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Go and Martial Arts
Path: PhilosophyAndGo   · Prev: ArtOfWar   · Next: TheZenWayToGo
    Keywords: Culture & History

Sages were sometimes said to be masters of five arts:

- Painting
- Poetry
- Music
- A game (usually Go, but could be xiangqi, etc)
- Martial Arts

I believe there is some crossover knowledge between Go and Martial Arts, especially with some of the softer arts such as Aikido or Tai Chi.

For example, the concepts of yin and yang are applicable to both. Also the mindset of budo seems applicable for the go board. Here are some commonalities I've seen:

- Must have patience
- Don't over-extend
- Get the opponent to play your own game
- First become safe, then attack
- etc.

In the book 36 stratagems of Go, the author Ma Xiaochun expounds on some other interesting ideas.

The founder of Aikido, Morihei Ueshiba, and his Daito-Ryu instructor, were also known to be Go players.

Does anyone else have any stories about Go and Martial arts? I feel Go has improved my tai chi, and that tai chi has improved my go. Comments welcome :)

(p.s. I have added a Go and Martial Arts story about Morihei Ueshiba to throwing the board against the wall - denting the wall and the board - prior to uppercutting your opponent).

-Kungfu


When I was a member of an Aikido club, I wrote an article about the similarities with Go. It's been a long time since then. Dieter


I played with an opponent recently, he showed me a variant of a joseki that caught me off guard. I was very impressed and asked him " who taught you that ? " He kept silent. Determined to find a solution to the moves he just made, I repeated his form of attack on another corner. And he showed me how to defend correctly.

In a way, i just learnt a new style of attack... Eng60340



Path: PhilosophyAndGo   · Prev: ArtOfWar   · Next: TheZenWayToGo
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(OC) 2004 the Authors, published under the OpenContent License V1.0.