Why Does Practising the Shaolin 72 Techniques or Yi Jin Jing Causes Side Effects ??

[xiaop]

In DGSD, Old Sweeper Monk specifically stated that there are side effects in practising the Shaolin 72 techniques and Yi Jin Jing excessively.

In the novel, Murong Bo, Xiao Yuan Shan, Jiu Mo Zhi and another Shaolin Monk Xuan Cheng were all suffering the side effects from this.

According to Sweeper Monk, because each of the technique was potentially lethal, the only way to counteract the side effects is to attain the equivalent level of Buddhist enlightenment. He particularly placed a 法华经 beside the manuals that both Murong Bo & Xiao Yuan Shan peeped, with hopes that they can use the teachings in the scroll to negate the side effects of the techniques they learnt.

The funny thing here though, as the Sweeper Monk made Murong Bo & Xiao Yuan Shan unconscious, they were able to cure each other by balancing the yin & yang energies of their bodies. While they did choose to become monks afterwards, this also demonstrates that it is not necessarily Buddhist enlightenment that cured them, what they sustained were actual physical injuries that can be cured.

But my question here is, why does practising multiple Shaolin 72 techniques causes side effects? It appears the side effects only happen if you practise multiple techniques, other practitioners of a single technique or so seem to be not affected.

Was it because the pugilists practised the techniques in the wrong manner?

But how can that be? They followed the manuals as written by the previous Shaolin monks that created these techniques. Had there been any side effect in practising them, shouldn't this side effect be listed down in the manuals?

And why were the practitioners themselves unable to detect the injuries they suffered? Particularly with Jiu Mo Zhi, his injuries did not surface until he was already in 西夏 later. He didn’t realised he was injured, only Sweeper Monk was able to see it, not the other pugilists present at the library then.

And if you need to attain Buddhist enlightenment to counter the effects, Jiu Mo Zhi and Xuan Cheng were already established monks when they practised the techniques. While Jiu Mo Zhi is evil, I’m sure Xuan Cheng wasn’t. So why did Xuan Cheng become disabled as a result?

How come the other Shaolin monks who were versed in only 1 Shaolin technique or so did not suffer any side effects? Even Reverend Xuan Ci and the other elder monks seem to be skilled in only one or couple techniques. You will think that with that many techniques under their wing, the elder ones especially ought to have mastered at least a number of them.

Does Shaolin temple have regulations to discourage or not allow their monks to practise multiple techniques? Are the Shaolin monks themselves even aware of this problem?

Also, how come in other Jin Yong novel iterations such as Heaven Sword Dragon Sabre, Smiling Proud Wanderer, other shaolin technique practitioners do not experience or mention the same side effects as the DGSD characters?

[Ken Cheng]

One would think that no body of martial arts is safer, more stable, and more orthodox than Shaolin martial arts. It's not like Shaolin techniques are weird techniques loaded with improper shortcuts.

[Western Eccentric]

XF even not a monk based on new edition yet he still could mastered one of 72 Shaolin Divine Art without much of "problem"..

[Stance]

What did the abbot Xuanci knew? Was it more than one? He didn't seem to have a problem.

[CC]

It is not specified (and I assume not), if MRB and XYS had their inner energies dissipated as part of the cure process.

But if we wanted to argue it, the fact that they gave up their revenge/emperor dreams and went into monkhood meant that they achieved the level of enlightenment required to cure their ailments. I think Sweeper forced them to be in the position where they had to save each other instead of going for the mutual KO and that sort of was a 2nd catalyst (1st one was when XYS saw MRB die and he suddenly felt sad and aimless) for their express enlightenment.

[hyoyatika]

I think it was a Buddhism thing.

Each of the 72 arts were said to be extremely lethal. The practitoner might become obsessed with becoming a top fighter and overly-driven to hone their skills, thereby leading to being obsessed with killing/lethal.

Let's take a look at the three people who got injured-MRB, XYS and JMZ. All 3 of them were obsessed with a mission and they used the 72 arts as a means to achieve that.

[xiaop]

Coming back to this thread.

The more I think about this, the more confusing it gets. For the 72 techniques, there are multiple developers of various techniques. Why is it that techniques developed by different people share the same flaw? Like someone shared earlier, you would think that the Shaolin Kungfu is the most orthodox of all martial arts. There shouldn’t even be any flaws in the techniques to begin with.

Most importantly, how come the Shaolin monks did not try to correct this flaw in their skills? Having this flaw lingering there, its equal to putting a limit to how strong a Shaolin monk can become.

Xuan Cheng was versed in 13 of the 72 techniques, but he eventually became paralysed. Even Old Sweeper Monk said that he couldn’t cure him. There was no mention of him being evil or not being a devout monk. So its weird why he ended up being disabled.

The only aspect I can understand out of this, is why Jiu Mo Zhi had injuries, because he had used 小无相功 to conjure the Shaolin techniques. Naturally you can be injured if you execute a technique without using the proper inner energy formula.

