Mutokai School of Traditional Japanese Sword Arts

It was done under the guidance and advice of his teacher Tsumura Keiji Sensei of Tokyo. The name translates as the "sword of nothingness" or the "empty sword". In the Mutokai we practice two distinct forms of iaido. All members train in the forms and traditions of the Musoshinden sect. As the master of Musoshinden-ryu died without naming a successor there are no longer any dan rankings (black belt

s) issued in the style with a validity beyond the club level. Ranking is given according to the old style of awarding den. There are three levels: shoden, chuden and okuden. In the Mutokai we have members training at all three levels. We also train in the modern forms generated by the All Japan Kendo Federation. Kendo is a competitive, sports oriented adaptation of the traditional schools of ken-jutsu. Practitioners wear padding and use split bamboo sticks to prevent injury to the opponent when striking. This has led to techniques suited to speed of hitting rather than power in cutting. The All Japan Kendo Federation iaido forms were developed to remind kendo practitioners of what the real katana was all about, It was also an attempt to standardize iai testing in the Kendo Federation so that people with backgrounds in any of the traditional iai schools could test for nationally recognized rank.