The classic BBC TV series, Way of the Warrior’s episode on Shorinji Kempo just appeared online, and it still holds up today.
The BBC seem to have complete access to the style to film this, which at the time they say had a million followers and was floating on that ‘cult’ borderline, and it’s a fascinating glimpse into the past. Shōrin-ji kempō means something like Shaolin Temple Fist Way, and was established in 1947 by Doshin So after his time as a spy in China, where he supposedly trained at the Shaolin Temple. I think, as the documentary makes out, that his main form of training at the Shaolin Temple consisted of looking at the famous painting (which is not that old at all) of Chinese and Indian monks fighting. Like all Kempo styles his art is probably an eclectic mix of all sorts of different martial arts he trained in. However, he appears to have used that painting as the inspiration for his whole martial art! The Shaolin origins made a great backstory, anyway.
The mural painting from the Shaolin Temple.
While this is only one type of Kempo from Japan, you can see a lot of the elements we talked about in our Heretics Podcast, History of Kempo and Jiujitsu episodes, that seem to be recurring themes:
The blending of marital arts and religion (in this case Buddhism)
Far right political views
A sense of freedom in where you get techniques from (absorb what is useful)
Helping fight crime as a kind of unofficial police force
A lot of sparring!
What is also interesting is that the film shows the widespread use of the original Shorinji Kempo logo – the Swastica – that they replaced for all branches in 2005 with the so-en (double circle).
The world is full, or so it seems, of marital artists trying to fix Aikido by making it more practical/better/not as weird. I’m proud to say that my Xing Yi teacher, Damon Smith, (who studied Aikido himself for years) is joining the fray with a new podcast called (wait for it) Fixing Aikido! It’s a podcast where Damon gets together with another friend of ours, Tammo Trantow who is a highly ranked Aikidoka from Austria, and they set about the enormous task of, well, fixing Aikido and creating an Aikido 2.0.
Will it work? Is it a fruitless task? Even if you don’t practice Aikido, or you don’t think it needs “fixing”, it’s quite an entertaining podcast so give it a listen!
Oh, and while you’re here, you can also listen to the now infamous and highly controversial episode of our Heretics podcast that possibly inspired the whole venture. Aikido Heresies
Our new podcast is out! I talk warriorship with the esteemed Matthew Kreuger of the Walking with the Tengu podcast, as part of the #warriorshipconversing project started by Kung Fu Conversations podcast. We also talk about Shuai Jiao, Iaido, BJJ and professional wrestling. You’ll find us on iTunes and Spotify. Search for The Tai Chi Notebook podcast. Enjoy!
Somebody posted a quote by (founder of Yi Quan) Wang Xiang Zhai from his 1940s interview containing his thoughts on Tai Chi. It is pretty clear, unambiguous and to the point. Have a read:
Wang Xiang Zhai on Taijiquan (from an early 1940’s interview):As masters of the original Taijiquan, I should recommend the Yang brothers Shouhou and Chengfu. They are my friends, and I know that their Taiji has some knowledge of mechanics. But out of one hundred students, not even one gains its essence…and even then, it is still one-sided, because the skills of intuitive perception died out a long time ago. Originally, Taiji consisted of three fists, Wang Zongyue changed it into thirteen postures, and it was later embellished into as much as one hundred and fifty postures. This is the cause of the distortion.Sticking to mechanical movements, seeking beautiful postures and mistaking it for the glory of martial arts…that is terrible. Such a person cannot comprehend boxing for life. If a man of insight sees such a performance, he will feel sick for ten days.As a means of health preservation, Taijiquan restrains the spirit, and brings discomfort to its practitioner. For combat, it harms the practitioner’s limbs and trunk, and causes a useful body to become a mechanical and stiff thing…it’s nothing more than a waste of time.As for the training method—a punch with the fist here, a slap with the palm there, a kick to the left, and another one to the right—it is pitiful and laughable.As for dealing with an enemy in a fight: please do not even consider it. So ruined is this boxing that it has become useless. There are many more things, but I feel embarrassed to say them.
He doesn’t think much of Tai Chi, but there are some things to consider.
Wang was building a brand – Yi Quan – in a commercial setting. Setting out how you are different to/better than your competition is the first stage of building a brand.
2. This “three old fists” idea of history I don’t put much stock in. I think it’s a reference to the three old fists of Xin Yi (info on Jarek’s website), which he is therefore assuming as the origin of Tai Chi Chuan, but there’s not much of a link there that I can see. Or if there is, it’s very tenuous.
3. I think he’s criticising the Tai Chi training method, more than the art. He seems to hold the Yang brothers in high regard, but it’s their students and training methods he thinks are flawed. Wang was never a fan of forms training.
