BRIEF HISTORY OF SHAOLIN
The Shaolin Temple was built by order of the Emperor Wei (471-500 AD) for the Buddhist Monk Batuo (Buddhabhadra) circa 497 AD. The original construction was very simple and consisted of a shrine and a platform in which Indian and Chinese monks translated Sutras into Chinese. The first two martial monks were Huiguang and Sengchou who became disciples of Batuo. The great Indian Master Da Mo (Bodhidharma - Founder of Chan (Zen) Buddhism) had meditated for 9 years nearby the Shaolin Temple and imparted his knowledge of Buddhism and other conditioning or exercies methods for health around 540 AD.
The earliest record of the development of Shaolin Temple and its martial arts is in the Tang Dynasty (618-907) which included the defense of the monastery from local bandits, assisting Li Shimin to defeat Wang Shichong at the battle of Hulao on 28 May 621 AD. This includes the legend of the 13 Staff fighting monks. The first destruction of Shaolin Temple was around 845 AD.
Throughout history the martial arts, Buddhism, Medicine and culture of Shaolin Temple developed including in the Song Dynasty (960-1278 AD) Abbott Fu Ju (circa 961 AD) placed much effort in the consolidation and development of Shaolin Martial Arts. Later in the Song period (circa 1230 AD) the famous Masters Jue Yuan, Bai Yufeng and Li Sou also developed the shaolin skills.
In the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644), Shaolin Boxing along with other ancient chinese martial arts flourish and their methods start to influence broadly across China and even neighbouring countries like Japan and Korea. In 1674, under the Qing Government the second destruction of Shaolin occured. During that time Songshan Shaolin boxing went into a period of decline as the Henan Shaolin temple was monitored tightly. Much of the martial arts had then been almagated into general society and other temples across China.
Shaolin Temple has had both an illustrious history and a tragic one, as dynastic politics and wars had impacted the temple and its activities continuously. It was destroyed and rebuilt numerous times and as a result many of its martial arts have been spread amongst lay disciples more so than in the temple itself. The burining of the Temple in 1928 was siginificantly damaging as many records were burnt or destroyed and monks were killed whilst others hid in seclusion resulting in the worst degenration of the shaolin martial arts in history. Whilst still in ruins in 1941, the Songshan Shaolin Temple was controlled by the Japanese. In 1948, the people's party assumed control of the Temple's land and throughout the cultural revolution most monks fled.
Most of the halls that are now in Shaolin temple are actually rebuilt. Images below show the two main hall areas from 1979 :
As a result of government efforts to restore the temple in the mid 1980's and given the additional funding from tourists and visitors motivated by the classic film "Shaolin Temple" starring Jet Li of that period, the temple was to be restored. The same halls are shown from 2005:
Although some monks had survived such as Shi Dechan, Shi Suxi and Shi Suyang, they had only acquired a part of the shaolin martial arts. This resulted in a project to invite all masters around the temple to re-develop the Shaolin skills, such notables as Liang Yiquan, Zhang Qinghai, Liu Zhenhai and Liu Baoshan are some of those requested to assist.
Given over 1,500 years of history the Shaolin Temple has of course many events and battles which have been told throughout the world. The combination of Chan Buddhism and Shaolin Gongfu lead to an excellent path to happiness and health.
