Asian Fighting Arts

This is a summary of the Asian fighting arts of China, Korea, Okinawa, and Japan through their basic history, philosophy and terminology used in class.

The fighting arts are as old as man himself and as varied as his languages. In Asia they developed to a degree of effectiveness probably unsurpassed elsewhere in the world.

China
China is a vast country inhabited by many and diverse people with a long history. Boxing is a part of this country and a part of these people. At first boxing began as a rugged form of personal combat, although it also provided beneficial exercises. In time, however, this form of fighting became influenced by Taoist meditative-respiratory techniques, which were initially practiced for health purposes, but later came to have a fighting application and subsequently were modified by Buddhism. These external and internal forms have come down to the present as Chinese boxing.

The term for Chinese Boxing is Chung-Kuo Chu'an (Chung-Kuo means Chinese and Chu'an means fist). The term Kung-Fu, much used in the West, is not a system of boxing, but rather the term may mean task or work performed, etc. and is a generic term for exercises. The term for martial arts is Wu-Shu.

To speak of Chinese boxers is to speak of wrestlers and weapons adepts as well, for if the master boxer was not a complete combat expert, he would come out poorly in a challenge that specified a weapon or method which was not his specialty. Chinese boxing has a myriad of methods and schools. All teach that the user's technique becomes a reflex action. The methods are either internal (essentially soft) or external (hard and rigorous), and many are a combination of the two. The external system stresses the regulation of breath, training of bones and muscles, ability to advance and retreat, and unity of hard and soft. Shaolin Ch'uan, Chung Ch'uan and Kenpo are but a few examples of the external system.

The internal system stresses training of bones and muscles, subduing the offensive by stillness, exercise of Chi-Kung, and has the aim of defeating an enemy at the instant he is attacked. Tai Chi Ch'uan exemplifies the intenal art better than any other active system of Chinese boxing. Some other are Hsing-I boxing and Pa-Kua boxing. Chinese wrestling is called Shuai-Chiao and the art of seizing is called Chin-Na. China greatly influenced the martial arts of Korea, Okinawa, and Japan as it spread out from the mainland.

History Page 2