by Dan Docherty
A convenient but somewhat implausible historical tradition claims that the Eight Trigrams (Ba Gua) of the I Ching (Book of Changes) were invented by the legendary Emperor Fu Hsi (circa 2852 - 2737 BC); that the I Ching was put together by the founders of the Chou Dynasty (circa 1030 - 221 BC), and that Confucius wrote a commentary on it. Furthermore, Lao Tzu, the putative author of the Tao Te Ching, is supposed to have been a contemporary of Confucius. In any case, the Taoist classics of the I Ching and Tao Te Ching did exist in something like their present form during the late Chou Dynasty.
Around the 4th century BC, the Taoist philosopher, Chuang Tzu, was referring to 'Dao Yin' - exercises designed to increase blood circulation and the flow of Chi by bending and stretching the limbs. Chuang Tzu also referred to 'Tu Na', a breathing method for exhaling old air and inhaling the new. These exercises were practiced for both meditative and therapeutic reasons and they still exist today in various methods such as the Five Animal Frolic, Taoist Eight Set Brocade (Baduanjin) and Chi Kung.
The famous Shaolin Temple at the foot of Songshan was only built circa 494 AD. However, well before this, during the Shang Dynasty (circa 1520 - 1030 BC), well developed methods of weapon training and martial arts contests and games already existed. During the Chou Dynasty (1033 - 221 BC), wrestling, archery and chariot racing were all considered military sports.
In 1984 I visited the Shaolin Temple on Songshan. It is quite small and remote, and was in a state of disrepair though it has since been renovated. The idea that this place was where Chinese martial arts originated and that Bodhidharma was the man who introduced martial arts to China just does not hold water. It is certain, however, that the Shaolin Temple did have considerable influence on the development of Chinese martial arts.
As both martial arts and Taoism existed in China long before the birth of Christ, it would be most surprising if Tai Chi Chuan was either the only, or the first, Taoist martial art. There is a historical tradition that Tai Chi Chuan was preceded by other similar Taoist martial arts. Some authorities state that these were :- the Thirty Seven Styles, Nine Little Heavens, Innate (Before Heaven) Boxing, and Acquired (After Heaven) Boxing. The Thirty Seven Styles is said to have been the earliest of these and was founded by the giant hermit, Xu Xuan-ping, during the Tang Dynasty (618 - 960 AD). As Taoist philosophy, Taoist exercise and Chinese martial arts all predate this by more than 1,000 years, we can see that it is not unrealistic to believe that Taoist martial arts similar to Tai Chi Chuan did exist as early as the Tang Dynasty. However, whether or not they might have included any of the arts listed above is impossible to say.
Before trying to ascertain who might have been the founder of Tai Chi Chuan, it is necessary to ascertain who was not.
Until recently sections of the Chinese Government and many writers on Tao Chi Chuan accepted the claim of the Chen family of Henan Province that their ancestor, Chen Wang-ting was the founder of Tai Chi Chuan. My teacher and I have always contended that this claim was false.
In an article written on 9th June 1980 in China's 'Physical Education Newspaper', Gu Liu-sheng, one of China's leading martial arts writers, states that he had at one time mistakenly believed that the Chen Wang-ting of Chen clan of Henan Province had been an imperial censor (a high ranking post in Imperial China), but later found that he had only been a garrison soldier in his local county. For many years Gu said he was unable to rectify his mistake his mistake because of the activities of 'the Gang of Four'.
Next, there is the evidence of the famous martial arts historian Wu Tu-nan, who was born in 1885, who practiced Tai Chi since he was a child and who practiced in Peking until his death in the mid 1980's. I have translated some of his comments from "A Research into Tai Chi Chuan" (edited by his student Ma You-ching and published in Hong Kong in 1986).
The book describes how he went to the Chen clan village in Wen County, Henan Province, in 1917 to research into the origins of Tai Chi Chuan. His guide was Chen Xian, the village schoolmaster, and the only educated person in the village. Chen told him that the Chen Family martial art was Pao Chui (Cannon Punch) which was connected with Shaolin Boxing (the Shaolin Temple is also in Henan Province) and which for the last been passed down from one generation to another of the Chen clan.
One autumn, after the harvesting, when Chen Chang-xing (1771 - 1853) was teaching his sons, relatives and students the Chen Family Pao Chui, a stranger who had been watching their practice laughed out loud. Realising his discourtesy, the stranger turned to leave, but Chen Chang-xing pursued him and grabbed his shoulder. The stranger turned, throwing Chen to the ground. Chen got up and begged to be accepted as a student. The stranger was named Chiang Fa and he promised Chen Chang-xing that he would return after three years to teach him Tai Chi Chuan.
Three years later Chiang returned and Chen Chang-xing was taught all the secrets of Tai Chi Chuan after going through a formal ceremony to become his disciple. However, as the Chen clan considered this a disgrace for the Chen family they forbade him henceforth to teach Chen Family Pao Chui, though he was permitted to teach Tai Chi Chuan. Other members of the Chen clan confirmed this record of events to Wu Tunan.
Chen Xian then took Wu to Chen Wang-ting's grave where the inscription showed him to have been only an elementary school graduate and not a military strategist and imperial censor as is claimed in some books on Tai Chi Chuan.
