Talk:Neijia/Archive 1

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I don't know much about martial arts, but I don't think the etymology with 家 meaning "family" in that context makes a lot of sense. In Chinese, the morph 家 often means "school of thought" like in 儒家 Rújiā ("Confucianism").

Soft/hard is NOT internal/external
im sorry if im adding this in the wrong part of the page but there is a major error about who is using what is states that the shaolin people are internal style users, while taoists are external, its the complete opposite the shaolin are known for their hard physical training, stamina and strenght, especially for their high pain endurement —Preceding unsigned comment added by 83.87.80.183 (talk) 22:13, 16 May 2008 (UTC)

Soft/hard is just not the same as internal/external. This thinking comes because most people have only ever seen Tai Chi in practice. I propose removing the hard soft terms from the article.Bihal 07:13, 12 January 2006 (UTC)

Six months later and I'm making the edit. Bihal 05:57, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

Soft Style (martial arts) and similar terms redirect here. If it's not the same thing, then we need a separate article for it. (Also, we need separate articles for external and hard martial arts, neither of which I could find.) -Toptomcat 01:38, 23 October 2006 (UTC)

I absolutely agree that a soft art is not necessarily internal, hence I have started a page hard and soft (martial arts) and changed the redirects from soft style and soft style (martial art) to point there. (Womble_bee 24 Oct 2006)

Have a look at these external links:
 * The martial arts FAQ . org/faqs/martial-arts/faq/ was built up over years of discussion on rec.martial.arts. In part one, there is an entry for hard vs soft and internal vs external.
 * Ezine article re hard and soft martial arts . com/?What-Are-Hard-Style-and-Soft-Style-Martial-Arts?&id=106147
 * Stanford Jujitsu FAQ.

The redirects have been changed back to point to neijia and I fundamentally belive that hard/soft and internal/external are entirely different things. I'm not going to play tag and keep on changing them back - until we have cleared this up. (Womble_bee 25 Oct 2006)


 * Different schools have different usages for the term. In traditional T'ai Chi Ch'uan, we describe ourselves as "soft" and most other styles, with very few exceptions, as "hard". And for the traditional schools at least, the soft/external hard/external identification is absolute; we would never describe Judo as soft, for instance, as their quality of motion, in the opinion of T'ai chi practitioners is completely different. Not better or worse, but certainly different. Other people have different opinions, the opinion I'm reporting is based on writings and teachings of the Yang, Wu and Sun families which are in themselves opinions, if historically influential ones. So, for Wikipedia to make an article making an absolute statement as to what is hard and soft violates WP:NPOV and will have to be qualified or eventually deleted. --Fire Star 火星 20:39, 23 October 2006 (UTC)


 * I've added some citations in aid of shoring up the association of internal with soft, at least for the most popular of the big 3 arts. I was careful not to say that soft is better, and also careful to frame the quotes as opinions of the writers, not indisputed fact. This is primarily a western issue, IME, and due to bad translations over the years, and people not investigating further into what the old timers were really saying. Wu Jianquan, for example (in stories told by his grandsons) regularly worked with Shaolin practitioners in the Ching Wu Men and reported that their skills were nothing short of amazing. My experience has been that they were always careful to point out that the two approaches were different, not better or worse. For us to imply that they meant that soft is better (just as I can't put my hearsay stories in the article) is original research. --Fire Star 火星 21:54, 23 October 2006 (UTC)

The article hard and soft (martial arts) now seems to have accepted that Judo is a soft art, which is not necessarily internal. Can we now agree that the soft art, and soft style links should not redirect to neijia. Womble bee 11:28, 31 October 2006 (UTC)

OK. So... if you reject a definition based on hard/soft (and I do not really disagree), then what is a definition that you will accept for the foundation of Neijia kung fu? Appealing to Japanese styles seems to me to be a very poor way to define a set of Chinese styles. While Sun Lu Tang had a role in a modern revival and popularization of the Neijia concept, it certainly predates him. One problem with this Neijia page is that you can't decide what it is that you are talking about, so you can't decide what belongs here and what does not belong here. (I would go with the Taoist association of all of these Chinese internal martial arts. When I tried to add that as a definition it was removed almost immediately.) Other definitions would probably work, but no definition does not work at all. You people need to present a decent definition for Neijia kung fu or this page is about nothing! Jabberw0cky (talk) 01:20, 5 July 2008 (UTC)

Revsion
I have added some much needed structure to the article, but have been careful to keep the material that was there originally. I would like to see more content and I've added some external links to articles with further information. I'm not sure a casual reader would necessarily leave with a better understanding of the nature of a neijia art after reading the article in its current form. Womble bee 16:30, 19 December 2006 (UTC)

