Ba Gua Pre birth /Post Birth

Nei Jia: the Qigong and Taijiquan Forum Taijiquan and the Internal Martial Arts
1

Lately I have been trying to learn a bit about Ba Gua before I begin my ELF classes and I was wondering if anyone could help me with a question I have? Okay, now I’ve heard that there is two different ways to approach Ba Gua, and those are pre-birth and post-birth. I know that pre birth deals more with the meditation and spiritual side of Ba Gua, and that post-birth deals more with fighting and its applications. What I was wondering is this : Would it be counter-productive to learn Ba Gua as a pre-birth method if I am practicing an External Shaolin style, or would it strengthen my Shaolin technique? Also, if I take the pre-birth approach to Ba Gua would it be possible to reach more “advanced” fighting stages of Ba Gua in the future?

I would like to hear from those practicing both sides if possible. Also, how many others here practice Ba Gua’s pre-birth method?

2

baguazhang

Hi , I like to practice baguazhang. As I understand it, prebirth practice refers to the circlewalking palm change sets. These are primarily for body training, and programing the body to move in a “ba gua” fashion. The postheaven straight line drills are more combative and tactical in nature, although they are always based on the circle forms. I am sure others could give you a much more in-depth description of how things are classified, this is just the general idea.

Also there are many bagua styles that do not use this calssification system, perhaps they do not even have any straight line forms at all.

As I understand it, pre and post heaven techniques are both equally important.

Regarding cross training, be aware that when you practice CMA, you are engaging in “body washing” where you are literally changing you body from the inside out to be more like your teacher. You “become” the art with time. So if you are doing half of one, half of another, you will end up as a synthesis, never truly in one camp or another. My advice would be to complete your Shaolin training and achieve a “shaolin body”. Then you will be able to carry that forward with you into your next course of study. Otherwise you are in danger of not reaching a high level in either.

On the other hand there is no harm in visiting and feeling other styles to get an idea of what they do, just in case… :slight_smile:

-Jesso

3

Good reply. I was also thinking the same about cross training, but I was also thinking that maybe the internal power ba gua gives would enhance my external power. In the Five Family Fist classes you learn the five element fist and foot of TCM or Xing Yi whichever you preffer to call it, as well as the five animals and five families system. Five Family Fist has some internal work as well. I also think your right about sme schols not even using this classification, and thats the direction I kinda wanted to take this discussion. Also, I’d like to hear about who does and who does not use these methods , along with a little exlanation. Also, I still want to hear others opinions on cross training just to get a generla idea. Thanks.

4

I also wanted to add that the system of Ba Gua taught by our Sifu is Royal Palace style, part of Tai Tzu Chang Chaun.

5

lineage

Sil-
Yeah, you will find that there is no clear definitions among the baguazhang schools, different schools use the same terms for different things. For instance, your use of the term Five Family Fist is one I have never heard before. Have you had a chance to read the old Pa Kua Chang Journal? This publication had a pretty exhaustive examination of the major baguazhang schools in Taiwan and mainland China. You would find a lot of insight in the way these systems classify their material by reading the old Journal.

-Jessæ

6

This pre-birth and post birth Bagua is really nothing more then a great misunderstanding and mistranslation of I-Ching and trying to apply it to the martial art of Baguazhang.

The circle is the heart the very core of Baguazhang, it is what trains it’s techniques, builds the power and restores and balances the health of a person, the Chinese would say, to return to a state of prefect health as one was in the womb.

Being that China at that time didn’t have a large population of crack addicts and thus the crack baby who is addicted and who’s body craves this addiction and bares the ill effects of his/her crack ***** mother wasn’t exactly part of Daoist/Buddhist thinking of prefect health before birth.

The linear sets came because of the great interest by Hsing-I Chuan people in Bagua and it was easier to conceptualize the linear fashion. Linear Bagua was never meant to be more combative and technique teaching then the circle walking, neither is it anywhere near has health producing or developmentally challenging as circle walking.

I am the big toad and this is my pond.

7

Nice reply Toad, I had also been told by others that the circle walking was the core of Ba Gua. I have seen people doing the circle walking, but I know without actually being taught there is no way to understand it. I’ve read a bit of material on it including B.K Frantis’ book, “Power of Internal Martial Arts”, and thats where I heard the pre/post birth thing. I’ll learn more about it when I begin my ELF course I’m shure.
Rock-
Five Family Fist/ Five Animals is a Southern Sil ( siu) Lum system. It is the system I am currently studying now, and it is also the system I will start Master’s Degree courses in beginning September. Emperor’s Long Fist ( Tai Tzu Chang Chuan) is the internal art practiced at our school which contains Ba Gua ( Royal Palace style), Xing Yi , Tai Chi. ALso where can I get a copy of that book? Thanks.

