Dao of the Warrior: Push Hands, Ethics, and Hot Takes

Historical Evidence of Zhang Sanfeng’s Existence If you trace Taijiquan far enough back into the mists of Chinese history, you eventually arrive not at a dusty village courtyard or the clang of a soldier’s training ground, but at a mountaintop shrouded in cloud. Wudang Mountain, home of Taoist immortals and hermits, is where legend says a sage named Zhang Sanfeng (張三丰, Zhāng Sānfēng) discovered the secret of Taijiquan by watching a bird and a snake fight. The snake coiled and yielded, the bird struck and failed, and Zhang, in that instant of revelation, saw the Dao itself. It is a beautiful story. It is also one that dissolves under the light of history. Despite the countless martial arts manuals and tourist brochures that revere Zhang as the “Founder of Taijiquan,” the real Zhang Sanfeng—if such a man truly existed—was not a boxer, nor a warrior, nor even a martial artist. The historical records, sparse but consistent, paint a very different picture: that of a wandering Ta...