Shaolin Temple Myths

[PM]

Dian H. Murray is Associate Professor of History and Associate Dean at Notre Dame University. Qin Baoqi, of the Qing History Institute of PRC University in Beijing, is the editor of seven volumes of Tiandihui palace memorials and other documents.

Meier Sahar received his doctorate in East Asian Languages and Civilisatons from Harvard university. He is author of Crazy Ji: Chinese Religion and Popular Literature (1998) and coeditor (with Robert Weler of Unruly Gods: Divinity and Society in China (1996). associate profesor in the Depatrtment of East Asian Studies, Tel Aviv University.

the books are not some cheap martial arts boks, but serious scholar works with everything needed - ie. appendix, notes, glossary, works cited, index. their books were published by University of Hawai'i Press Honolulu and Stanford University Press. (compare these datas and references Kennedy/Guo and their book- which is good, but from a scholar's point of view... )

lkfmdc, who are you? :-) (joke, ok, i know you have a university degree - i have mine too; i actually consider your short text on history of cma to be one of the few interesting texts on cma out there). i just do not understand why you criticise something that you have not read or did not know about.

common guys, i do not know what is the argument about. research, ok? Achilles might not exist, but Troy is proven not to be a myth.

[SimonM]

Ok to summarize what we have ACTUALLY been discussing:

1) There is conclusive evidence of ONE shaolin temple, on Song Shan, in Henan being around since antiquity. There is further evidence that they had an in-house brand of staff-fighting. Though it has not been discussed I think we can also agree that they likely had an in-house brand of qigong.

2) There is annecdotal evidence of a second shaolin temple (often called siu lum by it's proponents which, IIRC, is wade jiles transliteration for the cantonese pronounciation of Shaolin) which may or may not have been burnt down for anti-governmental activity during the Qing dynasty. Some people believe to have found this temple (in Fujian) but critics have pointed out that you can't so much as spit without finding a ruined temple in China... the main reason for the absence of a ruined temple being that somebody nicked the bricks back in the 1960s to build a pig sty or a garage or something.

3) Claims beyond that push the boundaries of credability and appear to be communicated folk-tales.

4) Most parties agree that there is a long tradition of fugitives (political and otherwise) seeking refuge from the authorities at temples. This is largely because of the adoption of new names (names in religion) which would allow a fugitive to potentially break from his past history and evade capture. This is NOT unique to Shaolin temple. That, along with the need for protection of monastery grounds against incursion may have led to stories of martial monks, many of whom may have been the same previously mentioned fugitives rather than in-house trained guards.

Fictional examples of this in China are not limited to Shaolin historically... but recent fiction concentrated on that temple.

5) Shaolin temple remains important, regardless of it's association with martial arts, as the temple at which ch'an was formulated by the first patriarch and the temple in which the second patriarch trained and received communication of the dharma.

but Troy is proven not to be a myth.

Not quite.

They found a ruin in the place Troy was supposed to be and some silly b@stard said "I have discovered Troy".

That's not quite the same.

Like China the middle east is lousy with ancient ruins.

[TenTigers]

The Five Ancestors in Hung Mun (Moon, Muhn..)'Traditional History' are different names than the Five Ancestors in Southern Gung-Fu 'Traditional History.'
Triad History also mentions "Ah Tsat" a monk who was punished severely due to his breaking of an incense pot, and turned traitor. Also there is the traitor Ma Fu Yee, as well and in some stories, Bak Mei Do Jung.
(sorry, can't find them now-my pc won't open up adobe acrobat reader)
There was a man in history, Hung Hsia Quan (sp?)who was very active in the rebellion, and his name bears striking resemblance to Hung Xi Kwan(Hung Hei-Guen) enough to link them in legends and of course movies, to each other.
Apologies, this is from memory. Perhaps someone with the resources can look this up.

There is not a fine line, but a tangled mess of many lines linking history, "Traditional History," Allegory, legend, myths,wishfull thinking, and just plain made-up crap.
Even in our own Gung-Fu "Traditional Histories" there is much room for ..speculation.
Fong Chin-yang a woman who learned Fukien White Crane in Wing Chun county
Fong Wing Chun, who combined her snake and crane techniques with her husband, Hung Hei-Guen's Tiger to create Fu Hok Seurng Ying Kuen
Yim Wing Chun, a woman who learned Gung Fu from the Nun, Ng Mui
Ng Mui who witnesed a fight between a Crane and a Snake
Ahdahtor(sp?) who some say was Ng Mui(Staples' book) witnessed a fight between a White Ape and a White Crane (what are the odds of that happening)
it goes on and on...

[hskwarrior]

no one brings up my name, huh?

Chan Family changed from saying there was NO green grass monk to now having Choy Fook take on that identity.

I changed jeung hung sing's birthdate back to the original of 1824. I originally said that jeung hung sing was born in 1814 because we knew that the chan family changed chan heung's birthdate from 1814 to 1806 to make him look much older than jeung hung sing. That was done on this forum to draw out some fools who were telling lies.

