Can Chinese martial arts actually fight? Qi Jiguang battlefield ignored martial arts masters

The Japanese invaders were warriors whose individual martial arts skills were much higher than those of the Chinese soldiers, but the Qi family army was almost invincible in the war against the Japanese for many years, and even created a war record of wiping out thousands of Japanese without a single casualty in the Qi family army.

This article: "Times Weekly" No. 115, by Le Tao, originally titled: "How is the actual combat level of the "martial arts literary power"?

China is a famous ancient civilization, there is human civilization, there is hunting, war, combat, performance, these are closely related to martial arts, Chinese martial arts certainly has a long history. China's pre-Qin Dynasty is a "chivalrous to martial arts to violate the prohibition" of the era, from Han Fei Zi "Five Dangerous" can be seen in a spot. Up to the Han Dynasty, there was still a group of "chivalrous warriors" with a clear identity in the society, which was recorded in the Records of the Grand Historian (史记), a biography of chivalrous warriors. As one of the "Five Dangerous Men", "chivalry" was in fact a group of warriors who served the individual and were retained by the vassals and nobles of the states. And Sima Qian's Han Dynasty "chivalry" is originally some of the people of the cloth, they use their personal strength, to eliminate violence and peace, preside over justice. It can be said that, due to the existence of "chivalry" such an armed defense, vengeance, assassination, private fights, etc. for the occupation, advocating personal courage of the social class, in the pre-Qin and even the Han Dynasty, the level of Chinese martial arts combat skills should be no less than the same time as the rest of the country.

Ranger group disappeared

From the world history, the warrior class is generally in the feudal aristocratic system, the product of the decentralization of political power. For example, the Western knight class emerged in the European medieval "king" and the "lord" **** political and social structure, the Japanese samurai class emerged in the 10-19th century "shogunate" and the "daimyo". The samurai class in Japan emerged in the 10th-19th centuries under the political structure of the "shogunate" and the "daimyo "****. Political power was decentralized, and the armed forces of the country were also decentralized, with small groups of samurai dominating. Under such a system, the lords and vassals frequently fought, but the scale of the battles was also small, and the individual warrior's bravery was very important.

Under the centralized system, the power of the state was concentrated in the hands of the emperor, and the power of the emperor was consistent from top to bottom. The armed forces of the people had to be eliminated so that they would not threaten the monopoly of imperial power. The armed forces were centralized into a large-scale army that took orders only from the supreme ruler, while the state pursued a basic social policy that emphasized civilization and suppressed the military. Since there is only one sole royal armed group in the entire country, wars generally do not occur. When wars did break out, they were basically large-scale wars in response to foreign invasions or dynastic changes. In China, starting from the Qin and Han dynasties, the feudal aristocratic system withdrew from the stage of history, and the centralized system of grand unification was established and gradually matured. After the Han Dynasty, warrior groups and ranger groups as a social class were completely cut off and disappeared.

In medieval Europe and Japan, the samurai class was an important part of the feudal aristocracy. Competitive fighting and even duels between samurai were officially supported and institutionalized, which naturally ensured that they achieved a high level of martial arts skill. European chivalry did not end until the modern era, and the Western style of martial arts and dueling has continued. For example, the famous French mathematician Galois died in a duel, Pushkin died in a duel, and the famous Federalist Alexander Hamilton died in a duel with his political rival, U.S. Vice President Aaron Burr. The samurai system in Japan lasted until the Meiji Restoration, and Japan became the most martial nation in the Eastern world, developing the so-called "Bushido". It's no coincidence that two of the world's top mixed martial arts organizations, the UFC and K-1, are located in the U.S. and Japan, respectively. In China's nearly 2,000 years of history, the emphasis on culture and martial arts is the basic national policy, the lack of a real life warrior class, the lack of institutionalized combat tournaments experience, experience, China's martial arts combat ability can be imagined.

War and martial arts are far away

Although there was no samurai system in ancient China, the frequency of wars, the scale of the grand, the extent of the tragedy is unparalleled. War and martial arts naturally have a close relationship, can war create a large number of martial arts masters for ancient China?

In fact, there is a big difference between large groups of people fighting in positions and samurai sparring, and Qi Jiguang, the famous Ming Dynasty military man, had a very classic view on this point. Large group combat emphasizes the professional division of labor and overall cooperation of various weapons and types of soldiers, rather than the individual martial valor of a single soldier. In the "Jixing Xinshu" Qi Jiguang spoke very thoroughly: "open a large array, the enemy" is different from "the field of art, capturing small thieves", "Tang Tang's array, thousands of people lined up in front of the brave shall not be the first, the timid shall not be after; clumps of guns poking The line of the Tang Tang formation, thousands of people in front of the line, the brave can not be first, the timid can not be after; clusters of guns poking, clusters of guns poking to go, chaotic knife hacking, chaotic kill back to him, just a crowd into the hands of all the difficult to turn their hands, how can we allow left and right to jump? A person turned back, the public suspect the same; a person to shift inch, the public also want to take heart, how can we allow either in or out?"

