The Founder’s Journey
The Life and Legacy of Morihei Ueshiba
O-Sensei (“Great Teacher”)
Morihei Ueshiba (植芝 盛平)
Morihei Ueshiba (植芝 盛平, December 14, 1883 – April 26, 1969), commonly known as O-Sensei (“Great Teacher”), was a Japanese martial artist best known as the founder of the martial art aikido. He is widely regarded as one of the most influential martial-arts teachers of the twentieth century.
Early life and training
Ueshiba was born in Tanabe (Wakayama Prefecture) into a farming family. As a youth he studied several traditional jujutsu schools (including Tenjin Shin’yō-ryū and Kito-ryu) and later served in the army. After leaving military service he moved to Hokkaidō to work as a pioneer settler, where he continued training and deepened his martial studies.
Spiritual life and transformation
In the 1910s–1920s Ueshiba became close to the Ōmoto-kyō religious movement and its leader Onisaburo Deguchi. Accounts say that a profound spiritual experience in the mid-1920s transformed his outlook and led him to place far more emphasis on harmony, compassion, and the spiritual aspects of martial practice. After this shift his physical technique also grew calmer and more circular, reflecting those principles.
Establishing a dojo and spreading aikido
Ueshiba moved to Tokyo in the mid-1920s and established the Kobukan (later Aikikai Hombu) Dojo, where he taught a growing body of students. After World War II he settled for a time in Iwama and continued to teach and refine aikido’s physical and spiritual curriculum; from the late 1940s through the 1960s he worked to promote aikido across Japan and overseas.
