Wen county named the official birthplace of TJQ

[justincasea]

Omar, after calling me arrogant prick, you still want to ask me Chinese language? well, i really have no further interests in continuing this thread. Since you bring it up again, and also because i have a soft spot for those who are inquisitive, I decide to post one last one.

SNIP
Here is the apple: Between scholarly and martial skills, there is a saying in China : "穷文富武“。 if you do not understand Chinese, please ask your Chinese friends who are reasonably educated.

Since Justin is being an arrogant prick in this case, I'll translate, it just means "good at martial arts but not very literate"

In the old time, kids from poor family could only pursue scholarly because hiring someone understand chinese language in writing and reading is cheaper than hiring a martial art teacher for years. However, scholarly pursuit was painstaking. lt challenging, one had to pass a lot of exams along the way. A kid from rich family would rather go for martial skills because that skills can easily get him a position with authority/emperor in military or "rule enforcement"(like police etc).

I call total bullshit on this one.

Martial skills have NEVER been valued anything close to literary one's in Chinese culture. Kids from poor family would not pursue scholar stuff because it was cheaper. That's insanse. They'd pursue scholarly stuff because since the Qin dynasty (roughly 2000 years ago) all the way until the 20th century, you could win a government position and immediately be raised from peasant class to government official just by passing an exam. There's nothing even close to equivalent for martial achievement. .

"穷文富武“- the correct translation is "the poorer goes for scholarly career and the richer for martial".This kind of old language has to be put in appropriate social context. Just knowing what each word means is not enough. Under an emperor's "administration", all official positions are divided into two categories. One is wen 文 (scholarly) and other is wu 武 (martial). someone in charge of advising an emperor, managing an engineering project, writing official documents ... are Wen Guan (scholarly officer). The military officer, police, security at all levels are Wu Guan (martial officer). Periodically, an emperor would hold a national competition. The winner of final scholarly exam (after several exams at local and regional levels) was called Wen ZuangYuan and became a Wen Officer. In Parallel to that, the winner of Wu, called Wu Zuangyuan (#1 martial), became a general in military or the sort. General Yue Fei of song dynasty, who was incorrectly attributed to the creation of Xingyi, was a we zuangyuan. In the time of emperor or any dictatorship, military officers are always well treated and rewarded by their masters.

Peasants in ancient China had never had a chance for anything (wen or wu). So here we are talking about those who were able to afford some education for their sons. A martial student was required to have basic training in read and write. Second, a martial instructor was extremely expensive -a teacher usually was "live-in", one-on-one teaching, and it took years and after that the student usually continued to support the teacher because of discipleship in the "men (door)". one also needed to buy weapons and horses, good nutrition, sometimes multiple teachers. Now let's look at the education cost of a wen student. The scope of teaching was "four books and five sutras", the textbook could be hand copied or borrowed, several students could share one teacher in a classroom setting (one -to -many). after a student can read and write all the words in those book, he was pretty much on his own to sharpen his skills in writing articles (shorter period of hiring a teacher, less demand on a teacher's qulification, most of the teachers were those who failed to pass the exams for years and got no position with emperor).

Because scholarly pursuit was more affordable to many, the scholarly exam offered by emperor became a lot more competitive. The richer .... I guess i do not need to explain further.....
///
Do you still call this Bullshit?

[justincasea]

Sorry Justincasea, no language teacher to check with. I'm just fine on my own.

Unless you actually have something specific you think I got wrong, then help yourself to a large cold glass of STFU.

This last post of yours is just an ad hominem with nothing specific. I will say though, even though you were unable to come up with anything yourself, I took another look at that last phrase, 观耄耋御众之形，快何能为。

When you originally said I got it wrong I was thinking that at the very least you did pick the one phrase in the translation that I wasn't 100% sure of but when you failed to suggest anything yourself I decided you were just being an ass. Nevertheless, being a stuffed shirt does not mean you are wrong and like I said, I already wasn't really that satisfied with that phrase. Just talked it over with my wife who also couldn't tell what it meant at first (despite being Chinese herself) but after a little discussion she pointed out that it appeared to be a contrast with the previous phrase, 非关学力而有为也。察四两拨千斤之句，显非力胜. In that context, rather than "When you look at people as they age, they lose their speed" I would change it to "When you look at older martial artists, one's who have practiced for many decades, where do you see a reliance on speed?"

But you still an ass.

Ass? I really do not know how strong the language it is. I guess it is better to be an ass than being an ass kisser. right?

I decide to post one last one.

I will reply at BTDT thread later. it is late here. My bed time.

[bailewen]

Omar, after calling me arrogant prick, you still want to ask me Chinese language?

No. You misunderstand. I am challenging you to demonstrate that you are worth listening to with regards to the Chinese language. You are following the same pattern you have done on other threads regarding gongfu. You are happy to criticize but refuse to either offer a correction, show a clip you think is better or say anything about your background that would give your critique credibility. It's just low class and rude, hence my assessment of your character. Simply put:

If you wish to criticize my translation, then you had better have some sort of correction to make otherwise, you are just a monkey throwing "stuff".

"穷文富武“- the correct translation is "the poorer goes for scholarly career and the richer for martial"...blah blah blah....

There is no such thing as "the" correct translation. There are all sorts of ways to translate phrases, especially proverbs or sayings like the one quoted. If you had any real language experience you would know this. A translation is an interpretation. It is subjective. The saying does not mean that "A kid from rich family would rather go for martial skills because that skills can easily get him a position with authority/emperor in military or "rule enforcement"(like police etc)." Considering the vastly greater potential for power and influence and the lack of facing life or death battles, the Confucian, Daoist and Buddhist proscriptions against soldiering, that claim is silly. I suppose I can admit that the kid might rather go for martial skills but that does not mean that his parents will support that decision.

