I called a couple Kung Fu schools here in town and when I asked what style they teach they say things like northern shaolin. I thought northern shaolin has many different styles in it?
yep, there are a few different northern shaolin styles.
5 main branches of northern shaolin as there are 5 main families of southern kung fu.
so, many will just say “northern” or “southern”. It saves a lot of time going into an arduous explanation about the ins and outs of a style.
shaolin is the catalyst for many styles and sub styles of both northern and southern fighting styles.
peace
what kung lek says is true. what you have to do though is have some info to make them realise you know what you are talking about.
they also get allot of phone calls so going personally is more appropriate.
make sure you know your stuff i.e. info on the gung fu, if they still just call it northern then go somewhere else.
it’s like ringing a resteraunt and them saying the cook food, you have to ask them what food and what style etc.
speaking of food i’m getting hungrey
yum cha anyone
Terms overused.
I think the real problem is that the terms Shaolin and Kung Fu are bandied about so much. Does Shaolin only come from the temple in Honan? Is it really “kung Fu”, ie chinese martial arts, or is it some more eclectic art with elements of CMA.
The only way to find out about these things is to witness a class for yourself. Personally the mood of the class and the personality of the instructor are more important than the style.
It doesn’t matter how authentic a style is if you don’t like the school and drop out. You want something you can stick with.
What 5 main styles does the north consist of ?
hi just a word of warning
some ppl might claim to teach the five different pais in northern or southern shaolin. Anyway this might be true to an extent, that is they know parts of each or have studied parts of each. But to refer to themselves as being masters of more than two or three pais is usually a load of rubbish. Just keep this in mind.
5 branches
wah,pao, fah, cha, and shaolin.
much of the first three branches is no longer practiced with shaolin and cha branches being the most widely practiced.
bak sil lum or North Shaolin is the verfy famous style of North Shaolin. Taught by Kyu Yu Cheong to hundreds even thousands of students and still pretty much recognized as the North Shaolin when it is mentioned or named only that.
the other styles would clarify which branch usually, the same as any school would.
“Hong” style is the “red” fist is also belonging to the repetoire of Shaolin styles and it exists too, with big red and little red boxing still being taught.
But generally, the five main branches are as mentioned. Of these, there are many sub styles or styles that have their origins or much of their content derived from these main five.
Some styles are a mixture of northern an southern styles. Choy Li Fut is a good example of the crossover styles of north and south shaolin.
many southern styles were of course influenced by the northern styles as well. Since the early dissemination of Kung Fu styles of military or temple origins the main branches were recognized and recorded as such for posterity.
peace
Northern Shaolin = the animal systems
Not to mention the discrepancies of contemporary and classical Shaolin.
Northern Classical Shaolin is rare, and those systems comprise animal systems, and as friday said mastery of more than one did
not happen. Too munch info per system. These system are all about fighting and not about exhibitionism. They will not spill their history just to bait you in.
Systems such as Red fist are more contemporary Shaolin systems that exhibit trace amounts of classical material and are influenced more by contemporary sport wushu.
Southern Shaolin systems were at first put together by monks from the North. The systems were designed to provide farmers and peasants a form of self defense that didn’t cut into their work.
farmers could not practice all day like the monks, so the systems were altered,and became less involved. A practice the Southern temple adopted was the adoption of other martial arts as a whole. Though the Northern systems learned from other systems they did not adopt whole systems of kungfu into the temple. They took the theory and made their own applications.
5 styles
Kung Lek, I thought the 5 classical northern styles were Hua (flower), Hua (valuables/Chinese), Hong (red), Pao (cannon) and Cha (moslem), all of them considered as Shaolin in its broadest sense.
Northstar-
Wah is a canton anglasized spelling of Hua
Fah is also canton and means flower or blossom also the system branch.
Hong and Sil Lum (Shaolin) are often considered interchangeable.
Siu Hong Chuan and Dai Hong Chuan still being taught as classical Shaolin at the Honan Temple even today.
Bak Sil Lum (cantonese for North Shaolin) contains the 10 core sets, 2 preliminary sets and at leats 40 weapons sets, iron palm, small golden bell and large golden bell training as well as many other standard Shaolin augmentation exercises and drills.
Portions of the ten core sets of Bak Sil Lum can be found in other systems and also within the other branches. Likely due to Shaolin being the synthesis point and gathering place for the exchange and development of many martial styles.
But, Bak Sil Lum is not Hong style. So, there’s the itch and probably a great cause of confusion for many.
The cultural revolution certainly didn’t help matters in the structure of the Kung fu styles and historical records either. But I think that can go without saying.
Reemul makes a good point especially in terms of the novice or beginner who is unaware of the differences between modern wu shu and classical or Traditional Martial arts of Shaolin.
This is also worth investigating.
peace