Cheng Man Ching (Zheng Manqing) was one of the great Tai Chi masters of the 20th Century. His students include William C.C Chen, Robert W. Smith, T.T. Liang, Stanley Israel, Huang Shyeng Shen, Ken Van Sickle, Benjamin Lo, Ed Young, Abraham Liu, Maggie Newman and many others.

In this rare collection of previously-unreleased tapes, Professor Cheng is seen teaching, pushing hands, fencing, laughing, telling stories, demonstrating mastery in every gesture.

ChengManChing.com

The cost for the set is $149.00

Basic concepts are explored in detail as well as methods to adapt problem movements for at risk students.

The DVD was originally produced for senior citizens by Harvey Kerland and can be purchased at Amazon.com
Cost is $27.50 with Free Super Saver Shipping.

Yang Style T'ai-chi ch'uan (Taijiquan) is an excellent low intensity aerobic exercise that will improve your balance and coordination. It is a wonderful Stress Reduction method. This DVD is the first of two DVDs covering Section One of the long form.

The DVD was originally produced for senior citizens by Harvey Kerland and can be purchased at Amazon.com
Cost is $27.50 with Free Super Saver Shipping.

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To find us at the park you will park at the south end of Pease Park. The meeting place is easy to access from Enfield by going north on Parkway.
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Martial Arts teachers may be in attendance at these gatherings, and some may even teach, but this gathering is intentionally *NOT* a martial art class! Rather it is intended as an opportunity for sharing knowledge. A way to 'give to' and 'take from' each other. Freely you have received freely give! Multiple groups attend. All are welcome!

The following article about Dr. Chi Chiang Tao was written by Richard Farmer of Rising Dragon Tai Chi and was reprinted with his permission. Richard Farmer while visiting Dr. Chi Chian Tao in Vancouver BC in the mid 1980's, also visited with Tchoung Ta-Tchen. I hope you enjoy the article:

When Dr Chi died in 1994 I felt I would like to honour his passing by spending some time writing about him. This article has been taken from a newsletter of the RDTC School at that time. [Richard Farmer 1998]

Dr Chi left mainland China when the communists took control. Being a Mandarin speaker and traditionalist and having fought in the mountains, he was at risk if he stayed, so he and his family moved to Taiwan. Up to this point in his life he had already been studying Tai Chi Chuan for over 25 years with several well respected masters and once in Taiwan he met Cheng Man Ching and continued to study for a further 15 years. When I say study, I mean he would take time before work and after work, to be with his teacher, 7 days a week, 52 weeks of the year, as is the Chinese tradition.

He was completely dedicated to Tai Chi Chuan, so much so that he was not only the Vice President of the Taiwan Tai Chi Chuan Association but one of its chief instructors. He was involved politically as well as physically. It is said that if it was not for his Tai Chi he would have died of the tuberculosis which he contracted whilst in the mountains fighting.

© 2003 by Russ Mason.
This article originally appeared in the Taijiquan Journal 4/4 (Fall 2003) and can probably still be ordered as a back issue. This issue also contained articles by a Daoist author, A Buddhist teacher, and a student of the Jewish Talmud.

Russ Mason, M.A. has studied Yang-style Taijiquan since 1978. He teaches English and culture at the University of Delaware.

Click Here to Download Printer Friendly PDF Version of Studying the Tao with Jesus: Taijiquan and Christian Spiritual Life.

Over the last century, cultural winds have carried the seed of taijiquan beyond the borders of its native China, and it has taken root in Western lands. Many of these new learners consider the art of taijiquan to be somehow related to spiritual life. However, neither the principles of taijiquan nor the concepts of philosophical Daoism are necessarily wedded to any particular religious doctrine or practice. Indeed, our taijiquan family includes people of every faith. But what is the nature of this connection of taijiquan and spirituality? How does taijiquan mesh with Western concepts of spirituality? In particular, can an Asian martial art created by a culture influenced by Daoism, Confucianism, and Buddhism be compatible with the Christian faith? As a follower of this faith it has been my experience that taijiquan is not only compatible but that it can also enhance spiritual growth within a Christian context.

When my wife and I moved to the Austin, Texas area both my previous Bay Area teachers, Pak Chan and Ed Chan, challenged me to start teaching as a way to further improve my skills. I was not really considering doing it because I could not imagine finding the time but then in one day out of the blue I was asked by two different people, not knowing each other, to teach them Tai Chi. I went home that evening and told my wife about it. She said that on the same day two of her staff came into her office closed the door behind them and asked to speak with her, then they asked her, "Do you think you could talk your husband into teaching us Tai Chi?". We were both a bit amazed at the timing of being asked three times in one day and felt that it was a providential leading.

