I have been practising Chulgi Chudan Hyung for a few years now, and it is still giving me all kinds of ideas and lessons in mechanics. The other day the schools opened up after a looooong summer and we could finally start up formal training again, and so I met up early to do some self training and I also used the oppertunity to shoot a little video of myself performing Chulgi, Taegeuk il jang and taegeuk i jang. Taegeuk Il jang I shot from different angles etc, and I intend to make a video where the performance is done, interjected with clips of applications. For this post however I am sharing what I can only call a hybrid or personal version of Chulgi Chudan Hyung.
A little historical background of the form:
Chulgi Chudan Hyung is nown as Naihanchi or Naifanchin in Okinawan Karate styles. Okinawan Karate is the source of the modern form we have today, but there are discussions on wether the form is produced on Okinawa, or if it was imported from China (or possibly having its origin in China, being imported and then adapted/changed into what we have today). As far as I can tell we can trace the form back atleast to "Tode" Sakugawa, the teacher of "Bushi" Matsumura. This places the form in the late 1700s or early 1800s. As I have said there is a lot of discussion wether the form was imported from China, and some texts even suggest that it goes back to the 1600s. I personally lean toward it being imported by or invented by Sakugawa. There are actually 3 forms in a series, and in the west ONE author suggested that originally all three was one long form which was later divided into three forms. This has been repeated so many times that many take this as gospel truth, but if you do serious research you can trace this notion back to ONE author who can not back up his claims on this issue. Serious actual research as done by Master Parker (and others however) supports that what we today know as form one in the series was an original form all by itself, later another was made (number two) and finally a third form was made within the same framework giving us Naihanchi 1-3, or Chulgi 1-3. We can look at different Karate lineages as Master Parker has done and see that the oldest form can be found in lineages that goes back to Sakugawa. The lineages that goes through Sakugawa, then Matsumura but not Itosu practise Naihanchi 1-2, which supports a theory that Sakugawa imported or invented the first, and Matsumura invented the second form. Lineages that goes through Sakugawa, Matsumura and Itosu practise all three forms, suggesting that Itosu created the third form.
Historical importance: This form contains the essentual "textbook" of the old masters. Sakugawa emphasised this form, Bushi Matsumura, a legendary fighter in his own right emphasised this form, and taught it first to his students. He also made his own "commentary" on it by creating the second form. Anko and Azato Itosu both emphasised these two forms, and Itosu created his very own commentary on it by creating the third form. Naihanchi or Chulgi was the first form taught to most Karate students prior to the invention of the Pyungahn/Pinan/Heian forms in the early 1900s. Funakoshi, founder of Shotokan and teacher to many Kwan founders had to master these three short forms and devoted his first decade of study on them! Legendary fighter and practical Karate pioneer Choki Motobu taught this form to his students and stressed its importance by claiming that everything one needs to know about fighting is within it. Otsuka, the founder of Wado Ryu Karate loved this form, and made special not of it in his writings claiming that there is something deep about it. When Karate was imported to Korean in the 1940s onward, what was to become Taekwondo taught this form widely until the early 1970s when it fell out of favour, with the introduciton of Korean made forms. I feel that they threw the baby out with the bathwater and I hope that more people will consider learning it as part of their study, and historical heritage.
One form many names: The form has many names. As I allready wrote on Okinawa it is commonly referred to as Naihanchi or Naifanchin. In Japan Funakoshi renamed it seemingly twice; Kiba Dachi Kata (named after the stance that characterise the form) and Tekki which stuck with Shotokan until modern times. When the form(s) were imported to Korea it was imported along with the name according to the masters lineage. Some called it Naebojin, which is the Korean reading of the Characters making up Naihanchi. Some just called it Naihanchi, while others call it Kima Hyung, Kima referring to Kiba Dachi. Others again call it Chulgi which is the Korean reading of Tekki if I am not mistaken. So in Korean you might see the same form reffered to as Naihanchi, Naebojin, Kima or Chulgi but it is essentually the same form.
