Quote: "My only question, is what do you say about all the research that has been done and the accepted history of mantis? Why do so many people believe something so different from you?"
I don’t know why people believe different things from me. But I can try to explain why I believe what I do. It is more likely that a martial art is composed by 2 or more persons. You need at least one partner to test out your techniques and that partner would have to be quite competent as well. Though the act of testing, the partners would be able to refine their ideas. I don’t think the generation of ideas would be one sided (ie by one person and the other person is just a test dummy). This seems more logical than to think that someone sat in a cave, observed an insect and came up with a new system.
Quote: "I'm sorry, I must have misunderstood what technique you wre refering to. The attacks with the wrist ( where your hand is in a dil sau, and you actually make contact with the back of the wrist) you are correct about, but that technique shares no similarities to taiji. I thought you were refering to the finger strike at the beginning, where you are blocking with both hands in pak sau, then strike under the armpit with your fingers. That techniques does share a resemblance to the uppward cutting movements of the gim. Still, none of this lends itself to both systems being created together, or at the same time. In fact, most 7 star mantis schools do not emphasize as much "taiji principles" such as disrupting the center, staying lower than your opponant. That is why I was interested in knowing your lineage. May I ask again who you study under?"
Same body movement underpinning the "rounded feeling" in tai chi and the wrist strike. Tai chi may not have the exact hand configuration but the body movement behind that move is similar. What makes the move work is not so much that the point of your wrist hits the target precisely – that may / may not happen. But the rounded feeling in your arms supported by your body that creates a "wedge". Oh yes, heaps of what mantis does involves staying lower compared to your opponent and slicing hits upwards or taking away their balance – by wedging and / or sweeps. That includes getting your opponent to cross their own centre. The objectives of control is similar to tai chi. In the opening moves when you have side stepped your opponent – you say that you launch finger strikes to the armpit. We’re not that precise – using the straight punch instead of a finger strike. That’s because we treat the whole flank of the opponent as a legitimate target as opposed to one particular point. As for the lineage, my instructor’s instructors were from Taiwan originally.
Quote: "Thats doesnm't make any sense though. Your going to blindly accept one part of the history and not another part, because you personally have an emotional reaction to one part. I dont mind people having different beliefs about the history of mantis, most of it is hearsay at best anyway, but to just pick and choose what you are going to believe by what sounds good to you, is, in my opinion nieve. I do think you should read up more on the accepted history of mantis, no where does it talk about only one source, he used techniques from the insect, then monkey footwork, then later on 17 techniques from other systems. Remember, he was a skilled MAist before developing mantis."
It is not really an emotionally reaction as such. There are more accounts from different sources of bodyguards of important people who know mantis then there is verifiable evidence of the system’s creation. So the conclusion I come to results from a balance of available facts as opposed to emotion. I’m not sure about 17 techniques. Mantis does not lend itself to techniques as such, the basis of it’s body movement comes from earlier northern systems such as long fist, baji etc.
Quote: "It is important to see relationships between different systems and your own, however be careful assuming those relationships lend some type of heavy connection. To see a similarity and immediately claim the two systems were created together, is jumping the gun a little bit. Where in taiji is the dil sau? Or the wrist locks and breaks as in the beginning of Da Goon? There are similarities, and there are differences. saying the similarities mean simultaneous creation is the same as saying the differences mean they are from different countries of origin. Without research and any type of proof its hard to make any concrete statements in CMA history. I didnt say anything about similarities between northern and southern mantis, I just said they both use techniques from the mantis insect."
I don’t think Tai Chi misses out on getting into positions where you can do joint locks. Both mantis and Tai Chi attampt to control an opponent without having to lock on to one specific point in a grabbing action. Sure part of the act of controlling may lead to a grab and hold, but that results from an interplay between what you do and what your partner is doing at that time. In most situations (in tai chi or mantis), the control techniques allow you to disrupt the opponent and give you an advantage. What is Da Goon? Is it a form?