The locating of a beautiful facility to teach in just one mile from our home and one mile from my wife's Medical Practice, AllMedPhysicians, is another story. The Central Texas Academy of Martial Arts had no open evening time-slots. But, I still called Ray Parra and told him I would be interested in teaching Tai Chi there. Unfortunately I only had Monday nights as an available night to teach. Ray told me that their Monday night teacher had just called and wanted to teach in the daytime instead. So, the studio was available only on Monday nights, starting immediately!

Then I let the local newpaper, The Hays Free Press, know that we were starting a Tai Chi class in Buda and they sent a reporter to take the first nights class and produce an article. That favorable article brought in quite a few new students! And so... that is how the Soft Answer Tai Chi class began. Where it ends only God knows!

CTAMA has since installed a beautiful padded floor which works great for grappling arts but did not serve Tai Chi students well. This made us sadly leave their location. We then moved outdoors to the Elm Grove Elementary Schoolyard but left because they often had large events that displaced us and there were no washrooms or good cover from bad weather.

We have now moved the class to AllMedPhysicians while we seek and pray for another indoors location in Buda to open up for us! In the meantime we can meet in the Medical Office waiting room on poor weather days and practice under the canopy and in the shady areas of the parking lot when the weather is good. There is also water and washrooms which is very good!

• Cheng Man-Ching Style: Yang Lu-Ch'an -> Yang Pan-hou & Yang Chien-hou -> Yang Ch'eng-fu -> Cheng Man Ching -> Benjamin Lo -> Ed Chan & Pak Chan
• Tchoung Ta-Tchen Style: Yang Lu-Ch'an -> Yang Pan-hou & Yang Chien-hou -> Yang Shao-hou & Tian Zhao-Lin -> Shi Tiao-Mei -> Tchoung Ta-Tchen

Tchoung Ta-Tchen created the 6 section Dual Sided Yang Style Tai Chi Chuan Form in the late 1960's. He felt the standard Yang Tai Chi form favored the right side, which he considered unbalanced. He taught a two man partner set called "Section 7 & Section 8" and he created "section 9", a fast set combining elements of the Natural School, Tai Chi, Bagua and Hsing-I.

Tchoung Ta-Tchen began teaching in 1970 as the Tai Chi Chuan teacher for President Bongo of Gabon. He also established the South African Chinese Health and Self Defense Club in Johannesburg.

Having been one of his students in Vancouver, BC I can testify that he loved his Tai Chi Classes and his Tai Chi Students! He was like a father to us. He cried publicly when I returned to the club to visit after years away!

Cheng Man-ch'ing is best known for his "Simplified" 37 Posture Yang Style T'ai Chi Chuan. *Simplified* does not mean easier. It was simplified in it's length and complexity but not the quality or difficulty of the postures.

Cheng Man-Ching developed lung disease in his twenties which is believed to have been tuberculosis. He was coughing up blood and began to practice taijiquan diligently to aid in his recovery. He met the well-known master Yang Chengfu in 1928 and began to study his Yang style T'ai Chi Ch'uan until 1935.

Cheng Man-Ching's changes to the Yang style form were controversial but allowed him to teach larger numbers of students in less time. These changes are still a source of controversy to some T'ai Chi Chuan practitioners in the Yang Style community.

After returning from South America and after the birth of my daughter (Children can have a very taming effect on wild creatures!) I had a conversion experience, through many miracles and a slew of experiences that I hope to write into a book someday, and I have been following Jaheshua (Jesus) as a Seventh-day Adventist Christian ever since. This was a logical transition for me, having been raised in a Jewish home and believing in healthful living. At this time I decided that my Christian faith and the martial arts could not coexist. I kept my limbering exercises going but stopped the martial arts study.

When I turned forty I started to suffer from plantar faciitis, which is caused primarily by tight achilles tendons. This caused me to have extremely painful heals and it hurt to stand up for long periods of time! After speaking with a Chinese Seventh-day Adventist physician, Dr. Chester Wong, about the cause of the problem, I realized that I should get back to the Tai Chi from my youth because it would help fix that problem. And... Once again the flexibility training in Tai Chi came to the rescue and caused me to get better from another of my physical ailments! As well, I was able to reconcile my faith and the practice of Tai Chi. The key to me is not to worship the created but to worship the creator! It still took me quite a while to come out of my closet with my Christian friends and admit that I was a secret Tai Chi Aficionado!

