Martial Arts in the World

There are numerous accounts and legends of the origins and history of the Shaolin Temple. In my humble opinion this is the story of Shaolin. Most likely you learned of the Shaolin Temple through the Chop Sokey Kung Fu movies and the Kung Fu TV series of the 70’s. Some of what you watch was true, yet some of the story lines are fictional. There were indeed 36 Chambers that a monk would have to successfully complete before exiting the temple and graduating. In the Kung Fu TV movie and series young Cain picked up the burning urn between his forearms to engrave the tiger and dragon. In reality that scene is authentic, however in actuality the engravings on the forearms were both dragons. The legendary Shaolin Temple (Sil Lum in Cantonese) was also known as the “Number One Temple under Heaven” due of those incredible fighting monks. The Chinese characters for Shaolin translate to “Youthful Forrest” or “Youthful Gathering.” Shaolin is the mother of all Asian martial arts (Karate, Tae Kwon Do, Jiu Jitsu, etc.). Kung Fu went from mainland China to the island of Okinawa and later to Japan in the early 1900’s. They called it “karate” which originally translated to “Chinese hands.” Shaolin is translated to the Japanese language as Shorin-ji. Shorin-ji Karate came from Shaolin Kung Fu. The Indian monk Bodhidharma also known as Damo traveled to the Shaolin Temple taught the monks internal exercises for health, yet he was not the originator of Shaolin Kung Fu. Thousands of years before Damo’s visit there were already fighting arts in China. Shaolin is part of the rich history of China.

The Shaolin Temple was a place where numerous martial artists including fugitives hiding from the authorities, met and shared their martial arts systems. This was a place where different styles and weapons were put to the test before they went out to do battle. You can say that Shaolin was the first mixed martial arts arena. The Northern Shaolin Temple was burned in approximately the 1750’s AD. According to Chinese legends, a monk by the name of Gee Seen survived the burning and traveled to Southern China to become the Abbot of the Southern Shaolin Temple. Gee Seen used the Southern Temple as an underground training center to overthrow the Ching Dynasty and restore the Chinese ran Ming Dynasty. Numerous other styles of Kung Fu originated in the Southern Shaolin Temple including Hung Gar which I’m a Master of and Wing Chung popularized by Bruce Lee. There are five family styles that came from the Southern Shaolin Temple they are Hung, Lau, Choy, Li and Mok. These family kung fu systems continued the Shaolin tradition as rebels fighting the Ching Dynasty. The Southern Shaolin Temple taught the monks the 5 Animal styles of fighting. These movements were developed by monks carefully observing and imitating the moves of the Tiger, Crane, Snake, Leopard and the mythical Dragon. From the Tiger we learn tenacity and acquire power. From the Crane we learn to evade and strike vital points. From the Dragon we get wisdom. From the Snake we learn patience and flexibility. From the Leopard we attain speed and power.

You can classify Kung Fu styles into four major categories: Southern, Northern, and External (hard) and Internal (soft). Southern Shaolin is a southern external style. A southern school is known for low stances, kicks below the waist and fast and powerful overwhelming hands. It is an external style which emphases mostly on power. The Chinese have a saying “Southern Fist/Northern Kicks” which means that in the south they use their hands more and in the northern part of China they use their kicks. Much of this has to do with the terrain and their size and built of the people in the two geographic. In Southern China the people tend to be shorter and stockier. In Northern China they tend to be taller and more slender. Due to the Northern terrain, mountains and open land they walk and ride horses. They favor high kicks and acrobatic movements; where as Southern China’s terrain is agricultural wet land which produces rice and waterways which people live near. Due to the southern life style and terrain they make use of their arms more than their legs. Fighting in wet land or in a boat made it difficult to make large movements and kick high. The low Southern horse stance, for training balance and stability, was developed by the southern kung fu warrior.

