Kwan Heon - A closer look at Kwan creeds of early Taekwondo part 7.2: Ji Do Kwan

 

This time I revisit the Ji Do Kwan because I want to make this blog series the most accurate and comprehensive series available for free in English on the old Kwan philosophies and creeds. I am sure someone else has made something better, but I can not find it, and if I would want to read something and it does not exist I feel I should do my best to make it. Most of this blog has come about this way, I want someone to write about something, I can not find much and so I do research and try my best to share what I find here :-) Anyway, in this post I will:

- Look at the Ji Do Kwan Members pledge

- Look at the Ji Do Kwan Crest

- Finish my theory and speculation on what Yeon Mu Kwan philosophy MIGHT have been and why I think so. 

So without further adu lets start :-)

Kwan Heon - A closer look at Kwan creeds of early Taekwondo part 7.1: Ji Do Kwan

 

I have been steadily giving out posts on the Kwan Heon or Kwan Creeds over the course of 2026. This time we have come to one of the Kwan I have a direct lineage back to through one of my original teachers Grandmaster Cho Woon Sup; The Ji Do Kwan. I will draw on both of his early books entitled Taekwondo 1 and Taekwondo 2, as well as a phamplet assembled by Grandmaster Al Cole and the 2015 historical collection phamplet I have been using as a base throughout the series. I will make sure to make it clear what I got where, and especially so if they are conflicting. 

Compared to Han Mu Kwan, the Ji Do Kwan is very well known and documented, and since this Kwan (and the Oh Do Kwan) is the school I have a very personal connection to I have been both looking forward to it and dreaded to start the post. 

I will as I have routinely said throughout the whole project, I am not fluent in Korean, nor am I a professional translator. Therefore any mistake here is mine and mine alone. And with that out of the way, let us look at Ji Do Kwan, their history and philosophy.

Balsaek - Bassai a peculiar movement discussion

There is a great upside to embracing your Kwan-roots fully, and that is the opening up in rich forms material and historical forms material that is no longer normally preserved in the mainstream Kukki-Taekwondo or modern ITF curricula. This post is not about proving one version right and another wrong. It is about tracing how one movement in Balsae/Bassai was described and performed across Japanese and Korean sources, and what that tells us about Kwan-era transmission.

One of the very oldest forms in the Oh Do Kwan repertoire is Balsaek Hyeong. It is also perhaps the oldest form I know and practice (along with Cheolgi / Tekki / Naihanchi and Ban Wol / Hangetsu / Seisan). 

"The Balsaek forms come in two versions, large and small. The distinctive feature of this form is that the blocking hand is quickly turned and transformed into another block, thereby shifting one from a disadvantageous position into an advantageous one. Its energy resembles the action of piercing through an enemy’s defensive fortifications, and from this comes the name “Balsaek.” - Choi Hong Hi 1959

It is a very interesting form, and among the forms that Anko Itosu drew from when he developed the Pyeongahn / Pinan / Heian Forms. We see the form echoed even into modern Taekwondo Poomsae. In Koryo Poomsae for instance you have right after a side kick, placing the foot down you do an upset low section spear hand thrust with one hand while the other one comes in front of the opposite shoulder in a long front stance. You then move the front foot back while pulling the "spearhand-thrusting-hand" back and up (to your hip in modern Koryo) while performing a low block. 

This short sequence originated quite possibly in Bassai Kata or Balsaek Hyeong, before being mined to be included in Pyeonghan 5. One of these two then served as inspiration or knowledge-well for the originator(s) of modern Koryo Poomsae when it comes to this short sequence. I am not claiming a direct documented borrowing here, only that the technical resemblance is suggestive when viewed against the background of the KTA forms committee.