Later I came across an article written by a Cheng Man-Ching Tai Chi Practitioner who went through an almost identical experience as myself. In order for you to read this article I had to retype it because of copyright issues. I have the author's permission and the permission of the publisher, to put up the text of the article. It is a great article! I hope you enjoy it! The title of his article is: Studying the Tao with Jesus: Taijiquan and Christian Spiritual Life.

      Click Here to Read: Studying the Tao with Jesus: Taijiquan and Christian Spiritual Life!

      Click Here to Download Printer Friendly PDF Version of Studying the Tao with Jesus: Taijiquan and Christian Spiritual Life.

© 2003 by Russ Mason. This article originally appeared in the Taijiquan Journal 4/4 (Fall 2003) and can probably still be ordered as a back issue.
Russ Mason, M.A. has studied Yang-style Taijiquan since 1978. He teaches English and culture at the University of Delaware.

There is another article I came across on the web about a student of Cheng Man-Ching that become a Christian, dropped out of the Tai Chi scene and then came back. His name was Dr Chi Chiang Tao. Click Here to Read the Story about Dr Chi Chiang Tao. The article about Dr. Chi Chiang Tao was written by Richard Farmer of Rising Dragon Tai Chi and was reprinted with his permission. Click Here Read the Original Article from Rising Dragon Tai Chi.

Tchoung Ta-Tchen was my eventual teacher (Sifu in Chinese) and was like a father figure to me. He was also the teacher of Steve Malliaris and my logical next teacher. I attended classes every day of the week. My wake up routine was about four hours and I did that for years. Tai Chi was my life but I also managed to work part time to pay my rent and put myself through high school.

Sifu Tchoung Ta-Tchen encouraged us to go to other cities and visit and practice with other Tai Chi teachers. He spoke most highly of Cheng Man-Ching in New York. This was before Cheng Man-Ching passed away. In taking his advice, one year a carload of us students rented a station wagon and drove to San Francisco California to visit an old Tai Chi teacher, in his 90's that taught in a park every morning at 6:00 am!

National Geographic magazine produced an article on Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada which was published in October of 1978 shortly after I hitch-hiked to South America. When I returned the following year friends showed me my picture in the National Geographic Magazine. I managed to find a copy for 25 cents in a thrift store, and have since scanned in the image. I am the little blond head of hair just above/behind the teachers right shoulder. In case you haven't found me yet I am wearing a blue shirt. Let me know if you still can't find me and I will consider drawing a little circle around my head!

After deciding to study Tai Chi again I was frequently gathering in the parks in the Bay Area in California pushing hands with Tai Chi students from many styles, while trying to find a school, and was always not quite satisfied that I had found what I was looking for. One Sunday afternoon a man, Howard Wang, came to the park and pushed with us and everybody said to me "He pushes like you!". That got my attention! We pushed together and it was true. I was so happy to meet somebody with a soft touch. He told me that he practiced the Cheng Man-Ching style. I remembered then that Tchoung Ta-Tchen had also learned from, and HIGHLY RECOMMENDED, the Cheng Man-Ching style. At that point I decided to seek out a teacher in the Cheng Man-Ching style.

The Cheng Man-Ching style was a natural fit after learning the Tchoung Ta-Tchen style. The Tchoung Ta-Tchen style I originally learned is the closest I have found to Cheng Man-Ching style because the Tchoung Ta-Tchen style follows most of the same principles as the Cheng Man-Ching style. It took quite some time looking, but I was finally able to find some teachers in the Bay Area that would teach me the Cheng Man-Ching style. These teachers were not taking new students but took me because I knew the form and had past experience. I felt blessed to have them teach me!

I learned from Pak Chan for some years and did a lot of push hands training. Pak was an awesome form, push hands and sword form teacher and I really miss his classes. No matter what mistakes I made Pak would always have the same reply to my question about what I needed to do to improve; "RELAX". And, he was always right! We would meet on Sunday mornings outside rain or shine, hot or cold at 7:30 am and generally practiced until around noon, or even longer. I would then leave his class, go home to eat some lunch, and then head to other parks to push hands with practitioners from other styles. Needless to say my legs were always extremely well worked out on Sundays! If there were teachers of the Cheng Man-Ching style in the Austin area of Pak's caliber then I would be signing up as a student right away! The Cheng Man-Ching style teaches relaxation better, in my humble opinion, than any other style and that is why I am so motivated to teach it. I want to have people to practice with that follow the same principles!

