From: eskrima-digest-owner@hpwsrt.cup.hp.com To: eskrima-digest@hpwsrt.cup.hp.com Subject: Inayan_Eskrima/FMA-Digest V6 #228 Reply-To: eskrima@hpwsrt.cup.hp.com Errors-To: eskrima-digest-owner@hpwsrt.cup.hp.com Precedence: Inayan_Eskrima/FMA-Digest Mon, 31 May 1999 Vol 06 : Num 228 In this issue: eskrima: Feinting eskrima: Re: Inayan_Eskrima/FMA-Digest V6 #227 eskrima: Rattan Sticks eskrima: Article: Filipino Martial Tradition (fwd) eskrima: . .......................................................................... Eskrima-Digest, serving the Internet since June 1994. ~1100 members strong! Copyright 1994-99: Ray Terry, Inayan System of Eskrima, Martial Arts Resource Replying to this message will NOT unsubscribe you. To unsubscribe, send "unsubscribe eskrima-digest" (no quotes) in the body of an e-mail (top line, left justified) addressed to majordomo@hpwsrt.cup.hp.com To send e-mail to this list use eskrima@hpwsrt.cup.hp.com See the Filipino Martial Arts (FMA) FAQ and online search the last two years worth of digest issues at http://www.MartialArtsResource.com Mabuhay ang eskrima! Ray Terry, PO Box 110841, Campbell, CA 95011 FMA@MartialArtsResource.com ---------------------------------------------------------------------- From: "Don Edwards" Date: Mon, 31 May 1999 09:39:52 PDT Subject: eskrima: Feinting Re the subject on feinting..I have used it alot.. and for me it works well... for others it might not... in fighting you use what works for you and it may not necessarily be something that works for the next person. I do disagree with the comment that if you use feinting you are going to get hit.. all depends on the individual! Don Edwards _______________________________________________________________ Get Free Email and Do More On The Web. Visit http://www.msn.com ------------------------------ From: "Cartlon H. Fung,D.D.S." Date: Mon, 31 May 1999 09:50:03 -0700 Subject: eskrima: Re: Inayan_Eskrima/FMA-Digest V6 #227 I don't mean to sound ungrateful, but isn't >there someone out there who has a problem with even one thing I wrote in the >article? Someone, somewhere, has to have at least one bone to pick with >something in the article. Come on guys let's hear it! > > > Tuhon Bill, Can you submit that articke to this list or privately? I did not read it but I will give an opinion...I always have one. No surprise coming from me eh? >In ED # 225, Dave Huang wrote: "Feinting is effective if the other guy >isn't that experienced. A lot of really good people, I think, treat the >feint a "real attack" and deal with it accordingly." > >In ED # 226, Tom Ochs wrote: "In summary, I think that feints are good >against novices, do not aid in the progression of an attack, are a subset of >the bag-of-tricks known as >misdirection, and are not generally efficient." > >My two cents: Feinting should not be in one's toolbox. A seasoned Fighter >will make mince meat out of you if you waste your time trying to feint. Al, You need the feint especially if you are not seasoned. A "convincing" feint maybe your only way to draw a more experianced player while not truely exposing yourself because you lack the skills to be decisive on your more direct strikes. What you may lack in timing and rhythum and power you may make up in sofistication. However, sofistication does not necessarily beat timing etc... Regards, Carlton H. Fung, D.D.S. Redondo Beach, Ca. ------------------------------ From: "BILL MCGRATH" Date: Mon, 31 May 1999 13:41:04 -0700 Subject: eskrima: Rattan Sticks I have a theory that one of reasons the techniques of Filipino martial arts are so quick, fluid and practical is the emphasis on training with rattan sticks. The theory states that the FMA's are so good because Filipinos both had rattan available to them and were forced to train with it because of the Spanish ban on long swords. Rattan has two main benefits. Being lighter and far less dense than a hardwood stick of the same diameter, accidental contact with rattan is less likely to break the bones of your training partner's than a hardwood like komagong or bahi. An added benefit of rattan is its ability to absorb shock rather than transfer it into your joints. I was told many years ago by Grandmaster Gaje that constant contact weapon to weapon with hardwood sticks would lead to joint problems. Rattan was for training and Bahi or Kamagong was for fighting he told us. Training with hardwoods is also hard on the stick (they tend to break quickly when using dense hardwood against dense hardwood). Safety reasons aside, I guess you could train hardwood against rattan, but the rattan would not last very long. Now the Indonesians have some great rattan (hard and heavy, yellow "Mandau" rattan, my favorite tournament rattan), but even my Penchak instructor acknowledged that the Filipinos had the better stickfighting techniques. The Dutch may have tried, but the Indonesians were never forced to give up their swords and therefore were not forced to concentrate a good portion of their training on rattan sticks as the Filipinos were. The weight and balance of most swords is going to be different than a rattan stick, so one would not practice with rattan unless one had to. Training with rattan allowed for greater