8

Sil-
You can find some back issues of Pa Kua Chang Journal (its a mag not a book) at http://www.plumflower.comOther than the few they have, you will have to find people that have them and check it out. They have lots of historical, lineage, and training data.
Tai Tzu Chang Chuan is something I have never heard of. Of course, China is a big place and there are lots of different villiage and family styles that are unique and unknown in the west. Is it from the mainland or was it brought from Hong Kong or Taiwan?
I must admit it sounds almost unbelievable that someone could synthesize so many martial arts into one. It would be like bringing bowling, baseball and hanggliding into one practice. Of course, it it might be possible, but it would take a super genius to do it!
Do you train all of the different forms, or have the principles of each been distilled and brought together into one series?
-Jess

9

In our system of Yin Fu style bagua ala Gong Bao Tian, linear forms also employ some type of weapon. In the Ying Shou form, deerhorn knives are added so the form is either open handed or with weapon. We also, with slight modification, put in the bagau hooked swords. At another level of the form, we add back in circle walking utilizing the 8 mother palm forms so the form consists of both noncircular segments and circle segment. The linear form ba gau combination fists can utlize the pens.

In the bagua sword we have segments that are noncircular and you can also put in circular segments. Our post work also has circular and noncircular segments and I have been told that all of the linear forms can be decomposed back into circle walking.

Xiao kai men, our first and most elementary form can be linear and decomposed into circle walking. Applications are most evident in the linear form.

I know that our nei shou zhang and eight mother palms are designed for conditioning and qi circulation but all have applications.

Some say that the linear forms in our style is really Lohan but I don’t buy it. It may have the some of the movements and postures from lohan but they are filtered through the techniques and jings of bagua.

The count can probably add a bit more to this

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Crackwhores?

WTH was THAT all about? By the way, You’re right In the 1850’s there was no rock cocaine in china because everyone was smoking opium. Ever heard of the Sick Men of Asia? This dark period lasted untill around 1911 when the Republic was formed and the use of Opium was banned and punishable with death.

I just wrote an article on Pre- and Post birth training in Ba Gua and basically, it’s all an illusion. Your Intent (yi) is what makes it Yin or Yang, Post or Pre birth.

I know I haven’t read any of the I Ching in the original chinese, and I don’t think Kevin has either. I’d be carefull about swallowing too much of that “Misinterpreted reading” stuff. Too many people are using the “ancient chinese secret” BS these days. But…as far as I remember.. All of my translations of the I Ching don’t even MENTION the pre- and post birth arrangement. It is more often talked about in TCM.

11

I forgot to add…

As far as pre-birth (linear, yang) being done with weapons and post-birth (circular, yin) being done empty-hand, again, it is an illusion. The key to the internal arts as I understand it is yi. Change your intent from empty hand to weapon, and Poof! It’s a weapon art. I realise that a lot of styles of ba gua have unique weapon forms, but in our family I have been told that you merely practice your palm changes as-is with the weapon in your hand. It is easy on one hand but very challanging on the other.

One thing Kevin said I do agree with is that if you wanna get good at bagua… PRACTICE BAGUA! Don’t get too tied up with this pre-post-am I moving my chi-My master can beat up your master crap.

If ya wanna get good, get on the Circle and walk baby… Thats the secret.

Bill

12

Crackwhores?

WTF was THAT all about? By the way, You’re right In the 1850’s there was no rock cocaine in china because everyone was Smoking Opium!!! Ever heard of the Sick Men of Asia? This dark period lasted untill around 1911 when the Republic was formed and the use of Opium was banned and punishable with death.

I just wrote an article on Pre- and Post birth training in Ba Gua and basically, it’s all an illusion. Your Intent (yi) is what makes it Yin or Yang, Post or Pre birth.

I know I haven’t read any of the I Ching in the original chinese, and I don’t think Kevin has either. I’d be carefull about swallowing too much of that “Misinterpreted Translation” stuff. Too many people are using the “ancient chinese secret” BS these days. But…as far as I remember.. None of my translations of the I Ching don’t even MENTION the pre- and post birth arrangement. It is more often talked about in TCM.

As for Linear Bagua being “simplified” so Hsing I guys can understand it… That’s kinda talking down to Hsing I. I am not sure as to the origins of the linear sets, but I do know that Gao Yi Sheng supposedly learned them from a wandering Taoist that no one had ever met before. (And as a student of Doc Painters, that story should sound familiar kevin) I get the feeling that the most likely explanation of the Linear sets is the EXTENSIVE cross-training between Hsing I and Ba GUa guys back around the turn of the century in Tianjin and Beijing.

