Wes,

Hello, your post on the lion head repair was very interesting. I know this kung fu master in Hawaii who did the same thing as you guys.

But he did it differently. He brought this guy all the way from Hong Kong or China. To reconstruct a lion's head. This guy is an expert at making lion heads and repairing lion heads.

According to my friend, they had to collect alot of horse hair. They went to this Koolau ranch in Hawaii, which was nice enough to let them have the horse hair. Then the process of reconstructing the lion head began. Alot of sewing dealing with bamboo pieces ( lots of it ). Ofcoarse, this friend of mine was being instructed by the man of how to go on about fixing the head. The inside part of the head they probably sewed it up. Outside they probably had to do the same thing as you wes. And gave it a nice art work. The horse hair was used to fix up the beard, and for the eyebrows, just like what you people had been mentioning. Rabbit's fur or sheep's fur. The newly reconstructed lion head was to be used for performances at weddings.

If we can all learn this delicate craft and art of repairing lion heads, and art work. We can all save money on lion heads. But another thing is that, lion heads may only lasts so long, depending on how often we use it. So, I guess it'll be nice to purchase some nice lion heads, from either Hong Kong, China, Malaysia.

Anyway, just wanted to share this FYI information with you people.

Take care, and bye.

And wes, your way of repairing the head is good too. That's a good point, we all know how to lion dance and play the music and do everything that goes on, in a lion dance performance. But, we should all how to repair lion heads and tail, like what we've all been talking about. Bye.

Laine

Hey Chris,

Dr. Hu talks about this in his book, Chinese Lion Dance Explained, starting around pg. 76. Paraphrasing him, it says that the lion dance has always had tamers involved from the very beginning, and when the dance became more entertainment than religious ritual, the tamers became more important to the entertainment. This happened in the Sung dynasty (~1000-1300 AD). He goes on to say that the female character was there from the very beginning of this transition, and she was the love interest of the jolly monk. The scene between the two could be played with or without the lion dance. In addition, the female character could be used to lead the lion without the monk.

There are many issues I haven't quite figured out, though. For instance Dr. Hu mentions that females who were menstruating or who were pregnant could not participate in the lion dance because they were considered unclean. But what if they were neither menstruating nor pregnant? I suppose you could say 'because no one can tell if a woman were menstruating or pregnant that would be sufficient reason for traditional practitioners to ban all women from the lion dance'. But was that the thinking back then?

Perhaps it was just a coincidence that the organizations that practiced the lion dance (martial arts schools, certain operas, acrobatic troupes) were predominantly male or chose to use only males in the lion dance for their strength. In the case of the rule stating that 'women were traditionally banned from lion dancing', maybe we deduced the wrong conclusion from the evidence.

Another issue I see going unresolved is the matter of the lion dance being 'related' to kung fu. I believe that the lion dance is and has always been a separate entity that has been adopted by various organizations and institutions for their own purposes. Martial arts schools adopted the lion dance as a way to train and show off their school's skills. Gangs have used it for extortion. Operas and acrobats have used it in their repertoire of performances. Buddhist/Daoist/Confucist groups have used it for religious/exorcism purposes. And granted, each of these groups have made their own lasting contributions to the lion dance, which we can still see today. But I believe that the dance itself has always been a separate entity from the purpose it was used for. I mean, if we can't determine 'how' it started, how can we determine 'why' it started? What do you guys think?

It's just that I often run across people who have been led to believe (by movies, tv, false myths) that the lion dance is a kung fu activity. They believe that one must practice kung fu to perform the lion dance, or that one must practice kung fu to be good at the lion dance. And I say, if you want to be good at the lion dance, PRACTICE THE LION DANCE. It has obviously worked for many lion dance-only groups in Asia, chief among them KSK.

Getting back to Chris' question, I don't know if women were allowed to play the monk, even the female monk. But we need to re-examine the reasons why women generally did not participate in the lion dance historically. Maybe we need to change our thinking a bit.

Best,

Willy

Hi anybody

I can't say if woman are allow in lion dance in ancient time. Our teacher, greatmaster Pham Xuan Tong from Vietnam never talked as a forbidden thing when women play the lion dance. He teach male and female, but normaly the girls play just the gong or cymbal, because the dancing with the head use a lot of force and power. They only roules for women are never touch the horn of the lion, especially during the menstruation. Because after touching, the whole troupe will have bad luck for the future untill the horn will be cleaned by a taoist monk. The horn belongs to heaven, is like by human the acupoint bai hue (Du Mo 20) and is the connection between the own spirt and the heaven and is absolutely Yang. Women, especially during the menstruation or pragnant ar pure Yin. By touching the horn, the spirt of the lion will be disturbed and the connection with the heaven will stop. When women play the monk, then the female of course!

