Exactly How High is the Status of Mehdi Zand

Once you have seen the numerous martial arts qualifications achieved by the Supreme Grand Master Mehdi Zand, you may be left wondering, ‘what does it all mean?’ With so many qualifications to his name it is indeed difficult to appreciate exactly how exceptional his status is.

First let start with the 10th Dan qualification.

The character of Dan (段, dan?) is used in Japanese to mean step or grade, and is commonly used to demonstrate the ranking of black belt martial artists. 10th Dan or jūdan (十段:じゅうだん): is the highest degree of black belt and is rarely achieved.

In order for you to understand how rare it is, let’s do some simple statistic.

Currently there are just under 6.9 billion people living in the world today. Now compare that to how many 10th Dan Black Belts there are officially recognised worldwide which is only in the hundreds, and you can already see how rare that is. These figures are not exact but they do not differ significantly enough to change the order of magnitude.

Let us now consider the numerous Master, Grand Master and Supreme Grand Master awards.

Master and Grand Master titles can be awarded after having reached around 7th Dan or higher in any system depending upon the level of contribution to the style itself. Yet the title of Supreme Grand Master is almost unheard of as this demonstrates an exceptionally high level of understanding and ability both, physically and mentally. Naturally Supreme Grand Masters are rarer even more so than a traditional 10th Dan.

Then there is the achievement of Founder and Sokeship which is the highest possible acknowledgement of any individual and is only given to those who have created and perfected their own system of martial arts.

Finally we must also consider the fact that while any one of these qualifications is an outstanding achievement, to have so many, awarded by the major martial arts organisations and governing bodies around the world is a tremendous testament to his status and continued contribution to martial arts.

However it does not stop there! Supreme Grandmaster Mehdi Zand, while maintaining his down to earth attitude still pushes the boundaries and as such has formed his own martial arts governing body, World Institute of Martial Science.

Impressive, you may rightly surmise. However when looking at all of the achievements in the context of his age you will also realise that now Professor Mehdi Zand has yet much more to achieve and contribute to world of Martial Arts.