76 Systemizing Martial Practice
Temples offered martial artists not only shelter, but also space to demon-
strate their art. “Temples,” writes Susan Naquin, “were overwhelmingly the most
important component of public space in Chinese cities in the late-imperial
era.”^76 Martial artists often made a living by giving public performances on
temple grounds. Like other “rivers and lakes” artists—actors, singers, and
storytellers—they traveled from one shrine to another, performing on such hol-
idays as the local god’s birthday. A seventeenth-century pilgrim discovered at
the Shandong Temple of the Eastern Peak “some ten wrestling platforms and
theatrical stages, each attracting hundreds of spectators who clustered like bees
or ants.”^77 “In every city temple fair,” observed the late Qing Yun Youke, “there
are martial artists demonstrating their art.”^78
Martial artists performed in temples on holidays and temple fairs. After
their show they would collect money from the audience or sell pills and oint-
ments, which were supposed to make their clients as strong as they, the seller’s
physique proving the efficacy of his medicine. In addition, some military ex-
perts offered classes in temples on a regular basis. To this day, Taiwanese mar-
tial artists teach in neighborhood and village temples. Likewise, the
seventeenth-century Wang Zhengnan taught his internal martial arts at the
Ningbo Iron Buddha (Tiefo) Temple because, we are told, “his own house was
too small.”^79 This rare glimpse into an unlettered martial artist’s life is given us
by his literati student, Huang Baijia.
As distinct from local temples where martial arts were performed, the big
centers of monastic fighting each merits a study in its own right. Here are only
a few comments on some of them:
Mount Wutai
The “Four Great Mountains” (Sida ming shan) occupy a central place in
Chinese Buddhist sacred geography. Each is associated with the cult of a Bodhi-
sattva, who is supposed to be manifested there. Mount Wutai, in Shanxi Prov-
ince, is considered the abode of the Bodhisattva of wisdom, Mañjušrî (Wenshu).
As early as the first centuries CE it had attracted pilgrims who sought the deity’s
epiphany. The mountain houses dozens of monasteries, some of which date
back to the early medieval period.
The military activities of Wutai monks resulted in part from its strategic
location on China’s northwestern border. The mountain rises over nine
thousand feet above the city of Taiyuan, in an area which has seen constant
fighting between Han Chinese and nomadic central Asian people. Indeed,
the earliest recorded instance of Wutai involvement in warfare dates from
the twelfth-century Jurchen invasion, when its monks participated in the un-
successful campaign to salvage the Northern Song dynasty (960–1127).^80
In 1126, during the eight-month Jurchen siege of Taiyuan, two gener-
als, Wu Hanying and Yang Kefa, sought Wutai military support. Their re-
quests were granted by the mountain’s abbots, and Wutai fighting monks
participated in the doomed campaign to save the city. Two clerics, Li Shan-