Shotokan's Secret

Have you ever participated in a session where people were trying to figure out the significance of the opening posture of Empi? It can be very entertaining.

Standing in a natural stance, you put your right fist into the palm of your open left hand, and place both in koshi kamae at the left hip. Why are the hands down there? Why is one hand open and the other closed? Why do we end the kata in the same position?

The solution is laughably simple, and is another example of a shotoism.

Only Shotokan places the hands at the left hip. The other Shuri-te styles open and close this kata with the hands in the familiar karate salute in front of the chest. Left blade hand with right fist.

This gesture is a signature of Okinawan karate. Apparently somebody in Shotokan decided to conceal the Okinawan link by moving the hands down to the hip.

In other words, the opening posture of Empi has no martial significance and never did.

Hello Dr. Clayton,
I always thought it was the traditional "kung fu" salute, you know like David Carridne would do in the t.v. series, given the folklore of the kata, but my sensei taught a "kote -gaeshi" type of technique as bunkai!
Saludos!

I think your sensei was ahead of his time. We should all be teaching kotegaeshi, but not necessarily as an application for the fist-in-palm salute!