'Korean karate': candor and denial

[MBuzzy]

The short of it is that the Chil Sung and Yungno forms were created by Hwang Kee based off of his interpretations of various CMA and MYDTJ. These forms are considered the essence of SBD is supposed to be.

Excellent point - the story is that both sets of forms were "translated" from the MDTJ....but as I'm sure you know, they are definately not in there. He may have taken some of the movements described and reformulated them into new forms, but there are not 13 forms in the Kwon Bup Bo chapter.

Most of the chinese influence came from HK's time working on the Chinese railroad and learning the southern chinese styles.

 

[MBuzzy]

As for videos, here's what I can find. I'm not sure if some of these are the Federation interpretations as I can see some differences....although they could just be school differences. I found all of the Chils Sungs, except 3, which is my favorite. Although, I only found 1 of the Yuk Rhos...they seem to be MUCH harder to find. Even at competitions, not too many people do those forms. Since only the first 3 are published anywhere and they aren't as popular as the Chil Sungs, they are hard to come by.

Yuk Rho Cho Dan (Du Mun)

Chil Sung Il Lo (One of our own members, hopefully he doesn't mind the link - EXCELLENT Performance, Joel)

Chil Sung Ee Lo

Chil Sung Sa Lo

Chil Sung Oh Lo

Chil Sung Yuk Lo

Chil Sung Chil Lo

 

[MBuzzy]

Ruk Rho Sam Dan - Po Wol

Yuk Rho Sa Dan - Yang Pyun

Here's two more.....Each of the Yuk Rho forms has another name. I listed them in another post somewhere on here, but I can't seem to find it again. As you can see, Sam Dan and Sa Dan are Po Wol and Yang Pyun respectively. Cho Dan is Du Mun, Ee Dan is Joong Jul, and I forget the last two.

 

[exile]

Bumping exile's question from a few posts back, could someone please proivide more information on the yuk rho fporms, including where they came from, what they entail, and maybe some links to vids?

I was just reading in the MYDTJ again, and the long-fist derived fist techniques were broken into 6 paths (yuk rho) and 10 levels. Just looking for any possible/meaningful connection.

Ah, that makes sense. Given how well read HK was in the MYDTJ, it would make sense for him to use nomenclature from that manual for his own form creations.... nice observation, NjM!

The short of it is that the Chil Sung and Yungno forms were created by Hwang Kee based off of his interpretations of various CMA and MYDTJ. These forms are considered the essence of SBD is supposed to be.

Thanks, UpN! And thanks, Craig, for posting those links!

I can only give my limited understanding, but here is what I know.

Both the Chil Sung and Yuk Ro forms were created by Hwang Kee, I believe in the 70s. As for why they were created, I have heard different things. There is the ever present rumor that the Federation is trying to de-emphasize the japanese influence. There is the fact that Hwang Kee was trying to "Koreanize" Soo Bahk Do more, through the creation of Korean only forms. There is the story that he was trying to bring his chinese training in more to "soften" the art. Could be any of these or a combination.

Both sets of forms are characterized by long, chinese stances. They have a contrast between fast and slow, hard and soft movements. Both also have some unique movements, not really seen in other forms.

This is where I personally feel that the two differ. Yuk Ro seems to me to be a lot more original. With a lot of movements created specifically for those forms - and believe it or not, some movements that I can actually see in the MDTJ. The Chil Sung Forms, though, tend to be more conglomerations of other forms. Though they have some of their own movements, they seem to just be textbooks of the pyahng ahns and more advanced hyung. For example, both Chil Sung Il and Ee are in the Kicho pattern. Ee is fairly simply in execution, but has many more movements than the Kichos and is much more advanced. Chil Sung Il does have some unique movements which are hard to interpret. Whereas Chil Sung Sam seem to be practically a textbook of Ship Soo, Pyahn Ahn Sa Dan, and Bassai.

I asked about the meaning of the two forms names while I was in Korea. I got the answer that Yuk Ro means "A man walking on a path." Chil Sung means "Seven stars." And I have also heard the story that Hwang Kee's mother dreamt of 7 stars when he was born or something along those lines.

