Archers aim at spiritual target
Center teaches ancient Zen art to eager students
By Matthew Walberg
Tribune staff reporter
Published November 11, 2001
In the practice of Zen archery, called kyudo, it takes about five minutes to go through the cycle of shooting and retrieving an arrow.
Each movement is infused with the contemplation of one's mind and heart and the clearing away of distraction. Every step is part of a meditative process.
The archer fits the shaft to the bowstring, takes the proper stance, steadies mind and muscle. The bow is held aloft, then lowered slowly, like a falling leaf, as it is drawn. The archer pauses to focus before loosing the arrow toward the target with a shout.
"Kyudo is like mindfulness practice in action, and it's often referred to as polishing the mind or polishing the heart," said Peter McLaughlin, former director of the Shambala Meditation Center of Chicago. "I don't really regard it as a martial art. I've always referred to it as standing meditation."
McLaughlin is a student at Fuko Kyudojo, 3117 W. Montrose Ave., where instructor Tina Carter teaches about 20 students, most of them on Saturday mornings.
Open since May in a storefront space that doubles as Carter's office and art studio, the facility is the only kyudojo in the city to date, although occasional classes are taught at local colleges or meditation centers.
On a recent Saturday morning, incense burned on a small altar along the wall as students in stocking feet padded around. The sound of Carter's quiet instruction or encouragement was punctuated by the regular shout of "ee-ah!" as an archer released the bowstring and the "thwap" of the arrow as it pierced a straw target.
`It's about calming myself'
The participants come from widely divergent religious backgrounds. Carter was raised a Jehovah's Witness but has been a Tibetan Buddhist for more than a decade. Two students are Jewish. Several were raised Catholic.
Martha Fourt, 46, said she and her partner, Patricia Benjamin, 54, took up kyudo several months ago.
"I've been enjoying it more than I thought I would. It calms me down," Fourt said. "Basically, I try to let go of the busyness in my mind--it's about calming myself."
Another student, Jim Nudo, 47, is an attorney who holds black belts in karate and kendo, or Japanese fencing. He has wanted to study kyudo ever since he read Eugen Herrigel's "Zen in the Art of Archery" in the 1970s.
"I like that you're just doing it for yourself, and you're doing it to improve yourself," he said. "When I do this, I tend to be aware of myself and all that's around me."
Fourt said the spiritual principles of kyudo do not interfere with her religious beliefs. "I don't think that anything we learn here has any conflict with Judaism, which has its own meditative aspect," she said.
There are a number of branches of kyudo. Some emphasize competition; others, such as the Heki Ryu Bishu Chikurin-ha branch that Carter teaches, stress spiritual development.
Pointing in new directions
In Chikurin-ha kyudo, the goal is not to hit the target. Instead, practitioners strive to see their reflection in the target, purifying their minds of doubts and distractions as they hold the bow in the drawn position, then releasing it when they see themselves clearly.
"Your ego becomes the target," said Dennis Martin, a kyudo historian and instructor at the Kishintaikan Dojo in Bangor, Maine.
Although the slender, asymmetrical bows used in kyudo are virtually identical to those that samurai wielded from horseback in feudal Japan, kyudo evolved into a more spiritual practice as firearms replaced the bow in warfare during the 16th Century.
Schools that were formed to preserve the skill introduced Zen, Confucian and Shinto teachings to the study of archery, Martin said.
"You still had the methods, but they were not as directed at killing. The emphasis was to develop the individual spiritually as well as physically."
In the United States, kyudo has none of the recognition that karate or judo enjoys.
"Kyudo is not a popular martial art," said Keith Moore, a martial arts instructor at the Japanese Cultural Center, 1016 W. Belmont Ave. There are few qualified instructors and relatively few competitive outlets, making it difficult to raise the art's profile, he said.
In addition, the cost of equipment can be prohibitive. The composite bamboo bows, most more than 6 feet tall, range from $375 to thousands of dollars.
For Carter and her students, the measured, meditative forms of kyudo served as a refuge after September's terrorist attacks.
"It was like practicing in the heart of sadness--which wasn't terrible at all," Carter said. "It was a way of seeing the moment as it was, letting go of the past, and being available for the changes."