The greatest military forces in the world are known for using their own special form of combat. Each country created its military martial arts to make its
Buddhism and the Martial Arts
A Basic Understanding of the First Will Give You a Deeper Understanding of the Second!
Life is chaos. How we deal with that chaos is the key to living life without having life merely throw us about. Buddhist thinking holds that Life is suffering. It doesn t say, Life is terrible or Life is unlivable. It s how we use martial arts to deal with the chaos, not so much with the combat, that makes life livable. It can even bring us happiness.
An examination of the philosophical side of Buddhism, as opposed to the religious side, has a lot to offer people, martial artists in particular. That s because more than a few arts, styles such as China s Shaolin kung fu, Japan s Shorinji kempo and Korea s bulmudo, are closely tied to the culture of and the mental processes taught in Buddhism. As such, a cursory study of Buddhism can give us insight directly into these specific arts and indirectly into the arts we practice.