13

Pre and Post Birth

Obviously different things to different people and nothing at all to some. Generally the pre-post thing in the I-ching has to do with the two different layouts of the trigrams. By the way taoboxer, both layouts are found in my translation of the I-Ching. One earlier more orderly version and the post method which is more complicated and related to baguazhang. Again, the relationship with the I-ching and baguazhang means many different things to different schools.

Some styles hold to the pre-birth method or returning to the natural state in a physical way. The way you were in the womb before you were born. A different way of breathing, a different head position etc. For our style (Yin style), it is pre-birth more for development of internal strength and health and post-birth more for combative. Not that the circular forms aren’t combative either. These linear forms in the post birth methods may have the slightest similarities to hsing-i and lohan, but are clearly bagua not hsing-i. They are the same forms as the circular ones.

RAF, a point of order. First of all I haven’t heard the same explanation of pre and post birth related to the fact that many of our hand forms later add the weapons. Is that what you were saying in your comments? Also, I was told our forest palm is the set for the needles. The fist set is for brass knuckles and to add to that, our bagua 12 elbows is the set we use to learn the elbow dagger’s. I’m sure they are interchangeable to some extent though. You have to show me the bagua sword form when I come out for the tournament in October. I don’t think Jason knows that set. :wink:

Count

Kabooom.com

Chi Kung International

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Count

I do not know the 12 elbows (seen pieces of it demonstrated). I know a form called bagua combination fist. I was shown a couple of moves on how to put in the bagua needles (for this form) (except its not quiet a needle–its an 8 inch tapered piece of steel with a ring in the middle which permits the bar to rotate. Its tapered on both ends)

The tighthand form is used with the deer horn knives (technically not deer horn knives but that is what we use). One set of deerhorn knives fit into the palm your hand (Tony had them when he came over from Taiwan but now they have somehow mysteriously disappeared or borrowed). In the same form you can take hooked swords and play them. As we add some of the circle walking postures back from nei shou zhang, the deerhorn knives follow both the circular walking pattern and noncircular walking pattern. I have been told that another form, the bagua combination hand, is for use regarding the judge’s pen.

So you are right, not every noncircular (linear) has a weapon to it. Although at a very high level, TaoBoxer is probably correct any weapon should fit. However, at these low levels, it is not a one-to-one correspondence of the open hand to the weapon in the form. There are some movements that must be changed to accomodate the weapon usage.

I have seen footage of GM Liu playing the deerhorn knives and then with the same form playing the hooked swords. We have these segments on our xiao kai men tape and I will share them with you sometime.

I have never heard of the noncircular (linear) being a modification for Xing Yi players.

I will share with you information on the sword in an e-mail.

As I have said, you can probably shed more light on some of these forms. Yang Laoshi tends to be short on theory and big on practice (especially basics) and it has only been in the last 3 years that he has really opened up. We spent many years in xiao kai men and still do to this day. I once knew the two man xiao kai men fight but my partner left 3 years ago and I have since forgotten it (I’m angered at myself). It was a really good form with rotating arms, elbow strikes, leg sweeps, groin strikes. Very simple but effective.
Like I said in a previous post, I really concentrate on the 64 moving (nei shou zhang) and the conditioning exercises.

I really hope you can make it and we have time to sit and exchange some ideas.

Later.

15

TaoBoxer

To be very honest I have read and have had read to me YiJing Chinese and have talked with a few YiJing scholars to make sure what I say is correct you wanna debate YiJing with me, tell me where I’m wrong, bring the noise…

There is nothing about what I wrote concerning Pre-brith and post birth Bagua that is totally wrong. In your system there may or not be a pre and post birth system, however the idea of circle walking restoring one’s health to a place of prefect energy before one wasted(pre-say) it as he/she lived is a Daoist way of thinking and is way circle walking was used for at least a 1000 years in Daoist temples as a health only exercise.

As for intent. Well, welcome to club buddy. I’m about one of the only people that talk intent, intent behind movement, intent behind the Gua..So what are you doing, Shifu Painter is HUGE on intent, maybe you could learn something? Happy to see an article out on it maybe you’ll bring more people around.

The point I was making is that its only conceptual if you don’t work in the fact that one can be injured and sickly before birth, most of the people on this boards know crack so thats the term I used.

The idea of a post birth Bagua is after the fact, since we are doing Bagua after we are born everything we do is post birth and therefore there is no pre-birth, which is where the mistranslation comes from.