I personally never seen the pyahng ahn forms being eliminated from the Soo Bahk Do curriculum. There will always be talk of it and we will probably continue to soften the style, but those hyung are too important to get rid of completely - even if all of their movements are in the Chil Sungs somewhere!

Very nice summary of the state of knowledge on these forms—much appreciated! :asian:

 

[tellner]

Hwang Kee himself told us that Tang Soo Do was a generic term for martial arts.

He said that when the first person picked up a rock and defended himself against an attacker, that was TSD. When somebody shaped a spear and defended himself, that was TSD. When somebody constructed a tank and defended his country, that was TSD. I am paraphrasing this quote, because the book isn't in front of me, but I think the point is preserved.

That's a little disingenuous on his part. First, consider what the words "Tang Soo Do" translate to. Compare it to what "Kara Te Do" meant before it was made politically correct for the Japanese audience.

But what it does is make a vague connection to Ancient Mysteries without strictly lying. Pinocchio could say "The roots of Tang Soo Do are millions of years old" without his nose getting longer. It's easy to say "All fighting is TSD, so that really kewl move is TSD." But one can still evade any particular inconvenient question about the recent past.

It's like the eighteen year old cat who is sitting next to me right now. It doesn't wash.

 

[MBuzzy]

I can only give my limited understanding, but here is what I know.

Both the Chil Sung and Yuk Ro forms were created by Hwang Kee, I believe in the 70s. As for why they were created, I have heard different things. There is the ever present rumor that the Federation is trying to de-emphasize the japanese influence. There is the fact that Hwang Kee was trying to "Koreanize" Soo Bahk Do more, through the creation of Korean only forms. There is the story that he was trying to bring his chinese training in more to "soften" the art. Could be any of these or a combination.

Both sets of forms are characterized by long, chinese stances. They have a contrast between fast and slow, hard and soft movements. Both also have some unique movements, not really seen in other forms.

This is where I personally feel that the two differ. Yuk Ro seems to me to be a lot more original. With a lot of movements created specifically for those forms - and believe it or not, some movements that I can actually see in the MDTJ. The Chil Sung Forms, though, tend to be more conglomerations of other forms. Though they have some of their own movements, they seem to just be textbooks of the pyahng ahns and more advanced hyung. For example, both Chil Sung Il and Ee are in the Kicho pattern. Ee is fairly simply in execution, but has many more movements than the Kichos and is much more advanced. Chil Sung Il does have some unique movements which are hard to interpret. Whereas Chil Sung Sam seem to be practically a textbook of Ship Soo, Pyahn Ahn Sa Dan, and Bassai.

I asked about the meaning of the two forms names while I was in Korea. I got the answer that Yuk Ro means "A man walking on a path." Chil Sung means "Seven stars." And I have also heard the story that Hwang Kee's mother dreamt of 7 stars when he was born or something along those lines.

I personally never seen the pyahng ahn forms being eliminated from the Soo Bahk Do curriculum. There will always be talk of it and we will probably continue to soften the style, but those hyung are too important to get rid of completely - even if all of their movements are in the Chil Sungs somewhere!

Correction - Chil Sungs were created in 1952...just not made very public until later. No clue on the timing of the Yuk Ros

And if ANYONE has similar information on the Ship Dan Kum Hyung...I'd give away large portions of my anatomy to get such information....especially videos.

 

[MBuzzy]

That's a little disingenuous on his part. First, consider what the words "Tang Soo Do" translate to. Compare it to what "Kara Te Do" meant before it was made politically correct for the Japanese audience.

But what it does is make a vague connection to Ancient Mysteries without strictly lying. Pinocchio could say "The roots of Tang Soo Do are millions of years old" without his nose getting longer. It's easy to say "All fighting is TSD, so that really kewl move is TSD." But one can still evade any particular inconvenient question about the recent past.

It's like the eighteen year old cat who is sitting next to me right now. It doesn't wash.

