History of Chin Li Ming Chi Tao Chuan GUNG FU
CHUAN FA
By
Chin Li Ming
means literally "golden dawn" and is the name of an obscure northern
Chinese warrior of reputedly Korean/Manchurian ancestry who was very skilled in
a
mysterious, all but unknown of, style of white crane boxing called colorfully
"the
flying art of the child spirits of the night". God, and some lucky person
only knows
what it looked like, but it was supposedly unbelievably awesome. It was the
epitome
of human movement potential. Also, supposedly this Chin Li Ming was a traitor
to
the Manchurians (dragon throne), and threw in his lot with the rebellious south
(the
underground secret societies). The person, Chin Li Ming, had nothing to do with
our art. His art was devastating and mysterious, and our art is devastating and
mysterious. We like it that way. Our version of the system took the name of
this
person for no other reason than we like it because it means “golden dawn” to
distinguish it from the original Chi Tao Chuan taught to me by Wen Yen Pao
and his advanced student Shu Feng many years ago.
Chi Tao Chuan
translates as “spiritual way of the fist.” Therefore, the entire name of
our system means, “The Golden Dawn style
of the Spiritual Way of the Fist.” This is
admittedly a rather fancy and high-falutin name for what has essentially become
a
pretty nasty system of quick and dirty breaking bones, crushing internal
organs, and
slapping people to the ground dead with your bare hands. How did it get this
way, and
where did it come from? Here’s the story:
At the end of
the 19th century, the revolutionary state of the populace in China was at
a fever pitch. The rebels had for the past two centuries (since the fall of the
Ming
Dynasty in 1644) organized an underground organization in scope unequaled in
the history of man: the dreaded and feared Triad Society (Heaven, Earth, and
Man Society), also know as the "Hung League" the original purpose of
this society
(started by 5 Shaolin monks, who escaped the burning of the Honan Province
Shaolin
Temple) was to train the populace in martial arts for the eventual overthrow of
the
Ching (Manchurian) Dynasty, and the restoration of the Ming Dynasty.
In and around
the turn of the century (1900), a secret Chinese Triad society (of which
there were dozens) called the "Dragon Flower Society" gathered
together several
Chinese martial arts masters. In secret, and of course in jeopardy of their
lives if they
should have been discovered, they devised from their combined knowledge a
system
of empty handed assassination techniques. This system consisted primarily of
nine
empty-handed killing techniques (called the "Nine Dragon Flowers" or
the “Nine Dances
of the Dragon Flower Sect”). This secret society obviously had some special
mission,
perhaps to kill certain select (perhaps nine) Manchurian government officials
in
case the revolution failed.
The
revolution led by the "Righteously Harmonious Fists Society" did, of
course fail.
The societies seized the city of Peking, and held it for 55 days. The kung fu
boxers
terrorized the city, held the foreign missionaries captive, and raped,
tortured, and
killed both Chinese and "foreign devils" alike. This was known as the
Boxer
Rebellion. British, German, French, Italian, and finally, American troops were
lead
into Peking to save the missionaries by the Japanese. The kung fu boxers were
absolutely unmatched in hand-to-hand combat, in fact, they held off and turned
back
major forces on several occasions with their skills, but, eventually they
succumbed
because they could not stop bullets, or rather they DID stop bullets (but not
the way
they wanted to).
Aside from
the many secret societies, the true purpose of the mysterious Dragon Flower
Society and its nine (?) hand-selected and trained assassins is unknown. All we
can do is
surmise. There is a lot of colorful mystery surrounding these nine Dragon
Flower
warriors. One account has 3 members of the society meeting on a “Dragon Flower”
bridge at midnight under a red lantern for special rituals on the darkest night
of each
month. The Chinese have always loved spiritual and symbolic significance,
secret and
mysterious rituals, secret handshakes, passwords, and such. These practices
tend to focus
one’s mind repeatedly upon the mission at hand while assuring that outsiders
(who don’t
know the rituals and such) will immediately stand out like a sore thumb, and
also
immediately lose their heads.
Accounts show
that two high officials of the revolutionary secret societies escaped. One
was the leader of the entire underground movement and nationalist predecessor
of
General Chiang Kai-Shek. His name was Dr. Sun Yat Sen. In 1895, Dr. Sun Yat Sen
had started the revolutionary efforts to oust the Ching Dynasty through the
power of
the Kuo Min Tang political party he founded. The Kuo Min Tang won the national
elections in 1913, but was soon removed from the parliament, placing General
Chiang
Kai-Shek and Dr. Sun Yat Sen briefly in power. Dr. Sun Yat Sen died of cancer
in
Beijing in 1925. Even though the Ching Dynasty fell in 1911, and even though
the Kuo
Min Tang won the elections in 1913, an obscure, secretive agent of Dr. Sun Yat
Sen,
supposed leader of his Kuo Min Tang party’s intelligence operation, and the
leader and
chief instructor of the "Dragon Flower Society", escaped to Japan
sometime in the
early 1900’s, and was not heard from since. That Master Assassin’s name was
“Moon”.
Wen Yen Pao specialized in Pa Kua Chang, and an especially ruthless
jujitsu-like art
that was handed down from his two uncles (his father did not teach him). His
uncles
stated that the art had been taught to them by their father, Wen Yen Pao`s
grandfather.
Wen Yen Pao also stated that his grandfather had learned, and was drilled in
the
fundamentals of the art, as a young boy, from an old Chinese man, in
this old man was the only person feared by the local thugs and bullies. He was
named
"Moon".
The art had
no name, at the time, but consisted of some rather ruthless methods and nine
short series of movements that Wen Yen Pao’s grandfather called the “9 dances
of the
dragon flower.” Later, the art was named Chi Tao Chuan (Spiritual Way of the
Fist)
not to be confused with several other systems advertised today that also bear
that name,
or names similar to it. In general, Wen Yen Pao`s family system of Chinese
Boxing, which
grew beyond the original “9 dances of the dragon flower” assassination
techniques, appears
to be a devastating mixture of mostly linear Pa-Kua Chang, Hsing-Yi Chuan, and
a
select mixture of Shaolin Tiger/Crane, with some Southern Praying Mantis, and
Shaolin Plum
Blossom Boxing techniques.
bobby Brown in Dallas, Texas introduced ray French to CHINESE BOXING in 1984.