I have fleshed out the article with a lot of text plundered from the "Styles of Chinese martial arts" article, which I think now gives this article a better feel for the neijia. There is still a long way to go in improving this article though. Get writing! Womble bee 09:01, 21 December 2006 (UTC)

T'ai Chi Ch'uan -> Taijiquan
Everything else in the article is in Pinyin Romanisation. Would it not make sense therefore to change T'ai Chi to Taiji? Leushenko (talk) 04:15, 19 January 2008 (UTC)


 * Whoa whoa whoa, at least offer an objection before removing the existing pinyin...! Leushenko (talk) 00:06, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

Bak Mei Pai, Bok Foo Pai
An anonymous user keeps adding these two names to the list of internal arts. It has been reverted by at least two different users (one was me). There is no accompanying reference, and there is very little info on these arts on WP. I would like to see what others' opinions are about this. Helikophis (talk) 19:55, 10 April 2008 (UTC)


 * I left a message for the anon with links to WP:REF and WP:Reliable sources, with no subsequent communication. The same anon has been also recently over at Martial arts and Dim Mak adding the same stuff, I see. I'll look at those tomorrow.


 * They are probably real styles, I know Bak Mei is, but without proper sourcing we shouldn't add them, I'd say. --Bradeos Graphon Βραδέως Γράφων (talk) 02:20, 11 April 2008 (UTC)

Neijia is a legitimate category
No matter if you relate the Chinese Martial Arts of Baguazhang, Xingyiquan and Taijiquan by their commonalities, trace the concept of martial qi gung exercises to the Han dynasty, or claim that Sun Lutang invented the idea of the Chinese Internal family of martial arts, this is clearly a legitimate category for these arts linked by their Taoist foundation or association. I have added a Neijia category. Jabberw0cky (talk) 05:04, 7 May 2008 (UTC)Jabberw0cky

Neijia and the practice of Chinese internal martial arts
This page is a scattered and not very informative presentation of Neijia martial arts. Part of the problem seems to be that the authors/editors do not agree on much of anything. Part of the problem can only be attributed to authors pushing individual agendas. There is a lot of text on this page that has a low signal to noise level. Jabberw0cky (talk) 03:37, 24 May 2008 (UTC) I think that this is a good topic: this page should be better. Jabberw0cky (talk) 03:48, 24 May 2008 (UTC)

internal/external vs. soft/hard
The internal/external distinction is clearly valid and notable, but it remains unclear whether it is entirely idiosyncratic to Sun Lutang and his followers and as such inherently affected with an "internal" bias, or whether it is embraced by schools who self-identify as "external".

De facto, it appears that any presentation of the "internal/external" seems to end up suggesting that the "internal" way is superior or more refined. Typically, such presentations end up using terms like "brute force" or "muscular tension" for the external approach. This is clearly wrong. The distinction of hard and soft (martial arts) has nothing whatsoever to do with the internal/external distinction. Any (every) external school will also teach you that you need keep your muscles relaxed and to meet 'hardness' with 'softness' (and vice versa!).

As such, the defining feature of Neijia is not being "relaxed" but the proposition that this has something to do with "qi". The external approach will be "you need to relax this muscle". The internal approach appears to be something like "channel your qi and this will ultimately result in relaxed muscles".

It is fair enough to group martial arts schools which operate with notions of qi, but it is clearly incorrect that they are unique in teaching "relaxation". --dab (𒁳) 11:58, 9 January 2010 (UTC)

I just found this. Apparently, this is the typical case of a "usenet controversy" reflected on Wikipedia.
 * "Soft" styles tend to redirect energy, channeling and diverting momentum to unbalance an opponent, or to move them into striking range. They tend to be lower commitment and use less force.  Thus, they are less likely to be unbalanced and can recover from redirection easier.   Examples are Taiji, Aikido, Ninjutsu, or many Gongfu styles and sub-styles.
 * "Internal" styles are styles that emphasize the more non-tangible elements of the arts. They utilize chi/ki/qi flow, rooting, and those elements which some people consider "mystical".   They tend to emphasize meditation, body control, perception, mind control (self,  not others!), and pressure points.  `Typically' internal styles are soft.

