The Seitokai line of MJER is a member of the Zen Nippon Iaido Renmei and so naturally uses Iaido most of the time. Some styles will pick one or the other terms for their official designation, but members of those styles will frequently use the terms interchangably.

The terms Iaido and Iaijutsu are considered interchangable in everyday use. So there is no need to fear that joining an Iaido school will leave you lacking in some element of basic swordsmanship. The waza do not stop after the draw, the majority of the each waza occurs after nukitsuke. If it were, then it would be part of the regular curriculum.Īs was already mentioned, while Iai concentrates on maximing the effectiveness of the drawing cut, it is hardly the only part of the training. Suffice it to say that it is not considered a necessary or desirable part of regular training. We can speculate on the reasons all day and not get anywhere meaningful. There is no 'free sparring' inside the MJER curriculum.

which are difficult to work on when you are training against an imaginary opponent. They allow the student to focus on issues like timing, distance issues, suki(opening) creation, etc. (NOTE: Shinken are usually only introduced into regular training several years into a students iai career for obvious safety reasons.) The kumitachi, or partner practice, waza are not usually introduced until a ways into the curriculum and are meant to fill in the gaps of solo waza. As regular practice requires a shinken, most waza in MJER, and other Iai ryu-ha, are solo waza. It is necessary to train with a shinken(live blade) most of the time in order to really get the details associated with nukitsuke. What seperates Iai ryu-ha from other kenjutsu ryu-ha is an extra emphasis on nukitsuke(drawing cut) which leads to a different mode of regular practice, ie with shinken most of the time. Then there are dozens of kae-waza which present variations on the usual way of doing waza. The regular training curriculum of MJER as we practice it in the Seitokai consists of around 80 solo and partner waza. I will stick to MJER since it is all I know well enough to speak on. MJER is one style of Iai-do/jutsu/heiho (depends on who you ask, what time of day it is, and the color of your shoes).

Kendo vs iaido