photo of Usui and reiju-givers

aloha! -----

what can anyone tell me about the photo at:
www.reiki-dojo.com/images-reiki/usui-reiki-ryoho-gakkai.gif ?

it is supposedly a photo of Usui-sensei and a bunch of his students who were authorized to give reiju, and supposedly taken in 1926. it appears in Light on the Origins of Reiki (Yamaguchi) ... and i read somewhere that it came originally from an article in the magazine Sunday Mainichi. the rather mysterious thing is that the caption (which gives the description and the date) was apparently added at least 20 years after the photo was taken!

the photo -- if the guy who looks like Usui is really Usui -- must have been taken no later than 1926 ... but the caption is written in the modern style of kanji, which came into being after WW II...! (note the arrow in the photo, pointing to the modern character for "ki")

does anyone have an explanation for this?

thanks! -----
db

Hi Don

Yes, that photo is very interesting. I don't think the caption being written later is a huge problem - especially if it was originally in a magazine, which may have been published much later than 1926. Also, if you have seen the photo of Hawayo Takata and Hayashi sensei in a Reiki class in Hawaii, you can also see the modern kanji in the caption even though the photo was supposed to have been taken in 1937 (i.e. pre-kanji simplification).

http://www.aetw.org/reiki_koushukai.htm


As for whether that is really Mikao Usui, if you take the whole photograph into context (and the whole photo is not shown in your link - or in Tadao's book!) then I think there is sufficient evidence to show that it is him. Firstly, I can recognise some other people in the photo: on Usui's left, as we look at the photo is Umetaro Mine, a student of Usui, of whom there is a (different) photo in one of Toshitaka Mochizuki's books. To the right of Usui is Jusaburo Ushida, one of the admirals who began the Usui Reiki Ryoho Gakkai, of whom there is also a (different) photo in Mochizuki's book. On the left on the front row is said to be Chujiro Hayashi (remember this is at least 10 years before the more common photos we have of Hayashi sensei). Usui sensei in this photo also appears to be the same person as Usui sensei in the student group photo (of 16th January 1926) that also appears in Mochizuki's book).

And the clincher, which cannot be seen in this version of the photo, but is present in the original, which I have seen and which Tadao has in his possession, is a huge framed copy of the the Gokai hanging on the wall of the dojo, above the group.

Hope that helps.

Colin -----

thanks for your answer! i had the impression that the Sunday Mainichi article was published close to when the photo was taken ... but i don't know that there was any such article anyway.... : ^ )

i don't doubt that it really is Usui -- and i didn't know there was more to the picture! thanks for telling us that. when you saw the original photo, did it include the caption (and, if not, how did anyone know what to say in the caption later)?

thanks again ----
db

johreiki wrote:Colin -----

thanks for your answer! i had the impression that the Sunday Mainichi article was published close to when the photo was taken ... but i don't know that there was any such article anyway.... : ^ )

i don't doubt that it really is Usui -- and i didn't know there was more to the picture! thanks for telling us that. when you saw the original photo, did it include the caption (and, if not, how did anyone know what to say in the caption later)?

thanks again ----
db

Hi Don

I am also not aware of any Sunday Mainichi article that contains this photo.

I think the caption was actually present on the photo I saw - so maybe I should have said the "complete" photo rather than the "original" photo because the caption was probably added later.

When the photo was originally taken, I would imagine that people looking at it would know who was in the photo and it wouldn't have needed a caption - only later, maybe when it was to be shown to more recent Reiki students (maybe in the 1970s, as part of the 50th anniversary?) might it have required a caption as only the older students would be aware of its significance.

Having said that, I have no idea where Tadao go the photo from, whether it was a family member (most likely) or from someone he may know in the Gakkai.

Colin ----

thanks again -- sounds like a good explanation....!


a l o h a ----
db