Basic Philosophy
Sinmoo Hapkido is a comprehensive martial art, emphasizing kicking and punching as well as joint-locks, throws, chokes, take-downs, and the use of pressure points, weapons, meditation and healing. Sinmoo literally translated, means Sin (higher mind or spiritual) and Moo means (martial or war), Hapkido, literally translated, means the way (Do) of power (Ki) and coordination or harmonize (Hap). So Simmoo Hapkido means Spiritual Martial Way of Harmonizing Power.
Sinmoo Hapkido focuses on some philosophical ideas like, Circular motion and the Water principle. Circular motion is a concept that allows the defender to deflect and redirect the attacker using the attackers force and momentum, rather than meet force with force. The concept of the Water principle looks at the actions of water in a stream. An obstacle in the path of the stream is not forced to move out of the way of the water but rather, the water flows around the obstacle. Sinmoo Hapkido allows the defender to flow around and through an aggressor’s attack while manipulating the aggressor’s power to his or her own advantage.
Sinmoo Hapkido is unique in that it allows the defender to gain complete control of the situation with a minimal amount of effort and without unnecessary aggression or injuries to the defender or attacker. The study of Sinmoo Hapkido develops: strength, speed, agility, flexibility, coordination, discipline, sportsmanship, leadership, respect, peace of mind, self-confidence, winning spirit, character, mind and body harmony.
Lastly Sinmoo Hapkido has a special philosophical practice not found in other Hapkido systems taught in the form of 9 Rules of Sinmoo Hapkido, I outlined these rules in another post.
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Sinmoo Hapkido has a catalog of about 800 techniques through Master level and is considered a very comprehensive martial arts teaching skills from all areas of defense and combat including many weapons. Not only does Sinmoo Hapkido teach martial arts it also emphasizes morals, ethics, spirituality, and healing.
Holds and Joint Locks
Holds and joint locks are used primarily for control of an aggressor. They are primarily defensive, but at more advanced levels can be interpreted as attacks. At the 4th dan black belt there is also taught 30 special attack techniques using variations and combinations of basic locks.
Throws, Re-direction and Blocks
Throws and re-direction of an aggressor’s energy use an attacker’s momentum to continue their own motion using the circular motion principle of Hapkido. These techniques depend on the incoming energy of the attack to determine their outcome; a soft or weak attack will require a small or soft re-direction. A large or powerful attack will result in a re-direction or throw that involves much more energy, translating to a more devastating outcome upon the attacker. The blocks used in Sinmoo Hapkido are usually just re-directions but some blocks are intended to be used to stop an aggressor’s sudden attack. Hapkido also use kicks and special leg movements for blocking as well.
Kicks and Punches
Sinmoo Hapkido uses a wide variety of strikes. Sinmoo Hapkido incorporates 25 kicks and most are useful in “street style” defensive situations that counter incoming attacks – out of the 25 several are specially used to block kicks. Many of the kicks are designed for use in restricted spaces like hallways or crowds. After learning the basic 25 the student then learns 29 special kicks. Special kicks are harder to master but they need more room to be used, and they include combination kicks, jumping kicks, ground kicks, feint style kicks, etc…
Sinmoo Hapkido over 20 different kind of strikes using the hand, fists, forearms, elbow and head.
Pressure Points and Energy Flow
Pressure points are used in Hapkido to control the physical body, and to manipulate the body’s Ki to stop, disarm and disable an attacker or heal a person. Sinmoo Hapkido uses 365 pressure points out of the body. The pressure points are also referred to as vital points. Sin Moo Hapkido has a special side called Hyol Do Bup which specializes on pressure point fighting and eastern medicine.
Weapons
Sinmoo Hapkido weapons training consist the use of short stick (Dan Bong), walking stick (Dan Jang / Ji Pang e), long stick (Jang Bong), the sword (Kum), rope (Po Bak), knife (Kal), Scarf both long and short versions, projectile weapons, and adapting everyday objects as weapons. Weapon training is learned after student achieves a black belt, but knife defense techniques are learned before black belt.
