Martial Arts Introduction

The Han Chinese evolved from a small group between 12,000 and 10,000 years ago. Weapons have played an important role in the history of Chinese martial arts from the beginning when the proto - Chinese fashioned blades out of jade 3,000 to 5,000 years ago.

During the Spring and Autumn period, Yue Nu, a female jian, or straight sword, expert explained soft, or internal strategy to the Emperor Yue. She wrote a book and trained the Yue army in use of the Jian and they defeated the kingdom of Wu. Zhang p17 The martial philosophy of "the soft overcoming the hard" was developed from sword play.

Much later in Chinese history the Wudang monastery became very famous for its system of sword fighting. Again, the concepts which have become familiar to us through the modern internal arts of Tai Chi, Pa Kua, and Hsing-I were first developed through study of the sword. The famous priest credited in some circles with inventing T'ai-chi chuan, Chang, San feng, stayed in the Wudang Mountains for 23 years in the 1300s and combined martial arts and nei kung [inner work] into a new system. Chang was famous for developing his own sword method that used the soft philosophy. His connection to the modern art of T'ai-Chi Chuan is tenuous at best but there may be less doubt as to the connection between Wudang methods of internal cultivation and each of the soft arts.

The Ming general Chi, Chih Kuang, Qi Ji Guang [1528-1587] is credited with developing a unique sword method used to combat Japanese pirates welding samurai swords and with a 32 posture boxing style, which was recorded in his book Boxing Classic [1561]. This book would prove to be important as an underpinning of Northern boxing forms created during the Ching dynasty [1644-1911]. His sword method used soft techniques to over come the hardness of the Japanese swords and is still passed down through some Pa Kua lineages on Taiwan. The tradition of martial arts being associated with the Chinese military is a long one that is well documented. The connections between Taoist meditation and the internal martial arts of Tai-chi chuan, Pa Kua Chang, and Hsing-I chuan will be discussed below.

The martial arts which have been passed down to the present day in Northern China have a strong connection to the military arts developed in the later half of the Ming dynasty and early Ching. From this historical period starting four hundred years ago the arts that have come down to us as the neijia [inner family] were developed through different families in different geographical areas of China. What makes these arts unique is their use of the basic nei dan practices combined with martial arts. To find written information on nei kung practice applied to martial arts we will need to consult numerous Chinese sources because so little has been written about this in English. Indeed, some popular translations of Chinese martial arts titles have left out entire sections on Taoist meditation practices that were extant in the originals.

Hsing-I is possibly the oldest of the three internal Chinese martial arts. Chi Lung-Feng founded the present day lineage of Hsing-I Chuan [Form-Will boxing]. He claimed to have learned Six Harmony Boxing, Liu He Chuan, from a Taoist hermit living in the hills outside present day Hong Kong in the late1600's. Several generations later, nineteenth century Hsing-I master Kuo, Yun Shen wrote a book called An Explanation of Hsing-I Chuan in which he extolled his unique method of using the chi of each pair of acupuncture channels with the five forms and the five Shen. Hsing-I uses the Smelting of the Five Agents meditation as its base internal practice. The five shen fused together form the unified will and this single point concentration was the key to the explosive power that Hsing-I was famous for.

In his book Self Defense Applications of Tai-chi chuan [Tai-chi chuan shih-yung fa], Yang, Chen-fu states " In reality, the essence of Tai-chi is not found in the external postures, but rather in the internal principles, energy and chi." Wile p 132 He goes on, "Yang is the trigram Chien…yin is the trigram Kun. Inhaling and retreating represent the principle of the reversal of yin and yang. If we allow the fire to rise and the water to sink, the two will separate. If, however we put the fire under the water then their positions have reversed…This is called the principle of water and fire complementing each other, or the principle of reversal." Wile p 135-36 He goes on to very clearly talk about cauldron meditation and its importance to Tai-chi practice.

In his book Complete principles and applications of Tai-chi chuan [Tai-chi chuan ti-yung chuan shu ] ghost written by Cheng, Man-ching in 1934,`Yang says…"it is said, 'Train during the three periods after the summer solstice and the three periods after the winter solstice.' At these times the sun's influence is more powerful than during the spring and autumn." Taoist meditation and chi kung has always sought to harmonize with the patterns of nature and so it is with Tai-chi.

Cheng, Man-ching, in his book Master Cheng's New Method of Tai-chi chuan Self Cultivation, translation by Mark Hennessy, he states "The Taoist phrase, 'the waterwheel spins backward,' depicts the flow of chi as it travels up your spinal Tu Meridian." Again, he is clearly talking about nei kung practice as it relates to Tai-Chi practice. The Tai-Chi forms provide a vehicle for combining prescribed movement with the meditation practice and this is the unique breakthrough that these arts represent even now, at least one hundred and fifty years later.

Pa Kua Chang was brought to Peking and the world by Tung, Hai Chuan in the 1860's. Tung was a member of the Chuan Chen sect of Taoism. When he was asked to demonstrate for the first time before the Duke of Ssu he chose to demonstrate the bu gang [ritual circle walking] practice taught to him by the Taoists.[literally "Nine steps to Heaven"] He called this practice "turning palm." Pa Kua had "standing post "training during which they practiced Chien and Kun meditation. [See Pa Kua Chang Manual and method of the secret transmission by Gao, Yan He. translation Shawn Eichman]

Tung's famous student Cheng, Ting hua is quoted in Bao Zhen Pa Kua Chang by Wang, Sun Xiang; "In the Tao of practicing Pa Kua you must find a luminary teacher so he can explain. Pa Kua is a division of the one chi which produces Tai-Chi. The one chi is the composite of the pa kua, and the five elements." Translation Shawn Eichman. Cheng is referring to shen theory and Taoist cosmology.

Pa Kua master Chang, Rong Chiao writes in his book on Pa Kua staff, "I have had the opportunity to study with Mr. Chang, Jiao Tong the method of Tong Fu Kung [virgin boy nei-kung]. For breathing it has been very beneficial to me, because in Tong Fu Kung you are, in fact, preserving your chi. If you practice hygiene in this way, it is of great benefit to both mind and body. There is nothing that is better than Tong Fu Kung. Today, there are many of my classmates and friends who, in studying Tong Fu Kung, have already achieved a very advanced spiritual level." translation by Shawn Eichman This nei kung method was also practiced by Sun, Lu-tang and other Pa Kua lineage holders.

It is interesting to note that when Sun, Xi Kun [a student of Cheng, Ting Hua's son Cheng, Ting Hai] wrote his book on Pa Kua Chang in 1934 he placed a picture of his Taoist nei kung instructor Chiao, Bi Zi at the front of the book. The book is a clear attempt to connect Pa Kua to religious Taoism. Sun says, "The practice of the Tao is closely linked with martial arts and medicine. Meditation is inner, martial arts is outer, and medicine is to assist both." translation by Shawn Eichman

The ancient masters successfully married the martial, or military, with the Taoist inner cultivation practices to create truly unique arts. The links to different types of Taoist meditation in each art are clear. These breakthroughs in the early Ching dynasty period were preparation for what as to come in the next two hundred years. This was a fascinating time in the development of Chinese martial arts. Each of these martial arts of the nei jia, or internal school, have very different looking forms yet they work with many of the same principles. They all use the tendon stretch that is common to the ancient Dao Yin [taoist yoga] exercises. This allows the practitioner to "dredge the channels" and make the chi flow. The practitioners trained in order to fight but they achieved robust health in the process.

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