suckful? man, that sounds like a subtitle!
cl: No disrespect to Sifu Meng or GM Gee, but lately, some of the HFY stuff has been pretty undecipherable by the general public. I don't think BL is alone in her comment on your post. I konw you guys are on to something, but you should be very careful when you mix 'science' and 'chan.' That concoction often results in nazism. Where do you think Hitler got his swastika? It's all in the jargon.
bl: All martial artists DO NOT have to confront spirituality. All should do so, but most can be content with less. That is acceptable too. I think to reach the high levels, you must grapple with it, but how many of us really, REALLY, reach high levels?
s: Your 3 'ifs' are contradictory.
kl: What's in a name indeed. We might as well be asking, "what's true?"
objectives and contradictions
Thanks KL, I'm glad I'm not the only one who noticed the 1, 2 & 3 problem.
The objective argument is interesting. What is the objective of Shaolin? I'm sure our detractors would say commercialism, then we'd all be Shaolin (except for those unknown Mr. Miyage types who work as sups for low rent apartments). The monks would probably say it's about Chan. But then, if you study Chan, one of the main tenets is not to be possessive of the teachings, so in a sense, that renders this whole discussion as not being Shaolin. Why would you want to define the teachings in such a way to exclude potential sangha? That's the problem with thinking too hard on this stuff, you'll end up in mind traps. That's why Chan has koans (or kung-ans in Chinese).