This is fair enough, but I am uncomfortable with the terms "soft style" or "hard style". Strictly speaking, there are soft and hard techniques. I suppose that "soft style" is then just a shorthand for "a style that tends to emphasize soft techniques". This is fine with me as a point of terminology aslong as it is understood that no working martial art can be "only soft" or "only hard", it can just be categorized subjectively based on how much relative emphasis it puts on either. --dab (𒁳) 12:51, 9 January 2010 (UTC)

Overzealous Editing & Moving
1. Neijia is a broad term like "human." It is not synonymous with Wudangquan, but rather encompasses all internal qi practices, including QiGong and Wudang Chuan-- which are sub-sets & should each have a page on Wikipedia. I had done a lot of work on the Wudangquan page, only to have some Sun Lu Tang fan(atic) move it here and eradicate all of my work. This is not right and I'm not happy about it. 2. We need to rebuild the Wudang page. Can someone help me find my old work ? I have done gobs of research on Wudang, but I'm not incredibly savvy with Wikipedia. I see my name in the history here, but can't get to my writings. (Tommy Kirchhoff) 3. Sun Lu Tang was not the end-all be-all for Wudang. He just published more books than the Wudang lineage holders. Fu Chen Sung was not Sun's student. This stuff frustrates me. 4. It is a mistake to omit information on Wudang Sword, Wudang Spear, Sung Wei-I, Li Jing Lin, The Fu Family and Baji Chuan, which are all very important historical factors in Wudang. 4. My e-mail address is tommy@paracreative.com If you are interested in Wudang Quan, and have some skill with Wikipedia, please help me rebuild that which was errantly destroyed. TommyKirchhoff (talk) 13:12, 23 March 2010 (UTC)

--dab (𒁳) 13:57, 23 March 2010 (UTC)
 * 1) please post new topics to the bottom of the page.
 * 2) our problem is that we can only build content based on verifiable references. If you know something to be true, even if it is in fact absolutely true, you will not be able to add it to Wikipedia without quoting a published reference substantiating it. See WP:RS. You are most welcome to rebuild the Wudangquan article, but you will need to base it strictly on such sources. If something is "omitted", it is because nobody has so far bothered to present a referenced discussion.
 * 3) nothing has been "destroyed". The article as it stood before the merger can be accessed here. You will agree, I hope, that it was far from adequately referenced. In fact, the single point that was properly referenced was the statement that the common claim that tai chi chuan originated in the Wundag range had been 'debunked' by Henning (1994).

Okay, How Do We Rebuild Wudang ?
In truth, most of what I added to the Wudangquan page is adequately referenced. The citations from PakuaChang Journal back up all the statements regarding the 1928 competition, Central Martial Arts Academy, The Fu Family, Sung Wei-I, Wudang Sword, etc. Perhaps you (and the powers that be) would find the page more comforting if every third sentence has a numerical citation ? So, how do we split Wudang apart from Neijia, and create a page ? Can we title it "Wudang Chuan," similar to the Tai Chi Chuan page ? TommyKirchhoff (talk) 14:07, 31 March 2010 (UTC)

April 2, 2010
Dab said I could rebuild the WudangQuan page; so I have deleted the redirect. I'm going to start by simply pasting the entirety of the Neijia page into the Wudang page, and then editing from there. I'm trying to do this diplomatically, and above board; so if you want to help, I'm all for it. But please don't redirect the sub-category "Wudangquan" back to the general term Neijia again. Most sincere thanks, TommyKirchhoff (talk) 15:03, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

April 3, 2010
Already this morning, someone had redirected the WudangQuan page here. Is this going to be an edit war ? Also, this is the English Wikipedia, so I have moved the Wudang stuff to Wudang Chuan for it's easy association with the much larger Tai chi chuan (Wade-Giles). TommyKirchhoff (talk) 15:10, 3 April 2010 (UTC)

QiGong
Since I started working on these pages again, I have been speaking to my teacher about these topics to better understand and define them on Wikipedia (my teacher is a 64-year old Chinese-born and raised master of all the Wudang arts). This morning, he told me that Neijia includes the Wudang arts (TCC, XYC & BGZ) and also all forms of "soft QiGong." He elaborated that the "soft QiGong" include both Buddhist QiGong and Taoist QiGong (the soft stuff, not Iron QiGong). Our system has QiGong built into the forms, so I am not the person to research this. But if someone wants to do this correctly and find the proper references, the QiGong aspect of Neijia is one "I know to be absolutely true," but I'm working on other things... TommyKirchhoff (talk) 20:20, 17 April 2010 (UTC)

I appreciate there are terminological subtleties, and I certainly support discussing them in detail, but why must you split the article and "rebuild" Wudangquan as a separate article? It would just be enough to make clear this distinction here on this page. This is assuming that the discussion can be referenced, needless to say you cannot base it on your personal communication with your martial arts master. The way I understand you, the "Wudangquan" group proper is just what was called "Wudang" in 1928 at the Central Guoshu Institute competition. "Neijia" is de facto the wider term because anyone can come up with new styles based on the idea of "internal" technique and group it under "Neijia", but not under "Wudang", because that is limited to the big three (TCC, XYC & BGZ) of 1928. If we assume for the sake of argument that this is undisputedly the case, I still see no reason to split the page instead of just clarifying the situation here in this article. --dab (𒁳) 14:22, 27 December 2010 (UTC)