A major aspect of Taoist influence on Chinese culture is its martial arts. Chinese martial arts of all sorts have a long history and a great diversity of methods and styles. Generally speaking, they are divided into two big schools: the south school and the north school.

The north school originated from Shaolin Temple of Songshan Mountain, the Holy Land of Buddhism and is called the Shaolin Sect with its boxing called as Waijiaquan. The south school originated from Wudang Mountain, the Holy Land of Taoism and is called the Wudang Sect with its boxing called as Neijiaquan. Thus Wudang and Shaolin are considered as the two main sects of Chinese martial arts.

Wudang Kung fu has a very long history. Incorporating ways to stay healthy and prolong the lifespan as well as collecting the skills to fight, it is not only a special school of martial arts, but also a whole system of martial arts theory.

Wudang Kung fu, as a culture, takes root in the fertile soil of thousand-year long Chinese civilization, containing profound Chinese philosophical theories, combined with the traditional notions of Taiji, Yinyang, Five-element, Eight-diagram into boxing theories, boxing skills, exercise and attack policies, tantamount to studying the laws of life activities. So we can say that Wudang Kung fu is the crystallization of Wudang Taoism in the process of studying life.

Wudang martial arts are a great contribution of Wudang Taoism which is a famous branch of Chinese Taoism. It is said that the father of Wudang Neijiaquan is Zhang Sanfeng, an outstanding Taoist. When practising asceticism at Wudang, he saw a fight between a pied magpie and a snake which enlightened him a lot. The original legend of Wudang Kung fu and the pose of the snake in the fighting have visually demonstrated the gist of Wudang Kung fu: to overcome the strong in a gentle way and to win by striking only after the enemy had struck. To ascertain one’s position and then defeat the enemy.

Based on the postures of the two animals, he eventually created the unique Wudang boxing. It has been developed and enriched successively by the great masters over the generations and has now grown into one of numerous schools and varieties with rich contents. Wudang boxing includes boxing varieties such as Taiji (shadowboxing), Xingyi that imitates the movements of animals or birds of various kinds and integrates physical motions with concentration of the mind, Bagua (eight-trigram boxing), weapon arts such as Taijiqiang (Taiji spear) and Taijijian (Taiji sword), Qinggong (light skill), Yinggong (mastery skill), stunt and various Qigong (a system of deep breathing exercises) for health.

After many boxing masters enrichment and development, Wudang kung fu has many derivative schools and kinds, such as, Taiji boxing, Form-and-will boxing, and Eight-diagram Palm; and Taiji Sword; Lightening Kung fu, Hard Kung fu, feats and variations of Qigong. From then on, Wudang Kung fu has walked out of the deep mountains and become important school of Chinese martial arts.

As a main sect of Chinese martial arts, Wudang martial arts are heading for the world and have drawn a lot of martial arts fans from outside China.

Tags: Postures, Sect, Zhang Sanfeng