Students of Hayashi and Takata
In our discussion of the history of reiki, we looked at three of the most important figures within the system of reiki: Mikao Usui, its founder, and Chûjirô Hayashi, one of Usui’s students, who went on to teach Hawayo Takata, who was responsible for reiki’s initial transmission to the West. In this section, we’ll look at the different branches of reiki that have sprung directly from this original source, and in Appendix B we’ll look at further offshoots from these primary branches.
Chûjirô Hayashi, one of Usui’s students, went on to teach, among many others, two women who are relevant to our discussion: Hawayo Takata and Chiyoko Yamaguchi. We’ll look at Yamaguchi first, as Takata’s “branch” leads to many sub-branches that we will discuss below.
The Yamaguchis: Jikiden Reiki
Chiyoko Yamaguchi took Reiki One and Two with Hayashi, and she and her son, Tadao Yamaguchi, went on to create what is now known as Jikiden Reiki, with Jikiden translated as “directly transmitted or passed down from one’s teacher,” in this case, Chûjirô Hayashi.1 The Yamaguchis aim to replicate Hayashi’s original teachings as closely as possible based on information from Chiyoko, as well as other family members who attended Hayashi’s seminars. Tadao acknowledges that it is impossible to recreate the experience in full, but he strives to carry on the original teachings as best as possible.
Returning now to Hawayo Takata, the reiki tree branches into multiple offshoots, as many of Takata’s master-level students went on to create their own system of reiki. To learn more about Takata, please refer back to Chapter 7.
Phyllis Lei Furumoto: Usui Shiki Ryôhô
After Hawayo Takata’s death, her granddaughter, Phyllis Lei Furumoto, hosted a gathering of Takata’s master-teachers, and during this meeting, they compared class notes and decided to standardize the symbols. This group eventually became known as the Reiki Alliance, and Furumoto was given the title of Office of the Grandmaster (OGM), defined by the group as the “lineage bearer of the system of Reiki.” 2 They called their system Usui Shiki Ryôhô, and there are four aspects to the practice: healing practice, personal development, spiritual discipline, and mystic order.3 Healing practice centers around self-healing, augmented by giving treatments to friends and family and receiving treatments from others. Throughout this, the student undergoes personal development, perhaps by becoming more sensitive to the body’s needs and making healthy changes, uncovering latent gifts, or finding meaningful work in alignment with the True Self. Spiritual discipline supports this change and growth, and students are asked to build and maintain a practice that deeply nourishes their whole being. And finally, the group defines a mystic order as a “group of people who share a common practice that brings them through experience to a reality beyond the realm of the five senses,” and they see the touch aspect of reiki as a gateway to deeper union with the self and all beings.4
Beth Gray and John Harvey Gray
Beth and John lived in San Francisco and were students and practitioners of various metaphysical systems before studying reiki. Beth became a minister of the Universal Church of the Master, taking over a local chapter of the church as pastor in 1973. Initially, the services included a healing meditation, during which healers would demonstrate various techniques. John Harvey writes, “About one-third of the healers felt worse at the end of the healing meditation, while there seemed to be little improvement in the health of those who sat for healings.” 5 It was during this time that the Grays first heard about Takata through a man named Wally Richardson, who was planning to host Takata in his home so she could teach reiki while visiting California. The Grays took the introductory level course with Takata and were attuned to reiki.
Shortly thereafter, they offered to host Takata’s classes in their own home in Woodside, California, and during the next several years Takata would stay with them and teach, en route to visiting her daughter in Iowa. John became a master-teacher in 1976, and Beth’s students claim that she received her master-teacher training at the same time; her official certificate is dated 1979. Beth taught Usui Shiki Ryôhô throughout the US and Australia and is said to have instructed over 20,000 level one and two students between 1973 and 1990.6 John went on to create the John Harvey Gray Center for Reiki Healing, which teaches “the original Usui Reiki system, in its complete and authentic form and as further expanded by John Harvey Gray.” 7
Ethel Lombardi: MariEL
In 1983, Ethel Lombardi, one of Takata’s master-teachers, diverged from the Reiki Alliance and created her own system of reiki: MariEL or Mari-EL, named after Mary in the Christian tradition. She taught only one teacher.8 Information is difficult to track down, but various websites corroborate that the system was developed to balance patriarchal energies through the divine feminine. Healing focuses at the cellular level, as each cell is seen to hold memories, which, when negative, can block the flow of energy. Practitioner and client work together to release these memories and harmonize energy flow. Reiki master and scholar Robert Fueston writes that Lombardi was already a well-known healer in Chicago before studying with Takata.9
Barbara Weber Ray: The Radiance Technique
Weber was one of the few master-teachers who was not present at the initial meeting of what is now the Reiki Alliance. She claimed to be Takata’s successor, which was disputed by the group, and went on to create the Radiance Technique, also referred to as Authentic Reiki and Real Reiki. In 1983, Weber published a book, The Reiki Factor, which triggered a resurgence of interest in reiki in Japan, thanks to the efforts of one of her students, journalist Mieko Mitsui (see Chapter 7). In the first edition of the book, three levels of study are described, but this was later expanded to seven levels. Traditional and non-traditional symbols are taught.
