Daily Reflection
Those who turn from delusion back to reality, who meditate on walls, the absence of self and other, the oneness of mortal and sage, and who remain unmoved even by scriptures are in complete and unspoken agreement with reason.
—Bodhidarma, Two Entrances and Four Acts1
Good morning friends,
I hope you’ve all had a nice weekend. All this week, we’re going to be discovering the philosophy behind some of the world’s oldest self-defense disciplines.
I’m calling it the Philosophy of Fighting, but as we’ll see in the world of self-defense, it’s always better not to fight—to paraphrase a famous Wing Chun Master we’ll study later this week, Yip Man.
Behind the development of martial arts is a rich history and deep philosophy. Recently, I’ve become enamored with the principles and parables behind various forms of fighting/self-defense, and the capacity for self-knowledge which comes through the daily habits of martial arts.
Today, we begin with the earliest organized and recorded days of martial arts. I didn’t realize it until working on this series, but Chinese Buddhism and martial arts are deeply connected.
The person most responsible for bringing Buddhism into China also brought with him the basis for future martial arts.
Often, monasteries were centralized locations of devotion, ascetic, and worship. This meant local communities would contribute to making monasteries beautiful palaces of heavenly worship and cultivation of the self.
As such, these rural, isolated palaces were prime targets for thieves and gangs.
Over time, there emerged organically the need for pacifistic monks with vows of non-harm to defend themselves from random acts of violence—not to kill but to defend one’s right to life.
This very unique niche-need led to the evolution of various forms of what we call Kung Fu or Gong Fu. The phrase refers to any activity in which one must make themselves disciplined to attain.
The most famous example of this unique blend of Buddhism and martial arts comes from the famous Shaolin Temple in Southern China.
Shaolin is actually where Bodhidarma first taught and settled in China—according to legend. Over the centuries, the monks there would take both his Buddhism and Martial Arts and begin crafting a uniquely Chinese version of both.
There is a saying that goes something like, “All Chinese Martial Arts originated in Shaolin.” This speaks to the notion that Chinese Kung Fu can almost always be traced back to the self-defense and self-discipline of the earliest Chinese Buddhist.
I’ve found that most westerners (Americans especially) most readily associate Kung Fu with Hollywood films and actors like Bruce Lee, Donnie Yen, Jet Li, or Jackie Chan. Interestingly, there is a direct line between the Shaolin Monks and these films. If all goes right, we’ll be covering the distance between those two points this week.
And so we conclude today referring back to the famous practice taught by Bodhidarma. This wall gazing is the earliest written record and experiment with naming and observing ego, and even more than that, the discipline of meditation.
This discipline of overcoming one’s own immediate perceptions in order to peer into the realities of life as an observer, is the seat from which Chinese Buddhism and Kung Fu originated.
As we’ll see, in many respects you cannot have one (martial arts) without the other (spirituality).
I’m excited to peel this back with you this week friends.
Until tomorrow,
Matt
References:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shaolin_Kung_Fu
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bodhidharma#Pointing_directly_to_one's_mind
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bodhidharma#Pointing_directly_to_one's_mind