What is Jeet Kune Do, article by Bruce Lee

[Steve]

I used to walk by his grave fairly often, before Brandon was buried next to him. Otherwise I don't think much about him, unless someone stirs the pot a little.

 

[Jenna]

I used to walk by his grave fairly often, before Brandon was buried next to him. Otherwise I don't think much about him, unless someone stirs the pot a little.

Where is that?

 

[Tez3]

So, if we're coming up on 44 years since Bruce Lee passed away, how many commenting here are old enough to have been an adult

I was an adult, serving in the RAF. I remember we were all quite sad when he passed away. what he said and did didn't change my training or how I thought about martial arts to be honest then or now but what he did do was make them 'cool' to people who'd previously thought it 'weird' or 'macho' to do martial arts. We all enjoyed his films whether we were martial artists or not. I have always thought of him as a practitioner of Chinese martial arts so to be honest have never taken a lot of notice of his writing on martial arts, might have been a mistake but I wouldn't slag him off either. I really don't know that much about his style or training. I do think he was good for martial arts though, he may have been self promoting but that's not always a bad thing if it changes people's perception. As I said he made us martial artists of whatever style cool so a lot to be thankful for there.

 

[Steve]

Where is that?

He's buried in a cemetery next to Volunteer Park in Seattle. It's on Capitol Hill, with a beautiful view of Lake Washington. Brandon Lee is also buried there now, but he passed much later.

 

[jobo]

for once I find myself in agreement with every one, im not sure on the,scale of things how,good BL was, but talented enough that he,wasn't a complete movie fake,but was a,great self publicist
I have trouble with the jkd being style with out a,style, it has become just that and then it begs the question if jkd is the best bits or the other styles and therefore,superior why its such a minority style, the other's should really have been replaced by it. So maybe it's not really that good?.

it seems He is at least as famous now as he was before his untimely,death. a bit like Marilyn Monroe, so definitely an iconic figure and surprisingly the body type most men would like to have, I say,surprisingly as it a lot,easier to replicate that toned thin look that the Huge musclemen look.( provided your thin in the first place)

 

[Xue Sheng]

Where is that?

Where is what?

 

[wingchun100]

The fact remains, Bruce Lee was an overhyped actor that did some martial arts (the Wing Chun community claims he didn't get far), then used that celeb status to write a book about his own thoughts on martial arts.

I know alot of Americans idolize him and think he's an icon, in Europe however we have far greater icons if you compare Bruce Lee with people like Jon Bluming, Tom Harinck and Peter Smit.

Actually, he didn't use his celebrity status to write a book because, aside from the slim CHINESE GUNG FU book, every book was published posthumously.

 

[wingchun100]

for once I find myself in agreement with every one, im not sure on the,scale of things how,good BL was, but talented enough that he,wasn't a complete movie fake,but was a,great self publicist
I have trouble with the jkd being style with out a,style, it has become just that and then it begs the question if jkd is the best bits or the other styles and therefore,superior why its such a minority style, the other's should really have been replaced by it. So maybe it's not really that good?.

it seems He is at least as famous now as he was before his untimely,death. a bit like Marilyn Monroe, so definitely an iconic figure and surprisingly the body type most men would like to have, I say,surprisingly as it a lot,easier to replicate that toned thin look that the Huge musclemen look.( provided your thin in the first place)

I think JKD has not replaced every other style simply because not everyone agrees that combining bits and pieces of styles is the best way to do it. Some still believe in sticking to one system.

 

[jobo]

I think JKD has not replaced every other style simply because not everyone agrees that combining bits and pieces of styles is the best way to do it. Some still believe in sticking to one system.

yes but some people won't accept anything new if is superior or not. But the take up and,spread of jkd, is far less than that other bits of other system all mixed into one MMA. So clearly a lot of people will buy into a new system if it's good enough

 

[WhisperingButterfly]

 

[KPM]

My 2 cents....probably worth less than that!......Bruce was into philosophy. He studied Buddhism as well as Krishnamurti. JKD was his path of discovery and development. JKD was a process. You see his martial art style evolve through the years. There were the early years, the Oakland years, the Chinatown years, the final years when living in HK....and his personal style and teaching was different at each phase. There seems to me no "one" JKD. There seems to be no good definition of JKD. It is different things to different people exactly because it is really a path or process rather than a style.

Now, when you get past the philosophical points and down to practicality.....any martial art has to be taught using a curriculum of some sort. When you solidify things down to a specific curriculum, now you are defining the style. That obviously differed at each phase of Bruce's own development and differs today depending upon the JKD teacher. So remove the philosophical layer and what you find in JKD is a search for practicality. And what works on a practical level can vary depending upon a person's physical abilities and make up. It can also vary depending upon the fighting environment or context.

So on one level you have the people that want to do exactly what Bruce Lee was doing (which also varies depending on which phase of his life they are concentrating on) and on another level you have people that want to follow the concepts Bruce laid out and train more eclectically to come up with what works for them. "Original" vs. "concepts"....."style" vs. "path".... both approaches are valid depending upon your purpose.

 

[FighterTwister]

Hi m8 I'm new here myself.

I would like to say that there are many great fighter's some never raise to the surface because they don't pursue media movies etc.

Guys like John Bluming are an example of that of course.

Bruce Lee never said he would beat all in a fight, but only to claim how confident he is as a martial artist, he is no fool but very intelligent.

So much has been blown out of proportion nothing seems to stick anymore.

Bruce Lee was a master simple as that he was a student like all others in the martial arts world.

I have been a student of all but with a passion for JKD thats rooted in Wing Chun myself that I love for it's artistic sense and practicality.

Watch this.............

Its good fun using a Mook Jong I encourage people to try it out.

 

[MA_Student]

There's no middle ground with lee it seems, he was either an actor who couldn't fight or a god among men who could beat the whole ufc roster at once.

I don't believe lee was as people claim I don't believe he was the fastest man alive or that he couldn't be touched but he was obviously skilled.

Maybe in pure wing chun he was nothing speacial and there are probably way better people than him in the wing chun world but that's not what he's known for. He was obviously very fit and very strong and he was respected by the top martial artists at the time including ed Parker, chuck Norris, joe lewis, mike stone, dan innosanto and others so if he was just a average martial artist they wouldn't care about him.

Again I do believe he's overrated these days and people confuse his movies with real life but to say he wasn't a good martial artist is frankly stupid