Paul Brennan:

The Taiji Boxing Treatise

Douglas Wile:

The T’ai-chi ch’üan Classic

Lars Bo Christensen:

Treatise of the Thirteen Movements

TT Liang:

T’ai Chi Ch’uan Classic

Waysun Liao

Treatise by Master Chang San-feng

Once there is any movement, your entire body should be nimble and alert. There especially needs to be connection from movement to movement.

As soon as one moves, the entire body should be light and sensitive and all its parts connected.

Once you start to move the whole body must be nimble and agile and in particular the moves must be connected and continuous

In every movement the entire body should be light and agile and all of its parts connected like a string of pearls

Once you begin to move, the entire body must be light and limber. Each part of your body should be connected to every other part.

Energy should be roused and spirit should be collected within.

The Ch’i should be roused and the spirit gathered within

The qi should surge and the spirit should work inside

The ch’I should be stimulated and the spirit of vitality should be retained internally

The internal energy should be extended, vibrated like the beat of a drum. The spirit should be condensed in toward the center of your body.

Do not allow there to be cracks or gaps anywhere, pits or protrusions anywhere, breaks in the flow anywhere.

Do not allow gaps; do not allow bulges or hollows; do not allow discontinuities.

Do not allow there to be imperfections anywhere.

Do not allow there to be high and low anywhere

Do not allow there to be intermittencies anywhere.

There should be neither deficiency nor excess, neither hollows nor projection, neither severance nor splice

When performing T’ai Chi, it should be perfect; allow no defect. The form should be smooth, with no unevenness, and continuous, allowing no interruptions.

Starting from your foot, issue through your leg, directing it at your waist, and expressing it at your fingers. From foot through leg through waist, it must be a fully continuous process, and whether advancing or retreating, you will then be able to catch the opportunity and gain the upper hand.

The root is in the feet, energy issues up through the legs, is controlled by the waist and is expressed in the hands and fingers. From the feet to the legs to the waist should be one complete flow of ch’i. One will then be able to seize the opportunities and occupy the superior position

The root is in the feet.

Issue from the legs.

Direct in the waist, apply in the hands and fingers.

From the feet to the waist all must be one continuous qi.

By moving back and forth you gain the [forward flowing] momentum [of a movement] in the pivotal point.

The energy is rooted in the feet, develops in the legs, is directed by the waist and moves up to the fingers. The feet, legs and waist must act as one so that when advancing and retreating you will obtain a good opportunity and a superior position

The internal energy, ch’i, roots at the feet, then transfers through the legs and is controlled from the waist, moving eventually through the back to the arms and fingertips.

When transferring the ch’i from your feet to your waist, your body must operate as if all the parts were one; this allows you to move forward and backward freely with control of balance and position.

If your body easily falls into disorder, the problem must be in your waist and legs, so look for it there.

If one is unable to seize opportunities and gain the superior position, the body will be scattered and in confusion. Look for the weakness in the waist and the legs.

When the momentum is not achieved in the pivotal point the body is scattered and disordered.

The mistake is to be found in the waist and legs.

If you fail to gain these advantages, your body will be in a state of disorder and confusion. The only way to correct this fault is by adjusting your legs and waist.

Failure to do this causes loss of control of the entire body system. The only cure for such a problem is an examination of the stance.

This is always so, regardless of the direction of the movement, be it up, down, forward, back, left, right. And in all of these cases, the problem is a matter of your intent and does not lie outside of you.

The same is true for above and below, front and back, left and right. All of this has to do with the mind and not with externals.

Whether above or below, front or back, left or right this is all so.

All this is intention and not external.

The same principle applies to upward and downward, forward and backward, left and right. All the movements are to be directed by the consciousness within rather than the appearance without.

Application of these principles promotes the flowing T’ai Chi movement in any direction: forward, backward, right side, and left side.

In all of this, you must emphasize the use of your mind in controlling your movements, rather than the mere use of external muscles

With an upward comes a downward, with a forward comes a backward, and with a left comes a right. If your intention wants to go upward, then harbor a downward intention, like when you reach down to lift up an object. You thereby add a setback to the opponent’s own intention, thus he cuts his own root and is defeated quickly and certainly.

If there is an above, there must be a below; if there is a fore, there must be a rear and if there is a left, there must be a right. If the intention is to rise one must pay attention to below. If you want to lift something, you must apply breaking power. In this way the root will be severed, and its destruction will be swift and inevitable

There is up and down, there is left and right.

If you want to go up, then place a downwards intention.

If you want to make someone come up then you must also have an intention to make them come down, this will certainly make themselves break and ruin their root at once.

When attacking from above you must not forget below; when striking from the left you must pay attention to the right; and when advancing you must have regard for retreating. If an attack is proposed upward, the initial intent must be downward. If you want to pull something upward, you must first push downward, causing the root to be severed and the object immediately toppled.

