Question or 3 for HFY players

[Fresh]

Originally posted by Savi

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A requirement of the system? I personally have never called it that... Well let me put it this way. Hung Fa Yi, as with all Shaoiln arts, consists of the 3 treasures of the Shaolin Temple: Combat, health and philosophy.

If you, or any practitioner really, is searching for a full understanding of HFY, or any shaolin art, you have to dive deeply into these 3 areas. If only for one or the other, maybe two out of the three, that is the choice of the practitioner. It depends on where your finger is pointing (the moon?)! To become an HFY teacher, most definitely YES! But not just reading, I'm sure in your question you meant practicing Chan. Chan is the overriding philosophy of the HFY. If you are only interested in fighting and nothing more it is certainly possible to train the HFY, but not understand it.

It sounds like you have to be a Buddhist to really understand HFY. You said philosophy but it seems like more people practice it as a religion instead of just philosophy.

So would someone have to change their religion to become a HFY teacher or really understand it? Could a Muslim, a Jew or a Christian have a fare shot to become a teacher? How about a Taoist or a Confuscianist? Do some of the students feel pressured to convert to Buddhism? How many non Buddhists actually practice HFY, or does it mostly attract people who are Buddhist anyway? Seems like there a lot of implications in all of this.

[JK Walz]

Originally posted by Hendrik



How in the world one can practice Chan when one couldn't even get the a b c basic of Chan right?


It is more fun, positive, and happy to sing Kareoke.
Forget about Shao Lin and WCK, those are just suffering. LOL

Sing------
Amitaba Amitaba great great you all are right! so everyone is happy. LOL

Wow...Hendrick you sure are something! Thanks for enlightening us! A little cryptic critisism goes a long way when you are trying to baffle and belittle people.

At least this post of yours was a little more lucid than normal! Thanks for coming down from your perch on high and **almost** joining us lowly, swamp traversing, human beings in reality.

JK

[JK Walz]

Originally posted by Fresh


It sounds like you have to be a Buddhist to really understand HFY. You said philosophy but it seems like more people practice it as a religion instead of just philosophy.

So would someone have to change their religion to become a HFY teacher or really understand it? Could a Muslim, a Jew or a Christian have a fare shot to become a teacher? How about a Taoist or a Confuscianist? Do some of the students feel pressured to convert to Buddhism? How many non Buddhists actually practice HFY, or does it mostly attract people who are Buddhist anyway? Seems like there a lot of implications in all of this.

Don't read too much into the practice of the Chan philosophy. I admit to being very inexperienced and even naive on this subject but I will say that in my opinion you can apply Chan thinking and philosophy to any "religion", lack of religion, or way of life. At our school we have quite a few people in the HFY program who are Catholic, Mormon, Protestant, athiest, agnostic....so on and so forth. There is no pressure to "convert" since there really is nothing to convert to! There are no assigned religious texts to read, no rituals, no tithing, no secret Chan meetings, no nothing that you would find in a standard religion.

JK

[Hendrik]

Originally posted by JK Walz


Wow...Hendrick you sure are something! Thanks for enlightening us! A little cryptic critisism goes a long way when you are trying to baffle and belittle people.

At least this post of yours was a little more lucid than normal! Thanks for coming down from your perch on high and **almost** joining us lowly, swamp traversing, human beings in reality.

JK

JK,

I learn that from Hui Neng, the 6th patriach of Chan.
So do you still want to join Chan? LOL

[Savi]

Great insight! I think you pointed out an error I did not see, you will have to forgive me on that statement. I think I said that comment (about practicing/reading Chan) directly from my Buddhist nature (I should have restated that comment from a detached/neutral position). It certainly does not mean that anybody has to convert from their religion to understand HFY, just understand its perspective. From a Buddhist perspective (well, at least from my perspective), that understanding only comes from practicing HFY; actually doing it. The saying "Hau Chun San Sao" permeates the HFY. It means to learn first- face to face. Direct from the source. Then to gain a full understanding (100% - no less!) through the rest of the 5 (6 in Buddhism) senses. In other words, learn through experience and interaction with others. *So by default, if you are practicing HFY, and searching for that complete understanding (not yet attained, or even have attained for those at that level), you are in essence practicing Chan. But your religious disposition is yours alone. Not neccesary to violate that just as JK addressed.

