My theory on the history and practical use of martial arts

[Jab]

Often times you hear people make fun of martial arts and their lack of practical use.

 

I have a theory as to why Tae Kwon Do, Kung Fu etc, don't appear to be as useful as they were made out to be in "ancient times".

 

I've read that when those dirty Spaniards invaded South America, the average height of a conquistador was around 5'1. This leads me to believe that the average height of a Chinese, Japanese, or Korean martial artist 300-500 years ago was around 4'8 at the most.

 

Asians also are known to have light thin bone structure that isn't made to carry excess muscle. So they probably weighed somewhere in the area of 85 - 100 lbs with thin, 'ripped', Bruce Leesque physiques.

 

Smaller people are more adept at balance and tend to have better technique at fighting than larger people. Look at boxing. Your average flyweight boxer is technically far superior to your average heavyweight. Martial artists of this time were also very dedicated. This leads me to believe fighters of this time were extremely quick with tight, economical movement in executing techniques.

 

A persons reflexes and speed do not adjust accordingly with a persons size. Therefore, two of these smaller fighters are not as able to "see each other coming" as todays larger, slower, clumsier fighters. If a modern fighter were to attack some one on the street with some sort of spinning kick, he would leave himself wide open. Unless he has blinding speed (relative to who he's attacking) this is not a practical move. He would get cracked in the back of the head if his opponent was atleast as fast as he was. But the Asians of the past could get away with these tekniks because they were too fast to be countered as consistently.

 

When people of today found these techniques difficult to use they wrote them off as being useless.

[omnifinite]

That's probably part of it. A hundred things are probably part of it. I don't think we're quite using the martial arts they practiced then. So many teachers in the past learned the art, changed it around to serve their own purposes (be it innovation, money, ego, manipulation, whatever), taught this "better" version to a student who did the same thing later on, who taught it to someone else, etc. Not to mention hiding things from the students so they'd always have some advantage over them. Do that for a couple hundred generations and you have an art that barely resembles itself anymore in the ways that truly matter. The newer arts don't have that problem as severely as the older arts do. But they will... and a century from now people doing future arts will argue about how "useless" today's newer arts are.

[magikchiongson]

The only reason why Kung Fu, Karate doesn't appear as practical as they use to, is simply because nobody trains in the old way anymore. Kung Fu nowadays has turned into a new wave exercise program for senior citizens and a lot of the techniques are saturated with these healing motions. TKD, Karate and some Kung Fu styles have turned their Martial Techniques into tournament moves.

 

There's not many places where these old Martial Arts exists as they used to. Even China, don't be fooled by the lure of China, Chairman Mao tried to eradicate Old Chinese Kung Fu in China.

 

Its also true, that some of the more dangerous styles have been discouraged from being practiced by certain Governments. Indonesian Government has tried to ban Kuntao several times in Indonesia, while promoting Silat as a "National Sport". In the Philippines, rules were set for Eskrima/Arnis tournaments forcing you to wear head gear and ridiculous armor.

 

Martial Arts as a whole has simply athropied. The crucible in which they were forged no longer exists. Which is why I want to see more Traditional fighters compete in the NHB tournaments, its the closests thing we have to a crucible. Maybe we there, we can relearn what we lost.

[LOILOI44]

I think we're missing the main fact here. The world has changed. There are factors that come into play. I don't know about everybody else, but I have a full time job. I do not train every day like a samurai. The four classes I attend a week come nowhere near my teacher's six hours a day he used to train in Japan. In ancient cultures people start earlier. If you were born into the role of a soldier, you started at age four. I started at age 20. My feeling is that these NHB fighters are much larger than the samurai, and in much better shape, but the samurai played for keeps. When you fought, it was for your life; not money and a belt. I would put my money on a samurai, any day of the week. To answer the question...the styles have not changed; we have!

[ZeRo]

interesting theory.

[yoriki816]

Make no mistake the world had indeed moved on. The time when a warriors martial prowess relied more on his physical skills than the level of the technology he employs is long since passed us by. I agree that the majority of the martial ways have been sportified, spiritualized, and commercialized to a frightening level. In olden days these techniques were about like and death, and how many of us can say we face that same sense of urgency when we practice.

 

I would agree that part of the changes do result from the simple law of atrophy, the arts have become more and more diluted as they get farther and farther away from the source. And as someone pointed out the amount of time the martial arts practicioner trains is miniscule now compared to the warriors of old. But do we really want to be modern day samurai, fighting for our lives on some battlefield. Is the reason we enjoy our practice about violence? Or is it about enlightenment, fitness, or self confidence? The reasons we train are different and we should understand that with the change in the mindset of the students there will inevitable by a change in the art to suit the needs of those practicing it. Everything evolves it is as simple as that.