I’m in no way down playing Hsing-I Quan I done, studied, fought with and lived on it for 13 years now. I pretty much have a good foundation to say the least. It is hard fact that Hsing-I people where interested in Bagua, Bagua people weren’t as interested in learning Hsing-I, linear methods came so Hsing-I people could conceptualize and rework Bagua into their already proficient Hsing-I matrix. If you took something from that and it twanged some insecurity of yours don’t let it out on me.

This sounds more like an attack on Shifu Painter. As I can see where one post was made and another made just to make sure the dig on Painter gets in. I’m pretty sure your in Texas … you think he is full of so much crap..simple go see him. That simple. Prove to me he doesn’t have skill, that he made the whole system up, let me tell what will happen, I can play this both ways.

First you try and take a piece out of his ass and choke on it, thats a given the only constant in this equation. You can then tell me yes he is rooted and steeped in classical and traditional Chinese martial art which is beyond your understanding of how he came by this knowledge. Or.. you can still tell me he made it all up. And we can work on the assumption that he is a martial genius with some of the most natural and powerful skill in modern times.

I’m game either way dude.

I am the big toad and this is my pond.

16

Pre-heaven/birth/natal and post-heaven/birth/natal arrangements of the eight trigrams are often called Fu Xi’s arrangement and King Wen’s arrangment, respectively.

Hopefully that clears up some confusion for those who cannot find them in their books.

17

>I’m pretty sure your in Texas … you think he
>is full of so much crap..simple go see him.

TaoBoxer stated some time ago that he has already visited him.

Guandi

18

ummm…?

Someone sounds a little sensitive…

Where was there an attack in anything I said? If you’re mad about the Gao Ti Sheng comment, sorry, but if the shoe fits… As far as “Debating the I Ching,” When did I say I was right and you were wrong?

Us poor white folk (and most non-chinese) are at a pretty big disadvantage when it comes to the cultural and historical nuances of China. This whole pre- post-birth thing is just another example. My Tai Chi teacher told me once, when asking him a similar question “Mmm Hmm…” Shaking his head, “This kind of thing all psychological. You forget about it…you want to learn taiji you DO TAIJI… this just psychological trick…”

If ya wanna learn Ba Gua, just do it. A lot of this other stuff just falls into place after some time.

And yes Guandi, my stance on Doc Painter has been made, and I am not gonna rehash it here AGAIN.

19

Rockwood

I just wanted to step in here and answer you’re questions, hopefully I will avoid the heat!

Tai Tzu Chuang Chuan is Emperor’s Long-Fist Kung-Fu, it was compiled in 960AD by Emperor Chao Kuang-Yin, sometimes called Tai Tzu. The art is a northern art made up of 50% original Tai Chi, 25% Hsing-Yi, and 25% Ba Qua. It was brought over to the US by Chao Yuh-Feng, the 35th Patriarch. He taught the art to Sifu Kash, who was known in China already as he used to be a monk at the Shaolin temple. Si Lum is learning the Five Family Fist from Sifu Kash and that is a separate art from ELF. Sifu Kash then became the 36th Patriarch and the first american to be ranked in the art. My instructor is William Seibert (Wei Shi Bei) and is the 37th Patriarch. I don’t know much about the Five Family Fist, but my instructor told me it was a very good art, I look forward to learning it one day.

ELFdisciple

Direct Disciple to the 37th Patriarch of Emperor’s Long-Fist Kung-Fu

Practitioner of:
Internal Iron Palm
Genki Ryu Do Karate
White Crane and Spirit Dragon SCA combat

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Yes , William Siebert is in the Wei family, as I hope to be one day as well. The arts are seperate so when I am asking about questions pertaining to ba gua, Xing Yi, or Tai Chi I am merely looking for more info. Sometimes its hard to ask your instructor all theses questions , especially when its not pertaining to the subject matter of the class. I haven’t learned a single thing about these arts yet except what has been discussed between other classmates and I. I know I will learn it in time, but I like to have a foot ahead if I can, it helps to be prepared.

My main interest is in the Five Family Fist/Five Animal system, however I know that I’ll be moving on to the Tai Tzu system as well one day so I’m trying to learn as much about internal as possible. I’ve noticed that there is a lot of good Internal stylist here so that’s why I asked. Also I know a couple of you out there may be practicing Tai Tzu ( Royal Dragon, ELF) , so I can usually get good answers there as well.

I heard about pre/post heaven-birth ba gua through “Power of the Internal Martial Arts” by B.K. Fratzis and I was wanting more info about the concept. I’m not shure what approach to Ba Gua is taken at our school.