 Perhaps one of the most iconic emblems of Ed Parker's American Karate system is the IKKA crest. You've probably seen this everywhere. It's a very common symbol associated with American Kempo, but it also stands for a lot of different things, part of the brotherhood and the community, and it's got some really interesting history when we break it down. So today, we're going to take a quick look at the Kempo patch. In the first video in this series, The Origin of American Kempo, we explored how Hawaiian-born Edmund K. Parker took the style of self-defense taught to him by William K. S. Chow and adapted it for American street fighting. William Chow himself was a student of James Matosi, and Chow had mixed the hard, linear style of Matosi's fighting with the circular Chinese movements his father had taught him. As Chow passed the system down to Ed Parker, the two of them had discussed taking this new mix and adapted it even further and introducing it to America as a newly structured self-defense system. In the second video, The Evolution of American Kempo, we looked at how Mr. Parker continued to adapt this system over the years into a living, organic and community art. After his passing, his students continued the legacy and took Kempo into their own directions and adaptations of self-defense. Despite all of the interpretations that Kempo has gone through, much of the symbolism still remains. The two most prominent icons in the American Kempo system have to be the Tiger and the Dragon. While Kempo is a modern art, Ed Parker did not want to forget its roots. The Tiger and the Dragon go back into deep Chinese mythology and often represent a balance of energy. The two are also often seen and twined in various yin-yang formations to highlight this concept. In American Kempo, the presence is no less significant. The Tiger represents a grounded physical strength. It has raw power and is dangerous to be trifled with. As Mr. Parker describes it in his Infinite Insights book, the Tiger represents earthly strength derived during the early stages of learning. This is the stage where the individual is more impressed with his own physical prowess. The Dragon represents a spiritual strength and an achievement of wisdom. If the Tiger is to power the student first learned in their training, then the Dragon is a state of enlightenment that comes with experience and seasoning in the art. Also in Mr. Parker's words, the attitude of the Dragon is the ultimate goal of Kempo. Armed with this attitude, an individual will not be afraid of the opponent, but of what he can do to the opponent. Thus, he turns his back and walks away from an unwarranted conflict confident that he could have been the victor. One of the most important lessons that I try to impart on my students is confidence. To have the ability to use martial arts doesn't mean that you need to go do it. You should have the confidence to walk away from a situation. I always tell them the best fight is the one you can avoid. This duology is a major component of most Kempo systems and their relationship together is included in Kempo's most iconic emblem, the Kempo crest. The Kempo crest is the image that Ed Parker and his brother David composed while forming the International Kempo Karate Association or the IKKA. Previously, Mr. Parker had been running the KKA or Kempo Karate Association of America and it was represented by a fist emblem with the art's name. For the IKKA, Parker wanted an emblem that embodied the philosophy and integrity of the art. It stood for a lot of things. It stood for, you know, the tiger being physical strength, the dragon being spiritual strength. The shape of the crest was in a certain way that if you betrayed the art, they would cut you off with the axe at the bottom. And just the way it was shaped and things like that, there was a lot of meaning. Generally, if you look at the shape, it has the arch on the top which meant you're anyone under the top of the roof is protected like family. You watch it. The arch on the side is to give out evil and separate evil spirits. Okay? And there's the axe on the bottom, which means if you do something to deface or to wrongdoings, if you will, or something that's not in a loyal content or embarrassed, humiliate, you could get yourself cut off. In other words, you were asked to leave. Now that we have the boundary set, let's take a look at the inner elements. Featured in the center of the crest is the circle and the line patterns. These represent several different ideas. First, the circle represents a continuous flow as in life having no beginning or end or the perpetual motion of techniques. According to Mr. Parker, the circle also represents the concept that all moves evolve from a circle and it represents the bond of continuous friendship and also that the circle is the base of our alphabet. The lines overlaid onto the circle also represent a few different ideas. First, it was Mr. Parker's homage to the original 18 hand movements found in the old Chinese arts. Additionally, if you imagine yourself standing in the center of the circle, the straight and diagonal lines represent the entry lines of attack from an opponent as well as the paths of movements a practitioner can step to. Kempo is also an art that mixes both linear and circular movements and techniques and one of the principles of the system stemmed from the concept of how they can cancel each other out. Generally speaking, a linear attack can be countered by a circular motion and a circular attack can be cut short by a linear action. Also residing in the