{"id":22074,"date":"2022-12-03T08:01:19","date_gmt":"2022-12-03T14:01:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/martialartsclique.com\/ma\/feet-together-postures-in-taiji-tai-chi-and-xing-yi\/"},"modified":"2022-12-03T08:01:19","modified_gmt":"2022-12-03T14:01:19","slug":"feet-together-postures-in-taiji-tai-chi-and-xing-yi","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/martialartsclique.com\/ma\/feet-together-postures-in-taiji-tai-chi-and-xing-yi\/","title":{"rendered":"Feet-together postures in Taiji (Tai Chi) and Xing Yi"},"content":{"rendered":"

I\u2019ve always been curious about the postures in martial arts forms where both feet are together, because these postures don\u2019t look very martial at all. In fact, it\u2019s hard to imagine why you would want to use a stance like that in a fight, and yet we find them in a lot of Tai Chi forms:<\/p>\n

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From: Sun Lu Tang, A Study of Taiji boxing, 1921<\/strong><\/p>\n

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From: Long ZiXiang, A study of Taiji boxing 1952<\/strong><\/p>\n

Here\u2019s an example of the posture in application in Taiji performed by my teacher Sifu Raymond Rand:<\/p>\n

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Sifu Rang, Brush Knee, Twist Step.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

It seems to be mainly Taiji lineages that have some influence from Sun Lu Tang that do this the most. A lot of people attribute the distinctive \u2018feet together\u2019 postures he used to his prior training in Xing Yi, and there could be some truth to this. Xing Yi does have \u2018feet together\u2019 postures quite a lot.<\/p>\n

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Sun Lu Tang showing a selection of postures from , A Study of Xing Yi Boxing, 1915<\/strong><\/p>\n

Of course, the root of Xing Yi is spear fighting, but the modern interpretation of the art is heavily biased towards bare hand training, and this creates a misleading impression. Think about it \u2013 if you were at at least one spear length away from your opponent the risk of being tackled to the ground because your feet are together would be greatly reduced. You\u2019re now free to use the power generation advantages that can be gained by letting both feet come together, which is handy when you are holding a heavy object, like a spear.<\/p>\n

If you watch this excellent video of Xing Yi spear technique by Byron Jacobs you\u2019ll see that he doesn\u2019t hang out with his feet together all the time, but occasionally he uses the feet together moments for power generation (and of course, also standing on one leg for range advantage and manoeuvrability in a way that makes sense with weapons).<\/p>\n

Video:<\/p>\n

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Example feet together transitional posture:<\/p>\n

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Byron Jacobs of Mushin Martial Culture<\/strong><\/p>\n

In Xing Yi the most famous example of the \u2018feet together\u2019 posture is the Half-Step Beng Quan. Here the back foot stepping up to meet the front foot in place creates a powerful closing action of the body, kind of like a door slamming.<\/p>\n

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From: Selected subtleties of the Xing Yi Boxing art, by Liu Dianchen [1921]<\/strong><\/p>\n

So, is this the origin of \u2018feet together\u2019 postures in Taiji forms? Quite possibly. However, there is one more thing to consider. After first learning Xing Yi, Sun Lu Tang learned his Taiji from Hao Weizhen 1849\u20131920, who learned from Li Yiyu 1832\u20131892, who learned from one of the Wu brothers, Wu Yuxiang 1812\u20131880 who had learned directly from Yang Luchan 1799\u20131872 and also sought out Chen Qingping 1795\u20131868 who he learned from in Zhaoboa village.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s often thought that the distinctive stepping seen in Sun style Taiji, where the back foot is often lifted and brought up close to the front foot, is a consequence of Sun\u2019s prior Xing Yi training. This makes sense as part of the narrative created as part of the Sun Style Taiji brand, which is that he incorporated his earlier Xing Yi and Bagua training into his Taiji style. However, if you look at the Wu (Hou) style he learned, it already had this distinctive stepping in it.<\/p>\n

For example:<\/p>\n

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From: Wu Yuxiang style Taiji Boxing by Hao Shaoru<\/strong><\/p>\n

While the feet don\u2019t go completely together as much, if at all, in Wu(Hao) style, they are very close together for a lot of the time. Watch this video for an example of the form in action:<\/p>\n

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[embedded content]<\/span><\/div>\n<\/figure>\n

One theory about why this is is that Wu Yuxiang was a member of the Imperial Court at the end of the Ching Dynasty, and was therefore expected to wear traditional court dress, which restricted the stepping.<\/p>\n

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I think you can see that influence extending into Sun Lu Tang\u2019s Taiji, which makes sense since he learned from this lineage.<\/p>\n

Finally, I should note that thought this post I don\u2019t want to create the impression that all the steps in either Xing Yi or Taiji performed by Sun Lu Tang are small or restricted. He also had plenty of wider postures his arts too, for example.<\/p>\n

Xing Yi:<\/p>\n

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Taiji:<\/p>\n

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However, compare it to postures found in other styles of Taiji whose practitioners didn\u2019t have to wear court dress:<\/p>\n

Chen Weiming for example:<\/p>\n

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From: The inherited Chen family boxing art, Chen Weiming<\/strong><\/p>\n

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Like this:<\/h3>\n
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I\u2019ve always been curious about the postures in mar<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":99,"featured_media":22075,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2815,11827,1529,10662,4939,752,13831,14432,14433,1786,2033,1787,10285,13479,3303,1492,5392],"tags":[954,1539,1225,2817,886,11832,1540,1535,10668,6704,1457,4944,1224,1231,10008,13836,4805,14434,1793,2047,1794,13481,3310,2671,1504,5395],"class_list":["post-22074","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-baguazhang","category-chen-style","category-china","category-defining-tai-chi-chuan","category-internal","category-martial-arts","category-spear","category-stepping","category-sunlutang","category-tai-chi-applications","category-tai-chi-history","category-tai-chi-movement","category-tai-chi-notebook","category-taiji","category-weapons","category-xingyi","category-yang-style","tag-about","tag-always","tag-arts","tag-baguazhang","tag-been","tag-chen-style","tag-china","tag-curious","tag-defining-tai-chi-chuan","tag-forms","tag-ive","tag-internal","tag-martial","tag-martial-arts","tag-postures","tag-spear","tag-stepping","tag-sunlutang","tag-tai-chi-applications","tag-tai-chi-history","tag-tai-chi-movement","tag-taiji","tag-weapons","tag-where","tag-xingyi","tag-yang-style",""],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/martialartsclique.com\/ma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22074","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/martialartsclique.com\/ma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/martialartsclique.com\/ma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/martialartsclique.com\/ma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/99"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/martialartsclique.com\/ma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22074"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/martialartsclique.com\/ma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22074\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/martialartsclique.com\/ma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/22075"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/martialartsclique.com\/ma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22074"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/martialartsclique.com\/ma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22074"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/martialartsclique.com\/ma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22074"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}