safety in sparring and allowed for more experimentation in techniques when compared to arts that train only with swords or hardwoods. I haven't had any experience with Jeff Finder's Lexan sticks, so any thing I said about them would be just a guess. Therefore I would like to hear from those of you who have trained with these sticks. I am especially interested in learning if anyone has used them exclusively, Lexan stick on Lexan stick, with hard contact for many years and were they using the solid Lexan or the Lexan tubing. Regards, Tuhon Bill McGrath ------------------------------ From: Robbie Trinidad Date: Mon, 31 May 1999 10:05:54 +0800 Subject: eskrima: Article: Filipino Martial Tradition (fwd) Hello, I was planning of forwarding this magazine article I posted on peak-l, but I've been having problems with my ISP lately. BTW, the illustration of the lineage of the Ilustrisimo style isn't included because I'm not sure how an attached gif will turn up in the digest. ==== FORWARDED MESSAGE ==== From : Robbie Trinidad Date : 22-May-99 Re : [peak-l] Article: Filipino Martial Tradition Hello, The list has been silent these past few days so I thought I'd post this article I recently got ahold of. It should serve as an interesting read and a platform for future discussion. Comments are welcome. *** Start of Article *** Rapid Journal, Vol. 4. No. 1., 1999 Taichi Works Publications, 458 Jaboneros St. Binondo Manila 1006 rapid@tri-isys.com FILIPINO MARTIAL TRADITION by Pedro Reyes I hear that on the Internet, there is acrimonious debate on questions such as who is the arnisador whom Gran Maestro Antonio Ilustrisimo appointed as his successor, who should continue the line of Edgar Sulite, who is the real representative of Pekiti-Tersia? I can only shake my head in amused disbelief. To a traditional arnisador, such questions are non-questions. The controversies arise because some martial artists who know the Chinese or Japanese martial arts try to force the tradition of arnis to fit the molds of those styles. But the tradition of arnis is different. Arnis is a Military Art, not Civilian Legend asserts that monks and civilians developed Kung Fu and Karate. There are many variations to those legends. In one, monks hardened their hands so that they could chop wood for fire because they could not carry bladed instruments. They extended their discovery to develop external Kung Fu for self-defense. In Okinawa, civilians also hardened their hands and feet, and use agricultural implements to defend themselves against marauding Japanese soldiers. That is the origin of Karate, legend says, And Taoist monks developed internal Kung Fu to integrate mind and body. How about Arnis? Here, there are no records, there are legends. But we can make educated inferences. The first clue is the name of the art, Arnis de Mano. Arnis seems to be a corruption of the Spanish word "arnes", which means mail armor. Mail is flexible armor made of overlapping metal rings, loops of chain, or scales, such as those worn by European knights in the Middle Ages. Arnis de Mano thus literally means armor with the hands and alludes to the reputed ability of the arnisador to defend himself with his hands and alludes to the reputed ability of the arnisador to defend himself with his hands as though he had put on an armor of mail. Another clue to the military character of arnis is that arnisadores train with weapons before they train with bare hands. Why? No soldier goes to war with empty hands. He fights with weapons first, and uses his bare hands only as a last resort. In contrast, Kung Fu, Karate, Judo practitioners betray their civilian origins by starting with empty hands. Arnis Adapts to Civilian Weapons But when the Spaniards occupied the Philippines, they abolished the warrior class. They forbade the Filipinos from carrying their beloved spears, kampilans, and blowguns. They banned archery. But Filipinos could still carry the riding or whipping stick with which to drive their cows, carabaos and horses. They could walk around town with canes or walking sticks even if they were not elderly. Farmers could strap a utility bolo around their waists before stepping out of the house. Any farmer or townsman could conceal a dagger or a knife around his person. And of course, a man, or woman, always had his hands and feet. Arnisadores now concentrated their techniques around those five classes of weapons. They no longer practiced archery, used the blowgun, and they eventually forgot their techniques for those weapons. Of course, the arnisadores would also use other weapons if they were the only ones available, such as the hand scythe, the pestle, or the carrying pole. But they retained the military character of arnis. Arnisadores still began their training with weapons and the teaching remained impersonal. Arnis is Tribal, not Familial What do I mean by "impersonal?". The unit of ancient Filipino society is the barangay. A barangay is composed of several families which were not always related to one another. The number of dedicated warriors in a barangay was probably small. So every able-bodied man had to be able to defend the barangay. Thus arnis masters would teach any able-bodied man in the barangay