Quote Originally Posted by Siu Lum Fighter View Post
I really think this should be in the "discrepancy in Bei Shaolin history" thread but I have to address these supposed discrepancies somewhere so here we go. First of all, the names of the sets don't even seem close to me. Perhaps you could translate some of the names (San Jian Zhu Ge?) Here are some translations of the Bei Shaolin sets:
Shaolin #1 Open The Door (entering the gate)
Shaolin #2 Lead the Way (following step)
Shaolin #3 Riding the Horse (sit on the horse)
Shaolin #4 Chest Attacks (penetrating the heart)
Shaolin #5 Military Moves (martial practice)
Shaolin #6 Short Strikes (close fighting)
Shaolin #7 Plum Blossom (plum flower)
Shaolin #8 Three Palms within Eight Steps (uprooting step)
Shaolin #9 Continuous Links (connecting circles)
Shaolin #10 Standard Moves (the method)
So where are the similarities? The only English words I can see in common are with both of the 4th forms, but "crossing heart hammer form" still seems dissimilar from "penetrating the heart". I don't own the book, but the pictures and descriptions I've seen in the wushu manual "Shaolin Kan Jia Quan" don't seem similar enough to be directly related to Bei Shaolin either.

I can understand that there will always be an effort to find "missing links" between styles. Especially when there are so few historical documents to go on. But pure speculation is no substitute for the actual history. Based upon the evidence presented, I can still only conclude for myself that the Bei Shaolin sets were kept totally secret and they're not really related in structure to the Kan Jia Quan sets. During the time of the Qing Dynasty they were kept secret out of necessity since openly practicing or teaching martial arts was punishable by death for a time. Then we jump to the 20th century and the disastrous Cultural Revolution when all of the Bei Shaolin, Shaolin Longfist, and Shaolin Lohan masters had to either flee the country or completely hide the fact that they knew martial arts. How did Kan Jia Quan survive in Shandong completely unscathed while other masters were being imprisoned and shot on sight even? Even the Buddhist monks were humiliated, persecuted, and denounced. Many of them had to flee or hide. You're gonna tell me Shaolin kung fu survived completely intact after all of this?
Sorry, I used a crappy automated translation for the names of the moves (I had scanned the page).

Look again I have revised the names for the sets correctly, you will see that a lot more match. If you had the chinese names and characters for the 10 Bei Shaolin sets, I bet there will be more matches.

I looked over all the 13 Kanjia Quan sets, they are short sets, all about 20-35 postures each . And, they are not actual sets, but all one set, separated into 13 sections, just like the 10 Bei Shaolin sets are one set, not really 10 separate sets.
Obviously the 13 Kania sets have been condensed into 10 easier to remember units.
And, this was done before they reached Shandong, because the one place left in Henan that still practices these sets says that they were condensed into 10 sets before they left Henan!

So, when I looked at the Shaolin Kanjia sets and compared to the 10 Bei Shaolin sets, it looks like all the constant repetition of postures was kept to a minimum, which shorten the sets already there.

The Shaolin Encyclopedia documents the old long versions of the sets.
Not the condensation that happened after it left the temple and went into the Henan countryside that practices these sets today, which is near Shandong border.