August, 3rd, 1945 – December, 28th, 2022
To our great sadness, Terence (Terry) Ezra Shihan passed away on December, 28th 2022 after a devastating illness. The Aikido Federation of the Netherlands (AFN) has lost a great inspirator, instructor, and friend. Since 1990, Ezra Sensei has visited the Netherlands several times a year. Initially he came as a personal guest of Piet Lagerwaard, and since the AFN was established in 1997, as AFN’s senior instructor.
Ezra Sensei practiced aikido since 1963 and trained under great Japanese teachers like Kazuo Chiba Shihan and Minoru Kanetsuka Shihan. The somewhat harsh style that characterized his early development, became more relaxed following a visit from Yamaguchi Shihan to England in the nineties. Over the course of the years Ezra Sensei developed a personal style in which consistent deep relaxation and centering are key elements to reach harmony at both the physical and the spiritual level. He demonstrated, sometimes in an inimitable way, that this way was highly effective in dealing with confrontation. His mastery of aikido still remains a distant goal for us, yet he was relentlessly committed to take our aikido to a next level.
In addition to aikido Ezra Sensei was a committed student of iaido, zen, kototama and kundalini. All these ‘paths’ were essential to him. They constituted an integrated system, which not only embedded his aikido, but that structured his entire life.
Ezra Sensei was strongly rooted in the region where he was born, The Wirral (just south of Liverpool), where his own dojo, the Komyokan Dojo, is located in Birkenhead. He was one of the most prominent aikido teachers in Great Britain and was well known and respected as a guest instructor in many countries. Amongst others, he taught in Colombia, Costa Rica, Russia, South Africa, Spain and Bulgaria. He visited the Aikikai Hombu Dojo in Japan several times. In the nineties, Hombu Doshu Moriteru Ueshiba visited the Komyokan Dojo in Birkenhead during his visit to the UK.
Ezra Sensei will live on in our memories and in the aikido practice within the AFN, for years to come.
On behalf of the Technical Committee and the Board of the AFN,
Piet Lagerwaard Shihan
John Goverts Shihan
Gertjan Boks, chairman