Another really good instructor, and one of Paks classmates, is Ed Chan who I was introduced to by Tony Wong, a Chen Style Tai Chi teacher, in the Bay Area. We met at a San Francisco Tai Chi gathering. Tony knew that Ed was an excellent Cheng Man-Ching practitioner and helped me to contact Ed. Unfortunately, Ed was not interested in teaching at the time. Fortunately Ed introduced me to Pak Chan who agreed to teach me. Then Ed and I got together every Tuesday evening for push hands in the yard of a local school. He also is VERY skilled at push hands and I learned a tremendous amount pushing with him. I had to really learn to relax otherwise I would be pushed around like a rag doll! I am deeply indebted to Ed for all his instruction! And, Fortunately for his present students, Ed Chan is now teaching a Tai Chi class!

The pictures above show Ed Chan pushing out an oppenent at a Push Hands Competition.

I had the good fortune to meet Benjamin Lo once and received a little instruction from him. Ben is the teacher for both of my instructors, Pak and Ed, in the Bay Area. Now I wish that I had gone to meet with him more often! Hind-site is always 20/20! Benjamin Lo has had more than 50 years of experience teaching T'ai Chi Ch'uan. He has been giving workshops across the United States as well as in Europe. Ben Lo is probably the mostly highly skilled Tai Chi practitioner alive in the United States. I can hardly count the number of highly skilled Tai Chi practitioners that have learned from Ben Lo!

In my visit with Ben he walked up to me and touched the little finger of one of my hands to show me that I was holding tension in that finger. Two weeks later I totally tore that finger up, doing push hands, because the little finger was tense. I won't show you the pictures of my finger entirely black and blue. But, needless to say I learned the importance of relaxing. Injuries happen because of tension!

It also became apparent how small the world of Tai Chi is even though people are practicing around the globe. I showed Ben Lo a picture of my first teacher, Tchoung Ta-Tchen together with Cheng Man-Ching as younger men. Ben recognized Tchoung from the picture in Tchoung's Tai Chi book, and remembered Tchoung sometimes practicing with Cheng Man-Chings students during their early days in Taiwan!

This Video was the first quality video of the Cheng Man-Ching Yang Style form produced. Not as relaxed as Ben Lo or Tricia Yu, but the teaching style is good.

To find search for "terence dunn yang short form" at your favorite search engine. Cost of the DVD should be around $18.00

Note: These Postures are not always counted the same by all teachers and students but all counts manage to end up with 37 postures. We cannot clear up any confusion on the ordering of the form but have tried to demonstrate ways in which the form has been counted differently in different publications.

Click Here to Download the Form List

B eautiful hand: No bends or kinks in wrists
U pright Body: Spine is always kept upright and not leaning
R elax: This is the key principle. Let go of all tension!
S eparate the Weight: No even weight distribution
T urn the Waist: Movements controlled from the Hips/Waist

Clearer understanding is given in the handout. The document also includes other principles.

Click Here to Download the Principles Handout

To purchase this DVD you will need to visit the DVD section of the Wuji.com website. First Click on the Navigation Bar item that says "DVD Videos". Then look for the link on that page that says "Taiji Master Tchoung Ta Tchen" to add this DVD to your cart. Hopefully they will redesign this page soon so that we can link directly to the items.

Click Here to Visit the Wuji.com website
Cost of the DVD is $30.00

Video highlights:
Develop solid foundational push hands skills. Detailed explanations of exercises and techniques. Many exercises for both solo and two-person practice. Multiple camera angles and close-up footage provided. See Tai Chi principles demonstrated in unrehearsed, free-style play.

Click to Order this DVD Online.
Cost of the DVD is $ 44.95 USD

Video highlights:
Easy Step-by-Step Instruction. Lessons are designed to be easy to absorb in short sittings. See Each Movement From Several Different Angles. All the Stances, Postures and Footwork Explicated. Improve Health and Vitality in 7 to 10 Minutes a Day. Prof. Cheng's Complete Yang Style Short Form Explained and Demonstrated. Perfect for the Beginner or Even the Advanced Student. Any student who has questions while studying with the video is welcome to contact Sifu Phillips directly via email!

Click to Order this DVD Online.
Cost of the DVD is $ 44.95 USD
There are also VHS versions available for $24.95

In the United States this can be purchased from
Cho San Inc., in Asheville, North Carolina. They may only carry the VHS version. Cost is $65 plus shipping, which is about $6.

In Taiwan this can be purchased from The Cheng Tze Tai-Chi Chuan Study Association They have a DVD version and can ship it. Cost is $35 plus shipping of $20.00 per order. Ordering more products can bring down the shipping cost per item. Click to See all their Products.