If you say each of the technique is potentially lethal, that you need Buddhist enlightenment to counteract the side effects, isn’t that the case for EVERY martial art out there? In the case of Murong Bo and Xiao Yuan Shan, they were cured of their injuries BEFORE they chose to be monks.

Jiu Mo Zhi eventually got “cured” cos his inner energy got sucked away by Duan Yu. So I really find the enlightenment aspect very ambiguous here.

[EdenResident]

First of all, there's always inconsistencies in Jin Yong novel. In HDSD, Kong Zhi was said to have mastered 11 of the 72 techniques (without any side effects) while in TLBB, mastering of 5 techniques was already considered elite. I doubt Kong Zhi was better than the Xuan-level monks in TLBB.

However, I think what JY was trying to convey was that Shaolin was first and foremost a Buddhist foundation. All those arts and techniques were created by monks who were already enlightened. Therefore, if you're already enlightened and have been able to get rid of (most of) your desires, then you have a very good base to start practicing those skills.

However, once Shaolin became stronger in martial arts, the monks did not follow the old way anymore (ie., enlightenment first then martial arts). More likely, they will try to achieve both at the same time and this causes conflict. How can you get rid of your desire at the same time as you train day and night to increase your inner power? How can you preach the "no-killing
precept at the same time as you train day and night to perfect that move that blasts someone head's off? This inherent conflict only existed for Shaolin monks and not other sects.

All Shaolin monks knew this. Or at least, they were definitely cautioned of it. However, they couldn't help but getting sucked into this conflict once they've made their martial arts progress, which was easier to see than progress in religious studies. So, as they tried to achieve both at the same time (enlightenment and martial arts), the "better" monks prioritized enlightenment first and became better at the end while the "worse" monks favored martial arts and the end result was either they didn't advance far in both, or worse yet, they fire-deviated. This is where Jin Yong is consistent again. In all of his novels, we see that the Shaolin monks with the highest level of martial arts were also the most enlightened ones (Sweepie, Du E, Fang Zheng).

To conclude, Sweepie's point in TLBB was that it's not that practicing 72 techniques or Yijinjing caused side effects but rather, to start practicing those major skills, you need to have the pre-requisite of already being enlightened (ie. like the original monks who created those arts), or at the very least, your Buddhist studies must be ahead of your martial arts studies. Otherwise, your desires or your killer side will consume you.

[Western Eccentric]

First of all, there's always inconsistencies in Jin Yong novel. In HDSD, Kong Zhi was said to have mastered 11 of the 72 techniques (without any side effects) while in TLBB, mastering of 5 techniques was already considered elite. I doubt Kong Zhi was better than the Xuan-level monks in TLBB.

However, I think what JY was trying to convey was that Shaolin was first and foremost a Buddhist foundation. All those arts and techniques were created by monks who were already enlightened. Therefore, if you're already enlightened and have been able to get rid of (most of) your desires, then you have a very good base to start practicing those skills.

However, once Shaolin became stronger in martial arts, the monks did not follow the old way anymore (ie., enlightenment first then martial arts). More likely, they will try to achieve both at the same time and this causes conflict. How can you get rid of your desire at the same time as you train day and night to increase your inner power? How can you preach the "no-killing
precept at the same time as you train day and night to perfect that move that blasts someone head's off? This inherent conflict only existed for Shaolin monks and not other sects.

All Shaolin monks knew this. Or at least, they were definitely cautioned of it. However, they couldn't help but getting sucked into this conflict once they've made their martial arts progress, which was easier to see than progress in religious studies. So, as they tried to achieve both at the same time (enlightenment and martial arts), the "better" monks prioritized enlightenment first and became better at the end while the "worse" monks favored martial arts and the end result was either they didn't advance far in both, or worse yet, they fire-deviated. This is where Jin Yong is consistent again. In all of his novels, we see that the Shaolin monks with the highest level of martial arts were also the most enlightened ones (Sweepie, Du E, Fang Zheng).

To conclude, Sweepie's point in TLBB was that it's not that practicing 72 techniques or Yijinjing caused side effects but rather, to start practicing those major skills, you need to have the pre-requisite of already being enlightened (ie. like the original monks who created those arts), or at the very least, your Buddhist studies must be ahead of your martial arts studies. Otherwise, your desires or your killer side will consume you.

But ZBT once said that WCY was such prodigy person which could learn and mastered taoism as well as martial arts till highest level..

[EdenResident]

Well yes, but super elites like WCY and Sweepie don't grow on trees. And besides, Taoism is not that conflicting with desires and the killing arts. Not to the extent of Buddhism anyway. Even though Taoists are supposed to be moral people, they don't have the concept of "sins." At least they don't preach against killing.

Zhang Sanfeng was probably one of the most enlightened Taoists and he was completely at ease with killing.