From reading the book - I really don't get that impression at all. I mean, it would be easy to put it in those terms, but my interpretation is that GM Hwang Kee was more alluding to the fact that TSD is about combat and getting at what is effective. Granted - many will argue that we've strayed pretty far from that, but I think that the original idea was pretty idealistic. He was talking about all martial arts being the same at their base and that Tang Soo Do was simple a generic term for a fighting method. It is just that knowing the history and where we've gone since the book was written, it colors our interpretation.

Of course...I have a tendancy to read into things....

 

[tkd1964]

Exile, I don't know what you mean when you say it started with Gen. Choi. He has always mentioned the Japanese roots and went so far as to include the patterns in his first book.

Mike

 

[exile]

Exile, I don't know what you mean when you say it started with Gen. Choi. He has always mentioned the Japanese roots and went so far as to include the patterns in his first book.

Mike

In his last interview in Combat magazine in the 1990s, Gen. Choi maintained explcitly that TKD owed nothing to karate. Check out the documentation in Stuart Anslow's book on the Ch'ang Hong patterns. And check out Gm. Kim Pyung-Soo's account of how Choi changed his story on the provenance of TKD, in his interview with Rob McLain in the January Black Belt magazine (or, equivalently, in the MartialTalk magazine version of that interview here), or his insistence on the role of a supposedly completely indigenous 'taekyon' in his own MA training, based on instruction from a supposedly famous calligrapher and instructor whose existence there is no record of, and which the Taekyon Research Association itself is dubious about (see Capener and Robert Young's comprehensive 1993 Journal of Asian Martial Arts article, 'The history and development of taekyon' for documentation).

That's what I mean.

 

[arnisador]

In his last interview in Combat magazine in the 1990s, Gen. Choi maintained explcitly that TKD owed nothing to karate.

I didn't know he had changed his story so completely. Was this due to political pressure placed on him, or did it come from within?

 

[tellner]

I didn't know he had changed his story so completely. Was this due to political pressure placed on him, or did it come from within?

Who can tell for sure? Once you decide it's alright to tell a little lie because it makes you feel good about yourself the bigger ones get easier. Pretty soon you start believing them. Maybe the Korean government was telling most of the lies. Maybe Choi started the pattern. Maybe it was his former associates. It really doesn't matter all that much.

It's a shame either way. Eventually lies get exposed. When they do people stop trusting you. Whatever good you did is tainted. See Elliot Spitzer for a recent not-terribly-random example.

 

[exile]

I didn't know he had changed his story so completely. Was this due to political pressure placed on him, or did it come from within?

Who can tell for sure? Once you decide it's alright to tell a little lie because it makes you feel good about yourself the bigger ones get easier. Pretty soon you start believing them. Maybe the Korean government was telling most of the lies. Maybe Choi started the pattern. Maybe it was his former associates. It really doesn't matter all that much.

It's a shame either way. Eventually lies get exposed. When they do people stop trusting you. Whatever good you did is tainted. See Elliot Spitzer for a recent not-terribly-random example.

Yeah, it's really hard to say, given the unfathomly murky political history of TKD (which makes its technical history look like a completely transparent tropical lagoon by comparison ) But remember, Gen. Choi was the dominant political force in TKD between the Korean War and the end of the Park military dictatorship; if there was pressure being supplied, I suspect he was on the initiating end rather than the receiving end. He spent time in a Japanese prison for his anti-occupation activities, and his life was probably in real danger, and in spite of the hosility engendered towards him in Korea by his trip to the North, he strikes me as a genuine Korean patriot. Given the nature of his actions in the Korean War epoch to further the Oh Do Kwan at the expense of its competitors Kwans, as Gm. Kim reports in the sources I mentioned, his revisionist management of TKD history seems almost incidental... and there were probably plenty of others in Korea who were in sympathy with his anti-Japanese attitudes in connection with the MAs. So it's probably a bit of this and a bit of that....

