu sect of Shinto, and before long became a master of Shinto himself.  He also studied yoga under Tengai Noda, "Japan's Highest Authority" on the art.

In due course, Yamaguchi formulated his own system of "Goju Shinto," a combination of Goju style karate, yoga and shinto, with some zen included too.  We should note, however, that this is more a personal thing with Gogen Yamaguchi, and the yoga and shinto aspect does not affect the vast majority of Goju kai practitioners; they practice their karate just as other karatemen do.

The Nippon Goju kai (Japan Goju Association) teaches an orthodox Goju style, but there are certain differences vis-a-vis the Okinawan Goju.  These are differences of emphasis rather than anything else the same kata are used but there are occasional minor variations in stances, for example.  The Goju kai is a somewhat "lighter'" style, too, and does not make extensive use of the chashi, chishi and other supplementary conditioning equipment.  Also, like other Japanese karate styles Goju kai makes more use of kicks, and has placed more emphasis on free style sparring as a training method.  As we noted earlier, the free sparring is a bit closer than in some other Japanese styles. Instructors like to see students use Goju techniques, such as the distinctive open hand blocks, and keep the techniques flowing. Another feature is the high use of groin kicks, the kick is made with the instep and in sparring it is directed to the inside thigh.

In the early 1970s Gogen Yamaguchi founded his "Japan Karate-do College," located in Tokyo's Suginami suburb.  (His previous dojo at Nippori was destroyed by fire).

It is a 3-story ferro-concrete construction, which Yamaguchi had built onto his house.  The ground floor contains a karate dojo; the first floor, a yoga-shinto centre; and the second floor a dormitory containing about a dozen beds.

This is Gogen Yamaguchi's Goju kai HQ, although classes in other styles are also taught, to give students of the college a well-rounded karate education.  Gogen Yamaguchi himself no longer teaches, (he is 73 years old at time of writing); instruction is mainly in the hands of his son, Goshi.

Yamaguchi has two other sons; Gosei, who has taught Goju kai in San Francisco since the sixties, and Gosen, who occasionally trains at the Karate-do College.  According to an article by Brian Waites in "Fighting Arts" magazine,  recently the Goju kai has begun to stress tournament work much more.  In previous years they were not overly concerned with this aspect and consequently did not have a great deal of success in open tournaments.

Just a few words about Yamaguchi's daughter, Gokyoku, (formerly Wakako).  She too teaches at the Karate-do College, and is Japan's premier woman in karate kata.  She prefers kihon and kata because she realizes that women are at a definite disadvantage in kumite--men are just physically stronger.  But Gokyoku Yamaguchi is an excellent technician and apart from that she is very good looking, intelligent, charming and very feminine.  She is a fine calligrapher and recently married her calligraphy teacher.

As you can tell from the above writing, Yamaguchi Sensei was a unique individual and walked to the beat of his own drum.  The information provided above is for historical purposes and not all is necessarily the beliefs of this school.  However, we cannot take away the fact that Yamaguchi has played a key and pivotal role in formation and foundation of Goju Ryu karate.

Sensei Mallin was graded to Shodan by Yamaguchi Sensei in 1955.  As stated above Sensei Mallin recalls the training being "wild" and Yamaguchi Sensei being the meanest little guy that he had ever come into contact with...he loved to kumite.  Because of his size, Yamaguchi nicknamed Mallin Sensei "Omoi-san" meaning heavy or big man.  Gogen Yamaguchi passed away of natural causes on May 20, 1989  at the age of 80.

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