Mantis vs. Bajiquan

[phantom]

In the new issue of Inside Kung fu, it has an article on Bajiquan, which it says is well-known for its ability to kill with one blow. It says that a six harmony praying mantis master ridiculed a Bajiquan master, saying that it takes too long to master. The Bajiquan master then killed the mantis practitioner with one blow. Do you guys think that there is any way that a mantis practitioner could survive a fight with a Bajiquan stylist? Thank you in advance.

[Mojo]

Since any Bajiquan master can kill any Mantis master the only way a Mantis master could survive would be to run away and hide from the Baji master !
It is so obvious I'm suprised you asked.

[RAF]

Come on!

The style is less important than the degree of mastery. The article was using it simply as a point of illustration. The late Liu Yun-Qiao was indeed a master of baji/pigua and went on to master the 6 harmony system.

Within the Wutan system as developed by GM Liu Yun-Qiao, every serious practitioner (disciple) also learned a great deal of praying mantis from Master Su Yu Chang.

To quote GM Liu regarding Northern Chinese Martial Arts: "They are all sons of the same mother!" It is my understanding that the 8 Step praying mantis system employs techniques from both Xing Yi and bagua. The most likely case is that the practitioner makes the system rather than the system making the practitioner.

[Brad]

Hey Phantom,

It's most likely just a silly legend made up by some Baji guy who was a little overenthusiastic about his style ;) Anyway, it seems a great deal of Baji guys learned mantis also. How could they learn mantis if they keep killing off every mantis guy they fight? And why learn the style of someone you could kill with one blow!? :rolleyes:

[baji-fist]

Brad,

When I wrote that article, I did not intend to offend any mantis practioners by that remark, I too practice mantis. Like RAF said, the point of the story was to illustrate the power that can be developed with serious practice in Baji. But I do not want to imply that Bajiquan is a superior art, only that Li Shu Wen was a great practioner of the style. The style is not what matters, rather the hard work a practitioner puts into training. Also like RAF said, GM Liu Yun Qiao later on studied under Master Ding the Six Harmony style Mantis. We are all brothers in the arena of Chinese Martial Arts and I am sorry if anybody took offense to that portion of the article. My apologies.

You must eat bitter before you can taste sweet

[RAF]

Factually it is true that Li Su Wen was never defeated. The local records of China were cross checked and his defeat was never recorded. His students were all head bodyguards for Pu Yi, Mao Zedong, and Chang Kai Shek. Few if any ever reach the level of Li Su Wen, and again, simply because someone is learning baji does not make them invincible: Students should not live in the legends of masters or their style. When you are defeated, you will blame the style instead of looking at your own deficiencies.

Liu Yun Qiao, at age 20 or so, challenged the 6 harmony master who was forty at the time. The Liuhe tanglang master neutralized Liu 3 times. Liu thought the softness was a sign of weakness (remember he is 20, trained 10 years with Li Su Wen and was probably quite cocky). The General he was staying with, Zhang Xiang Wu, laughed when he heard the story. Liu wanted to master the 6 harmony mantis so the General made arrangements and he was accepted into the lineage---the picture is on the Toronto website. Actually the Li Su Wen, General Zhang Xiang Wu, Warlord General Li Jing Lin were in association and were good friends with the 6 Harmony praying mantis master. The Illya Traditional Praying Mantis website records this.

http://www.bajimen.com/

Guo Bao Lo's article is really quite good and I hope we don't get hung up on that minor point and miss the major points of the article. If you are interested in baji, it is very open now and you can learn at a number of places. I really hope that we do not deteriorate into my style is better than your style. Styles fit practitioners. Grandmaster Liu's intention was to create an organization which would serve as the altar upon which all of the traditional martial arts could be preserved for future generations (Wu Tan(g) = altar). Praying Mantis is included among those styles.

Simply because Li Su Wen was undefeated does not make his students invincible. If you read Guo Bao Lo's article you will learn that it takes many years of very hard practice to reach high levels of baji. Many hours of stance work with 8 breaths and big spear training, 300 thrusts a day, two man fighting etc. A lot of guys try it but find out that it does not fit their training and lifestyle needs. 6 Harmony praying mantis also has many difficult training exercises and conditions that take years to master and develop. They are both great styles.

In the end, it was reported that Li Su Wen was poisoned by either students or a friend because he was feared so greatly. Not a nice way to go!

[word]

Phantom be showin up askin his usually stupid as5 questions man tird of this, chi this, chi that, death touch gets 10000 views, which style is best, is _______ better than ______, bruce lees one in punch, what style teahes the one inch puch, what style is most effective, blah blah, hung gar is powerful but i don know if it's effective? b/s

[phantom]

I honestly do not remember ever putting down hung gar. Could you please show me the thread I said that? I asked about death touch because John Painter wrote an article claiming that it was witch craft and voodoo, which is against my religion. I am not fascinated with the one-inch puch, I just wanted to understand the basic principles behind it, since it is a part of styles that i am interested in. As for this thread, I was just trying to get to the bottom of the truth. I get a little suspicious when someone makes references to a style being superior to another, and I am glad to see that the truth was made clear to me. I greatly appreciate everyone else's replies to this thread. Peace. :D Btw, word, I am sick of seeing 95% of your threads, which are simply "Wing Lam, Brendan Lai, or some other sifu sucks" or " style a,b, and c suck." Real enlightening let me tell ya

[word]

phantom it's jut not you, it's people likeyou on this board, go check the kung fu form everyday you will see a bunch of new posts taht ask the same stuff , thats' what i'm saying, and if someone wrote an article about one style being better than another, who cares! use your common sense, and for that fact, phatom, all these questions are pointless if you dont train, so why dont you train first and ask questions later, and once you train , with someone good, yu will see that all of the questions on this board are wack and jus sad, lame etc etc

[word]

and it's almost pointless to argue aout kungfu over the internet wihtout being there in person to touch hands and show each othr applications,t hats' what it comes down to AND it gets worse when idiotsthat dont know anything or train san soo try to argue , and peopl tat dont know anything like YOU try to argue but youcan only argue so much and se so much if you're not good, so its' pointless, i can brin up stuff about sentivtiy and people on tis board can try to think about what im sayin but because thy never trained w/ someoen good, they actually DONT know what i'm saying, and that makes their argument invalid.

[Brad]

I just think Phantom needs to think things through a little more sometimes before posting. I actualy haven't seen the article yet. It's just that the way phantom posted made it sound like the article was more of a My Style is Best! type of article.

Word,
At least Phantom is trying to learn, and that's the whole point of this forum. Insulting people contributes absolutely nothing. If you are sick of stupid questions then try to educate everyone. By the way, is English your first language? just curious.

[Ling Qiaozhi]

Hi I just want say that I am new to this forum and I like to say that I have been studying tonglong pai for close to 25 yrs and also study snake and dragon boxing and I have to say that i love shaolin arts I have never really paid any attention to the internal arts until I was introduced to bagua and I like to say that it is a pretty lethal system but very hard to master because the advance use of chi, my sifu have demonstrated one hit blows on canvas bag and literally put a hole thru the bag in which made me interested the system in which i still practice to this day don't get me wrong i still practice preying mantis and I love mantis bagua is on another level of thinking and I think that is the reason why it is not popular but thank you for allowing me to post my letter on this board P.S. I have also studied seven star mantis also :)