I never wrote a book that i will have to retract because of MISINFORMATION.

[SimonM]

Ng Mui who witnesed a fight between a Crane and a Snake

I loved my Sifu's rendition of this story.

He started by saying "there is a story about how Wing Chun started"
And then he told a very brief gloss of the Ng Mui story.
Then he said "but it's probably not true and besides which it's not important, back to practicing."

And HSKWarrior:

Veracity of your claims aside (because I REALLY don't care) making claims that you know to be false for the purpose of "drawing out" falsehoods from others would have you slaughtered by a peer review board. It's bad research technique.

[lkfmdc]

NO is (or rather, "should") be arguing about the temple in the North (it exists)

Similarly, like EVERY temple in China, it had some martial arts in it...

But the fact remains that the stories are bloated and the myths are many

For some reason, and those reasons would make for a fine study indeed! Secret societies, brotherhoods and rebellions often wrapped themselves in Shaolin... and subsequent martial arts traditions did as well EVEN WHEN THEY HAD NO RELATION TO SHAOLIN AT ALL

[AJM]

Shaolin itself has been influenced by the jesuits since the early 1600's and now the communists[read; jesuits] therefore rendering it useless. The master asassins loath at having any other fighting monks out there.

[hskwarrior]

ok............

[David Jamieson]

all that other stuff aside. I don't think the Chinese hold the title on face games.

I agree that in Martial arts, there have been many an illiterate trying to push a story as truth to prop themselves up and sell some snakeoil in the process.

I don't agree that this is exclusively a chinese cultural thing. It exists in all cultures, yours and mine included.

as for Shaolin, I think that paying homage to them has been done for ages and certainly they have been attributed as a extremely adept group of teachers and pugilists for a few hundred years at least.

I also think that anyone who really goes down into the vomit of it all and roots through and separates the carrots from the peas from the corn, then what is is what is.

History=zero if the person touting it gets knocked to the floor. Your lineage is useless when a mongrel bloodies your nose, your teacher is no one to the guy who breaks your arm, and so on, you get my point.

It seems the "nice to know" has taken to much precedence over the "need to know" all to often when it comes to martial arts.

Having said that, I enjoy training in what I know as Shaolin Kungfu. I never tell someone that I am hitting them, kicking them, throwing them or locking them up with Shaolin kungfu. I never tell them anything, there's too much to do at the time!

[Mano Mano]

Move that the CLF lineage war be taken off the Shaolin Temple Myths thread as nobody except for the CLF people care about it at all.

Some of us actually don’t care at all.

[SimonM]

Shaolin itself has been influenced by the jesuits since the early 1600's and now the communists[read; jesuits] therefore rendering it useless. The master asassins loath at having any other fighting monks out there.

That's pots of crazy there.

Some of us actually don’t care at all.

Ok I will ammend my statement:

I move no more CLF lineage war stuff be in this thread as nobody outside of CLF and even some CLF practicioners don't care!

[Sifu at Large]

There was a man in history, Hung Hsia Quan (sp?)who was very active in the rebellion, and his name bears striking resemblance to Hung Xi Kwan(Hung Hei-Guen) enough to link them in legends and of course movies, to each other.

Ten Togers, Is the first Hung you mention the one who led the Taiping rebellion? I remember picking up a book on that one and the name was so close that I got the two confused.

I don't agree that this is exclusively a chinese cultural thing. It exists in all cultures, yours and mine included.

David - Agreed - this extends to all cultures, and is not even the exclusive domain of CMA. The Koreans have cave paintings that one organization is trying to promote as being TKD forms.

On topic - The Secret societies would have most liekly used a tie (real or otherwise) to Shaolin as a recruitment tool. So, if it is not a real tie, there is the motivation for creating one.

As far as the tradition of lies and how to approach the subject, read this offering from Stanley E. Henning

http://seinenkai.com/articles/hennin...llycorrect.pdf

from the above "There is a rising trend in the “Occidental” world of “Oriental” martial arts – the number of “scholars” who, in spite of making pretenses to upholding “academic standards”, are displaying no small amount of intellectual compromise by acting as apologists for the myths surrounding the Chinese martial arts. They do this in a manner which gives one the impression that they somehow feel that to expose these myths is an irreverent act, harming the sensitivities of the Chinese people and insulting to pseudo-intellectual Occidentals seeking a New Age refuge in Oriental mysticism or, worse yet, causing them to lose interest in a subject about which these “scholars” delight in composing involved, ambiguous treatises."

Ah...but we do so love our myths.

[SimonM]

The leader of the Taiping rebellion was Hong Xiuquan.

[TenTigers]

The leader of the Taiping rebellion was Hong Xiuquan.

dat's da guy.

[TenTigers]

Frank, who are the five ancestors mentioned in Hung Mun's history?
I know they weren't Jee Siem, Hung Hei-Guen, Bak Mei, Ng Mui, and Fung Do Duk.
Nor were they Hung,Lau, Li ,Mok,and Choy.