Xing-Yi-Quan is one of the three major Chinese internal martial arts along with Tai-Chi-Chaun, and Pa-Qua-Chang. The direct English translation for the arts name would be Form-intention boxing.
The art is known for aggressive and powerful forward movement. Unlike most of the internal martial arts, there is no mistaking it’s obvious combat orientation. The art is designed to gather all the bodies energy and then release it in explosive bursts of forward motion. Xing-yi practitioners train to defend and attack simultaneously while constantly driving their opponents back with both bare-hands and a variety of weapons. The art is well rounded, including hand and foot strikes, throws and joint locks. Learning all the applications involves stripping the movements layer by layer to learn their deeper function and how they can be applied in different ways.
Like most internal martial arts, training centers around pre-arranged movement sequences known as forms. In the case of Xing-yi, their combat applications are more apparent than with the other two internal arts, but they still contain many hidden subtleties, and a variety of secret applications. As a student becomes more advanced, he will learn all the different ways to use the forms, which are fundamentally simple movements that allow the practitioner to harness their strength and move it explosively in a direction. Xing-yi contains both animal and elemental forms.
The creation of Xing-yi is historically credited to legendary Song dynasty general Yue Fei, and it was supposedly derived from adapting ancient spear fighting techniques. Some say these techniques go back as far as the ancient Liang Dynasty Shaolin temple. Like most martial arts, there is a lot of dispute about these origins, and many scholars claim there is no actual evidence that Yue Fei had anything to do with the creation of Xing-yi. There is a general acceptance that the art comes from ancient spear fighting techniques, but some of the documents credited to Yue Fei that are often cited as proof were actually written long after he died.
In recent years, the art has retained the spirit of it’s military origin. It was simplified and taught to Chinese officers during the second Sino-Japanese War, where practitioners used the art for both hand to hand and bayonet fighting. Unlike Tai-Chi-Chaun, and to some extent, Pa-Qua-Chang, Xing-yi is still practiced primarily as a combat system and a means of self defense.
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