JAPAN KARATE-DO DHAMMIKA-HA SHITO-RYU KAI

日本空手道ダミカ派糸東流会

Dhammika Kobu-Jutsu Ryu International

The beginnings

Logo of Dhammika Kobujutsu International

After years of hard training in kobujutsu and kobudo with world-famous and legendary grandmasters for handling Okinawan and Chinese weapons, Shihan Athula founded his own kobudo association Dhammika Kobu-Jutsu Ryu International which goes hand in hand with his karate style Dhammika Karate-Do.

In the early 1970s, Shihan Athula learned the ancient Indian weapon styles (Malayalam Sirambaram) of unknown masters. He also learned Chinese-Oriental weapons from Grand Master Chew Choo Soot 10th Dan, who himself knew 18 Chinese weapons.

After meeting the late legendary Grand Master Soke Teruo Hayashi, 10th Dan and founder of Okinawa Kobudo Kenshin Ryu, he began to learn Kobudo for a long time. Later, Shihan Athula met Kyoshi Yamazaki (8th Dan) who is an expert for Iai-do, Ken-do and Bo. In the following years, he learned some weapons including Iai-Do from him for several years. Shihan Athula also traveled to Malaysia, China, and Japan several times to practice with the various weapons. Shihan Athula saw and learned about the diversity of all three types of weapon systems.

Dhammika Kobu-Jutsu Ryu International

History of development

After all the accumulated knowledge about the different weapons, acquired skills and the fact that the old weapon styles are being forgotten and slowly becoming extinct, Shihan Athula Minithanthri decided to create a new weapon style, the so-called Dhammika Kobu-Jutsu Ryu International. The newly created style Dhammika Kobu-Jutsu Ryu International is supposed to combine all his knowledge of weapons such as Malayalam Sirambaram, Chinese-Oriental weapons, Okinawan Kobudo and Okinawan Kobujutsu into one style.

According to Athula, it is first necessary to learn Bo before someone can master Kobudo because this is most of the basic knowledge for all types of weapons.

For this reason, the emphasis in Dhammika Kobu-Jutsu Ryu International is mainly focused on training with the Bo and why there are ten different Bo katas. The other main weapons, nunchaku, kama, tonfa, sai and sword, are also practised and taught. Shihan Athula also says:

Real weapons training is not just to learn a little bit kihon to learn a Kata. Its gives very nice and effective techniques which members can practice with a partners.Then we do some free fighting with partners, only using the techniques what they have learned. Through practicing with partners we can see the effective and dangerous side of the weapons training. Also it is very enjoyable practicing with partners. This is the special side of Dhammika Kobu-Jutsu Ryu.
– Shihan Athula Minithanthri