But it is allow...

bye

Reto

Hmmm, gotta reread the book--it's been a while since I first did. I do have a question about Dr. Hu's source for those "rules" he listed in the back section of the book--it wasn't cited so we can't be sure if that was based on the tradition of his group, or a general practice throughout the lion dance world. I'm not trying to discredit his research, I am just curious.

He also mentions a rule about women not jumping or stepping over the lion--anyone know what this is about? Does it include the opening "Gung Fu salute" that some performers do before getting under the lion, which sometimes includes a leap or sumersault over the lion?

Very interesting information about the lion's horn not being touched--hadn't hear that before. Thanks for sharing.

Chris

Chris,

I thought that we weren't supposed to step over the lions, period. I thought that it was bad luck. Do you know of any other reasons? Also, I have seen teams done summersaults over the lions too. Are they breaking from the "rules?"

Vinh Nguyen

Hi-

my Si Fu possesses the book by Dr.Hu and has told me the story concerning the male buddha falling in love with the girl and the story that is told in Lion dance regarding these two.

Our school has both Male and Female buddhas and they are both complimentary to the overall Lion Dance (especially for weddings in my view where the female and male are highly appropriate)

As far as pregnancy and menstration goes, this sort of belief extends back through time and many cultures. In Native american culture for instance, Females who were menstrating or pregnant were not allowed into certain ritualistic events. Not because they were considered "unclean" but rather because the state of being that they were in was considered to be powerful magic and the possibility that interference with the magic being practiced by the shaman (holyman) would be affected by what was regarded as the "higher magic" of natural course.

the views will differ dependent on the basis of the society IE: patriarchal vs matriarchal. In a patriarchy, menstration is considered "unclean" in a Matriarchy it is considered quite holy. I understand that for the most part Chinese Civilization has been based in a patriarchal model with few exceptions in the time line. for instance, through the godess Kwan Yin, all compassion and mercy is attributed to the feminine aspect of humanity and yet there are references to Kwan Yin actually being a Male figure in disguise as a woman in some writings! In context to the Lion Dance, I think that the Female buddha is a great addition and as I said it is really good to have one at a wedding Lion Dance.

The mixing of Lion Dance with Kung Fu practice goes back quite far and to my understanding it was used by Kung fu practicing rebels after the fall of the Ming dynasty as a ways and means of raising money, passing messages and other covert operations.

I also was lead to understand that there are definitely "foundations" in Lion Dance and meaning behind specific types of stepping patterns and interactions between the Lion and the Buddha(s) and other things, but I was also lead to understand that there aren't any "Hard and Fast" rules to Lion Dance and the expressions being conveyed.

peace

David

by the way, my Si Fu is Si Fu Wes Cameron who also visits and contributes here and in fact directed me to this great list!

Thanks and Hi Si Fu!

peace

david

We have the man and woman teasers, and either boy or girl can play either boy or girl teaser (is that clear??!!). Our teasers never step over the lion or jump on them. When we do our opening salute as the dancers the last move is to do a carwheel over to the other side of the lion, then get underneath. I don't know if a cartwheel over the lion would be considered the same as stepping over it.

Geoff

Old Chinese culture ( 1800's) was a patriachial and agricultural society, thereby women in the these times were considered second class to men. Upper class woman in these times were property and had their feet bound so they couldn't run away. It would seem unlikely that women would learn martial arts back then, since you would never have a slave practice martial arts, and for sure then not lion dancing. It's like how China developed Wushu to be non-violent, for exercise.

I'm glad in today's modern society men and woman have basically the same rights. NO submissive BS. All can train and participate in Lion dancing. My daughter participates in both in lion dancing and martial arts, no submissive chinese stereotype stuff for her!

I've never really understood the menstration and the touching of the lion and Dr. Hu's book refers but doesn't explain either. David's Indian explanation may have some merit, any others?

Tim

First off, thanks gotta go out to Serhat--your special efforts to keep the server running are very appreciated! Sometimes "background" people get overlooked, but you are definitely vital to this list!

Willy,

Since I have today off from work, I can spend a bit of time concentrating on what's really important--liondancing! You raised some really interesting points that I've been thinking about, especially with regards to the origin and development of the lion dance.

I haven't had a chance to dig my copy of Dr. Hu's book out yet (I actually left it at the office, go figure) but you quoted him as saying that during the Sung dynasty the dance became more entertainment than religious. Was this specifically regarding the southern lion? I'm not convinced that this ever happened in the eyes of the practitioners. The audience may have seen it as entertainment, but in my experience virtually every group that performs the lion dance still keeps religious practice as an important aspect of the dance. For example bowing before altars, licking the doorposts and signs, etc. I'd love to hear more feedback on this.

