60 Systemizing Martial Practice
Pushing Staff and the Shuttling [Staff] differ from the remaining three in
being “free methods without fixed positions” (huo fa wu ding shi).^15
According to Cheng, the five methods all originated at the monastery. In
this respect, it is no accident that the word “original” (zong) figures in the title
of his manual: Exposition of the Original Shaolin Staff Method. Cheng’s goal was to
expound what he argued were the authentic Shaolin techniques, as distinct
from the numerous methods that—even as they carried the monastery’s
name—were far removed from its original teaching. His agenda mirrors the
fame the Shaolin Monastery had acquired by the early seventeenth century. If
it were not for the monastery’s renown, practitioners of other techniques would
not have capitalized on its name, and Cheng would not have been prompted to
present the original Shaolin method.
Thus, Cheng’s Shaolin Staff Method reveals a landscape familiar in today’s
Fig. 9. The “Lifting-Sleeve Position” from Cheng Zongyou’s 1621 Shaolin Staff Method.