4. I think we need to consider what was happening in China in 1940. China has never (and still doesn’t) had a free press. If this was published it would conform to the political direction of the day.
From Wikipedia:
“In 1940, the Japanese set up the collaborationistWang Jingwei regime, with its capital in Nanking, which proclaimed itself the legitimate “Republic of China” in opposition to Chiang Kai-shek’s government, although its claims were significantly hampered due to its being a puppet state controlling limited amounts of territory.
The United Front between the Kuomintang and the CCP had salutary effects for the beleaguered CCP, despite Japan’s steady territorial gains in northern China, the coastal regions and the rich Yangtze River Valley in central China. After 1940, conflicts between the Kuomintang and Communists became more frequent in the areas not under Japanese control. The Communists expanded their influence wherever opportunities presented themselves through mass organizations, administrative reforms and the land- and tax-reform measures favoring the peasants and, the spread of their organizational network, while the Kuomintang attempted to neutralize the spread of Communist influence. Meanwhile, northern China was infiltrated politically by Japanese politicians in Manchukuo using facilities such as the Wei Huang Gong.”
So while all this conflict with Japan is going on I think the general trend is towards westernising and modernising China, leaving behind the older traditions that had held China back. This interview – looking towards newer scientific methods of martial arts – is in keeping with that trend. Japan was also very into adopting western military methods and building an empire, like the British had.
5. Both Yang Shao-Hou and Yang Cheng-Fu died in 1936, yet Wang is talking about them as if they are still alive in the 1940s, so something doesn’t add up. This interview is either doctored, or was done a long time before it was published in the 1940s.
6. You can get a better idea of his larger themes by reading the whole interview.
What is Shamanism? And how does it relate to martial arts? In this episode I catch up with my old, friend and teacher Damon Smith to answer some of these questions.
Damon is an incredibly experienced martial artist with a background in various Japanese and Chinese arts including Karate, Kempo, Xing Yi, Baji and Choy Lee Fut. And those are just a few of the arts he’s pursued to a very high level.
But despite being a great martial artist Damon’s true love has always been Shamanism.
And while he’s no stranger to banging a drum, Damon’s shamanism is not the hippy dippy sort of practice you might associate shamans with, instead it’s a very down to earth and practical art, much like the martial arts he does.
In this episode we talk about the link between martial arts and shamanism, and where the crossovers lie.
There’s a new episode of the Heretics podcast out. In this chat, Damon and I discuss Shuai Jiao, the popular modern Chinese wrestling style and try and separate fact from fiction. We discuss what martial arts it is related to and also if there is a connection to Japanese Kempo.
The best thing about this episode is that Damon talks a lot about Chinese cosmology, and how it may related to an earlier form of Chinese wrestling – we look at the cosmological concept of Qinglong, or the Azure Dragon.
The Azure Dragon on the national flag of China during the Qing dynasty, 1889-1912:
I really enjoyed watching the judo at this year’s Olympics. I thought the technical level on display was simply electrifying, which is why I find it odd that people sometimes refer to judo as dumbed-down jujutsu.
I’m a practitioner of Brazilian jiujitsu (which could be described as an offshoot of judo), and I’ve only ever dabbled in a few classes on Japanese jujutsu, so I’d hardly call myself an expert on it. However, from my experience, and what I’ve seen I’m going to make a bold and possibly controversial statement: Judo is more sophisticated than Japanese Jujutsu.
The question is what do I mean by ‘sophisticated’. I certainly don’t mean that there are a greater number or variety of techniques. There is certainly more content in the old jujutsu systems than there is in judo.
Kano created Judo by removing a lot of content from the Jujutsu systems he started learning in 1877, and changing the emphasis from performing kata and drilling applications to randori – free practice. There is also a big emphasis on competition in Judo. Strikes and weapon defence were originally part of Judo, but only in pre-arranged kata and are not included in competition and over time they have receded into the background. Most Judo clubs these days don’t even include the original kata or self defence techniques and simply train for competition.
Broadly speaking, the content Kano removed were the things that couldn’t be practiced safely in randori – throws that landed the opponent on their head, for example, or the sort of techniques that were designed for the battlefield and therefore irrelevant to civilian life. The change resulted in judo becoming the prominent style of jujutsu in Japan and internationally. The key to judo’s effectiveness was this switch in emphasis to randori. By trying to get the same moves to work over and over on resisting opponents, the technical level of the practitioner naturally rises. If you’re going to hip throw somebody in a setting where they know you’re going to try to hip throw them, then your setups for the technique have to evolve and get better. You cannot simply step in and expect your hip throw to work. You’re going to have to improve your ability to fake, shift weight, take balance and finish the techniques massively. This process produces a much more sophisticated level of technique.