It is near impossible to justify within yourself what you do in combat to somebody else if you do not understand the philosophy and nature of the system itself. You just won't understand (and "understand" is the key word) what, and why you did what you did when you did what you did. You may KNOW what you have done and how you did it, but I use that in the context of only surface understanding, not a complete/internal understanding. As in my understanding/contemplations going back into history, the Shaolin Temple nurtured those on the path of Chan Buddhism (perhaps only one faucet in the temple, I do not say exclusively!), so those teaching HFY should also be Buddhist. In that sense I could say your conclusion about Buddhist teachers would be correct in reference to the Shaolin monks... these are just my personal thoughts though on history. I'm not an authority on that.

Hendrik, thank you for the information, but are you respecting others' willingness to share their understanding of Chan? Are you sure your understanding is complete and realized? Would you mind clarifying if you consider your understanding to be universal or personal? And are you speaking from a neutral or personal disposition? I'd like to know!

[reneritchie]

This is not Hendrik being cryptic. This, good or bad, is just the way he is, all the time, on the 'net, on the phone, or in person. He is Fujianese of SEA birth, US education, Buddhist pursuit, hyperactive nature, and with children facinated by pokemon. He has rather strict beliefs on what is or is not appropriate in terms of talking about WCK ancestors or Buddhism (which he yells at me about all the time too), so part of his crypticism is just him trying to find nicer ways of telling people he thinks its disrespectful doing what they're doing (he may be wrong, but that's his opinion). He, self-admittedly, has a very hard time communicating, but he has a lot of interesting stuff to share (even if you have to drag it out of him). It may help to consider him something of a Koan. Or to sit him down, calm him down, and get some talking goin.

RR

[yenhoi]

Is HFY not taught in the US?

How would someone go about finding a HFY school or instructor in the US? (West coast?)

I havent done any research yet, starting here.

Thanks in advance.

[taltos]

In the Western US, there are two schools...

In California you have the Hung Fa Kwoon (the headquarters).
http://www.hungfayi.com

And in Arizona you have Meng's Martial Arts of Arizona
http://www.mengsofaz.com

There are other places in the US (Such as the VT Museum at http://www.vtmuseum.org), but the above are the only two in the Wild West.

Hope that helps!

-Levi

[reneritchie]

FWIW - I'm not aware of any branch of WCK that actively promotes a non-personal, non-face-to-face, learning environment (though I suppose anything's possible). My own sigung says you have to learn one on one, directly, and he'll sweat right along with you to do it, hands on, and very directly. I personally agree with this 100%, yet I still think its possible to share some over the various communications mediums. With HFY, however, and the proposal that, unlike the major branches of WCK, it is not personal expression, but science, it should be easier to disseminate non-locally.

BTW- How does this attitude of face-to-face translate to many HFY students living so far away from Gee sifu? Do you notice any difference between the SF students, who have Gee sifu all the time, and the further afield ones?

RR

[teazer]

It may help to consider him something of a Koan. RR

"what is the sound of one hand slapping Hendrik?"

[reneritchie]

> "what is the sound of one hand slapping Hendrik?"

Dunno. His WCK is pretty good, he can generate some scary power, and he has a full contact background, so it may well be silence, followed by a brief thump a few feet away, and a pained "d'oh" from the would-be-slapper

RR

[Savi]

Originally posted by reneritchie
FWIW - I'm not aware of any branch of WCK that actively promotes a non-personal, non-face-to-face, learning environment (though I suppose anything's possible). My own sigung says you have to learn one on one, directly, and he'll sweat right along with you to do it, hands on, and very directly. I personally agree with this 100%, yet I still think its possible to share some over the various communications mediums. With HFY, however, and the proposal that, unlike the major branches of WCK, it is not personal expression, but science, it should be easier to disseminate non-locally.

