the REN DAO Wellness Center Blog

By Umar Sharif

The earliest records of martial arts training identify wrestling as the first martial activity. This is based on icons like a copper stand, dating back to the ancient African Babylonian civilization around the third millennium, BC. So ancient is this legacy that it remains coded in our genes to this very day. Early childhood play (wrestling) predates our current concerns about the relationship between television violence and violent behavior in children. Nor is ours the only species of life in which martial play is a primary basis for establishing social bonds. Historically there has been a difference between Martial and Healing Arts training, which was part of the intra-cultural relations of the people, and Military or Warfare training which was based on inter-cultural relations between various competing groups of people. The ultimate consequences of warfare were neither the goal nor tolerated aspects of Traditional Martial and Healing Arts training, exhibition, or demonstration. It is well know that the Nubian, Egyptian, Sumerian, Indian, Chinese, Japanese, Greek, and Roman civilizations all enjoyed the martial arts as part of their intra-cultural traditions.

Wu-Te is a Chinese word that is tied to the East Indian Buddhist Monk and Patriarch of Shaolin Kung Fu, Bodhidharma (Bo-dhi-dhar-ma). Legend states that sometime during the 6^th Century AD, Bodhidharma arrived from India at the Songshan Shaolin Temple in the Chinese Kingdom of Wei. After many years in private meditation he began teaching the monks of the temple his special meditation, martial, exercise and healing techniques. It was Bodhidharma who introduced the notion of Wu-Te (martial virtue) into the traditional Chinese martial arts vocabulary. By it he meant – we practice the martial arts to develop the qualities of disciple, restrain, humility, respect for human life, and the principle of Do No Harm. In other words, the goals of the martial and healing arts are not the same as those of combat warrior, although both will become highly skilled.

When your children are involved in a Traditional Martial and Healing Arts program, they will be involved in a process to promote mental, physical, social, and spiritual health and well-being. We should say that their self-defense skills develop as a natural by-product of their training. Where the combat warrior must learn to attack and destroy his or her enemy, with offense and aggression as the focus of attention, the Wu-Te practitioner must learn to defend against and mitigate the aggression, achieving a peaceful resolution if at all possible. Where the intention of the combat warrior must be to unleashed his or her rage, the intention of the Wu-Te practitioner must be to defeat their own rage within, so that they can act with wisdom and compassion without.

There are literally thousands of martial arts systems and styles stretching across all of the inhabited continents. Each system opens doors to cross-cultural knowledge and understanding. And fortunately for you and your family, there are probably a few martial arts programs right there in your neighborhood. So there are plenty of opportunities to check things out and get started once you meet some of the wonderful individuals in your neighborhood who have made Traditional Martial and Healing Arts training a part of their lives.

This is an excerpt from Umar Sharif’s e-book ‘Wu-Te, A Guild for Parents – Why Train Your Children in Traditional Martial and Healing Arts’. It can be obtained from www.wu-te.org. Comments can be sent to the author at seifu-sharif@sharif-enterprizes.com.