crest are both the tiger and the dragon, still representing strength and wisdom. The replacement is as such. The tiger stemming from earthly strength is positioned at the bottom with the dragon placed above the essence of a higher learning. As the tiger and dragon are present to retain the yin and yang balance of the art and in respect of Kempo's Chinese roots, so is the Chinese lettering on either side of the crest. This is a nod of respect and remembrance to Kempo's early roots. The script on the left reads, Spirit of the Dragon and the Tiger. And the text on the right is, Law of the Fist and the Empty Hand. There's the Chinese elements to the side, which stood for the Law of the Fist, Spirit of the Tiger and the Dragon. Ed Parker was very respectful to the Chinese and they had high regard for him. That's why I use the Chinese lettering in there. Tiger on the bottom, dragon on the top. Tiger stood for earthly strength. Most of us have that physical tenaciousness if we tap into not quitting. And we give you those physical skills, which empowers their mind. Now we have courage and bravery because I did the I can attitude. Concept of the dragon is to look down at the tiger and say, Calm down, be calm, think before you respond. So the dragon is really that spiritual side we hope that you have within yourself. Empathy, sympathy, mindfulness. Finally, we have the colors. The interior foundation is white, like the art whose foundation is out of the beginning student, and the crest walls are black, as the art is shaped by those who become proficient in it. The circle is gray, symbolic of the brain, often referred to as gray matter, and is the combination of both black and white, showing that wisdom is being both an experienced martial artist and a student. The red lettering of Kempo Karate represents small increments of mastery that are added to the professorship of black belt ranks. The color breakdown of the tiger and the dragon is a little more dynamic. As the tiger represents the early and raw strength of the students, it bears the early rank colors of white, yellow, and orange. The dragon, representing the higher wisdom and mastery of the art, is colored in red. However, the dragon never forgets its roots and retains the lower rank colors and trace. In the case of the patch that is worn on the uniform, it is typically red with yellow fins. However, in more elaborate illustrations, the dragon is composed of many colors, including all the belt rank colors of the system, showing that even as a master, the dragon can call upon all experience and never be too arrogant to go back to any level. All of the symbolism is immortalized within the IKKA or Kempo crest, and it is worn as a patch over the practitioner's heart. This was the definitive icon of Kempo for many years. These factors of Ed Parker's patch have a lot in the beginning that meant a life lesson, and it went over the heart was the art. Got to have it in your heart, okay? Which meant it's lifelong. That's the easy way of saying it. A more somber variation of this patch occurred upon the passing of Mr. Parker in 1990. Frank Trejo, one of Mr. Parker's most senior students and also a man who took the tournament scene by storm, began wearing a black-and-white version of the crest. It was Frank Trejo's patch. Him and one of his black belts was one of the first UFC fighters, by the way, Zane Frazier. They're the ones that did that for their group. What that stood for was, Frank said that the color was taken away. Ed Parker was the flame. He was the life. When the life of Ed Parker was taken, it took the life out of the patch, but not the art. So he wanted people to remember that life is precious and that it's up to us to treasure life and learn from those lives that we lose. Mr. Trejo and a few others wore this black-and-white version of the patch for many years and shows the love they had for Mr. Parker and how they mourn him after his passing. As mentioned in previous videos, the politics of Kempo are volatile and between legal disputes over who was allowed to wear the crest and the result of different organizations splitting off to teach their own Kempo, many new crests emerged that retained the root imagery of the IKKA crest while adding their own flare and personalization. A quick Google search of Kempo crest will show you just how many variations there are. It meant a lot to me when Mr. Parker was alive as to what it stood for and what it meant. And then, you know, when he passed away, it kind of, everyone created their own crest and kind of did their own thing. It's interesting enough that you can see all these different designs and all the different people who have patches. I usually like to ask people, tell me about your patch and what it means. What are the kinds of interpretations? And they're quite interesting. I had a couple of different crests. This one that I have here was when I had my schools in Orlando and kind of put my own logo in the shape of the Kempo patch. And now the logo I have on some of my other geese is a little adaptation of it. We still have the tiger and the drag and the drag and being above the tiger to represent spiritual strength is more important than physical strength. So we modified it just so we wouldn't be involved in that as to who could wear it, who couldn't wear it. So rather than be involved in that, we just kind of modified it a little bit and came up with our own. My patch, the red perimeter stands for bloodline, in our bloodline. So our lineage directly goes right, most of the generations that we have in the CKF were all