Aside from the mythical origin stories I've always been interested in researching the "real" origin. From my research (which I admit is based on what little material I could find in libraries--see my research paper, Lion Dance Myths & Meanings for the sources, but note that most of them are pre-1980 and written from the non-Chinese perspective) it seems that there were two distinct events that somehow came together to form the lion dance. One was the annual exhorcism rituals to cleanse the Imperial Palace, and one was the traveling Persian circus that visited China during the Tang dynasty.

There is a break in the information flow from there, but then the lion resurfaces as a buddist exhorcism ritual in the south and the Peiking Opera lion in the north. Try to tie that in with the secular origin stories of villagers using it to scare away the Nien beast and from there becoming an annual tradition to bring fortune, and try to figure out when Gung Fu came into the mix, and you have a huge jumbled mess.

My theory is that the southern lion started as a separate exhorcism ritual (pre-buddism), and became associated with Buddist exhorcism rituals. Gung Fu was also associated with Buddism through the Shaolin temples and there the lion dance and Gung Fu became intertwined. There are problems with this theory, and this is a rather simple/brief explanation, but what do you think?

Another link between martial artists in China and the lion dance is that after the destruction of the Shaolin Temple it was the martial artists that became the revolutionaries against the Ming dynasty. They used the lion dance as a means to further their work (passing messages, smuggling people from place to place, practice Gung Fu in secret...). I think Dr. Hu documents some of that in his book also.

Since many of these revolutionary groups became the "bad" tong and triad societies (as opposed to the "good" tongs that helped withoug becoming corrupted) in later years, they used the lion for their purposes of extortion.

This was a totally separate use of the lion, but it is still linked to Gung Fu practice with a root in Buddism. I don't see the dance as a separate entity, but find a definite pattern of development. I think it is becoming a separate entity in that some teams are now practicing it for sport, separate from anything else. It is very similar, as someone pointed out a while ago to the development of "modern" sport wushu. There is definitely a strong presence of Chinese martial arts as martial arts/self defense, but there is showy/sport wushu that is related but separate. I think the same thing is happening to lion dancing.

This isn't necessarily good or bad, just different. I don't think that one will ever replace the other (wushu hasn't taken over and watered down everybody's Gung Fu practice, has it?), but both will advance in different ways.

Anyways, those are some of the things I've been pondering so far today. I'm open to anybody who would like to help me process this! :)

Chris

P.S. Weren't Buddhist monks celebate & "cleansed" from earthly emotions? If so, how could a monk have a "love interest"? Or is that just part of the comedy/entertainment?

Chinese society is largely based Confucian philosophy, which is patriarchal. However, Taoism, at least in many of its forms (it's a long history lesson) is not. At the very least, it is not inherently so. Taoist and Confucian philosophies were very different. Women could get much further under Taoist considerations that under Confucian. These guys never really to on very well, hence the Taoist rebellions and so forth.

Kwan Yin is really not a Goddess, but a Bodhisattva. In India, the original Bodhisattva (and I'm not even going to try to spell the Indian name) was a man. He somehow became a woman in China. Some say it is simply because it was easier for Chinese to envision a person noted for compassion and mercy as a woman rather than a man. It may also be possible that the Bodhisattva was "combined" with a female entity with similar attributes. This is probably how such stories came about.

FWIW.

Christopher Yau Choy Young

Sidartha Gautama (sp?) was the Indian Bodhisattva, and there are a number of distinct differences between his Indian persona and what he translated to in China. For instance the Indian version is thin, the Chinese versions is quite a rounded fellow. I don't think Kwan Yin is supposed to be equated with Sidartha, but is another manifestation of one who achieved "true enlightenment" and became a Bodhisattva, since there are both male and female "buddahs" in Chinese culture.

I can't say if Kwan Yin existed as the goddess of mercy before buddism, but interesting theories about the combining of a Bodhisattva and an existing entity--happens all the time when cultures merge. Never heard the one about Kwan Yin being a male in disguise before...more interesting stuff to ponder.

But this isn't a discussion list on Buddism, so to bring it back to lion dancing: does anyone know of a group existing today that practices the lion dance solely for the Buddhist/Taoist exhorcism ritual and apart from martial arts or sport?

Such a group would support the theory that the lion dance was used for that purpose before the development of the lion as a martial arts instrument.

Any thoughts?

Chris

Actually, Sidartha Gautama is the historical Buddha, not Bodhisattva (which is a person who delays their Buddhahood to help others reach enlightenment even though they could choose to attain it). Kwan Yin was who of the Buddha's greatest disciples. The "rounded" Buddha is not the same as Sidhartha Buddha. If you go to a temple, that is not the Buddha you will find. If anybody wants more detail, feel free to email me directly since, as Chris points out, this is a lion dance list. I just wanted to clarify a few points.

