BSL vs. SSSL: GeneChing's New Topic

[YouKnowWho]

Not sure which NYC Northern Shaolin school that you are talking about. If you are talking about the old "5 tigers club", my longfist brother Nelson Zou used to teacher there. It's quite different from the Shaolin monk style.

[JamesC]

I was referring to the Ku Yu Cheong lineage of Northern Shaolin. It includes the 10 Hand Sets, etc.

Why the difference in forms even? Xiaohongquan, Dahongquan, etc.

[GeneChing]

KYC Shaolin Vs Shaolin Curriculum Today

I merged your thread into a 10-year-old thread as well as another about my BSL Master Wing Lam. There are a few other threads that touch on this subject.

[JamesC]

Thanks Gene!

[ginosifu]

Ku Ye Cheong Shaolin curriculum is an older system going back to the late 1700's. The forms are not quite as flashy as the new Shaolin Temple stuff of today. Back in the early 1900's they was a "Destruction" of the Temple and a "Burning" of all the historical manuals and books. Any of the surviving Monks fled (Hong Kong, South East Asia, Europe, America's etc etc), taking this Ku Ye Cheong system with them.

Any remaining Monks were either killed or went into hiding. Eventually the Temple reopened and Monks returned, only to follow and teach what the Chinese government would let them. This included more flashy stuff that made money for the Government!

They have a curriculum now, but it is more of a San Shou / Kickboxing / San Da curriculum that an old school fighting / self defense system.

ginosifu

[GeneChing]

You're only looking at the performance stuff. The classical Songshan Shaolin curriculum is traditional. It's not flashy at all. There are some versions that 'flash' it up, but the same is true for BSL. I've seen xin wushu versions of some BSL forms coming out of the mainland.

But check out curriculum in Shaolin Gong Fu: A Course in Traditional Forms which gives a decent overview of Songshan Shaolin forms and you'll find that it's very traditional. No aerials, no butterfly kicks, not even a cartwheel into splits like in BSL.

Gu Ruzhang's system may have roots in the 1700s with the probably apocryphal Gan Fengchi creation myth, but its composition is most likely rather modern (well, as modern as Gu).

[ginosifu]

You're only looking at the performance stuff. The classical Songshan Shaolin curriculum is traditional. It's not flashy at all. There are some versions that 'flash' it up, but the same is true for BSL. I've seen xin wushu versions of some BSL forms coming out of the mainland.

But check out curriculum in Shaolin Gong Fu: A Course in Traditional Forms which gives a decent overview of Songshan Shaolin forms and you'll find that it's very traditional. No aerials, no butterfly kicks, not even a cartwheel into splits like in BSL.

Gu Ruzhang's system may have roots in the 1700s with the probably apocryphal Gan Fengchi creation myth, but its composition is most likely rather modern (well, as modern as Gu).

My bad Gene, I only see what performance stuff. When I was in DengFeng village, they gave us a show that was purely flash which I assumed was their normal curriculum.

ginosifu

[ginosifu]

Gu Ruzhang's system may have roots in the 1700s with the probably apocryphal Gan Fengchi creation myth, but its composition is most likely rather modern (well, as modern as Gu).

I agree with you that Ku Ye Cheong and his peers may have altered, modified or even created the 10 hand forms. I doubt the Shaolin of Ku Ye Cheong looks excatly the way it did when Gan Feng Chi demonstrated in front of the Emperor.

ginosifu

[LFJ]

Any of the surviving Monks fled (Hong Kong, South East Asia, Europe, America's etc etc), taking this Ku Ye Cheong system with them.

Any remaining Monks were either killed or went into hiding. Eventually the Temple reopened and Monks returned, only to follow and teach what the Chinese government would let them. This included more flashy stuff that made money for the Government!

Not sure where you're getting these ideas. A number of monks never left the area, such as Shi Zhenxu, Shi Chunpu, Shi Sudian, Shi Zhenjun, Shi Xingjing, etc.. These monks never abandoned Shaolin Monastery and were working to rebuild it within the first two years after the burning in 1928.

Moreover, they continued practicing a centuries old traditional curriculum, which had nothing flashy and was not for or by the government. They taught this curriculum to more monks such as Shi Suxi, Shi Suxiang, Shi Degen, Shi Xingzhang, etc., who taught our current generation of elder masters.

How can you just write these people and what they did out of history like that?

Furthermore, we've had this discussion several times, that the 10 set curriculum of BSL is something that evolved out of the 13 set Kanjiaquan curriculum in Shaolin, but developed external to the monastery. There is no evidence of the BSL curriculum of Gu Ruzhang as it is having ever been taught or practiced at the Shaolin Monastery.

[ginosifu]

Not sure where you're getting these ideas. A number of monks never left the area, such as Shi Zhenxu, Shi Chunpu, Shi Sudian, Shi Zhenjun, Shi Xingjing, etc.. These monks never abandoned Shaolin Monastery and were working to rebuild it within the first two years after the burning in 1928.

Moreover, they continued practicing a centuries old traditional curriculum, which had nothing flashy and was not for or by the government. They taught this curriculum to more monks such as Shi Suxi, Shi Suxiang, Shi Degen, Shi Xingzhang, etc., who taught our current generation of elder masters.

