Chen taiji/ yang taiji statement

[Syd]

We spar amongst ourselves and apply our techniques and applications as close to *real* as we can. The fact that I have no interest in applying it in the ring is a personal preference shared by most people I know.

Street fighting and tournament fighting are very different animals. I know what I can do and where I'm going with my training and that's all that matters to me. If you think it's a cop out, great. If you don't, great.

Bottom line is that if you want to prove yourself in a tournament go right ahead, I got no use for it. Doesn't mean I can't fight or apply what I train, it just means I don't have the interest and I don't feel I need to prove anything to anybody but myself.

A man in the right frame of mind can go his entire life without ever having a single fight. This is the true warrior...

Best, Syd

[bamboo_ leaf]

''Yang taiji is for those who cant do chen taiji.''


I would have to disagree with this statement.

I have met and seen a few Chen people in my time; the style doesn’t really appeal to me for many reasons none important here.

I think both are equally demanding arts, just different emphases due to evolution of thought and experiences of different masters. It seems strange some how for an art that emphasis change and emptiness for people still trying to cling to some form and way as the only way instead of just an expression of it.

They then try to look for answers outside of themselves to support beliefs not founded on direct experience, again strange for an inner art only acquired thought direct experience.

As to the history and watering down (what ever this supposed to mean), think about who he was really teaching and what the results would have been for him and his family had it not been a valid model for others to follow.

[Chuck Man Chuck]

Good point Bamboo_Leaf,

Your point is a valid one -could the Ching dynasty rulers use the Tai Chi Chuan they were taught? I bet if they couldn't it would have been off with Yang Lu Chuan's head!

I think of the Yang style akin to the founding of Aikido. Yashiba smoothed out the Aiki-jutsu and developed the internal power to a greater degree, just as I belive the Yang family did to the Chen style.

I was told by Doc Fai Wong once, that it was the Yang family that developed the Tai Chi Sword and the Chen family copied it back from the Yang's.

[Syd]

It is reported that Yang Lu Chan had no sword in Yang Style until his son Yang Ban Hou was taught a sword form by a Wudang Taoist Priest. Yang Ban Hou was said to be as proficient in the Jian as his father was in Spear.

[Chuck Man Chuck]

Syd,

Doc didn't say how they developed the Sword, though as you indicate, it wasn't from the Chen's. Good deal -Merry Christmas, or in Chinese -Yukuaide Shengdanjie!

[RAF]

Doc Fai Wang has the Wu Dang Sword of Li Jing Lin who learned it from Song Wei Yi. Song Wei Yi told them that he learned it from a Daoist Priest (maybe, maybe not). Doc Fai Wong wrote this in a Wushu Kungfu article on the taiji sword in the 1980s.


If, and thats a big If, Yang Lu Chan had a straightsword, then it most likely came from the Chen Clan where he studied 18 years (documented, the 18 years. Stories about Jiang Fa and all that is just pure speculation at best). Also hard to find out when the straightsword came into the Chen family.

But no one seems to have documented that Yang Lu Chan even played a straightsword (jian).

Story is that either Yang Ban Hou or Yang Shao Hou traded their taijiquan with Song Wei Yi and that is how the straightsword got into the Yang lineage.

We know that Chen Weiming, disciple of Yang Cheng Fu, learned his two man sword fighting from Li Jing Lin and not Yang Cheng Fu. See Chen Weiming's sword book for his own conclusion that the Wudang sword is the (or a) taiji sword along with his experience with Li Jing Lin.

We also know that Zheng Man Qing had two man sword fighting along with two man training (posted film clips) and if Yang Cheng Fu did not teach his disciple Chen Weiming this, as indicated in his book, its questionable that Zheng Man Qing learned these from Yang Cheng Fu. Its questionable how much sword training Yang Cheng Fu had or even made available, assuming he had it, to his disciples.

Song Wei Yi was hired to teach the military units of Li Jing Lin.
Li Jing Lin also taught Chang Deng Sheng the wudang/taiji sword. The story is on one of their sites.

It is documented that Chen Fake's daughter played a straightsword (the routine was printed in the old Journal of Chen Style taijiquan) but I never heard of Chen Fake playing the jian or dao for that matter.

Scott Rodell just recently put out a very good book on the taiji sword and wisely concluded that it is almost impossible to document where and when the sword entered into taiji---smart man!

[Chuck Man Chuck]

None of the posts presented on this thread agrees with any of the other post, nor presents any compelling credentials, arguments, or documentation to be accepted as any kind of fact or authority. So, I'll go by what I've been told and seen performed by those I know; and which I have also observed conforms to the established norms of Yang Style Tai Chi Chuan.

In this respect one may say the same for me,
but the Chen Family doesn't equal Wu Dang Temple; nor does Wu Dang Sword equal Yang Style Tai Chi Sword; nor does Yang Lu Chan equal Yang Ban Hou or Yang Shao Hou as far as being independent and able to invent or incorporate any given element of Yang Style Tai Chi Chan.