Karate: slowed down Kung Fu?

[Hart]

I was surfing the Internet and came across a video showing Shaolin monks practicing forms. I noticed that a lot of their strikes and stances looked nearly identical to Karate. The only differences I could see was that their forms looked more sped up and had more acrobatic aspects. Is Karate simply a more "comprehensive" form of Kung Fu or is it an art all on its own? Like to hear some thoughts on this.

[elbows_and_knees]

kung fu is actually a more comprehensive karate. karate came to japan from okinawa and it came to okinawa from china.

shorin ryu - shorin = shaolin.

much has changed, so there are a lot of differences between okinawan, chinese and korean arts, but there are fundamental similarities that exist in pretty much all arts.

[Sohan]

Karate is to Kung Fu like you are to your parents. Many similarities, of course, but with your own adaptations to your environment and preferences. As a way of fighting passes generation to generation and across cultural divides, it changes to reflect that culture's needs and values.

I have read several masters who say that there is no such thing as fighting styles, just different expressions of the same way of fighting.

Respectfully,

Sohan

[Hart]

Never thought about martial arts that way before. Well said!

[Zatoichi]

Sohan deserves poster of the month

[ps1]

Sohan...you took the words out out of my mouth. Extremely well put. Thank you for such a great post.

[Sohan]

Thanks for the nice words.

Respectfully,

Sohan

[patusai]

Karate is to Kung Fu like you are to your parents. Many similarities, of course, but with your own adaptations to your environment and preferences. As a way of fighting passes generation to generation and across cultural divides, it changes to reflect that culture's needs and values.

I have read several masters who say that there is no such thing as fighting styles, just different expressions of the same way of fighting.

Respectfully,

Sohan

I liked that comparison...as for the last sentence...I agree....we are all one big family with different ways

[jaymac]

Sohan, you do have a great insight to the MA.

[Adam]

I was surfing the Internet and came across a video showing Shaolin monks practicing forms. I noticed that a lot of their strikes and stances looked nearly identical to Karate. The only differences I could see was that their forms looked more sped up and had more acrobatic aspects. Is Karate simply a more "comprehensive" form of Kung Fu or is it an art all on its own? Like to hear some thoughts on this.

Yes, Shaolin Kung Fu is the considered the "roots" of all martial arts. So yeah naurally some techinques are straight from the shaolin style. However, I think there seems to be "internal" wars if you will among different styles of MA. For Shaolin the great debate is the "shaolin is wushu" for some. The acrobatics is mainly the wushu aspect of shaolin but I do want to say that there still is traditional shaolin kung fu from the shaolin temple. The sad part is that there seems to be so many scams and internal war among the shaolin community.

I think for the Karatekas we are faced with the debate is what we are learning traditional or watered down versions of the style. The "Mc dojos" keep popping up around every corner and pass off cross trained styles as traditional.