Talk:Yijin Jing

message: the reason why it was deleted was due to the fact that many of the paragraphs talk about things that are disussed in other sections of the article and about subject matters that have nothing to do with the Yi Jin Jing. Further, you've made the article unnecessarily long.  Not only that, the discussion is about the Yi Jin Jing not Bodhidharma who has his own article.  The discussion on bodhidharma in the longer version is also contradictory in some aspects and discusses some legends as facts. Also, there are a lot of grammatical errors in the article.  Also, a whole paragraph and a half was spent on the discussion by a random interview with a monk and his ideas on martial arts. it doesn't add to the article nor is he a historian who discusses history. All he is doing is talking about his opinions on the matter.   Kennethtennyson 17:40, 15 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Deletion

message: This page needs to cut back on the number of quotes. I think it would be wise to paraphrase the material and only use quotes for the important statements. --Ghostexorcist (talk) 18:28, 28 June 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Too many quotes 

message: Anyone know the original sanskirt name of Yi jinjing?  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 220.255.1.132 (talk) 19:47, 16 March 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: Please read the article, it is an entirely Chinese work produced during the 17th century. --Ghostexorcist (talk) 20:09, 16 March 2011 (UTC)
thread_title: Original name

message: "Research Refutes Indian Origin of I-Chin Ching". Black Belt Magazine"?
Really?
a large portion of this page has very little if any refs, If you have no refs to back up the information you have given, then the section will be deleted by next week.92.236.96.38 (talk) 12:02, 10 October 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  Is this some sort of joke? scholar ref... "black belt magazine" ?  

message: This section does not say much about the possible origins of these exercises, and the relative merits of each argument. I've been sceptical of scholars so far. Or should I say, they may have the authority to discuss the precise status of a text as genuine/forgery, factually accurate/innacurate, but have less to say about the source of any exercise system. In fact, I've never given scholars much of a chance. So all I can do is say why I think I begin from such as sceptical position:
On this issue, and generally, I agree that there are just too many cases where investigation which relies on written sources is going to produce no knowledge. Scholars merely argue about which guess sounds more plausible. Was it worth listening to the Western scholars who described the Tibetan kingdom of Zhang Zhung and its ancient languge as "myths"? No; it was just their best guess, never knowledge. (We now know that tradition was correct in that case.)
Scholars aren't always in a position to make even an educated guess. If martial historians only understand what they see, they will miss that you can perform exactly the same physical movements in a manner identical to the observer, and yet actually be performing entirely different exercises each time. How much are scholars going to learn from studying ancient documents with pictures and elliptical texts, without actually finding a qualified teacher willing to explain the inner aspects?
It sounds incredible to me that Yi Jin Jing would be a form of Dao Yin. From what I know about the principles of Dao Yin, Indian Yoga and the Yi Jin Jing/Shaolin martial arts, I conclude that the Shaolin Temple claim sounds far more plausible: "Yi Jin Jing it is a mixture of Yoga and Kalaripayattu, an ancient Indian Martial Art from Kalari." 
(This in only my list based on what I have come across, but four entirely different philosophies are:
1) leading blocked energy outwards, often through lively but gentle extension of the body (the word "stretch" is not appropriate) but sometimes just with the mind.
2) Dissolving blockages in with the mind/awareness, usually while the physical body is in an extremely relaxed state
3) Using tension to generate heat which burns away/transforms the blockages. 
4) Using sudden force to drive blockages out.
They are different philosophies, associated with different times and places. And the skills that practioners developed all became part of Chi Gung. Pretty much all the main SKILLS known fron the history of Chinese exercises found there way into the original Yang Tai Chi and Dong Hai Chuan's Bagua.)
The key to taking seriously the notion that these exercises are foreign, as the Shaolin Temple claims, and not based on what existed in China to that date is what I wrote before: Dao Yin movements performed with Shaolin principles is not Dao Yin exercise, it is Shaolin exercise. A scholar who doesn't see that there are new principles in operation, because they do not undertand the principles of these exercises, will not be asking the question: where did these new principles come from? 
I think any theory is possible, including the one favoured by the Communists. But anything that knowledgeable practioners tend to reject, I also would be sceptical of. 
Historically, I think there was a bias for outsiders to go to extremes and either be entirely credulous and believe everything (especially if it is fantastical) or consider that, before they came along and applied their methods of assesing evidence, all that existed was ignorance and confusion. 
And the level of knowledge of Chi Gung/Nei gung available to the West is changing at such a pace that if I were to recommend my top 12 books, most were published in the past 5 years (by very knowledgeable practitioners). So, I'm not sure how much knowledge of these living traditions was available to earlier scholars. 77.98.32.90 (talk) 02:31, 31 May 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  Origins 

message: Coming back to this: I'd say there are two seperate articles that have been put on the same Wikipedia page. There is nothing useful about having them share a page. 
The second article is about the exercise system known as Yijin Jing curently taught at the Shaolin monastry and widely practiced by kung fu students around the world, as well as the many in China and abroad who practice it for health. For anyone interested in learning about this exercise system, including its traceable and claimed-but-unprovable origins, I would imagine that the preceeding section is unhelpful. This section already contains some discussion of the theories of the more distant origins of these exercises and I think, with some brief additions on the disputed Damo connection, it would be able to stand as a complete article.
That would leave the other article, which is discussion by historians about a text (or group of texts) and its origin and status. This could either have its own wikipedia page or disappear. (For anyone interested in working on that - or even just reading about it - there was a lot of information on the page in early versions, eg. 2006.) - In fact, most references to what the text contains have been removed by various editors leaving just the debate about the texts provenance. Which is part of what makes it seem like this page seem so disjointed. 
77.98.32.90 (talk) 21:20, 6 July 2015 (UTC)
replies: text: I don't see the two topics (the text and the exercises) as being separable. They're inextricably linked. The differing perspectives of historians and practitioners are part of an ongoing debate that should be reflected in the article. Splitting it into two would simply lead to even greater divergence in the two perspectives. I think it's more valuable for the debate to take place in one place than for practitioners and historians to each have their own articles where they can focus on just the part that interests them without having to engage intellectually with one another. In reply to the last part of your comment, I would welcome more additions related to the contents of the text, and agree that there is currently a lopsided focus on its authenticity/origins. --diff (talk) 23:45, 6 July 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  What should the article be about? A text or a qigong set? 

message: You say, that:
"The Yijin Jing appears to be the source for two other popular Qigong forms which are also attributed to various authors.  Both the Eighteen Luohan Hands (also associated with Shaolin) and the Eight Pieces of Brocade (Baduanjin) forms seem like abridged versions of Yijinjing sets."
Tho, this is in contradiction with the article on Baduajin, quoting:
"This exercise is mentioned in several encyclopedias originating from the Song Dynasty. The Pivot of the Way (Dao Shi, c. 1150) describes an archaic form of this qigong." (taken from Baduanjin qigong).
After reading the part of Modern Scholarly Research, which (unintentionally?) suggests that Yijin Jing is rather new, this makes no sense.
I suggest either making this article clearer, or it's removal.
Chemikalia (talk) 00:39, 3 January 2016 (UTC)
replies: text: The text you quoted from Baduanjin article is correct. That exercise is, as far as we know, older. This article is internally inconsistent to begin with, having been written by a succession of editors with differing views. It's not a suprise that it also contradicts other articles on Wikipedia. I'm going to do a little cleanup to fix the issue you brought up. --diff (talk) 01:26, 3 January 2016 (UTC)
thread_title:  Inconsistency of the time data with other articles