How can you just write these people and what they did out of history like that?

Furthermore, we've had this discussion several times, that the 10 set curriculum of BSL is something that evolved out of the 13 set Kanjiaquan curriculum in Shaolin, but developed external to the monastery. There is no evidence of the BSL curriculum of Gu Ruzhang as it is having ever been taught or practiced at the Shaolin Monastery.

My history came from my sifu some 20 years ago. I am not up to date on the newer discoveries and findings. I do not disagree with any thing stated here by you or Gene, I'm kind of an old school dinosauer. I don't research or spend a lot of time browsing thru all the threads. Thanks for the info

ginosifu

[RenDaHai]

Even there is Master Cui Xi Qi who is still teaching today at 90 years old (and still agile). He learned Shaolin back in the 1930's, right after the destruction.

These people are still around, you just have to look harder than the big few schools.

On the BSL SSSL Thing;

www.youtube.com/watch?v=dndU6SzYAE4 (lianBu quan, i think, i can't watch youtube, someone please confirm)

Is this a BSL form? Because it is the same form as Long Quan, 'Dragon Fist' still practiced at Henan Shaolin today. THis might be a link people are looking for.

http://v.youku.com/v_show/id_XNzkzOTIxNzI=.html (Long QUan)

FOr some of you it may be hard to see that this is the same form, The shaolin version is not such a good version from wushu guan. The one I know is somewhere between the two videos. It is referred to in song shan shaolin as both LianbuQuan and Long quan. It is called longquan because of the footwork. Contains lots of 'LongXingBu' Dragon step. Although the henan video I posted doesn't show the dragon step, as i say its not a great version, just can't find another video and can't be bothered to post one myself.

[Graculus]

I must admit that I don't think there is much likelihood of lianbuquan having been in the temple for more than a few decades - its introduction into the BSL curriculum is also quite well documented (from a CMA point of view), and it does not really belong to that system in the same way as the 10 core sets.

There seems to be no reason to doubt the connection between BSL and the Shaolin temple - however both common sense and the available evidence points to them having parted ways some considerable time ago and developed along separate lines. The extent to which styles can evolve (or devolve) in a comparatively short time can be seen in the progress of CMA in the 20th century - think of taiji (or various forms) and even the different branches of BSL. If we are talking 2 hundred years ago, even if the founders studied in the temple and swore blind they were passing on the same style, it would certainly have changed over the years.

For anyone new to this area, and is really interested in this kind of stuff, look up what Sal Canzonieri has written... love him or hate him, he has certainly gathered a lot of info on this.

Graculus
http://ichijoji.blogspot.com

[David Jamieson]

I gotta agree with ~G that the old BSL is way flashier than the current Shaolin curriculum.

the flooding fist sets aren't anywhere near as flash as the beginner sets for bsl (6/7/8)...

can't speak for what they teach noobs or beginners there...

[Siu Lum Fighter]

originally posted by LFJ
Furthermore, we've had this discussion several times, that the 10 set curriculum of BSL is something that evolved out of the 13 set Kanjiaquan curriculum in Shaolin, but developed external to the monastery. There is no evidence of the BSL curriculum of Gu Ruzhang as it is having ever been taught or practiced at the Shaolin Monastery.

I believe this information to be false and I'll tell you why. Sal Canzonieri pieced this theory together after he talked to some Kanjiaquan practitioners in some rural area (in Shandong?) who said that Kuo Yu Cheung's teacher, Yim Chi Wen, was mentioned in their lineage somewhere. This, he assumed, proved that Yim Chi Wen practiced Kanjiaquan and passed it on to Kuo who then must have drastically changed it so that it became what we know of as Bak Siu Lum today. I say drastically because I've compared the forms and I don't see any resemblance at all! The only set I saw that seemed to have a similar name was number 4 (Chum Sam or Strike to the Heart) but, just like in all of the other sets, most of the movements seem to be completely different or unrelated. The techniques that are supposed to be similar or the same are done very differently and the lyrics don't match up AT ALL. There's just no way they could have originated from the same masters. If the two styles are related then it's Bak Siu Lum that's older. Sal seemed to be trying to jam a square peg in a round hole. It's always being noted that he's fluent in Chinese but just because you can speak someone's language doesn't mean they're not giving you information that's false or incomplete.

To push this theory is to say that Kuo Yu Cheung lied to his students and said that his Bak Siu Lum was a style that was much older and not something that he'd just made up during his lifetime. It seems impossible to me (and somewhat blasphemous) to think that Kuo Yu Cheung would condense and completely rearrange a whole system, come up with a whole bunch of different lyrics, and then pass it off as the same Northern Shaolin style that was passed on to him from Yim Chi Wen.

[LFJ]

I don't know the details on Sal's personal research, but that's not the theory at all. If you are familiar with the theory of evolution, the same principles apply to the martial arts.

The theory is not that two apes mated and birthed humans as the next generation. In the same way, the evolution of martial arts happens over several centuries, not years and single individuals. And with the spread of the art into different regions and their developments therein, there are produced related yet quite distinct variations from the same root.

Gu Ruzhang is very recent history. What came to him had already been extracted from the Kanjiaquan of Shaolin and had undergone the process of evolution for centuries.