13th degree black belt????

[Winniford]

Now what's this all about?

A friend of mine told me that the person who started all that
ranking stuff orignally made it go to 13th while placing himself
at 10th of course. The reasoning beyond this is so that everyone
realizes that you can always keep learning and that you are never
going to be "perfect".

Now the question to this is whether in ranking in the degrees there
is a standard among all martial arts. Is there? And also, what are
the standards for ranking to the tenth even? Going to 13th just
blows my mind away!

Jay

[donald seto]

In article <2ijlhp$4...@vixen.cso.uiuc.edu> jay...@uxa.cso.uiuc.edu (Winniford) writes:
>
>Now what's this all about?
>
>A friend of mine told me that the person who started all that
>ranking stuff orignally made it go to 13th while placing himself
>at 10th of course. The reasoning beyond this is so that everyone

no, i think it's 11--that's 1 past 10!

i'm curious, would people in general rather be at a higher official rank or
a lower one...if you were a sandan, for example, but a shodan looks better
than you in competition and in kata, would you feel good about it? or
conversely, if you were the shodan and you'r much better than the sandans.

does it really matter what rank you are?

>realizes that you can always keep learning and that you are never
>going to be "perfect".
>
>Now the question to this is whether in ranking in the degrees there
>is a standard among all martial arts. Is there? And also, what are
>the standards for ranking to the tenth even? Going to 13th just
>blows my mind away!
>
>Jay

i think in kendo, going to 10 or 9 or even 8 would blow most people's
minds......

--
********************************************************************
d...@helix.nih.gov
301-402-0580 Bldg10/Rm8D14 NIDDK/NIH Bethesda, MD 20892

[Mark Urbin]

In article <2ijlhp$4...@vixen.cso.uiuc.edu> jay...@uxa.cso.uiuc.edu (Winniford) writes:

>A friend of mine told me that the person who started all that
>ranking stuff orignally made it go to 13th while placing himself
>at 10th of course. The reasoning beyond this is so that everyone
>realizes that you can always keep learning and that you are never
>going to be "perfect".

I remember reading the same thing years ago. The story was about
Mr. Kano. The fellow who founded Judo and formalized (or even perhaps
orginated) the system of pretty colored belts using in ranking.

>Now the question to this is whether in ranking in the degrees there
>is a standard among all martial arts.

Nope...some only go to 5th dan, other systems only use belts to
hold up their trousers.

>Is there? And also, what are
>the standards for ranking to the tenth even? Going to 13th just
>blows my mind away!

I've read the GM Chow (of Kara-Ho Kempo) promoted himself to 15th
dan after he heard that one of his old students ranked himself at
10th dan.
I guess if you are head of a system and enough people take you
seriously, you can have as many stripes as you want...

--
Mark Urbin -- ecl...@world.std.com -- These opinions are mine.
"It is criminal to teach a people not to defend themselves if they are the
constant victims of brutal assualt." -- Malcom X
---------------------------------------------------------------------------

[Daniel Moon]

13th Degree? What style? I think Tae Kwon Do only goes up to 8, but there
is an honorary 9th degree you can achieve.... Hah, That would be
ridiculous... "I am a 13th degree Black Belt!" Has anybody ever even
passed 10?

[James Hernandez]

Winniford (jay...@uxa.cso.uiuc.edu) wrote:

: Now the question to this is whether in ranking in the degrees there

: is a standard among all martial arts. Is there?

No.

There technically couldn't be as different styles will practice
different katas.

[James Hernandez]

donald seto (d...@helix.nih.gov) wrote:
: i'm curious, would people in general rather be at a higher official rank or

: a lower one...if you were a sandan, for example, but a shodan looks better
: than you in competition and in kata, would you feel good about it?

I would be very happy for that shodan and then try to figure out
why the hell s/he's better than I am and fix it.

: does it really matter what rank you are?

Only if you have an ego problem.

[Bruce Fancher]

Winniford (jay...@uxa.cso.uiuc.edu) wrote:

: Now the question to this is whether in ranking in the degrees there

: is a standard among all martial arts. Is there? And also, what are
: the standards for ranking to the tenth even? Going to 13th just
: blows my mind away!

: Jay

In most systems the highest dan is 9th. There is no standard however and
anyone can start a new "style" and declare themselves a ninth degree
grandmaster. From what I understand the system came from Japan but other
styles such as Karate and Taekwondo adopted it in this century.

[WILLIAM A DOCTER]

In article <2ijlhp$4...@vixen.cso.uiuc.edu>, jay...@uxa.cso.uiuc.edu (Winniford)

writes:
>A friend of mine told me that the person who started all that
>ranking stuff orignally made it go to 13th while placing himself
>at 10th of course. The reasoning beyond this is so that everyone
>realizes that you can always keep learning and that you are never
>going to be "perfect".
>

>Now the question to this is whether in ranking in the degrees there
>is a standard among all martial arts. Is there? And also, what are
>the standards for ranking to the tenth even? Going to 13th just
>blows my mind away!

The number of degrees of black belt is usually beteen 5 to 10. The stripes on
a persons belt are only as meaningful as the requirements that the practioner
had to meet to get them. I could create a new system today, call it
MyName-Ryu or MyName-Do, and declare myself grandmaster with 20th degree
black belt; however, the title would be meaningless

Likewise, a practitioner that is 10th dan in a system that terminates at 10th
dan is not neccesarily better than a practitioner that is 5th dan in a system
that terminates at 5th dan. Ranking are only good for comparison of people
studying the same art. For those of different arts, time spent in training is
a more reliable norm.