 

[Kacey]

Yeah, it's really hard to say, given the unfathomly murky political history of TKD (which makes its technical history look like a completely transparent tropical lagoon by comparison ) But remember, Gen. Choi was the dominant political force in TKD between the Korean War and the end of the Park military dictatorship; if there was pressure being supplied, I suspect he was on the initiating end rather than the receiving end. He spent time in a Japanese prison for his anti-occupation, and his life was probably in real danger, and in spite of the hosility engendered towards him in Korea by his trip to the North, he strikes me as a genuine Korean patriot. Given the nature of his actions in the Korean War epoch to further the Oh Do Kwan at the expense of its competitors Kwans, as Gm. Kim reports in the sources I mentioned, his revisionist management of TKD history seems almost incidental... and there were probably plenty of others in Korea who were in sympathy with his anti-Japanese attitudes in connection with the MAs. So it's probably a bit of this and a bit of that....

Toward the end of his life, especially after he was diagnosed with the stomach cancer than ultimately killed him, Gen. Choi expressed a great deal of desire to die and be buried in his homeland, where he was born. This required getting the North Korean government to allow him to return without being imprisoned. Did that affect what he expressed about his personal experiences? It certainly could have. Did it? Only he could have known for sure, and perhaps members of his family - and they are not talking, nor can I blame them. Nor would he be the first person to make such a choice.

 

[exile]

Toward the end of his life, especially after he was diagnosed with the stomach cancer than ultimately killed him, Gen. Choi expressed a great deal of desire to die and be buried in his homeland, where he was born. This required getting the North Korean government to allow him to return without being imprisoned. Did that affect what he expressed about his personal experiences? It certainly could have. Did it? Only he could have known for sure, and perhaps members of his family - and they are not talking, nor can I blame them. Nor would he be the first person to make such a choice.

See, that's the thing—there are all these wrinkles and personal crises that we don't necessarily know about that have significant impact on people's attitudes and choices. It's the same thing with the rest of us, but when you're a very high profile public figure, those actions and choices are greatly amplified, and people wind up attributing motive and placing blame where they really don't have the knowledge, or the moral authority, to do so. I've never understood the ferocity with which certain American MAists attack Gen. Choi's visit to the North, with all the nasty insinuations that he was in sympathy with the pathological government there. There's not the slightest shred of evidence for that. For what I know about the history, he really believed that this could be the same kind of initiative as the famous visit of a group of top American table-tennis players to China was, in 1971, which paved the way for Nixon's visit to China.

The other thing I don't understand is the righteous indignation (again, from American MAists) that I've encountered when I've noted the discrepancies others have discovered in Gen. Choi's statements about the history of TKD ('how could you/those awful people say such things about such an obviously honorable man?', etc. etc. ad nauseum). Tellner's right: the truth will catch up with you—no way you can avoid it. But our conception of truth and the conception of truth in much of Asian society are not the same: ours comes laden with a lot of heavy ethical baggage, baggage we can afford because of our comparatively very easy lifestyles and standards of living. Karel Van Wolferen, in his great book The Enigma of Japanese Power, makes the point that norms of courtesy in Japanese society entail honoring the 'official story' (tatemae) regardless of one's honne (personal understanding of the truth); the two are allowed to coexist side by side, so to speak (Plato's 'noble lie' is a similar idea: the official story that should be the truth, because it's more uplifting or edifying than reality, and therefore should be treated as the truth in spite of that reality). I've talked to a number of our Korean students about this, and the comment you hear from all of them, without exception is that things are exactly the same in their own cultures, and that they have trouble explaining this to us. These ideas are tied into norms of honor and deference (interestingly, both the Japanese and Korean languages have an extensive system of honorific-marking that enters into the syntax in important ways), and the idea that a leading patriotic figure would change his story to reflect better—in his own view, at least—on the nation is not in the least surprising, against that cultural background.

 

[Sukerkin]

Just a quick comment, given my lack of any credentials in the Korean MA's, to augment what Rob had to say about the radically different social 'rules' that define accepted 'history' in the East.