Judo is therefore not “dumbed-down” jujutsu – it’s highly evolved jujitsu. To my eyes at least.
We talked a lot about Kano and the creation of Judo in our Heretics Podcast on the history of Kempo and Jiujitsu in Japan.
An interesting video has surfaced that links the guard postures used in Shuai Jiao (Chinese Wrestling) with postures in various Chinese martial arts. The premise of the video is that Shuai Jiao is the root of all the Chinese martial styles. The text accompanying the video says:
“Guards in traditional Chinese wrestling are meant to favor certain fighting techniques and strategies. Since Shuai Jiao is very ancient and there are precise references in these guards to the styles that exist today, traditional wrestling is at the roots of Chinese styles. My Master Yuan Zumou has clearly stated this for over thirty years. In Shuai Jiao these attitudes are not aesthetic, but are used in real combat. I have put the captions of the styles I know or of those that maestro Li Baoru (Beijing, late 80s) mentions in the video.”
It’s an interesting theory, but unfortunately I can’t agree with such a blanket statement as “traditional wrestling is at the roots of Chinese styles“. Was it a strong influence on all Chinese styles? Yes, of course. But calling it the root of all styles is a bit strong for me. Some styles developed entirely from military practices, and a lot of styles have no wrestling component at all, or have their roots in weapons usage.
I can certainly see postures in the video that resemble Tai Chi – particularly the “White Stork Cools Wings” posture and another guard that looks a little like the “Wave Hands Like Clouds”. But we only have two arms and two legs – inevitably there are going to be similarities between postures found in different martial arts. That alone doesn’t confirm a genuine historial link. Influences betweewn marital arts can flow in both directions, too. So it’s quite possible that wrestling has been influenced by local village styles. And even things that are not necessarily combat arts, like xìqǔ, can have an influence on them.
I’d also have to take issue with the statement that “In Shuai Jiao these attitudes are not aesthetic, but are used in real combat.” Let’s not even get into the idea of what “real combat” is (Shuai Jiao matches have rules, after all) but it’s a simple fact that Shuai Jiao was enjoyed in the royal court in the Ching Dynasty (and probably all the dynasties before it) as a kind of entertainment for the nobles. The same thing happened in the Japanese royal court with Sumo, just as medieval kings in Europe enjoyed watching martial games like jousting and fencing. And obviously wrestling is still enjoyed as a kind of popular entertainment in America and Mexico today.
But let’s turn our attention to the contend of the video. A lot of the guards being demonstrated look quite showy to me – as if they were designed to impress an audience, particularly the Wave Hands Like Clouds style guard, where the practitioner seems to deliberately trip over his own legs.
But I don’t think that’s a bad thing. Ever since modern Wu Shu put the emphasis on gymnastic ability over practicality, people have been searching for this false dichotomy between performance and practicality in historical martial arts, too. It’s almost like a real martial art isn’t allowed to have any ‘fun’ aspects to it. In reality, and with several historical examples, a martial art can be both a serious, practical tool for combat, and something that can be performed for social, entertainment and cultural reasons all at the same time.
Choy Li Fut schools often perform lion dance, and that doesn’t mean their kung fu won’t work in a fight. Similarly, I would contend that Shuai Jiao can be used as a form of entertainment and a practical method of self defence. Just like almost all Chinese martial arts can.
I made a special guest star appearence on the Woven Energy podcast last week to join Damon Smith for a chat about Reiki and suicide monks.
Continuing our examination of the spiritual traditions that gave rise to modern Reiki, this episode looks at the Buddhist tradition of Mount Kurama. The tradition of Mount Kurama is one with strong shamanic undertones, and is one of the two primary lines of Buddhism that influenced Usui. We also talk about the related suicide cult of Kiyomizu-dera in Kyoto.
Woven Energy
A bit of an odd subject, and not something I know a lot about, but I the episode was really about how organised religions can convince people to do some very wacky stuff, which is more my bag.
This is a fascinating talk between Drs Jared Miracle and Paul Bowman on martial arts. There’s a little section from 31.20 onwards where they get into the miasma that surrounds martial arts and how it can be manipulated for nation building and national identity. the example given is Tae Kwan Do and its need to be ancient. But they go on to talk about how, on a personal level, we often have an idea about what we are doing when we do martial arts that doesn’t necessarily match what we are actually doing or getting out of the martial art we practice.
The Tai Chi Notebook 