BTW- How does this attitude of face-to-face translate to many HFY students living so far away from Gee sifu? Do you notice any difference between the SF students, who have Gee sifu all the time, and the further afield ones?

RR

First, I think I understand why there are some practitioners out there that doubt the HFY's "claims", "proposals", "marketing hype", " historical stories" and "theories", etc.... as people have called it. Most of the questions I have read this past month in regard to HFY are expecting all the answers to be spelled out because we call it "science". Science should be able to be spelled out as the quote states. But WHAT kind of science are we talking about. There are many fields in science but HFY's science was not discovered in a lab. It was not created from the periodic table of elements, and it certainly cannot be spelled out in a textbook to be learned step by step. HFY is a MARTIAL science to be proven through its use. The laboratories are the classroom. Information can only point the finger, but it cannot make the audience look at what it's pointing to.

On top of that, the HFYWCK development was a militaristic effort to defend what was China's. Forced underground by the the Qing invaders, do you really think HFY would take a SINGLE chance of any information leaking out to the public? HFY was developed on a basis of SURVIVAL! We have to consider this and we cannot ignore this!

Background info:
The following of course many would disregard and categorize as folklore, but please keep an open mind. As the HFY family has told their students this is the history as I understand it: The achievement of Shaolin was the 30 year collaborative effort of shaolin scholars, military officers, and over 300 shaolin warriors to develop from their existing knowledge, 1 combat system tailored to the natural movements of the human form (governed by the factors of reality: time, space, and energy) to defeat all styles that violate common denominators; To understand the relationship of Life, Death, and our existence through the philosophy of the Shaolin.

How can HFY prove its origins? Let me ask a few more questions to aide in the perspective... How do we find out how old the pyramids are? What about mummies? Trees? Rocks? Bones? How about the birth of our solar system? Does it not take a qualified person(s) to conquer the task? Were any of these answers found documented before the questions were born? And when there is documentation, how do we know it's validity? How do we even know the documentation matches what we are questioning? The only answer is to analyze the subject in question and continually cross-reference findings to available material. In the case of the HFYWCK, if we truly want to know the answers to the historical, technical, and philosophical questions, we cannot assume the answers will come in a format we EXPECT it to. We cannot assume the answer will come the way we want it. One would have to dive into the system deeply to find the answers.

Only a truly educated person with worldwide knowledge and experience of all Wing Chun today (well-rounded in other words) could only decifer if HFY is what it claims to be. Somebody with DEEP experience with qualified masters in all of today's lineages, who has enough information of each lineage to Respect and Understand their uniqueness is only qualified to judge. Just looking at the pyramids from the outside will not tell us how old they are. Even if it were carved in its stone, THAT must be questioned. You'd have to analyze the stone itself to find the true answer. If you really want to find the truth of HFY, you cannot just look at its techniques, or any historical documentations. The system itself is the proof of the science. The truth cannot be seen in its techniques (only to the trained eye), it is in the knowledge behind it. It is these answers which will then validate any discovered documentation or source.

Secondly, Rene's question about "Hau Chuen Saan Sao" and any differences in the students within the current schools... the answer is yes. There are differences in Training Methodologies for each sifu. One HFY person's Tan Sao will look different from another HFY student's, but again that's only looking at the surface. Everybody's form and body is different! But does the expression of proper knowledge behind the technique exist in the student? That is the driving factor of HFY's existence. That then is validated by "Hau Chuen." The success of that depends on highly qualified teachers/masters of the HFYWCK. Sitaigung Gee, Sigung Meng, Sifu Loewenhagen, Sifu Schulz, and all of HFY's disciples consistently meet and work for that quality control. It is a task which words cannot give justice to.

-Savi.

[Hendrik]

Originally posted by Savi
Great insight! I think you pointed out an error I did not see, you will have to forgive me on that statement. I think I said that comment (about practicing/reading Chan) directly from my Buddhist nature (I should have restated that comment from a detached/neutral position).

Which living beings don't do all things from thier buddha nature?
But do all things from thier buddha nature doesn't mean what they do are all correct and proper.

