- Ki power, Korean bushido

code and a martial arts

technique potpourri unite in
hwarangdo


(Black Belt Magazine January 1977)
by Paul William Kroll

Photo caption: "COME ALONG
AS A GOOD FELLA'." Joo
Bang Lee demonstrates a simple
technique for crowd control. A
few fingers can control the
movements of a large person. Lee
has trained special forces in Korea to be able to control rioters with minimum
force.
Automobiles can be driven over his body without hurting him. Blocks of
concrete can be smashed across his chest. He can jump 12 feet in the air from
a standing position to deliver a flying spin kick. He is Joo Bang Lee,
hwarangdo Founder, and president of the World HwaRang Do Association.
Lee has spent over 35 years of his life learning the more than 4,000 techniques
of hwarangdo and the esoteric Buddhist philosophy which influences their
teaching.
Lees brother is Joo Sang Lee, chairman of the World Hwarang Do
Association. Together, they control the 56 hwarangdo schools in Korea and the
38 schools in the United States and Europe. Like his brother, Joo Sang Lee
entered the Yang Mi Am Buddhist temple when he was a child and studied
with Buddhist priest Suahm Dosa until the Lee brothers founded art name
and opened the first hwarangdo school in Seoul, Korea, in 1960. It was the
first time in modern history that hwarangdo was taught outside a Buddhist
monastery. Joo Sang Lee was the first to come to the United States, making
the trek in 1968. In 1972, Hwarang Do Founder Joo Bang Lee came to the
United States.
The brothers, particularily Joo Bang Lee, are best known for their version of
ki, the ability to use internal energy to make their bodies hard, lighter,
heavier or to feel no pain. They have specialized in this area and it is what sets
their hwarangdo style apart. For example, in an experiment performed by the
Biofeedback Research Institute, and reported in the December 1972 issue of
Probe The Unknown magazine, Joo Bang inserted a spoke through the fleshy
part on his arm, and lifted a 25 pound bucket filled with water. The bucket
was suspended from the spoke, Joo Bang Lee felt no pain.
At the time, Joo Bang
Lee explained how he
did it, through an
interpreter. When I
am arranging my body
in my preparation, I
start my concentration
with abdomen power,
bringing the energy up
into my arm and letting
this energy flow out
into the arm. The
energy comes up from
the legs and abdomen
and flows into the arm. I start my concentration with abdomen power,
bringing the energy up into my arm and letting this energy flow out into the
arm. The energy comes up from the legs and abdomen and flows into the arm.
"It is at this point that I insert the spoke ....My concentrated mind is on the
activity itself.... I would have to say that my mind and body are together, and
then separated from the place where it would hurt and put somewhere else....
During the penetration, I am aware of what is happening because I am doing
it, but I do not feel anything." I asked the Lee brothers recently about this
experiment and other similar aspects of hwarangdo's form of pain control. Joo
Sang Lee explained it by saying, "I take feeling out of my arm by ki. The ki
takes the feeling out. I actually make the arm numb."
What happens is difficult to describe in words, as the above conversation
snatches show. The fundamental aspect of the Lee brothers' internal energy,
however, is similar to some other martial arts. The fundamental concept
behind the ki is that a power resides at the bottom of the abdomen, about
three inches below the navel. Everyone is said to possess this power and to be
able to learn to manipulate it.
In hwarangdo, the Lee brothers explain, there are five aspects to the ki power.
"To make body hard like steel, is first way," says Joo Sang Lee. "Can also
make body lighter to jump higher. We also make body heavier. Fourth way is
to make body feel no pain." How does this operate in something like the spoke
experiment? The best description is that Joo Bang Lee first moves the ki
energy into the arm and then uses it to create some kind of activity in which
whatever it is that causes feeling is "short-circuited" by the internal energy.
During the penetration of the spoke, Lee says, he is fully aware of everything
that is occurring. He simply feels no pain. In some fashion, he is able to 'take
feeling out" or take that part of his body and "separate it from the place
where it would hurt" and place it elsewhere. Biofeedback researchers,
commenting on the experiment they performed on Lee in the PROBE
magazine article, said, "It is as if there is no room in the consciousness for the
sensation. of pain. It is active elimination. It is different from the passive
willing of alpha elimination and biofeedback training. It seems to be 'making it
happen,' as opposed to letting it happen,' as in the case of classic meditation.
It is superb concentration in an active sense.
Zen masters and yogis, on the other hand,
employ what also seems to be superb
concentration but in a passive sense."
Apparently, there is more than one way to
achieve this control of internal energy.
Whatever this internal energy is, hwarangdo
ki experts of which there are only a few
claim it is real. "You can't see the energy
that runs through your nerve, but it's
there," says hwarangdo student Dan wanner. "Ki is even more subtle." What
do you feel when you're controlling this ki? "It feels hot in the danjun area. In
the palm there will be a strange, tingly sensation," Joo Bang Lee student
continues. "You can control pain as well as the circulatory system. The
masters can drive a nail through their hand without feeling pain or bleeding."
Joo Bang Lee ki control is particularly discussed among his instructors and
students. One example concerns Bob Doggan, one of Joo Bang Lee student.
The account, related many times, was told me by student Dan wanner.
"During a class, Duggan's hands lost their circulation. No one knows why but
he started getting numb. Grandmaster Lee was told. He checked Bob's hands.
Grandmaster Lee started to concentrate and his own hand turned blue. It was
icy cold. He held Doggan's hand and the circulation came back. Grandmaster
Lee began to concentrate again and his hand eventually returned to normal.
If this happened as reported, the principle of a roving ki energy would also
operate here. This ability is called Ki Ryuk Sool in Korean, or simply, moving
the internal energy from or to different parts of the body. One descriptive
analogy to explain this is that the ki practitioner concentrates on a very small
area. In this case, the danjun or spot just below the navel. He concentrates on
a small circle and expands that into larger ones. These radiate throughout the
body. In the converse, a large, radiating circle is constricted into ever smaller
circles into that part of the body to which the energy is to be brought.
Another, more showy experiment has
Joo Bang Lee being placed, sitting in
the lotus position, on a bed of nails,
spaced one inch apart. Then an
assistant comes in front of Joo Bang Lee
and smashes bricks over his head. Joo
Bang Lee remains completely
unaffected. He can also, according to
his associates, walk on and jump on
broken glass without being cut.