You should also follow the T’ai Chi principle of opposites: when you move upward, the mind must be aware of down; when moving forward, the mind also thinks of moving back; when shifting to the left side, the mind should simultaneously notice the right side – so that if the mind is going up, it is also going down

Such principles relate to T’ai Chi movement in the same way that uprooting an object, and thereby destroying its foundation, will make the object fall sooner.

Empty and full must be distinguished clearly. In each part there is a part that is empty and a part that is full.

Full and Empty should be clearly distinguished. Any given point has the potential for full or empty and the whole body has this dual aspect: full and empty.

Empty and full should be clearly distinguished.

Each movement has both empty and full in it.

In all the movements there is always this; both empty and full.

The insubstantial and the substantial should be clearly discriminated. Each single part of the body has both a substantial and insubstantial aspect at any given time and the body in its entirety also has an insubstantial and a substantial aspect.

Besides clearly separating the positive and negative from one another, you should also clearly locate the substantial and insubstantial. When the entire body is integrated with all parts connected together, it becomes a vast connection of positive and negative energy units.

Throughout your body, as the movement goes from one section to another there has to be connection. Do not allow the slightest break in the connection.

All the joints of the body should be connected without permitting the slightest break

The joints of the whole body are linked together, let there not be the slightest disconnection

All the joints in the body are to be threaded together without the slightest severance.

Each positive and negative unit of energy should be connected to every other unit and permit no interruption among them.

Long Boxing: it is like a long river flowing into the wide ocean, on and on ceaselessly…

One name for the Long [set of] Boxing[movements] is The Thirteen Movements

Long Boxing is continuously moving like a long river or the great ocean.

T'ai Chi Ch’uan is also called Cnang Ch’uan (Long Boxing) because its consecutive movements resemblethe stream of a long river which rolls on ceaselessly.

In Long Forms your body should move like the rhythmic flow of water on a river or like the rolling waves of the ocean

     [The thirteen dynamics are:] warding off, rolling back, pressing, pushing, plucking, rending, elbowing, and bumping – which relate to the eight trigrams:

☱☰☴
☲    ☵
☳☷☶

and advancing, retreating, stepping to the left, stepping to the right, and staying in the center – which relate to metal, wood, water, fire, and earth: the five elements. Warding off, rolling back, pressing, and pushing correspond to ☰, ☷, ☵, and ☲ in the four principle compass directions [meaning simply that these are the primary techniques]. Plucking, rending, elbowing, and bumping correspond to ☴, ☳, ☱, and ☶ in the four corner directions [i.e. are the secondary techniques]. Advancing, retreating, stepping to the left, stepping to the right, and staying in the center correspond to the five elements of metal, wood, water, fire, and earth. These combined [8+5] are called the Thirteen Dynamics.

The Thirteen Movements are:

Ward Off, Step, press, Push, Pull Down, Break, Elbow and Shoulder – these are the Eight Trigrams.

Step forward, step back, look left, gaze right and stand still in the centre – these are the Five Phases, together they make up the thirteen movements.

Ward Off, Step, Press and Push refer to the trigrams The Pit, Light, Thunder and Happiness, and these are the four directions.

Pull Down, Break, Elbow and Shoulder refer to the trigrams The Masculine, The Feminine, Stillness and Yielding, and these are the four diagonals.

Forward, backward, left and right and the centre refer to Metal, Wood, Water, Fire and Earth.

Ward Off, Roll Back, Press, Push, Pull, Split, Elbow-Stroke, and Shoulder-Stroke in T’ai Chi Ch’uan are equivalent to Chien, Kun, K’an, Li, Hsun, Chen, Tui, and Ken in the “Eight Trigrams”. The four first postures represent the four cardinal points [i.e. South, North, West, and East]. The second four postures represent the four corners [i.e. Southwest, Northeast, Southeast, and Northwest]. The Five Attitudes – Advance, Retreat, Look to the Left, Gaze to the Right, and Central Equilibrium – in T’ai Chi Ch’uan are equivalent to the Five Elements of Chinese philosophy: Metal, Wood, Water, Fire, and Earth. Thus, the Eight Postures plus the Five Attitudes are generally termed the T’ai Chi Thirteen Postures.

In the Long Form, Ward Off, Rollback, Press, Push, Roll-Pull, Split, Elbow, and Lean Forward are called the forms of the Eight Diagram (Pakua), the movements encompassing the directions. In stance, moving forward, backward, to the right side, to the left side, and staying in the center are called the Five-Style Steps. Ward Off, Rollback, Press and Push are called the four cardinal directions. Roll-Pull, Split, Elbow, and Lean Forward are called the four diagonals. Forward, backward, to the left side, to the right side, and center are called metal, wood, fire, water, and earth, respectively. When combined, these forms are called the thirteen original styles of T’ai Chi.