Sorry, not Buddhist nature. It is Buddha Nature.

I suggest you go to a real Chan Buddhist temple which has Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha and get a sifu to learn about Chan. Otherwise,


See, in Chan, it is said that one rather don't know a thing for ten life cycle than one instant get into the Demonic state.

You can read about the 52 Demonic states in Surangama Sutra.
That is a sutra for practice Chan. There you will find out all those "secret" teaching are actually Demonic States. Read it, see how the Buddha told his followers to be real careful.






So by default, if you are practicing HFY, and searching for that complete understanding (not yet attained, or even have attained for those at that level), you are in essence practicing Chan. But your religious disposition is yours alone.

Sorry, When did Gautama Buddha said that, and in What Sutras?

When there is no Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha, there is no Buddha Dharma.


However, Please don't get me wrong about HFY, I belive HFY doesn't have to prove anything. I can respect HFY as it is.


My point is just ,watch out for the Chan practised. It is not something fun when one get serious.
See, one can Check, most monks will at the end become Pureland school practitioners. They change from Chan to Pureland, Why?

For you all who interested in Chan, sincerely, read the Surangama Sutra.




Hendrik, thank you for the information, but are you respecting others' willingness to share their understanding of Chan? Are you sure your understanding is complete and realized? Would you mind clarifying if you consider your understanding to be universal or personal? And are you speaking from a neutral or personal disposition? I'd like to know! [/QUOTE]

Sure, I repsecting your willingness to share your understanding of Chan.

Why don't you share with all of us in the Forum,
Who taught you Chan? Which lineage of Chan? When?
Where? and what is Chan?



By the way, Chan is not about Understanding. So, get that correct before asking other questions.

[Hendrik]

Originally posted by Train
Yoe Hendrik!!

It seems that you have some knowledge about Chan. I very much agree with you that the 3 treasures of BUDDHISM (not only the Shaolin temple) are Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha. But come on dude, you don't have to take it so literally!! Combat, health and philosophy might not be the three treasures but it has a lot to do with buddhism. Matter of fact, Combat, health and philosophy is part of a "Moe Jung" (fighting monks) way of life. So, was it neccesary for you say all that stuff about Karoke?? All you had to do was just correct him. You should loosen up a little! and study more chan... because a true buddhist would never have the kind of tone that you have.... please read more about Compassion... or did you skip that part? LOL! But seriously, those comments to Savi were very unneccesary.
AMI TOH FOH (Buddha Bless You)

You want serious buddhist speaking?

Speak about Moe Jung, before the 8 western countries capture BeiJing in 1900's. The So Called Moe Jung burn and destory Christian Churches....
Then, when the 8 western countries capture Beijing, the Westerners army in return burn the Buddhist temple and killed the Moe Jung.

This is Karma as Chan Patriach Hsu Yun taught about this incident.

So, I rather go and sing Kareoke then create those killing and destroying Karma.

In the name of God, Taiping revolution, how many get killed? Red Junk ambush how many get killed? How many innocent people?

Read the Surangama Sutra and find out for yourself. What happen with commiting Killing karma.



By the way, Compassionate is not about being nice.
Compassionate is about tell the truth before others fell.

Chan practiced as the ancient monks said, is a path similar to a knife. It cuts both side. Without a Chan Patriach grade of Sifu, forget about it. Even with a Chan Patriach grade of sifu some students still get into Demonic state.

So, be compassionate? Can you help when one has get into those Demonic state when they ruen their life?
I know I can't so I rather be serious know.


I rest my opinion about Chan here. If Anyone get offended from my seriousness I appology to you here.

Train, To Losen up, sing karaoke. LOL

[Rolling_Hand]

Quote:
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You should loosen up a little! and study more chan... because a true buddhist would never have the kind of tone that you have.... please read more about Compassion... or did you skip that part? LOL! But seriously, those comments to Savi were very unneccesary.
AMI TOH FOH (Buddha Bless You)
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Hi Train,

There is a mediocre buddhist wannabe here, and he's entitled to a little representation.

humm...

Ami Toh Foh