The History
Rinkiohen-Do began in the 1970's as a training group that was made up of skilled instructors of various disciplines of martial arts. This group was in Puerto Rico, known as the Okinawa of the Caribbean for its varied population of martial artists, in particular the large presence of Karate. The focus of this group was to share training methods and to compare stylistic differences and similarities. The group would hold regular matches of full contact fighting to push each member to work on developing practical skill sets over stylistic expressions of their art.
Over time the group had realized that there was a core set of principles that were common to every martial art. They realized that the ones within the group who had greater success during their fighting matches were the ones who had a better grasp of how to use these principles. The ones who struggled the most were the ones who were not taught about these principles directly, and so were less aware of how to use them.
Over time the group had realized that there was a core set of principles that were common to every martial art. They realized that the ones within the group who had greater success during their fighting matches were the ones who had a better grasp of how to use these principles. The ones who struggled the most were the ones who were not taught about these principles directly, and so were less aware of how to use them.
As a result the focus of the group shifted from the individual styles, or even the collaborative efforts between styles. Instead they began to focus on the principles they had recognized as being fundamental to any style. These principles included the mastery of balance, distance, timing, perception and others. They learned by manipulating these principles they were able to make great improvements in the skill and ability of each member.
Among the members of the group was Edwin Rodriguez, whose primary style was Mas Oyama's Kyokushinkai Karate. Through his passion and dedication to the training he was chosen as the leader of the group. They continued to develop their own training curriculum with the guidance of Edwin Rodriguez and formed what would later become the testing structure they felt to be most successful in producing results repeatedly in others. Moving to the United States with his family, Edwin raised his is only son, Kerwin Rodriguez, teaching and training him in the martial arts methods distilled by the efforts of the training group he headed while in Puerto Rico. |
The DevelopmentGrowing up under the guidance of his father, Kerwin inherited the passion for the martial arts. Reading whatever he could find about the life and lessons of the martial arts masters of the past, Kerwin began to see that in addition to the common principles of combat, there were also common principles of philosophy and spiritual development. He also recognized that the legends of the martial arts all stressed the importance of spiritual development as being vital to the development of true mastery. This realization directed Kerwin towards internal development along side his physical practices. He began to study and practice esoteric traditions including Yoga, Mikkyo, Taoist Alchemy and others.
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After many years of study and practice in both martial arts and esoteric traditions, Kerwin found that the esoteric principles actually contained all the principles he had learned in the martial arts. This prompted Kerwin to merge and arrange the principles together in a way that they work together systematically and presented his father with the name Rinkiohen-Do as the name that he thought would best identify the spirit of the art. With his fathers approval, the curriculum and ranking structure was rearranged to reflect the philosophy appropriately.