regardless of the man's family. In contrast, ancient Chinese and Japanese masters considered their martial arts as family heirlooms, to be used to defend the family of to enhance its prestige. So they confined - or tried to confine - their instruction to members of their clan. For example: Formerly only members of the Ch'en family could learn Tai Chi Chuan until Yang Lu-ch'an broke the monopoly. Only the Takeda family and their retainers could learn Aiki-jutsu. At present, even the Kano family tries to keep control of judo even though instruction is not confined to the Kano family and is open to any one. In those styles, the titles of student, master, grandmaster, great grandmaster, and so on reflect those of the family, son, father, grandfather, great grandfather, etc. The master becomes the second father who can interfere in the most intimate details of the life of the student to an extent unknown to the arnisador. Each Arnis Master is Sui Generis Kung Fu students avidly seek geneological charts of their styles because that is how they establish their legitimacy. In figure 1, I have created a chart of the genesis of the Antonio Ilustrisimo style in imitation of the Chinese. (Notice that Gran Maestro Ilustrisimo has only his father as his teacher. In my conversations with him, he vehemently insisted that he learned only from his father, never from his famous uncle, Melecio Ilustrisimo, nor from Pedro Cortez, whose technique he considered inferior to his own.) [I recreated Figure 1 as a gif file and attached it to this article : Robbie] But the classical arnisadores pay only scant attention to charts like this. For the classical arnis master stands in his own abilities. He is not a master because he has received a certificate from a school, or because he has been appointed successor by a grandmaster. He is sui generis. Arnisadores prefer teachers who shine by their own light, like the sun rather than planets that shine by the reflected light of their school or master. That is why arnisadores like Remy Presas and Edgar Sulite claim to have created their own styles, rather than to have inherited them. When a student first approaches a traditional master, the master may say, "Yes, I will teach you the little that I know." He would then demonstrate his abilities and if the student likes it, he would stay for more instruction. What the classical master will not say is, "Yes, I will teach you because I'm the 10th degree master of Rabid Dog Arnis" or "The grandmaster of Howling Devil Arnis appointed me as his successor." Such boasts are the product of a later, crasser, more commercial age. Incidentally, masters from the north are more apt to be self-depracating while masters from the south are more prone to boast. This is due to social convention and personal dynamics and has little to do with actual ability. But in a century of hard sell, this could be one reason why Arnis from the south is spreading throughout the world, while Arnis from the north remains in the shadows. A Student Becomes a Master But in that case, does an arnis student become a master? Does he promote himself? Strange as it may seem to a Chinese of to a Japanese stylist, the answer tin traditional Arnis is "yes". The traditional arnisador begins to teach when he feels he is ready to teach, not when his master tells him so. For the traditional master will never give him a teaching certificate, much less appoint him as his successor, no matter how able the student is. That for a simple reason. Once an arnisador starts to teach, he is open to life-and-death challenges. A master who gives a teaching certificate to a student, or appoints him as successor, effectively signs the death warrant for that student. No master likes that responsibility. (A Minor factor that may inhibit the master would be his loss of prestige should the student fail the challenge). Suppose the student wants to teach, but the master thinks he is not ready. The dynamics of Philippine society decides what the master would do. He is likely to remain silent, although in rare cases he might tell the student not to teach. He might also express his doubts to a few intimate friends, but those friends are not likely to pass these to his student. Thus the new master would go on teaching blissfully unaware of the misgivings of his teacher. There are arnisadores who have become famous masters without taking lessons. Pedro Walis of Iloilo was one; he claimed to have learned arnis simply by watching other masters practice and teach. Arnis tradition is Open Certificates of proficiency, appointments of representatives of a style, selection of successors, are contemporary phenomena, products of masters who wish to commercialize their skills. Many of those masters have studied Japanese styles and they pattern their ranking after the Japanese; some even call their instructors "dans". For few contemporary students are willing to pay tuition, or put up money for a seminar without a visible token in return, be it a certificate of attendance, a grade diploma to be hung on a wall, or even just a membership card. Contemporary masters can provide those tokens with a free conscience because life-and-death challenges are illegal and are now