Iris Ishikuro (with Arthur Robertson): Raku Kei Reiki
Also known as the Way of the Fire Dragon, Raku Kei Reiki was developed by one of Takata’s original master-teachers and cousins, Iris Ishikuro, and one of Iris’s students, Arthur Robertson (Robertson also studied with Virginia Samdahl, another of Takata’s master-teachers). It is claimed that the system originated in Tibet, and there are four levels, with the first two combined into one course. Raku refers to the vertical flow of energy in the body, and kei is the horizontal flow. “Master Frequency plates” incorporating the antahkarana symbol are utilized to switch the polarity of the body, in addition to the use of other non-traditional methods, such as Breath of the Fire Dragon (page 235), chakra techniques, and the Johrei symbol (“white light symbol”).10
Other Students of Takata
The rest of Takata’s original twenty-two master-teachers went on to practice and/or teach in a variety of ways, but for some, very little information is known. Here is a bit about each of them:
• Before studying with Takata, Dr. George Araki founded the Institute of Holistic Health Studies in 1974, which is still in operation today at San Francisco State University. He is one of the founding members of the Reiki Alliance. Dr. Araki retired from the university in 1999 and passed away in 2006.
• Dorothy Baba was one of the master-teachers to attend the first meeting of the organization that was to become the Reiki Alliance. She was a social worker in Stockton, California, and passed away in 1985 after sustaining severe injuries in a car accident.11
• Ursula Baylow received her master attunement from Takata in either 1978 or 1979. Robert Fueston writes, “Takata secretly trained Ursula as a Master immediately after Ursula’s Second Degree training in 1978,” but she asked that Ursula not share this with anyone until, upon visiting with Ursula in 1979, Takata issued her master certificate, dated June 11, 1979. Baylow was the first reiki master in Canada; she also practiced reflexology.12
• Rick Bockner arranged a class of approximately fifty-four students in British Columbia to be taught by Takata in October of 1980, and a few days later, at Bethal Phaige’s cabin, Bockner received his master attunement from Takata.13 He is still active in the reiki community through his organization, Reiki Home.14
• Virginia Samdahl received her master attunement from Takata in 1976, prior to which she was a psychic healer in Chicago, Illinois. She introduced one of her students, Barbara Weber Ray, to Takata, and after Weber went on to form the American Reiki Alliance, Samdahl was initiated to the master level of Weber’s system in 1981, before leaving the organization in 1983.15
• Patricia Bowling (Ewing) received her master attunement from Takata in 1980, and Fueston writes that she was also interested in meditation, channeling, soul retrieval, and other metaphysical modalities.16
• Barbara Brown received her master attunement from Takata in 1979 in British Columbia, Canada. She was one of the founding members of the Reiki Alliance, and she passed away in 2000.17
• Fran Brown received her master attunement from Takata in 1979 in Iowa, and she wrote the book Living Reiki: Takata’s Teachings, published in 1992. She is the founder of the Reiki Center for Healing Arts. In 1999, she met with members of the Usui Reiki Ryôhô Gakkai in Japan, including Chiyoko Yamaguchi (see the earlier section on Jikiden Reiki), and she claims that, in comparing the teachings of the Gakkai with the material she learned from Takata, they found them to be similar: “Hayashi organized the hand placements taught by Usui so that it was easier to teach Reiki. Takata says that he never changed any of the teachings and asked her not to change them either, nor have I.” 18 Brown passed away in 2009.
• Harry Masami Kuboi was attuned to the master level by Takata in 1977. A 2010 article by Susan Uyemura of the Japanese American Living Legacy describes Uyemura’s interview with Kuboi at his home in Palolo Valley, Hawaii, during which they discussed Kuboi’s psychic abilities, healing, and exorcisms. He published two books, All of Reiki Book I and All of Reiki Book II, along with an unpublished book called Knowledge Beyond the Earthly Realm, which expounds on his belief that 99 percent of human illness is caused by entities from other planets.19 Kuboi passed away in 2013.
• Barbara Lincoln McCullough received her master attunement from Takata in 1977 in Iowa, and she taught a handful of students, including Helen Borth (1980), David G. Jarrell (1981), Judy Carol Stewart (1985), and Laryl Fett (1986).20
• Mary Alexandra McFadyen received her master attunement from Takata in 1980, and in 1990, she founded Reiki Outreach International, which describes its goal as “direct[ing] the healing energy of reiki in a specific healing transmission from thousands of practitioners every day toward famine, drought, flood, plagues, mass illness, wars, political turmoil, and the suffering of all kind on the planet.” 21 She was presumed dead in 2011, after a missing-person report was filed in Austin, Texas, where she lived.