Any serious student of Tai Chi Chuan realises that understanding the theory of the art demands a knowledge of Taoist philosophy (e.g. the Tai Chi Chuan Classics constantly refer to the Five Elements and the Eight Trigrams). The term 'Tai Chi' is itself the Taoist concept of the universe being composed of the complementary forces of Yin and Yang. Yet, in the 227 page "Chen Style Taijiquan" (compiled by the Zhaohua Publishing House, peking), there is only one slight reference to Taoism and none at all to Yin and Yang. What is more the Chen style contains techniques such as "Blue Dragon Flies up from Water", "Beast's Head Pose", "Jump and Kick Twice", which appear in no other style of Tai Chi Chuan. There is even a technique called "Budda's Warrior Attendant Punds Mortar" - completely out of place in a Taoist martial art.
The Chen clan have also failed to satisfactorily explain in detail how Tai Chi Chuan was handed down as they claim from Chen Wang-ting of the 9th generation to Chen Chang-xing of the 14th generation. This is the missing link as everyone seems agreed that Chen Chang-xing knew Tai Chi Chuan.
Wudang Mountain is a remote 77 square mile area in Hubei Province, Central China. In fact, Wudang Mountain has totally 72 peaks. Due to its remoteness and tranquillity, this area has been connected with Taoist hermits and religion since at least 649 AD, when the government of the day began constructing Taoist Temples there. Today 46 major temples and nunneries and 72 shrines are still standing.
I visited Wudang Mountain with my teacher, Sifu Cheng Tin-hung, in May 1984. I was told by our guides that this was only the third time a non-Chinese had been allowed to visit Wudang Mountain. Our visit was to try to gather material on the Taoist, Chang San-feng. To us as Tai Chi practitioners he has the same significance as Bodhidharma does to Shaolin Boxers. The oral tradition passed down to my teacher by his master Qi Min-xuan; from Qi's master, Ching Yat; from Ching Yat's master, Wang Lan-ting; from Wang's master Yang Lu-chan is that Chang San-feng, the Taoist hermit, was the founder of Tai Chi Chuan.
It is recorded in the official history of the Ming Dynasty that during the reigns of the Emperors Tai Zu (1368 - 98) and Cheng Zu (1403 - 24), officials were sent to look for Chang on Wudang Mountain to invite him to return with them to advise the Emperor. They were unsuccessful. In 1459, the Emperor Ying Zong gave Chang an official title stating that Chang was one who had merged with and become master of the Way.
During our visit, we were taken to a Taoist prison at the foot of Wudang Mountain. The main building is a small temple in which there is a self-portrait of Chang San-feng and a bronze tablet erected by the Emperor Ying Zong in 1459 to honour our Chang as a Taoist sage who had mastered the secrets of longevity and the Tao. There was nothing, however, that we saw on Wudang Mountain to prove that Chang San-feng did or did not have anything to do with Tai Chi Chuan.
My teacher has visited the Taoist temples in the small town of Pao Jie in Shanxi Province, Central China and is of the opinion that Chang San-feng retired there in his in his later years. His theory is that at this stage Tai Chi Chuan effectively went underground, being taught within the Taoist community in Pao Jie from one generation to the next until it turned up again in the Chen family village some 400 years later. There is a considerable body of evidence including pictures and inscriptions and a small meditation hall on the mountain slope commemorating Chang San-feng to support his connection with this town. The sage is supposed to have spent his later years there. This is an interesting and potentially valid explanation for the reemergence of Tai Chi Chuan in the Chen Village in Wen County, Henan Province which is not far to the South of Pao Jie.
The exact when, where and who of the origins of Tai Chi Chuan are uncertain. Like their Western counterparts, historians, bureaucrats and polititians have made mistakes, falsified records and suppressed or ignored contradictory evidence. The situation caused by the actions of these men has often been perpetuated by later scholars because of laziness, cynicism or the current political reality.
I am of the opinion that Chen Wang-ting from the Chen family village did not know any Tai Chi Chuan. I believe that Chen Chang-xing was the first member of the Chen clan to learn Tai Chi Chuan and that he was taught by the outsider Chiang Fa. I also believe that it was after this that members of the Chen clan took the opportunity to add and adapt Tai Chi techniques to their Pao Chui method. This would have been the natural thing to do, particularly after Yang Lu-chan became the chief combat instructor of the Manchu Imperial Guard and thus made Tai Chi famous throughout China. These additions and adaptations to the Pao Chui method produced what is now claimed to be Chen style Tai Chi Chuan. Lastly, I believe that the Chen Clan deliberately or negligently confused their Chen Wang-ting with an imperial censor who had a similar sounding name with only the "Ting" character being different.
As for Chang San-feng, his existence as a Taoist on Wudang Mountain during the Ming Dynasty would seem to be an established fact. I believe that he did play a part in developing existing Taoist martial arts into what we now call Tai Chi Chuan. This opinion is based on the oral tradition passed down to my teacher and is supported by the fact that a similar version has been handed down in many famous Tai Chi books. Furthermore, if a fictional founder of Tai Chi Chuan was to be invented, many more famous and more ancient Taoists than Chang San-feng could have been chosen. That is why, when I teach Tai Chi Nei Kung (internal strength), students must go through the ceremony that I went through when I learned internal strength from my own teacher. This ceremony involves paying respects to Chang San-feng as the founder of Tai Chi Chuan.