rare. Is this the end of a classical tradition and the end of a new one? Perhaps. For unlike the Chinese or the Japanese, Arnis tradition is open. Arnis masters are not afraid. This is due to the military origin of Arnis. In war, one utilizes even alien techniques if they are effective. The first radical change in the nature of Arnis occurred when the Spanish abolished the warrior class and prohibited the use of their weapons. The Arnis masters reacted by concentrating their techniques on the weapons now legally available to civilians. These are the riding stick, the walking cane, the utility bolo, and the hand knife. At the same time, a branch of arnis that many aspire to learn but only a handful can master became Christianized. I refer to esoteric Arnis. The arnisadores now directed their attention to the Christian pantheon. Curiously, the arnisador sometimes found himself using the names of the old gods to address the gods of the Christians without losing the effectiveness of his oracion In many cases, the changes were not too traumatic. For example, the arnisadores simply moved the great days of initiation into the oraciones of the Moon Goddess to the days of lent and to All Souls Day. As for the celebrations of the Earth God - Christmas became one of them, leaving only the summer initiations without Christian equivalents. Incidentally, arnisadores prefer to offer themselves to the Goddess. A traditional practice, for example, is to drill during the nights of the moon to seek favor, protection and strength of the Great Mother. Next, the Spanish friars introduced the komedya and asked the arnisadores to choreograph the mock battles. Arnis masters responded by creating a new style, or branch of arnis, exhibition or theatrical arnis. Present day masters who coach cinematic actors are heirs to this branch. The third change occurred when promoters introduced sports tournaments. Sports Arnis was developed from competition without protection to one where the competitors protect themselves with armor. The rules for this new branch or arnis are still evolving, but already arnisadores have created techniques specially tuned to sports. The fourth change is the one we have been discussing: the awards of certificates of proficiency by commercial gymnasia. This is no longer classical arnis. Commercial Arnis? To some, that sounds derogatory, but need not be. Competition for students can improve quality, although it could propel arnis the wrong way among unscrupulous masters hungry for money. Some masters are caught in the transition to this "new tradition." Grandmaster Antonio Ilustrisimo believed that certificates were worthless, so that he did not rank his intimate disciples. Nevertheless, he cynically issued certificates when he needed money, or to silence disciples who pestered him for them And in the future? I would like to see arnis maestros with intelligence and guts enough to integrate modern gun fighting into arnis. Some arnisadores would like to re-introduce archery, spear throwing, and blowguns, but I consider that a backward step. People do not fight with bows and arrows, shields and spears, and blowguns anymore. They fight with guns. A Different Enlightenment If you were to challenge me to write in a few words the essence of Arnis, what would I say? Arnis is the search for one's unique self. Who am I? If you are an arnisador, you begin by imitating a teacher. Then you find that the only way you can master the techniques is to make them your own, adapting them to your own build, temperament, and reflexes. Now go back and forth between those two states, the conditioned and the unconditioned consciousness, until you realize that your self has always been and is always free. Then shout in exultant freedom. The martial artist who is Buddhist awakens the non-attached heart; the Taoist, the harmonious heart. The arnisador enjoys the free, creative unconditioned heart. *** End of Article *** *** End of forwarded message *** - -- ][=====================================================================][ ][ Roberto B. Trinidad | E-mail: deadlock@mozcom.com ][ ][ Freelance 3D/2D GF/X artist | My home page is at: _ ][ ][ & desktop videographer | http://www2.mozcom.com/~deadlock/_ // ][ ][ Quezon City, Philippines | Member: Team AMIGA \X/ ][ ][---------------------------------------------------------------------][ ][ "Birds of the same feather look alike." ][ ][ -- old college proverb :-) -- ][ ][=====================================================================][ ------------------------------ From: Ray Terry Date: Mon, 31 May 1999 11:42:21 -0700 (PDT) Subject: eskrima: . ------------------------------ End of Inayan_Eskrima/FMA-Digest V6 #228 **************************************** To unsubscribe from this digest, eskrima-digest, send the command: unsubscribe eskrima-digest -or- unsubscribe eskrima-digest your.old@address in the BODY of email (top line, left justified) addressed to majordomo@hpwsrt.cup.hp.com. Old digest issues are available via ftp://ftp.martialartsresource.com, directory pub/eskrima/digests. All digest files have the suffix '.txt' Copyright 1994-99: Ray Terry, Inayan System of Eskrima, Martial Arts Resource Standard disclaimers apply.