• Paul David Mitchell received his master attunement from Takata in 1979 and was one of the founding members of the Reiki Alliance. In 1992, he became part of the Office of the Grand Master and was given the role of Head of the Discipline of Usui Shiki Ryôhô. Mitchell is the author of The Usui System of Natural Healing, sometimes referred to as the “blue book” of the Reiki Alliance, which includes content from Takata’s diary. The version of the precepts given is slightly different from other sources: “Just for today do not worry. Just for today do not anger. Honor your parents, teachers, and elders. Earn your living honestly. Show gratitude to every living thing.” Mitchell continues to travel and teach reiki around the world.
• Bethal Phaige (“Bethel” in some sources) was initiated to master level by Takata on 1979 (her certificate is dated 1980). She is the author of Gestalt and the Wisdom of the Kahunas (1983) and an unpublished work, Journey into Consciousness, in which she shared, “The lessons (in life that I needed to learn) may have been particularly painful because my initiations had been timed so closely together. I had left Hawaii that spring not knowing of Reiki. I return this winter as a Reiki Master, a very green one.” 22
• Shinobu Saito was attuned to the master level by Takata in 1980. Born in Japan, Saito survived the bombing of Hiroshima. She was a member of the Reiki Alliance and lived in Palo Alto, California.23 Saito passed away in 2015.
• Wanja Twan, a founding member of the Reiki Alliance, received her master attunement from Takata in 1979 in British Columbia, with Bethal Phaige and Barbara Brown. Her daughter, Anneli Twan, compiled a series of interviews by a few of Takata’s master-teachers, including Wanja Twan and Barbara Brown, entitled Early Days of Reiki: Memories of Hawayo Takata. Anneli was attuned to the master level by her mother in 1984 so she could assist in teaching courses.
• Takata’s sister, Kay Yamashita, received her master attunement from Takata in 1975. According to Fueston, she may have been a member of the Hayashi Reiki Kenkyû Kai (research society) in Hawaii. John Harvey Gray was told by Takata that Yamashita was qualified to complete his master-level training, should anything happen to her.24
1. Yamaguchi, Light on the Origins of Reiki, 18.
2. Stiene and Stiene, The Reiki Sourcebook, 188.
3. “Four Aspects,” Usui Shiki Ryoho, accessed June 2, 2019, https://www.usuishikiryohoreiki.com/usr-4%20aspects.htm.
4. “Four Aspects,” Usui Shiki Ryoho, accessed June 2, 2019, https://www.usuishikiryohoreiki.com/usr-4%20aspects.htm.
5. “John Harvey Gray,” The John Harvey Gray Center for Reiki Healing, accessed June 2, 2019, https://learnreiki.org/reiki-master-teacher/john-harvey-gray.
6. Stiene and Stiene, The Reiki Sourcebook, 190.
7. “John Harvey Gray,” The John Harvey Gray Center for Reiki Healing, accessed June 2, 2019, https://learnreiki.org/reiki-master-teacher/john-harvey-gray.
8. Stiene and Stiene, The Reiki Sourcebook, 208.
9. Robert N. Fueston, The History and System of Usui Shiki Reiki Ryoho, vol. 1 of Reiki: Transmissions of Light (Twin Lakes, WI: Lotus Press, 2017), 166, Kobo.
10. Quest, Reiki for Life, 378.
11. Fueston, The History and System of Usui Shiki Reiki Ryoho, 175.
12. Fueston, The History and System of Usui Shiki Reiki Ryoho, 176.
13. Fueston, The History and System of Usui Shiki Reiki Ryoho, 183.
14. “Reiki Home: An Unfolding Journey,” Reiki Home, accessed June 2, 2019, https://reikihome.org/.
15. Fueston, The History and System of Usui Shiki Reiki Ryoho, 151.
16. Fueston, The History and System of Usui Shiki Reiki Ryoho, 192.
17. Fueston, The History and System of Usui Shiki Reiki Ryoho, 183.
18. Fueston, The History and System of Usui Shiki Reiki Ryoho, 178.
19. Japanese American Living Legacy, “The Mystical World of Harry M. Kuboi: Reiki Master of Masters, Psychic and Professional Exorcist,” news release, October 2010, http://www.jalivinglegacy.org/press
/2010/12_Harry Kuboi.pdf.
20. Fueston, The History and System of Usui Shiki Reiki Ryoho, 174.
21. “Reiki Outreach International,” The Reiki Association, accessed June 02, 2019, https://www.reikiassociation.net/reiki-outreach-international.php.
22. Stiene and Stiene, The Reiki Sourcebook, 365.
23. Fueston, The History and System of Usui Shiki Reiki Ryoho, 190.
24. Fueston, The History and System of Usui Shiki Reiki Ryoho, 163.