Budo
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PREFACE

  A great variety of hand-to-hand fighting arts has been found in China since men first appeared there many thousands of years ago. It is reported in Chinese history that fighting arts were especially flourishing in Tang Dynasty (AD 618-907) and few men were without skill in fighting art during that time. It is recorded in history that 13 monks living in the Shaolin Temple located in the north west of Tong Feng Hsien of Ho Na province came to the rescue of the emperor (Tang Tai Chung) and finally assisted the emperor in routing the revolting groups including the big warlord Wang She Tsung.
Their triumph in the battles made not only the fame of the Temple Shaolin very famous but also the Style of their pugilism very well known in China, which in latter time was called the Shaolin School.
  Then it came to the year between AD 1101 and 1126 in Sung Dynasty when Master Chang Shan Feng made a study of many pugilist primarily from the Daoism religion and created a style of his own in pugilism called Tai Chi Chuan and so named Wu Tang School, Which gave much emphasis on the cultivation of the human mind and the promotion of health rather than the improvement of the fighting technique. Generally speaking, this style belongs to the interior school. Then some other schools in addition to the mentioned two were established afterwards.
  On the other hand, the Shaolin school paid more attention to the fighting technique than the maintaining of health and therefore, was put into the category of the exterior school, also a school of the hard pugilism.
  Since then, various schools of the Chinese fighting arts have been so mutually developed and interrelated with each other that it seems not easy to distinguish one school from the other in later time. Generally speaking, the Chinese fighting arts consist of two exercises, the pugilism and the Kung. The later includes the internal type and the external type, which, in turn covers the hard type and the soft type. In order to become proficient in such art, one has to master the aforementioned two exercises. The pugilism is intended to train the people to move and respond with flexibility and swiftness in a close hand-to-hand fighting., while the Kung is aimed to train the Chi (breath) internally and the strength and rigidity of the skin, muscles and bones externally. Therefore, the pugilism is the skin of Kung and Kung is the foundation of pugilism. The two are dependant on each other and it is not fitting to rely on one and give up on the other.
  My friend General Yen has practiced various kinds of pugilism including Shaolin Chuan, Kien Kang Chuan, Yu Fei Chuan, Mei Hua Sword for forty years. He is also an expert in iron ore palm, which he has started practicing since childhood. In considering the fact that many western people have taken interest in the Chinese fighting art, he has requested me to translate his book in this connection with the purpose of orienting the western friends to learn the right way in acquiring the Chinese fighting art including the iron ore palm. Nevertheless, he has advised us not to use this fighting art indiscriminately because the art is a fighting art and it does not only inflict on other people but also commit the user to a criminal offense if put to use at one's discretion.
In view of the fact that the author has attributed the contents of this book from both his experience and the source of other schools, maybe there are some points concerning the principles and methods used in this book not completely in agreement. If this occurs, we think that the variance in Chinese schools can be accounted for the minor difference found in this book.

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