Karate Mastery and Instructional Insights

Ed Hartzell spent most of his life training and teaching the martial arts. He started training at twelve years old. His first classes were judo, under national judo champion Bob Kenttenburg. That is when he fell in love with the martial arts. Ed spent all his time at a dojo. After high school, he found a karate school where he went to college. There, he studied Chinese kenpo under Robert Lyle, a student of Edward Parker. After college, he came back to Bethlehem, Pennsylvania.

His passion for teaching the martial arts really took hold. He spent the next decade learning and teaching in five different schools around his area. In 1984, he met Nimr Hassan, a student and disciple of the famous James Mitose, descended from the founder of the Kosho Shorei Ryu Kenpo in Japan. The Kosho Shorei Ryu Kenpo is taught the same way James Mitose taught Nimr Hassan. Ed had to promise Nimr that he would not change it. The Kosho Shorei Ryu Kenpo became the base for the Shin Ju Ryu Kenpo Ju-Jutsu system that Ed had been formulating from his early years of training.

In 1985, Ed started teaching the Shin Ju Ryu Kenpo Ju-Jutsu system that he had been developing. He picked the best techniques and philosophies that he learned over the last two decades to formulate the Shin Ju Ryu Kenpo Ju-Jutsu system. The techniques he used had to pass certain criteria. He painstakingly examined each technique for its effectiveness in real-life situations. He used mathematics and geometry in formulating the techniques. Ed developed the psychological approach by using the strategies of combat.