generations directly to Ed Parker, let it be the first, second or even to the last being myself. Who helped me with my patch design was Ed Parker Jr., David Hepler and David Stanley. David Stanley being the stepbrother to Elvis. David Hepler being the fact that he worked with Elvis for a couple of years. So I took that personality and we put TCB, that people on Kempo should take care of the business, take care of family, take care of community, help the weak, those kind of things. Also there's two lightning bolts on the top, which means the ones that above was the relationship he had with Elvis. Because EP, Ed Parker and Elvis Presley are gone from above looking down, we'll keep the spirit of the two alive. Take care of the business. And in a nutshell, that's what it is. Now the clock, if you look at the center of it, is multi-dimensional. If you look at it, you can see it's multi-dimensional because Kempo's a multi-dimensional system. So we put that there. We also put in the tiger and the dragon in balance, not one over the other. Like Yin and Yang, you need balance, both tiger and dragon. So in our patch, you have balance. So in a simple layout, there it is. That's what our patch is all about. Personally, I think it's a testament to show how powerful his teachings were. They keep and honor elements of his teaching while adding their own meaningful symbolism as they take the art into the future. One example of this is a community effort to come together and create a new American Kempo crest. Also called the Kempo Solidarity Crest or the Unity Crest, that stands for a strong brotherhood and a new era of cooperation. This new crest was composed by many so that not a single person can claim rights to it and it is free for Kempo practitioners to bear and represent their art as they wish. And this patch became available to the Kempo community and I chose to accept it. It's a modern American Kempo crest and it's supposed to solidify Kempo. A lot of people that I've talked to have actually accepted it and are going to be wearing it as well. So this is not just the history of Kempo in it but it's got a lot of the rules and principles. It was a group of Kempoists that got together to try to come up with a solution to the problem that was happening in our community. And I know Ed Parker Jr. was one of the supporters for the crest and he really liked it. It still has the Chinese writing to represent the origin of American Kempo. It still kept the dragon and the tiger and the empty hand and the fist. Everything on the patch is placed in a specific location for a reason. The shape on top is actually Mr. Parker's original school in California that was designed outside his school. Interior elements such as the compass rose are to honor Mr. Parker's days in the Coast Guard as well as an homage to the fist used in Mr. Parker's original KKAA emblem. The flame stands for many things such as the idea that it burns within each practitioner in the three levels of advanced achievement instructor, professor and master. It is placed within the white background of the triangle to remind the practitioner of where they started and while it touches the bottom of the triangle it never reaches the top to show a strong foundation and an effort to reach mastery. It's a very dynamic and intricate design and I definitely recommend taking a further look at it. The link for the website is in the description below. It goes into further breakdown of the crest as well as the mission of the Brotherhood. Once again, the crest is free for use and for any of you who wish to wear a physical patch all you have to do is contact EPACS and request one. And this concludes our three-part Kemple series. If you have not yet seen the first two episodes and are interested in the art and how it began and evolved those links are also in the description below. Mr. Parker has left an unmistakable mark on the development of martial arts in the United States that spread internationally. What started as an area of personal study exploded into a widespread culture of self-defense, education and the science of motion. Mr. Parker brought martial arts to a new level in the mainstream American media. He taught American royalty, brought notable names into the spotlight and left a legacy of disciples that are taking Kemple into new and exciting directions today. He was the powerful tiger that resided here as an earthly force until he descended above as the dragon, watching down on us with all of his wisdom. As martial artists, we strive to reach perfection while never forgetting our roots. Only when we achieve that can we too be the dragon. So that's today's look at the IKKA patch. Hope you liked it and enjoyed it. I enjoyed the symbolism behind it and I enjoy seeing how the community has embraced it and taken it in different directions. So as we continue to do these videos and look at other arts, we're going to break down the other symbols and emblems of their arts as well because part of it is martial art and it's symbolic and they have meaning. So we will go into further in-depth reviews of those as well. Thank you so much for watching. Thank you for watching today's video. Hopefully you enjoyed it. I'm really curious for my brothers and sisters out there in the Kempo community, what does your patch look like? How does your school? Do you use the IKKA patch or do you have your own? I would love to see what versions you guys use if you want to list them below in the comments and as always, please help our community grow, share this video, like and subscribe. Thank you very much.