Spirituality – Meditation – Healing
Sinmoo Hapkido wouldn’t be Sinmoo Hapkido if we didn’t practice the higher mental aspects of this Art. The “Sin” means spiritual, higher minded or god like and in Sinmoo we’re striving to reach our full human potential. Too much to mention here but I’ll disscuss all these aspects little by little.
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My thoughts on the Reality Based Self-Defense Hype.
Modern Reality Based Martial Arts (RBMA) are good for the most part and certainly have a place in acquiring skills in self-defense, in fact I teach RBMA at my school. What troubles me is how many proponents of RBMA often promote what they do as something new and improved, a system that really works, a system that’s no nonsense, a system that’s for the street, etc.
By comparison they imply traditional martial arts don’t work because they use ranking systems, practice Kata, learn Asian customs, meditate, teach self-improvement, and practice out dated material like the Samurai Sword for example. I can’t help having some trouble understanding how RBMA are more effective in the street because they don’t use rank, don’t bow or don’t wear a traditional uniforms. I’m I missing something or does that sound a little ridiculous? Some of the worlds best known martial figures practice traditional arts, Bruce Lee, Steven Segal, Jet Li, Chuck Norris, Dan Inosanto, Ji Han Jae, I could go on for an hour but you see my point.
I’m also trying to think of a traditional martial art that’s not rooted in reality but I’m having trouble naming any. It’s a historical fact that martial arts were developed for survival on the battlefield, self protection and self preservation. Let me be the first to admit we live in a modern society not Feudal Japan but the techniques of the Samurai still hold as much water today as they did then with few exceptions.
The reality based systems I observed like Karav Maga, Combato, Karav Maga, RAT, etc… clearly use the same skills and techniques taught in Karate, Jujitsu, Judo, Kung Fu, Kali, Muay Thai, etc… I find that kind of strange because after all many RBMA claim traditional systems are just done for preserving outdated ancient tradition and the material taught doesn’t work in the streets. Why then do RBMA use the same exact out dated material as Traditional MA?
Lets use this example to make a point. A student of a traditional school might learn to use a sword, he would learn how to cut, strike, block, how to retain their weapon, defend attacks, and they would develop attributes like speed, timing, distancing, focus, angles of movement, etc… The RBMA also needs to learn the same skills and attributes as well. I for one would hate to be the guy who jumped a good sword practitioner who adapted a stick, a car antenna, or 2×4 is the street. See the point!
Having been studying martial arts for about 30 years what I’ve found is that traditional schools sometimes focus on sport or kata and don’t spend all their time in street defense training vs. RBMA that only works on street fighting skills. Other schools like mine teach, reality based street self-defense, meditation, philosophy, personal development, bowing, earning belt rank, wear uniforms, and I can assure you we can defend ourselves.
In my opinion is RBMA isn’t better suited for street self-defense it’s just a myth. Some people like to carve out a niche for themselves so they can sell some more instructional DVDs and do some seminars, other folks just don’t have the taste for traditional asian culture or schools which is also fine but proves nothing about a lack of street effectiveness in traditional martial arts.
I would say if you want basic self defense and nothing more RBMA is a good place to start, but if you want a richer more well rounded experience in martial arts training find a school that offers the best of both worlds.
Stay Safe and Be Healthy!
Sincerely,
Stuart Rosenberg
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Sinmoo Hapkido’s basic rules are categorized into three groups to make a total of 9 rules. These rules were crafted to help the Sinmoo Hapkido practitioner have a better and healthier life. It’s taught by Doju Ji that these rules are generally easy to learn but also claims a serious student of Sinmoo must learn to master these rules to really understand Sinmoo Hapkido.
Master Ji studied Taoist and Buddhist philosophy to develop the Sinmoo rules but these concepts can be found in Judaism, Kabbalah and Indian philosophy as well.
Each rule has a philosophy that goes with it that we’ll discuss in future posts.
Physical:
- 1st - Eat Proper food
- 2nd – Healthy sexual behavior
- 3rd – Beneficial Meditation
Mental:
- 4rd – Do not be Angry
- 5th – Do not be Sad
- 6th – Do not be Greedy
Spiritual
- 7th - Water Control
- 8th – Air Control
- 9th – Sunshine Control
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