martial artist; yet we have the spectacle of Buddhist monks deciding to
fight physically for leadership. These are not men who have abandoned
their egos upon taking up religious vows, but rather men of violence who
work for monasteries and dress as monks. They are not just armed with
staffs but with swords as well, and they show no remorse in killing an
unarmed, noncombatant woman. In manner and skills, they resemble the
“fighters’guild”of Hangzhou mentioned earlier.
Shaolin’s reputation as a center of martial arts was notfirst recorded in
the Ming Dynasty; it wasfirst created in the Ming Dynasty. The events that
precipitated this new reputation appear to be the raids of thewokou
pirates in the middle sixteenth century. Martial monks including those
from Shaolin had taken part in earlier suppressions of other bandits with
mixed results. The Shaolin Temple was the direct recipient of imperial
patronage in the mid-sixteenth century and government exemption from
taxes on its lands. Like any other powerful landowner or institution,
Shaolin occasionally put its security force in the service of the state in
return for state confirmation of its local power. The temple had been
mostly destroyed by the Red Turbans just before the dynasty was founded,
but imperial service and patronage had allowed it to rebuild.
Before their recruitment tofight the pirates, and in spite of their previous
activities infighting local bandits and rebels, Shaolin monks were not
universally known for their martial arts skills. When Wan Biao, who was
responsible for recruiting Shaolin monks tofight the pirates, suggested
employing monks in the suppression campaign, three provincial officers
ridiculed him for it. These men, it seems, were entirely unaware of the
“famous”martial arts abilities of the monks. Wan ended up wagering wine
with the three men on the superior combat skills of monks. A nominally
unsuspecting monk chosen by Wan was summoned to a banquet where an
ambush of eight arms instructors waited to attack him with staffs. The
monk evaded their attacks, grabbed one of their staffs, and then proceeded
to knock all of them down.^12 This demonstrates that the monks were
highly skilled martial artists, but that knowledge of their skills was still
limited. All that changed after the pirate suppression despite the minor role
played byfighting monks in general and Shaolin monks in particular in the
campaigns. Shaolin monks were not a significant military force, yet their
reputation as martial artists became a culturalfixture.
Shaolin’s reputation for martial arts arose during the sixteenth century,
leaving a gap of nine hundred years since the temple was last mentioned in
connection with military action. This extremely long gap presents a chal-
lenge to those seeking to argue that Shaolin’s martial arts tradition goes
172 The Ming Dynasty