Originally Posted by
Judge Pen
I understand both sides of this issue. I loved the Hua material when I learned it, and my teacher really went into a lot of detail on the instruction and application. Essentially, I focused on the 4 roads of hua, almost exclusively, for over 4 years. So I feel better about applying this material than I do some other stuff that was taught but not in a great deal of detail. Having said that, you can't ignore the "lost in translation" argument if that material was pilfered and taught from a book. Even if a thoughtful and talented instructor is able to fill in the blanks based upon his own independent research and training to make this material very relevant and applicable (which is how I felt about my instruction) then the material is now different than traditional hua. Even if it has substantially the same form and flavor, it is now unique. Not bad, but different.