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Legends of Other Daoists
Aside from the story of Ba Gua Zhang originating from the brothers Bi, there are numerous other fables floating around which claim that Dong learned from other mystical masters of the mountains. Many of these stories of Ba Guaʼs origins, and anecdotes of Dongʼs life, were the creations of a well-known storyteller in Tianjin, Zhang Jie San. Zhang practiced Ba Gua and loved to tell stories about Dong to anyone who would listen. Those who sat and listened to his tales knew that he was making them up because many times he would tell a piece of the story and then ask the listeners to come back another time to hear the rest of the story as he had not yet thought of a good ending. Because Zhang was so good at his storytelling craft, some listeners wrote his stories down and they were subsequently printed in the New Tianjin Newspaper. A collection of his stories about Dong were also published in a novel. Unfortunately, many have read Zhangʼs stories and taken them to be fact.
One of Zhang Jie San stories had a hidden message to his listeners. On one occasion, when asked to speak about the origin of Ba Gua Zhang, Zhang told a story about how Dong Hai Chuan had learned Ba Gua from two men on Jiu Hua Mountain. One was a Daoist named Shang Dao Ming and the other was a Buddhist named He Dao Yuan. In this story, Zhang told of these two menʼs ability to walk on water. Their technique was to continuously whip the water which was out in front of them with a staff and use the force that was generated by the water splashing upwards to support them as they walked ( . . . it could happen!).
The Buddhist and the Daoist had come together and devised a system of health building which relied on the principles of the Ba Gua. Dong Hai Chuan met these men and spent 18 years learning their system. When Dong had first started to study with these wise gentlemen, they had him practicing a unique method for developing gong fu of the palms. Before Dong sat down to prepare a meal he was required to remove the hulls from his rice by rubbing the rice between his palms. In the beginning he could barely get enough food to eat because his palms had not yet been developed. However, after practicing Ba Gua, he was able to easily remove the hulls from rice using this palm method. The story says that when Dong left his teachers, he used the name Ba Gua Zhang to describe what he had learned and he later modified the method he was taught.
The message which was hidden in Zhangʼs stories about Shang Dao Ming and He Dao Yuan is revealed if you put the two names together and read the characters as a sentence. Shang Dao Ming means “if the way is clear” and He Dao Yuan means “why know the origin.” Zhangʼs message to his listeners was that if the way of practicing Ba Gua Zhang is clear, you donʼt have to be worried about where it came from.
Zum 400 Jahre alten „geheimen“ Bagua der Tian Family aus o.g. Quelle:
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The first article to appear on Tian family Ba Gua said that the Ba Gua that Tian Hui practiced was over 400 years old and had been a closely guarded, closed door art, only taught within his family. In the second article Tian said that at the end of the Ming Dynasty his ancestors Tian Hao Jie and Tian Xuan left the family without notice. They became Taoists and separated themselves from the world. The two went to Emei Mountain and studied Ba Gua from two Daoists named Bi Yun and Jing Yun. After several decades Tian Xuan returned home and taught the head of the Tian family clan what he had learned. From this time on, Ba Gua was taught to each generation in their family. The tradition was passed down from the elders who were frequently involved with anti-Qing organizations.
During the reigns of Kāngxī (1662-1722) and Yōngzhèng (1723- 1735), a second generation practitioner of Tian family Ba Gua, Tian Li Yu was in opposition with the Emperor. He secretly entered the Palace in Beijing on several occasions and killed people. During the Dàoguāng Emperorʼs reign (1821-1850), a third generation practitioner, Tian Fu You, had great battles in front of the Emperor regent palace and killed several scores of people. This news was said to have shaken Beijing at the time. This story was told 100 years later by Tian Hui, who at the time was 60 years old.
When Professor Kang Ge Wu read these two stories, he was naturally very interested and so he went to visit Tian on three separate occasions. Each time Tian Hui refused to discuss the origins of his “closed-door” system of Ba Gua and refused to say where the Tian family had originally lived. He also would not present any evidence that the story he told to the magazines was true.
Having hit a dead end with Tian Hui, Kang investigated the claims Tian made in his story. If it was true that members of Tianʼs family had killed people in the Forbidden City and outside the Prince regentʼs palace, there certainly would have been some record of it if, as Tian said, “the news shook Beijing.” The result of Kangʼs investigation into these stories was that this “earthshaking” news does not appear anywhere in the documentation of the time. Based on his experience with Tian Hui, Kang could not help but be very suspicious of his story.
The next step Professor Kang took was to examine the article Tian had written about his Ba Gua and compare it to the Ba Gua of Dong Hai Chuan. Interestingly enough the Tian family Ba Gua Zhang footwork, special characteristics of the style, and the palm methods of the style were not only similar to the Ba Gua of Dong Hai Chuan, but the words Tian used to describe these aspects of his system were exactly the same words Jiang Rong Jiao had used in his book Ba Gua Zhang Lian Xi Fa. What a coincidence!
Other aspects of Tian style were also similar to what is practiced by many practitioners in the Dong Hai Chuan lineage. He stated that his system utilizes the “crane” stepping technique throughout the practice. This technique is utilized by many practitioners in Tungʼs lineage. Practitioners in the Yin Fu lineage use this step when practicing the Phoenix Gua of their system. Based on the similarities between the two Ba Gua systems, Kang concluded that this was not an art that had been kept within the Tian family.
In the summer of 1984, Kang sent members of the Beijing Martial Arts Association to the Tian familyʼs original home in Tianjin city, Tang Zhang district, Shan Chang Township. The investigators were Zhao Da Yuan and Shao Guo Yong. The Tang Zhang District Athletic Committee accompanied Zhao and Shao. The group interviewed people who lived near the Tian family homestead. They spoke with members of the Tian family, their friends, and elders of the community who had grown up with them.
Zhao reported that it was clear that the names shown in the Tian family records of the past nine generations are different than the names Tian Hui used in his article. Also, the individuals who were interviewed went to great lengths to emphasize that no member of the Tian family had ever practiced martial arts. The people interviewed had grown up with Tianʼs father and three brothers and said that not one of them were martial artists. After reading Zhaoʼs report, Kang visited the Tian family homestead to follow-up and he found their investigation to be accurate.
During the investigation, Kang also talked with Xie Pei Qi, a well- known Ba Gua Zhang stylist in the Yin Fu lineage who resides in Beijing. Hsieh was a student of Men Bao Zhen, one of Yin Fuʼs students. Xie said that Tian Hui was a Ba Gua Zhang student of his senior student Shi Qin Jie (1924-1984). In light of the information which was collected, Kang concluded that the Ba Gua which is practiced by Tian Hui is not separate from Dong ‘s Ba Gua and the story printed in the magazines was totally fabricated by Tian Hui. Another one bites the dust.
Dong war Mitglied der Quanzhen Sekte des Daoismus und von dort stammt die Methode des Kreislaufens. Es war in dieser Sekte aber KEINE Kampfkunst, sondern eine Meditationsform bei der durch Harmonisierung des Körpers Ruhe in Bewegung gesucht wurde. Während des Gehens wurden verschiedene Mantras rezitiert.