My study of it: When I pick up "extra forms" I do so with a very picky attitude. The KTA has sanctioned 8 Taegeuk forms and 9 black belt forms making me working and studying hard in what I can only feel is quite enough forms allready. To top it off my Korean teacher has made his own forms in his Soak Am Ryu which I also study, but many forms gives great width, but not a lot depth. So I pick and choose from around the forms what I like, study a few indepth and train all so I get movement education. Picking new forms on top of all of this is tough, and many would say not necessary. I came across Naihanchi in my studies of practical applications. It shows up literally everywhere! Both historical texts such as Choki Motobu's books, and in newer texts such as Iain Abernethys books. Noah Legal on karateobsession.com also emphasises this form, Chris Denwood loves this form, and so when it shows up so much, you kinda want to see what all this fuzz is about. So I started studying it. From my clip you can see that it is very short, and a black belt practisioner should be able to do it within minutes. The perfection takes years, and the applications study is virtually endless, but if you import a single "Karate Kata" into your repetoire, you could do a lot worse than Chulgi. Given all of our lineages can be traced back to a Karate style if we go back far enough, and that if you go back as recently as the 1970s it was there right in our own Taekwondo.
I read about it in multiple books, bot Karate and older Taekwondo texts. I studied different peoples practical approaches on it. Whenever I was at a seminar or training weekend, or simply found myself traveling along with a karate practisioner I would encourage a little naihanchi time so I could learn more. The result is that I have a form that I know many small variations on. I can freely play according to my own moods and wants since it is not an official form. Therefore I made the additional note in my video that it is a hybrid or personal variation. The filmed result is close to the Shotokan and Kwan era Taekwondo versions however, but the way I learned it was extremly ecclectic, different books, articles, blogs, videos, and people have all given my a little to pour into it.
I hope that you enjoyed this short jurney on Chulgi, and I will try to provide more short comments about different forms in the future. In a way it is what I can only hope to be the best of both worlds; Video AND text :-P I tried to write and film so that each can be enjoyed for what it is by itself, but hopefully people will get something from both :-) Best regards from Norway, and happy training everyone :-)
Nathan J Johnson has a very interesting interpretation of this pattern. He claims it was originally made for policemen in Ming Dynasty China to submit a civilian with arm locks. I don't agree with everything Johnson says, but his interpretation of Naihanchi seems reasonable.
ReplyDeleteIs that the guy who wrote barefoot zen?
DeleteYup, same guy.
DeleteI’m not sure if I agree with his theory. You see there are three “problems” the way I see it: 1 we have no surviving parallel form that has survived in China. We have some that incorporates a technique here and there, and some who share the same floor pattern, but we don’t have a Chinese Naihanchi. 2: There is absolutely no proof at all that all three forms were originally one long one. His works kinda take that as a base assumption, but as I wrote in the post: there is no evidence for this anywhere, we can trace the notion back to one single guy who can’t back it up, and absolutely no one in the east is even considering this. All evidence we do have from serious research point towards them being made one after the other. Ryan Parker’s theory that Sakugawa made the first, Matsumura the second and Itosu the last is as I see it be most plausible one. 3: Johnson states stuff in this book that he later takes a 180 on. The forms were for empty handed push hands and non violent pursuits in barefoot zen, into some forms were actually weapons forms in another.
DeleteI have the book and despite my problems with his theories and conclusions I found it to be a good read and I do (despite everything) recommend it simply because we all should get our ideas challenged sometimes and I’d bet many would get their ideas challenged by reading the book :-)
Thanks for commenting :-)
That's interesting! I'm not that knowledgeable about Naihanchi (or any karate kata really) and so I just sort of pick up stray things.
DeleteGood performance by the way.
Thanks 🙏 for the kind words on the performance. The upside with having a form that you have no authority to answer to is that you can play around with it, changing according to your moods. The downside is that because of this you never truly have ONE way to do it, so the performance might not become as sharp as if you had that ONE way to do it :-)
DeleteAs to the history of the form, I love history :-P and a study of the history was a part of the process of deciding wether I should implement it or not. Like I wrote in the post: I’m very picky, and it’s a slow process:-) again thanks for commenting :-)