We Westerner's pride ourselves on knowing our own minds and speaking out if officialdom makes claims we know not to be true. A Japanese would be much more bound by the central rules of society to abide by the 'party line' whatever personal feelings or knowledge said.

It's one of those elements that makes the study of Japanese history so difficult and it still persists today.

 

[Steel Tiger]

Both sets of forms are characterized by long, chinese stances. They have a contrast between fast and slow, hard and soft movements. Both also have some unique movements, not really seen in other forms.

I asked about the meaning of the two forms names while I was in Korea. I got the answer that Yuk Ro means "A man walking on a path." Chil Sung means "Seven stars." And I have also heard the story that Hwang Kee's mother dreamt of 7 stars when he was born or something along those lines.

I found the reference to Hwang Kee's Chinese training interesting especially in light of the reference to Seven Stars. There is a northern style called Seven Stars Praying Mantis and I wondered if the inspiration might have come from there.

I've just had another look at some of the videos you posted and compared them with some mantis fist and the similarity is quite striking. Take a look at this example:

Just thought I would offer my technical observations.

 

[tkd1964]

In his last interview in Combat magazine in the 1990s, Gen. Choi maintained explcitly that TKD owed nothing to karate. Check out the documentation in Stuart Anslow's book on the Ch'ang Hong patterns. And check out Gm. Kim Pyung-Soo's account of how Choi changed his story on the provenance of TKD, in his interview with Rob McLain in the January Black Belt magazine (or, equivalently, in the MartialTalk magazine version of that interview here), or his insistence on the role of a supposedly completely indigenous 'taekyon' in his own MA training, based on instruction from a supposedly famous calligrapher and instructor whose existence there is no record of, and which the Taekyon Research Association itself is dubious about (see Capener and Robert Young's comprehensive 1993 Journal of Asian Martial Arts article, 'The history and development of taekyon' for documentation).

That's what I mean.

I've never seen the Combat interview, But I didn't see how Gen. Choi changed his story. He wanted to change the Tang Soo Do that the Koreans were learning. He developed new Patterns with the assistence of his black belts. He has stated in the past that without learning Karate, he would never have developed TKD. Gen. Choi was Brazen when it came to two things, Japanese and the WTF. But again, in all the articles and interviews I've read , he has never changed his story on TKD(2000 yrs old and so on).

 

[tkd1964]

Toward the end of his life, especially after he was diagnosed with the stomach cancer than ultimately killed him, Gen. Choi expressed a great deal of desire to die and be buried in his homeland, where he was born. This required getting the North Korean government to allow him to return without being imprisoned. Did that affect what he expressed about his personal experiences? It certainly could have. Did it? Only he could have known for sure, and perhaps members of his family - and they are not talking, nor can I blame them. Nor would he be the first person to make such a choice.

He asked the South Korean government to allow his return. They didn't respond due to the stipulations he asked for so he asked the North Korean Government and they said yes. I guess when you know your days are numbered you look for what you really want and what you really are. In his one interview he said he would want to be buried in Canada.

 

[exile]

I've never seen the Combat interview, But I didn't see how Gen. Choi changed his story. He wanted to change the Tang Soo Do that the Koreans were learning. He developed new Patterns with the assistence of his black belts. He has stated in the past that without learning Karate, he would never have developed TKD. Gen. Choi was Brazen when it came to two things, Japanese and the WTF. But again, in all the articles and interviews I've read , he has never changed his story on TKD(2000 yrs old and so on).

There were three Combat interviews:

1970s: Without karate there would have been no Taekwon-do

1980s: Karate was simply a reference tool that helped

early 1990s: Karate had only a minor or no impact on Taekwon-do/Karate has nothing to do with Taekwon-do

(Ch'ang Hon Taekwon-fo Hae Sul, by Stuart Anslow, 2006, Diggory Press (Cornwall, UK), p.11).

You don't see this as a 'change of story'?

