72 SHAOLIN SECRET ARTS OF MONKS FROM SHAOLIN MONASTERY

 

The 72 Shaolin Secret Arts are methods of preparing the body and the mind for action under extreme conditions (first of all, in conditions of real-life hand-to-hand combat). If you train only hand-to-hand techniques and do not pay attention to special training, you will never achieve the highest mastery and your movements will lack the real force. "The fists are like flowers, and the legs like embroidery needles", laugh the old masters at such "techniques". The 72 Arts of Shaolin are the foundation of the utmost mastery in all styles of Kung Fu.

 

"Seventy-two precious arts are kept in a brocade bag, they are kept like a great treasure. Eighteen of them are the essence of the famous treatises on pugilistic arts. Eighteen other arts describe in detail training methods with the use of special tools and training equipment. Wonderful methods of attaining the flexibility of the breath-chi, exercises in obtaining hardness and lightness, clenching methods are written with the blood of monks in books that are kept like a treasure in the brocade bag. One can seldom meet those who really want to do exercises with zeal: to become a real hero, one must often feel bitter taste of hard labour."

Seventy-two types of the Shaolin Arts represent an example of personal experience of monks from the Shaolin Monastery in the Songshan Mountains. This experience was obtained by hard exercises in combat arts during many epochs. The best samples of those seventy-two arts are such effective methods as qigong (chi kung), breathing exercises chi, exercises to obtain hardness yinggong and lightness qinggong, acupoint massage dienxue, clenching arts qinna (chin na), the art of setting dislocations and bones and others.

In all practices of the Seventy-two Arts at first the basic theory is studied and only then exercises are done. At first those who practice the arts train the softness of their sinews and bones and try to make agile all their joints and articulations. Then they set into motion the main breath zongli, strengthen the internal organs fu, improve blood state, consolidate body strength, control the cinnabar field and concentrate energy in it, overcome their desires and requirements. The strength spreads on the four extremities and the hundred joints and articulations, now a fighter is in command of unlimited power and he can move off one thousand jins. Your arm weighing only ten jins can move a thing weighing ten thousand jins with a stroke. Your arms are a head, your legs are a tail. Everything is permeated with a single movement, the body moves like a dragon. Teachers said: "Shaolin exercises develop forces of the whole human organism, all joints and bones; you are capable of striking with all parts of your body." There is one more saying: "The fist is the source of all arts and the leg is the base, the root of the fist." Ordinary practice of pugilism consists of seventy percent of leg training and thirty percent of fist training. If you acquire pugilism, you can use eighteen types of weapon. If you resort to all ruses of pugilism, you can fight against ten thousand fighters.

 

 

1	Mo zhang - the grinding palm
2	Feng zhang - the windy palm
3	Liuxin zhang - the rocket palm
4	Chuanso zhang - the shuttle palm
5	Tui shan zxang - the palm pushing a mountain
6	Pi chai zhang - the palm cutting wood
7	Chen zhuan zhang - the palm breaking bricks
8	Jin zhusa zhang - the palm with iron grasp
9	Jin gou shou - the iron hook-like arm
10	Wa yan shou - the hand tearing out eyes
11	Tanglang shou - the leg of an Mantodea
12	Bai she xin shou - the hand as accurate as a spittle of the white snake
13	Hei hou tiao shou - the black tiger jumps over a mountain
14	Heihu zhua lian shou - the claws of the black tiger grasping the face
15	She mao shou - the hand like a snake-shaped blade
16	Bai xin shou - the hand of eight wizards
17	Zhin cha zhi - the finger like a gold pin
18	Zhou zhi - the bamboo finger, the finger like a bamboo stick
19	Wu kua hongqian zhi - five fingers like red flower pistil
20	Zhin gong zuan zhi - the piercing finger as hard as a diamond
21	Cuan xin zhi - the finger piercing the heart
22	Tou gu zhi - the finger punching holes in bones
23	Yi zhi jin - the finger as hard as metal
24	Chan si zhou - the elbow with a cord wound on it
25	Go xin zhou - the elbow punching the heart
26	Po yin zhou - the elbow breaking Yin
27	Niu chan tui - the dislocated thigh
28	Pe zhu gan - a bamboo fighting pole
29	Gu shu pan gen - twisted roots of a dry tree
30	Te wu gen di - the iron buffalo ploughs soil
31	Fei mai qiao - the leg flying like a feather
32	Hei xian feng - the black water-spout
33	Tie sazou - the iron broom
34	Hou tiao qian - the monkey jumping over a wall
35	Yian qu shui - the swallow drinks water
36	Chang e bian yue -  Sorceress Chan E ascends the moon
37	Tian gou chi yang - the Heaven's Dog eats the Sun
38	Ha mo zu tian - the toad drills the sky
39	Gang jin juan - the diamond fist
40	Shi kai hua - the stone blossoms out like a flower
41	Zuan xin chui - the hammer punching the heart
42	Lu kai hua - the skull blooming out like a flower
43	Duan mu zhuang - to break a wooden stove-couch
44	Ti jie shi - to break a stone with a leg
45	Fang feng Zhen - Zhen releases winds
46	Da shai dai - to strike at a sand bag
47	Fen mu guan - the coffin broken into pieces
48	Dai tie wa - to wear iron hoops
49	Diao shaku - to hang trousers with sand
50	Yue ying jian - to jump over a moon abyss
51	Feng xuan ai - the flight from a steep precipice
52	Go wu ji - to jump over a roof gable
53	Zuo liu xing - the rocket stance
54	Taishan zhuan - the pole like the Taishan mountain
55	Xin yi ba - the heart and mind clench
56	Qi wei chuan dong - the bristling hedgehog strikes a hole
57	Suang to yue - to embrace the moon
58	Tie gan tui - the leg like an iron pole
59	Kao re guo - the cauldron heated on fire
60	Zuai ti deng - to throw down a stool by a foot
61	Lu da gun - the ass's strike
62	Zhai she zu - the foot digging soil
63	Guang chuan tie bu shan - to put on an iron shirt on the naked body
64	Wu kong fan jin dou - Wu Kong fights against sinew dislocations
65	Tian bing xia fan - the Celestial Soldier descends the sky
66	Da murien - to strike a man of wood
67	Xie zi zou lu - the scorpion crawls along the road
68	Qian jintui - the leg weighing one thousand jins
69	Zha yan huan zuo deng - to change in an instant the stool
70	Luohan shen gong - Luohan's magic feat
71	Jiao long nu kong - the coiling dragon growls in wrath
72	Qi guan qi mao - the breath "chi" washes the hair on the skin