All it means is that IF you want to study martial arts, you better have some money and if not, then you better be satisfied studying scholarly stuff.

Ass? I really do not know how strong the language it is. I guess it is better to be an ass than being an ass kisser. right?

我是说:你是个大烧饼，装逼得很。

[josh]

观耄耋御众之形，快何能为。

I think that this means something like, "to view the way an old man can handle a group of several people, one wonders how such speed is possible?"

[bailewen]

Hm. That's an interesting interpretation of 御众之形. Kind of works for me. I still have to wonder how that fits in with the previous line though which emphasizes that Taijiquan is not about the fast overcoming the slow. I do like how you interpret the first half though.

[josh]

I think that both of these lines are parallel, in that they suggest extraordinary scenarios in which the weak overcomes the strong, which contrast with the previously described situation of other martial arts that rely on natural talent and strength, but that's just an initial impression...

edit: i think the parallelism is more obvious when you look closer: 察 and 观 as the main verbs, 句 and 形 as object, and then the two rhetorical comments - 显非力胜 "obviously it is not a victory of strength" and 快何能为 "how can such speed be possible"

anyway, sorry to butt in

[bailewen]

There's an interesting interpretation here: http://blog.sina.com.cn/s/blog_5d95f9570100dxde.html that I think works even better for me but I haven't decided how to get that meaning across in English. Something like maybe...actually I kind of like yours better now that I think about it. The article linked kind of alludes to reactionary speed rather than direct speed with the saying, "getting there first is not as good as getting there at the right time". (来得早不如来得巧)

Good call Josh.

p.s. I see your back in LA. Didn't know you were from LA. Next time I visit home I should look you up.

p.p.s. The wife disagrees on the second half. She's pretty insistent that it reads more like it's says that the old dude is NOT fast. I think I'm gonna get Shifu's take on this one tomorrow morning.

[josh]

sure! i actually almost made it to Xi'an when i was in China earlier this summer, but the plans fell through...

p.s. actually, now, i think that your wife has it right. that fits the parallelism better - "clearly it is not a victory of strength" and "how can this be accomplished by speed?"

[Andy_S]

Justincasea:

SNIP
Because scholarly pursuit was more affordable to many, the scholarly exam offered by emperor became a lot more competitive. The richer .... I guess i do not need to explain further.....
///
Do you still call this Bullshit?
SNIP

I absolutely do call it bullshit. We are debating the late Qing/early republic era here, not the Song Dynasty, the Three Kingdoms or the Reign of the Dark Emperor's Taoist Cousin.

In China it may be different, but in the West, those who converse didactically through quoting Greek or Latin classics are considered pretentious boors or risible idiots. In fact, most such wannabe elitists died out over half a century ago in our culture.

Perhaps you would care to address the prviously posted questions and comments re the social status of MA and MArtists in this stage of Chinese history, rather than attempting to patronize the board from an elitist cultural perspective?

Of course, that might require a bit of thinking for yourself.

Speaking of your contentious little phrase:
Please show me some ancients beating up some young fighters (in the context of, say, fighting - rather than a gentle PH demo). Seriously, I would love to see it....particularly if you are personally involved, either one way or the other.

I have been on this board for several years and don't recall encountering anyone as smug as yourself - ever. I gave you the benefit of the doubt, thinking it might be a language problem, but clearly it is a personal issue:
Smugness.

[Ralteria]

Li Jing-lin speaking of Zhang Xiang-wu, who do you think introduced Li Jing-lin to his Wudang sword teacher? But since he's not on the list he must not be as good...even though he was his senior brother.

Didn't Li Jing-Lin get schooled by Cheng Tung Sheng in push hands at Nanking Academy, CTS having never pushed hands before and being at least 10 years younger than Li? I just find it interesting b/c this whole debate over the translation going on about "the older fending off younger, how can this be speed" (I'm paraphrasing not translating) w/ Taijiquan. CTS competed (and won) in the 1933 tournament while Li was head judge at the tourney in 29'. Granted CTS and Li ended up teaching each other, but I find the reliance on classical phrases to be pretty moot to the discussion that was going on. Shouldn't have Li's years of Taiji experience give him an edge, at least according the classics, and especially in PH? And yeah, PH isn't fighting but with CTS's skills both before and after practicing Taijiquan pretty much speaks for itself. Especially when years later he entered the tournament again (at around 40 yrs old) and won. It's really in the pracitioner him/herself and their training methods, not in platonic ideology. Quoting the classics doesn't really prove much.

And to my extremly limited knowledge, I thought it was people like Sun Lu Tang, who were both scholars and martial artists who brought CMA en vogue. Before that martial artists were considered pretty low class (like CFK would have been...hell like Yang Lu Chan would have been). If I'm wrong someone correct me.

[Daniel]

...it´s the darndest thing...the link doesn´t seem to show. I´ll try again. Maybe Mr. Justincasea can´t see it the country he´s in. I´ll have to ask the Mods. They usually respond better to questions than commands, I find.

http://wuyuan.de/en/wude/index.html


D.

Sarcasm. Oh yeah, like that´ll work.

[justincasea]

Daniel,

Thanks, I had decided to quietly leave this thread. But they just kept pulling me back. I guess my Hua Jin is not very good.

Justincasea

[Chris McKinley]

Daniel,

Thanks, I had decided to quietly leave this board. But they just kept pulling me back. I guess my Hua Jin is not very good.

Justincasea

Corrected to reflect more accurate level of solution.

[Daniel]

Daniel,

Thanks, I had decided to quietly leave this board. But they just kept pulling me back. I guess my Hua Jin is not very good.

Justincasea

Corrected to reflect more accurate level of solution.

+1


D.

Sarcasm. Oh yeah, like that´ll work.

[justincasea]

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