>But this isn't a discussion list on Buddism, so to bring it back to lion
>dancing: does anyone know of a group existing today that practices the lion
>dance solely for the Buddhist/Taoist exhorcism ritual and apart from
>martial arts or sport?

Well, I don't know of any such group, but that is the main purpose of the ion dance, is it not? To chase away bad spirits? That's why you have them at events like opening a store or restaurants.

Christopher Yau Choy Young

Lion dancing beginnings seems to stem more from superstition and later gain more religious significance somewhat like how the chinese religious beliefs are a combination of Taoist, Buddhist etc... and an "I just don't know where it can from stuff". Chris, I doubt if you would be able to find a pure Buddhist/Taoist exorcism. Check out Dr. Hu's book chapter 3 page 58. In times of the unexplanable, trying to understand nature, man creates supernatural explanations to rationalize reality. Lion dance can be compared to the American Indian rain dance.

Tim

I was just thinking, in a show I saw in Hawaii on the International Lion Dance Competition in Hong Kong (and I got the tape later as a present), they said the lion originated from a dream by an emperor in I think the Ming Dynasty. The lion did something heroic and saved the Emperor, so he had artisans build lions. And the dance came from that. The lion looks as it does because they had no idea what a lion looks like since they don't exist in China. So they made him part dragon, part phoenix, and part dog.

So the origins may not be so long ago (relatively speaking)

Christopher Yau Choy Young

Thanks for the clarification on the Buddah/Bodhisaatva thing. I've heard the story of the lion saving the emperor also, but lions are definitely pre-Ming dynasty. It's a pretty common motif very early on in porcelin and other handicrafts.

In my understanding Gung Fu doesn't have an inherent spirituality aside from those inferred upon it by its relation to Buddism/Taosim and the whole spiritualized aspect of Chinese culture itself. So the religious nature of lion dancing must come from outside of Gung Fu.

Gung Fu practitioners to my knowledge aren't used in in exhorcism rituals in any other way than the lion dance, so this also points to a separate development of the lion dance before or concurrent with martial arts in China.

So in my thinking there should be some lion dance in China that stayed separate to this day, but I can't find any. The native American rain dances stayed separate dances and never got incorporated into a different movement like archery practice for instance.

I guess I'm too caught up in wondering about things that don't have answers that can be found. :)

Chris

Hi-

I have heard that Lion Dance extends as far back as the Han dynasty.

Secondly, Lion Dance is celebratory ritual at its highest form in my eyes. Yes, the Lion, the buddha, the Lion Dance music are said to push "evil" away.

Perhaps there is an intrinsic tie to the Practice of Feng Shui? As for Native American Dance not being tied to war arts, I am not so sure that old time sun dances, rain dances and other ritualistic dances were not tied to the martial doings of the peoples who did these dances. For one thing it was strictly the warriors and initiated who danced in Sun dance and Rain dance and they were costumed as animals in many. The dancing in some cases was very physical and in many cases the dancers would carry out stepping patterns that reflected martial enactments. The act of war itself was a ritualistic act with tribal members in battle merely getting a bit bruised from being "counted" with a "coo stick" as opposed to killed as occured in later times as populations grew and even moreso with the advent of the european migration into North South and Central America. No women were allowed to participate in some cases Women weren't even allowed to gaze upon these dances(by the way, most native american cultures were and traditionally still are matriarchal).

OK, back to Liondance (the most important thing here! ha ha) The exorcism tie in is strong even related to the legends, particularly the legend of the beast who would visit the village and how the villagers mimiced the beast with a copy of itself to scare it away. Many of you have heard this story and I'm certain that Si Fu told me that it was in the book by Dr.Hu.

What happens according to that legend is in effect exorcism. I think that the ties are many as the practice is fairly ancient relative to this day and age. I'm willing to bet that the motivations to have a Lion Dance for whatever reason have grown according to the needs and resources of the people who do them and ask for them.

Would love to hear more variations of the history of the Lion Dance.

peace

David

"What is an IKEA"?

'Kam'

Hi All,

As far as I know it is okay for the Lion Dancers to jump over the lion body after their salute and then get in the Lion. The way I have my team do it is: the head player and tail player stand on opposite sides of the body, the head player near the head and the tail player near the end of the body and do the Sil-lum salute (as per style of martial art) and then the head and tail simultaneously exchange sides by jumping over the body of the Lion. I have seen other teams do similar to this as well.

'Kam' - Wes Cameron

Hello Student Jamieson!,

Glad you enjoy the site!.

'Kam' -Wes Cameron, Si-Fu