Or, as per the interview I gave you a link to with Gm. Kim:

In the early days he was teaching the same karate forms as the other kwans, such as Pyung Ahn, Bassai Tae, Kon Sang Kun, etc. Then in the late 1950’s he came up with a story about martial arts links to Korguryo dynasty, Silla Dynasty, 2000 years of tradition, etc.He created new forms and gave each form a name related to something in Korean history, such as a scholar’s name or a famous Korean patriot’s name. He called his system, “Taekwondo.” He was trying to get away from the connection to the Japanese - trying to make something patriotic. He wanted everyone to follow this new line and give up their previous training.​

Gm. Kim—who published the first book on the Palgwes when they were first created (heavily based on the Pinan kata set) and was a Kwan leader and the senior instructor in the Chung Moo Kwan, and later a Kwan leader in the Kwang-duk Kwan, in the late 1950s—was, as his BB interview makes explicit, approached on several occasions by Gen. Choi and urged to change affiliation to the Oh Do Kwan. He was an insider on the scene during the formative Kwan era, and knew exactly who was teaching what, what their background in the MAs was, their connections to the Japanese karate scene, and so on. He is telling you that Gen. Choi started off with the same curriculum as everyone else, derived, like everyone else (except Hwang Kee) from either Shotokan or Shukokan karate, and then, later on in the post-Korean War era, began to elaborate this legend of TKD's 'ancient' origins.

In view of Gen. Choi's own words and the testimony I've cited from one of those who was 'present at the creation', so to speak, are you really going to try to maintain that he was telling the same story over the four decades following the Korean War?

I also want to forestall red-herring objections along the lines I've already suggested, that in bringing these contradictions into the discussion I'm dishonoring the memory of a great man, or some such line. The underlying issue that drove my OP here has to do with the distinctly different technical approaches, on the part of many TSDers on the one hand and the 'official' Korean TKD directorate line on the other, to what were at one time the hyungs trained in common by the two groups. I was perplexed by the candor with which many TSD people seem to accept the O/J antecents of their art, in spite of the fact that Hwang Kee alone among the original five Kwan founders didn't study in Japan, compared with the denial of this connection that became a leitmotif of 'official' TKD in the post-Kwan era, with Gen. Choi arguably the first and most prominent example. The issue is important not as an obscure bit of ancient sectarian history, but because the different outlooks inform the technical approach to the hyungs practiced by TSD and TKD respectively. The discussion so far has suggested some interesting reasons why this split in attitude might have occurred, and leads me to suspect that dojangs which—in defiance of the dictates of TKD Central in Seoul—maintain their separate Kwan identity and links to their original curricula are also going to take a different approch to 'reading' hyungs, and deciphering their interpretations and applications, than those which identify completely with the canonical KKW curriculum. In the development of this discussion, I'm making no value judgments on Gen. Choi's revisionism; but to deny it strikes me as very wishful thinking.

 

[Master K]

I found the reference to Hwang Kee's Chinese training interesting especially in light of the reference to Seven Stars. There is a northern style called Seven Stars Praying Mantis and I wondered if the inspiration might have come from there.

I've just had another look at some of the videos you posted and compared them with some mantis fist and the similarity is quite striking. Take a look at this example:

Just thought I would offer my technical observations.

Actually, the Chil Sung hyungs/forms are represented by the constellation known as the Big Dipper or Plough. The form name translates to mean "Seventh Star". And supposedly the reference is to the North Star which is contained in the constellation. Many, many years ago when travellers would be traveling at night, they would use the North Star to guide their direction. As such these Chil Sung forms are supposed to help guide the Moo Duk Kwan practitioner to become a better martial artist.

I had also heard the story that Hwang Kee's mother had a dream of the constellation or the North Star itself when Hwang Kee was conceived.

Actually, the creation date of both the Chil Sung and Yuk Ro sets of forms are controversial. The Soo Bahk Do Moo Duk Kwan party line states the Chil Sung were created in the 1952. They were not unveiled to the most senior Moo Duk Kwan practitioners until 1983. All of the most senior Moo Duk Kwan practitioners state the Chil Sung and Yuk Ro Hyungs were created during the 1980s. As to which date is really the truth, I will leave that to the others to determine.