The 3rd form – First-aid kit or a higher dimension in WT? (June 08)
The 3rd form – First-aid kit or a higher dimension in WT?
What a storm in a teacup there was almost 30 years ago, when I aired my impression at the time in one of my first books, namely that the 3rd or Biu-Tze form was something like a "deadly whisper".
Oh how I was abused as an ignoramus by all manner of Chinese wing-chun schools or to be precise their German derivatives – all the latter of course headed by my former students – when I believed I had discovered a new dimension of wing-chun in this form and expressed the view that the Biu-Tze concept is superior to the basic idea of the two previous forms, and indeed supersedes it.
Quite wrong, they opined disdainfully as they parroted the teachings of their respective new Si-Fus with the utmost confidence: the 3rd form was by no means what that Kernspecht was claiming. It was not true that the principles of the 3rd form overcame the 2nd form. In fact the 3rd form was something in the nature of a first-aid kit: if something happens in a fight which should not happen, the shit hits the fan and the opponent on the street does not behave in the way the rules of the Siu-Nim-Tau and Chum-Kiu assume, then the wing-chun man can save the day by likewise breaking the rules.
And afterwards he should quickly return to the only correct and always applicable concept of the 1st form. This was why the Biu-Tze form contained a wide range of techniques which allow one to move one's arms back from the most incredible positions to the safe haven of the "immovable elbow" and the so-called "centre-line".
Well unfortunately, an attacker on the street never sticks to any Chinese mottos for the simple reason that he does not know them. Murphy's law tends to be the rule on the pavement arena: the worst and most unexpected thing that can happen, i.e. the unthinkable, will happen. Anybody who expects the opponent to launch a straight-line attack with a vertical fist and low elbow will soon find reality staring him in the face.
"If one of my students who has learned the 1st and 2nd forms loses a fight against an opponent from another style, I will jump from the xth floor of my house".
Woe betide anybody who derives his feeling of superiority from this promise, which is suspiciously similar to the yellow "invulnerability slips" distributed during the Boxer rebellion. This statement, which is "hopefully incorrectly" ascribed to Grandmaster Yip Man, is often quoted with the self-satisfied postscript: "And the Grandmaster never needed to jump".
Having listened to my teacher and the reports on so-called "Beimo" fights, which founded the reputation of wing-chun in Hong Kong versus de facto even more traditional styles, by the original students of the last Grandmaster of the overall style, I tend to think that Yip Man was by no means so divorced from reality as to believe that even the most diligent practice of a fixed sequence of movements can magically confer invincibility.
As if to confirm this view, and to his credit, he would conduct a post-fight analysis whenever his students were involved in a fight against other Kung Fu schools either for their ego or his style, and he even amended what many regarded as the holy and immutable form.
This is apparently how e.g. the "Gaun-Sau respectively Gwat-Sau" found its way into the 6th set of the 1st form. Obvious really: if the opponent ducks so low that his punch slips beneath our elbow, we need "something like Gaun-Sau" unless we actually enjoy being hit in the abdomen. The fact that my teacher prefers "Gwat-Sau" in this situation, though for a quite different purpose, is his perfect right and personal interpretation. After all, he is a grandmaster and has his own good reasons.
And when I found out that Yip Man would put his students to the test using arcing Choy-Lee-Fut attacks delivered with a horizontal fist, I had no more doubt that wise Grandmaster Yip was already preparing them for what was then the reality on the streets of Hong Kong.
Under his aegis wing chun was still used for self-defence purposes, whereas today wing chun is often only practiced for its own sake. Nowadays some students of his original students credulously assert that the exception is the rule, and that the rule is the exception.
A student who manages to strike his teacher is admonished: you must keep your elbow in when you punch. The student's successful punch proves that he has made a serious mistake, for how could he have hit the teacher otherwise?
Proponents of the theory that the 3rd form is a survival package which breaks the rules in an emergency claim that the Biu-Tze concept was created for these and other exceptions. As if every attack on the street was not an emergency, and fundamentally a matter of life or death. Conversely, anybody who seeks refuge in Biu-Tze techniques also comes in for criticism, because according to this homespun logic, using the techniques of the 3rd form is clear evidence that he must have done something wrong beforehand.
