I did some reading of this new book, I just purchased. I was very pleased with it. Very informative and it also provides an excellent background to some of the history associated with different martial arts system, as well as Tai Chi.
Of particular interest to me, is found on page 184 of the book. The authors here discuss how Martial Arts and Chinese philosophy were meshed together. This particular chapter also highlighted the famous writer and martial artist Sun Lu Tang. Essentially, it is clear that prior to Sun Lu Tang's influence as an author, martial arts were not generally associated with the philosophy of Taoism.
In addition, it was Sun Lu Tang that initially presented the idea of training martial arts for health reasons. Prior to this writing and idea, people practiced Chinese martial arts to learn how to fight and to get paid for fighting.
Sun Lu Tang was born about 1861. Hence it is only in relative recent times that Tai Chi practice was surrounded with all notions of Chinese philosophy AND was originally passed down as a serious fighting methodology.
The point is: there are a lot of teachers that will talk about this or that theory or philosophy for extended periods of class time, and actually limit the time in class spent actually PRACTICING. Chen Tai Chi is an art that must be practiced, just talking about philosophy or ideals, takes away from the original intents and goals of practice. This is my opinion and my belief. This particular book supports my opinion.
J
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