Some less esoteric, but still impressive, Lee brothers experiments are those
surrounding breaking. The supreme test of breakage is to avoid using a
leverage point. In supported breaking, the ends of a board remain stationary,
usually held by an assistant. The board bends and eventually breaks at the
point of impact, using the supported ends as leverage. Less force is required to
cause breakage. The same would hold for any other breaking activity. Joo
Sang Lee says the real test of breakage is to do it unsupported. He will suspend
a one inch board by having each end hung in rice paper. The paper is so brittle
that the weight of the board will almost tear it. Lee then steps forward, raises
his hand behind his head, and kiais. The descending hand makes impact with
the board, which splits in two and falls to floor,
without tearing the paper.
But what about the typical student who comes
into a hwarangdo school? Will he or she come
out as the personification power? Not likely, at all, says student Dan wanner.
Like other schools, the dropout rate is very large, so few people ever make
black belt. "I would say that one out of a hundred students gets to black belt
rank," Wanner said. But even at this state of proficiency, most of the learning
is involved with physical techniques. The mental aspect, which involves great
emphasis on ki development, does not occur until the higher black belt
degrees. What this means is that very few people really come to have a grasp
of the ki.
For most hwarangdo students, as for most martial arts students, the concept of
the ki remains just that, a concept. But there is physical training to prepare
the mind and body for ki training. The Lee brothers utilize the kiRyukSool, a
phrase hard to translate. It is an exercise meant to develop control over the ki,
and includes a type yell the beginning students must do over and over again.
Instruction in punching and kicking is also geared toward control of the ki.
Students are taught to remain relaxed during the delivery of a punch. Only at
the point of impact is flexing to occur. At the same time, power is to be
brought from the foot, along the leg and body and through the arm and fist to
the point of impact. There is consistent work on preparing the body physically
for a potential study of hwarangdo ki.
The Lee brothers, for example, utilize the
KiRyukSool. Students are instructed to tighten
up their stomach-abdomen area, the seat of
tangen from whence the ki power is said to
originate. Arms and fingers are also to be
tightened. The student is taught to push out
mentally from the stomach through the chest,
arms and fingers reaching out to the space
beyond his fingertips. At the same time, a
breathing exercise involving a kiai type of release
is done. "Students do this many times at the
beginning and end of each class," says Dan
wanner. Another exercise done regularly is a
lotus position meditation sequence. He studied
meditation with Indian yoga mystics for four years prior to joining the
hwarangdo World Headquarters and is very enthusiastic about the exercise.
The exercise in its simplest form involves inhaling and exhaling of breath. The
student is taught to think only about his breath. "His thinking must be focused
on his breath, watching it mentally. He is not to think of anything else," says
Dan. Students do this during every class for about five minutes. This exercise
is also designed to create a physical awareness, preparing the student for a
more sophisticated grasp of the ki power.
A casual stroller, coming into a Lee brothers hwarangdo school, might not see
anything that is different from other martial arts schools. He would see the
typical 'kicking and punching exercises. Students, in general, would be a little
different. But a few would one day become the hwarangdo elite, able to tap
para-physical powers about which most humans remain basically unaware.