In the pacification of the Japanese, Qi Jiguang invented the famous "mandarin ducks formation". The "mandarin ducks formation" is a combat unit composed of 12 infantry squads. In addition to a captain and a cook, the rest of the soldiers are arranged as follows: the first two hold two kinds of rattan tags with different functions, mainly as a guard, followed by two warriors holding a ten feet by three feet "wolf brushes" to sweep the enemy, behind the wolf brushes are four lancers to serve as the main assassination, and the last is two holding a "boring palladium". At the end are two soldiers holding "boring palladium" as guard, support and other work. All kinds of weapons division of labor is clear, each person as long as familiar with their own kind of operation, effectively kill the enemy is the key to the overall cooperation, the order is forbidden. The Japanese invaders were warriors whose personal martial arts were much higher than those of Chinese soldiers, but the "Qi Family Army" was almost invincible in the anti-Japanese wars for many years, and even created a war case in which thousands of Japanese were wiped out without a single casualty in the "Qi Family Army". After the pacification of the Japanese, Qi Jiguang was transferred to the north of Jibei for the defense of the Mongolian army, and he created a new formation of coordinated combat with multiple types of soldiers, such as caravans, cavalry, infantry, cannons, and gunners, etc. In a word, the large group of soldiers fought in the battlefield. In short, the nature of the large group of people fighting in a division of labor and cooperation with the cultivation of martial arts masters is a great distance.

Ten steps to kill a person, thousands of miles do not leave a line

After the Han, the Chinese warrior, chivalrous class in reality disappeared, but in literature and art works have gained a new life, and increasingly "strong" up. Moreover, away from the reality of the check, reminding, chivalrous people's martial arts is also increasingly strong, so that "out of the gods".

The first peak of Chinese martial arts literature occurred in the Tang Dynasty. In Tang poetry, there are many poems with "chivalry" and "sword" in them. The most famous one is Li Bai's "Chivalry": "Ten steps to kill a man, a thousand miles to leave no trace. After the incident, I whisked my clothes away and hid my body and name." Area 20 words, conveyed by the "martial arts" imagery has been very clever: martial arts mastery, unpredictable; whereabouts flitting, the mortal eye is difficult to see ...... This imagery and Chinese culture and art, "write the meaning of the shape is not written "The first time I saw this is when I was a kid, and I was a kid, and I was a kid.

However, the real martial arts literature of the Tang Dynasty appeared in the Tang legends. Tang Legend is an important stage in the development of Chinese novels, from the Tang Legend Chinese novels began to get rid of the historians of the "factual record" tradition, artistic fiction, the novel really became a conscious creation of the writer. The famous stories in the Tang Legends, such as "The Legend of the Qiu Bearded Guest", "Nie Yinniang", "The Red Thread", and "Kunlun Nu", are the forerunners of the Chinese martial arts literature. Mr. Jinyong highly respected the "Qiu Beiqi biography", that this text "or can be said to be the originator of China's martial arts novels". The martial arts in the Tang Dynasty Legends are already very strong, such as the martial arts of the assassin "Empty Air" in "Nie Yinniang": "No one can see its use, and no ghosts can trace its trail", and he strikes with just one move, and if he misses with one blow, he will float away and never make a second move, and "only not over a shift, has been a thousand miles carry on", visible light power is very good. This is far from the pre-Qin assassins can compare. Such as the "Historical Records assassins biography" recorded Zhuzu, Yu Jean, Jing Ke, etc., is only intentional sneak attack assassination target, after a strike, regardless of whether the hit or miss, almost can only be tied up and wait for death. If they have empty empty child one hundred percent of the ability, history will be rewritten. Relying on the gift of literary fiction, the Chinese warrior's martial arts level greatly improved.

To the late Qing Dynasty, there is a real typical sense of martial arts novels, namely, "Three Heroes and Five Heroes". According to the research of the Taiwanese scholar Mr. He Hongsheng, the elements created or greatly played by the "Seven Chivalrous Men" and its sequels, such as pointing, concealed weapons, sword techniques, lightness, smothering incense, night clothes, all kinds of organs and ambushes, etc., have had a decisive impact on the content material of later martial arts novels, and this book can be said to be a milestone of great significance in the history of Chinese martial arts novels.

A into the Republic of China, with the rise of newspapers and magazines, publishing industry, martial arts novels have ushered in an unprecedented golden age, emerged like Pingjiang not Shaoxiao Sheng, Zhao Huan Ting, Wang Du Lu, the owner of the Pearl Tower and a large number of martial arts novels such as masters, martial arts novels accounted for the majority of the number of published novels in the Republic of China. Li Shoumin's "Legend of the Swordsman of Mount Shushan" was five million words long. During this period, a large number of martial arts stunts and techniques were created. For example, Zhao Huanting created the method of taking thousand-year-old Ganoderma lucidum to greatly increase one's power in his Legend of the Wonderful Warrior Jingzhong, an element that abounded in later wuxia novels. As martial arts novels became more and more literate, their audience was no longer limited to the general public, and intellectuals with a higher level of appreciation also began to follow them. This is the main reason why Jin Yong has been elevated to the temple in recent years.