CLASSICAL WEAPONS IN MODERN TIME
Plum Flower Sabre
Question
Sifu, I know that the weapon training can help us in our everyday life. For example, the Green Dragon Crescent Moon Knife trains our courage, while the Shaolin Traveling Dragon Sword enhances our shen, mental clarity and agility.
-- Sifu Lee Wei Joo
Answer
Thank you for highlighting why we train classical weapons in modern time, or train Shaolin Kungfu or Taijiquan for that matter. How often do we use a Green Dragon Crescent Moon Knife or a Traveling Dragon Sword to fight? Practically never. Then why do we spend time practicing them? It is because of the benefits you have mentioned, like developing courage, presence of mind, mental clarity and agility.
Not many people realize this, or if they realize it they do not have the benefits because usually they only learn their forms. Worse, they even derive harmful side-effects.
.Green Dragon Crescent Moon Guan Dao
This answer is taken from Special Weapon Course: 10 Questions to Grandmaster Wong of the Shaolin Wahnam Institute Discussion Forum.
The answer first appear in the March 2913 Part 1 issue of the Question-Answer Series.
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