Today Southern Shaolin schools teach numerous traditional Chinese weapons of war. Yet, in the Shaolin Temple no blades were allowed. Only non-bladed weapons were allowed through the gates of the temple. Monks were known for their great skills with their walking sticks, or as we call them today the staff. Many define Kung Fu as a pretty, soft, circular, acrobatic, jumping, high kicking art that looks good in tournaments and in movies. The Chinese call this “flowery kung fu” which means that it’s pretty yet it has no defensive value in the streets. A true Southern Shaolin school will teach you an art that was used for war. You will learn to use every move in a form to defend yourself. A Southern Shaolin fighter will attack his opponent violently with tiger claws and crane beaks to the eyes, elbows, tearing grabs, knees, kicks to the knees and groin, Chin Na (joint locks), sweeps, throws, take downs and ground fighting. Southern Shaolin Kung Fu if handed down and taught traditionally, is not a sport but a reality based street self defense. In the end the only trophy that those fighting monks of Shaolin could win in ancient China was their life

The Shaolin Temple may have sidestepped a challenge to Chinese kungfu, but another prominent school has stepped in to pick up the gauntlet.

Five famous professional Thai Boxers offered a challenge, claiming that they wanted to "wipe out the Shaolin Temple".

"Shaolin kungfu is a lie by these monks to Chinese Buddhists, and Chinese kungfu is nothing compared with ours," said one of the five Thai boxers who is ready to take on masters from the famous temple.

"If they accept our challenge, we'll win 5 to 0."

But Shaolin responded by saying the provocative words were "ridiculous", refusing to reply to the "secular challenge".

Zheng Shumin from Shaolin Temple said the temple is a holy Buddhist place where monks' primary concern is Zen practice and they would not get into contests with secular people.

"We receive so many challenges like this every year, we just don't want to reply," Zheng said. "We think this is hype from the Thai boxers and the organizers of the competition."

"In the history of Shaolin Temple, we never challenge or agree to fight others," said Zheng.

However, followers of Emei kungfu, another important school of martial arts in China, considers this a challenge that "any kungfu practitioner with a sense of justice should face."

Wang Jian, director of the Emei Martial Arts Association, and his senior disciple Huang Lin, entered the contest "to let the Thai boxers know that Chinese kungfu is never easy to beat."

"I couldn't bear it anymore ... after the public and all my fellow disciples urged me to show them real Chinese kungfu," Wang said.

"This is not only disrespectful to Chinese kungfu, it is also disrespectful to our nation," said Zhang Ji from Emei Martial Arts Association.

"As disciples of kungfu, whether from Shaolin, Emei, Wudang, or anywhere else, we should stand up to such defiance," he said.

The five boxers from Thailand will be in China for the contest on Dec 19 in Foshan, Guangdong province, the hometown of late action star Bruce Lee.

China plans to give a large-scale facelift to the Shaolin Temple area in central Henan Province, where the renowned Shaolin kung fu (martial art) originated.

More than 1,000 enterprises, martial art schools, shops and households covering some 300,000 square meters are scheduled to be moved away from eight sightseeing areas in the city of Dengfeng, Henan, according to Jin Yindong, head of the city's cultural heritage administration.

Archeological experts will also repair and renovate the dagobas of the 1,500-year-old Shaolin Temple in the city.

The project, set to be completed by the end of this year, is aimed at clearing away constructions that diminish the image of the eight ancient cultural heritage areas.

Three of them, including the Shaolin dagobas and Songyang Academy -- one of the four most important schools in ancient China, are vying for the World Heritage status.

The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization has granted the status to 35 sites in China, including the Great Wall, the Forbidden City in Beijing, the 2,200-year-old terracotta warriors in the northwestern city of Xi'an, and the newly-added Diaolou watchtowers in Guangdong Province.

Local authorities are busy preparing a detailed plan of the project and compensation measures for the businesses and people to be relocated.

Dengfeng, China's best-known home of martial arts, also boasts 16 cultural relics under the state protection list.