And just to be on the safe side, they also deny the Biu-Tze the distinction of having a more advanced concept so that somebody who not only possesses common sense, but also uses it, will not dare to entertain the idea that the Biu-Tze might be more than a hotchpotch of damage limitation measures.
So whence does this psychopathic distaste for the black sheep of wing-chun theory arise? Well, from the simple fact that it is not white! It does not sit well with the theory of the other forms that Biu-Tze grabs the opponent's arms, even uses two arms to grab one of the opponent's arms, comes into such close contact, bends forward and backward, crosses its arms etc., etc.
The Biu-Tze is the Beelzebub, maybe it teaches us that even the so-called WingTsun principles are only temporary restrictions which were created to be broken "right at the end of the learning process".
Elsewhere I have already suggested to my readers that setting up defined principles is contrary to the approach of the Tao, and that a wise strategist will not rely on any particular idea – not even a little one. Taking the fundamental decision to dispense with other, equally valid options right from the start – which is actually the result of setting up a set of principles – means that WT loses a great deal of valuable and indeed vital content which can only be rediscovered and retrieved at great effort later. And only by starting back at the beginning, like a blank sheet, as if setting out to reinvent the WT wheel. In that case one no longer uncritically imitates what our forefathers did; one finds what they sought and were unable to find, because right from the start they had contemptuously shoved it aside to give precedence and therefore exclusivity to another, apparently superior approach.
The Biu-Tze was the last chance to add back what had been overlooked. Relief from suicidal servitude to the locked pelvis, and the restrictive immovability of the elbow and shoulder. The Biu-Tze represented the last big chance to give WT back what had been taken away by one-sided preferences imposed for didactic reasons. In this I not only include the new freedom of movement, but also the freedom to use non-linear movements and the freedom to use the eyes to detect attacks.
While the Biu-Tze is by no means "anti-WingTsun", it confronts orthodox, i.e. linear WT with problems that are practically unsolvable with linear methods. Non-linear systems, and all those occurring in nature, are simply not linear, are therefore unpredictable and cannot be planned for. Accordingly the Biu-Tze was never to be taught outside the immediate circle of the most loyal students ("Biu-Tze never goes out of the door"). Only very few advanced students learned this form in earlier times: it really was secret.
But it was not secret because it was so dangerous to an opponent. And neither was it secret because an opponent of a wing-chun man might find countermeasures to the techniques if he knew them.
No, it was secret for two other reasons:
Because some Biu-Tze attacks can put the less experienced instructor in serious danger. Even if the student executes the technique, e.g. Fak-Sau, very badly but with power and speed from Chi-Sau, the instructor might only be able to protect himself by injuring the attacker "without wanting to".
Because long experience has shown that a student who wants to learn WingTsun thoroughly must stand on solid foundations and necessarily complete his study of the Siu-Nim-Tau and Chum-Kiu forms before he even thinks about starting something quite new.
Something quite new? Yes, I say this in all seriousness: Biu-Tze is not merely slightly different, it is something different! It is the concept of the two knives applied to both arms. The entire arm, from the fingertips to the elbow, becomes a weapon. Often enough even my shoulder becomes a hand.
These invisible and appalling weapons, which have no beginning and no end because they are non-linear, and can combine with anything, are able to thrust and above all strike, hack and cut. They do not arrive directly, but often take a sophisticated detour that can be faster than a direct approach which surprises nobody. Escrima grandmaster Bill Newman, who recently watched me at work in Livorno, recognised some of what he saw as sabre techniques.
Biu-Tze also reflects the idea of attack, though in such a way that I appear to let the opponent act first but my reaction is faster than his action. At the last moment I forestall the opponent's attack, and the defending hand becomes a hand that is there first and attacks. By virtue of its circularity, the Biu-Tze offers a further (not just supplementary but higher) dimension, or to quote Sun Tzu (Chapter 11): "…(the wise strategist) constantly changes his location and takes a curving path so that he always remains a mystery to others".
Perhaps my enthusiasm has made you realise that I am in love with the Biu-Tze. Yes indeed! And because it goes against the traditional and generally accepted view, I think that hardly anybody before me can have approached the task I have set myself for years with such obsession: to establish by scientific experimentation what lies concealed in this most mysterious of all the forms, and to what extent it represents a complete, autonomous and superior concept.