Hsing I Chuan (Form Intention Boxing)
Hsing-I Chuan or XingYiQuan is the first of the "three sisters" of Neijia, or Internal Martial Arts (Kung Fu) practice. The Neijia School of thought is comprised of Hsing-I, Pa-Kua and Tai-Chi as primary disciplines.
There are three primary styles of
Hsing I Chuan being practiced today. The ShanXi Style, the HeBei Style, and the Honan Style
would be the most widely recognized today.
Each style of Hsing I Chuan is distinctly different in flavor and appearance from the other methods, or families, as they are sometimes called.
The ShanXi style is considered by most to be the original method, credited by many to General Yueh Fuei, circa 1100 A.D., although this cannot be substantiated historically. ShanXi style is known for its vigorous and powerful movements and abundant releases of fah jing energy. This method is tight in frame keeping a well-guarded movement structure which is quick and extremely powerful. It is by far the most complex in form and nuance of the three different families. This is especially evident in its twelve animal structures. But it is perhaps the most rare of the Hsing-I styles found today.
HeBei style, in contrast to the ShanXi style, uses much larger frames and appears slower in practice. Its stances are more open than the ShanXi style, and there will be less appearance of fah jing energy in the practice of the forms. The HeBei style is said to delineate from the ShanXi method, but this link remains unclear. Many people practice the HeBei method today. And chances are if you meet a practitioner of Hsing-I, they will likely be of the HeBei method over any other. HeBei Hsing-I's expressions of the Five Elements are more simplistic than those of the ShanXi and the Twelve Animal stuctures are much more simplified by and large.
The last style, known as the Honan style, is a very simplified style of Hsing-I practiced exclusively by the Muslim Chinese community for generations. It has only Ten Animal structures which are extremely simplistic one or two movement forms only. The Five Elements are present only as concepts in this method, having no movement representations at all.
There are several recognized spelling and/or renderings of this arts name. The most common being Hsing-I Chuan, from the Wade/Giles, or XingYiQuan from the newer PinYin system of Chinese phonetics. Other common spellings include the abbreviated Hsing-I, XingYi or Hsing I. Also, on occasion an apostrophe is added, as in Hsing I Ch'uan to further emphasize the pronunciation.