The Shaolin Temple was built in 495 A.D on the Songshan mountain in the province of Henan. The Songshan mountain is located in the centre of a group of five Holy Mountains, which are: Tai, Hua, Heng, Heng (in a different way of writing) and the mountain Song. The Shaolin Temple was built at the foot of the Five Breast Peak (Wu Ru Feng) in the middle of a young forest. It is in Chinese referred to as “Shoa Lin Si”. That is were the name originated from, since “Shao” stands for “young”, “Lin” is translated as “forest or wood” and “Si” means temple.

The Shaolin temple was established by a monk from India, named Ba Tuo, who received the order of the emperor Xiao Wen of the Northern Wei dynasty (386- 534 A.D). The monks who inhabited the Shoalin Temple followed a simple life with farming, philosophy, literature and meditation as the basics of their lifestyle and tolerance, non-violence, honour and humility as their ethical foundations.

According to the Chinese history, in 527 A.D., an Indian Buddhist, also known by the names of Ta Mo, Da Mo, Dharma or Bodhidarma, travelled into China with the goal of spreading the Buddhist philosophy and to see the Emperor. At that time, local Buddhist monks had just started to translate Buddhist texts from Sankrit into Chinese, with the intention of making the religion more accessible to the population. Ta Mo travelled to one of the Buddhist temples to meet the monks. But when he arrived at the temple, he was not allowed to enter. Therefore, he went to a nearby cave and meditated for the next nine years until the monks recognized his religious dedication and accepted him. According to the legend, by meditating for so many years, his constant gaze bored a hole in the wall of the cave where he used to meditate and his shadow was reflected on a stone, which unfortunately, was destroyed during the war.

When Ta Mo arrived to the Shaolin Temple, he found the monks in a rather bad physical condition as a result of inactivity and constantly seated position. The lack of activity had made them weak and vulnerable. Therefore, Ta Mo spend several years in the temple in order to strengthen the monks physically and mentally. He introduced the Chinese boxing, better known as Kung fu or Wushu, he spread the Buddhist theory of Chan and was responsible for the development of the 18 boxing techniques of Shaolin, which are also known as the 18 Hand Movements of the Enlightened One.

As a civil war broke out during the Tang Dynasty (618-906 A.D.), the peace and tranquillity came to an end. The monks blended Ta Mo’s exercises and with local self-defence techniques, which resulted in the creation of the style known as Lo Han. In 621 A.D. the monks fought their first battle with good results. A stone which is still at display at the temple shows the 13 Shaolin monks. After this, the monks were recognized for their remarkable and superior fighting skills and the term ‘fighting monk” was born. From that moment on, Shaolin was allowed to have soldier-monks. The rumour had it that one Shaolin monk equalled 1,000 soldiers. The Shaolin temple gained a very good reputation in China and was highly respected.

During the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644 A.D.) the Shaolin Temples grew into well-recognized centres of philosophy, history, mathematics, material arts and poetry. They housed over 1,000 soldier-monks, who were often used by the government to combat rebellions. There was a lot of exchange of knowledge with travelling monks, warriors, healers, teachers and so on. In 1522 Zhue Yuen joined the Shaolin temple and introduced Li Sou and Bai Yu Feng, who were both famous martial arts practioners themselves. Together they developed the five Animal Styles. During the Qing dynasty (1644-1911 A.D.), martial arts were forbidden and even under the protection of the Shaolin monks, Shaolin was seriously damaged by fire for a number of times. The fire that was set by the army of Shi Yousan in 1928, destroyed most of the buildings of Shaolin Temple, to be rebuilt later.

The Boxer rebellion in 1901 was actually the beginning of the ending of the Shaolin Temples. In the late 1800s, China had been occupied by Western and Japanese governments for business interests. The long hostility between Japan and China worsened and extended to include all foreign forces as well. As a result, a Nationalist movement was born. The front line soldiers of the new order were legendary material arts practioners (of which many came from Shaolin) better known as the Boxers. Their initial assaults on occupying governments were not successful and led to a more modern reformation that included adopting modern weapons and tactics.