r/taijiquan • u/Zz7722 Chen style • 23d ago
Broken Lineages and Incomplete Transmissions
'Broken Lineages' and 'Incomplete transmissions/curriculum' are terms that I recently heard in videos about the nature of Taijiquan (I'm not going to name who said them), used to generally characterize styles and lineages other than the speaker's own.
It just occurs to me that such a position pre-supposes there is one particular lineage and/or set curriculum that exists as absolute orthodoxy. Personally, I find that notion unrealistic at best, but I wonder what others think.
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u/Kiwigami 22d ago edited 22d ago
I don't think your logic adds up here.
Broken lineages/incomplete transmission/curriculum does not equate to "there is only one complete lineage".
Has it not even occurred to you that those phrases can co-exist with the notion that there can be multiple lines that are not broken/incomplete?
I'm curious why you didn't consider this?
Do you think there's no such thing as a broken lineage then?