What is Karate?

arate, meaning “empty hand”, is a fighting art originating in Okinawa during the 1600's. Okinawa is the largest island in the Ryu Kyu Island chain, located southwest of Japan in the western Pacific Ocean. Shin-mei means “true life”. Shin-mei karate is a combat style that teaches effective self protection in real life situations. Shin-mei is not a sport, nor a dance; it is a practical form of self defense.

Early Okinawan karate owes its origin to a mixture of indigenous fighting arts, various foot fighting systems and empty hand systems of southeastern Asia and China. The Okinawans being seafaring people were in constant contact with mainland Asia. It is quite likely that Okinawan seamen visiting foreign ports of call may have been impressed with local fighting techniques and incorporated these into their own methods.

Generations of secrecy have shed a veil of mystery around the history and origin of karate. To a certain degree, this veil still exists. What little information we may have has come to us through scattered bits and pieces that somehow have come into the possession of modern karate historians or from those of us who were fortunate enough to have been told some of the history from an Okinawan Sensei.