A Lifetime in Martial Arts — Two Lineages, One Complete Education
Dài Shìzhé (戴士哲) was born in 1941 into a family with a long martial arts heritage. His formation is unique in the history of the tradition: he came to northern Chinese martial arts already carrying deep roots in the southern systems, and ultimately received the formal discipleship of two of Taiwan's greatest masters. Liú Yúnqiāo (劉雲樵) — the closed-door disciple of "Divine Spear" Li Shu Wen and founder of Wu Tan — received him as a Wu Tan inner-chamber disciple of the "武" (Wǔ) generation, transmitting the complete Li Shu Wen lineage of Baji Quan, Pigua Zhang, and Gong-style Bagua Zhang. Zhāng Xiāng Sān (張詳三) — the sole custodian of Six Harmonies Mantis Fist in Taiwan — transmitted the complete Six Harmonies and Seven Stars Mantis curricula, and listed Dài first among his 31 formal disciples. This dual discipleship from two independent masters of the highest caliber defines the unusual completeness of Dài's martial transmission.
A practitioner who has trained throughout his life in Mantis, Baji, Pigua, Bagua, and Xing Yi — with Six Harmonies Mantis and Bagua Zhang as his most refined specialties — Dài has insisted on practicing every single day into his eighth decade of life. For nearly six decades he has embodied the Wu Tan ideal of complete, multi-system martial education — and through his eleven years in Venezuela, carried that tradition across the globe.
From Southern Roots to Northern Mastery
Dài Shìzhé's martial journey began at age eleven, guided by family elders who taught him the traditional martial arts of the Southern Fujian (Mǐn Nán 閩南) systems — a curriculum that included Tàizǔ Quán (太祖拳 — Great Ancestor Fist), Hè Quán (鶴拳 — Crane Fist), Yǒng Chūn (詠春 — Wing Chun), and Dà Zūn Quán (大尊拳). These southern arts — rooted in the coastal Fujian tradition with its emphasis on close-range striking, powerful bridging arms, and simultaneous attack-defense — gave him a structural foundation in real combat method that would later inform his absorption of the northern styles.
In 1964, Dài Shìzhé encountered Zhāng Xiāng Sān (張詳三) — the sole custodian of Six Harmonies Mantis Fist in Taiwan, who had been teaching daily at Taipei's New Park for fifteen years. This meeting began his immersion in northern martial arts and in the specific character of the soft Mantis tradition. Two years later, in 1966, senior Wu Tan disciple Liáng Jìcí (梁紀慈) — first of Liu Yun Qiao's Wu Tan generation — introduced him to Liú Yúnqiāo (劉雲樵), and Dài began training in the complete Wu Tan system of Baji Quan, Pigua Zhang, and Bagua Zhang.
In 1972, both grandmasters agreed to formally accept Dài Shìzhé as an official disciple in a bàishī ceremony (拜師 — literally "bow to the teacher") — the defining transition from student to disciple. He was accepted by Zhāng Xiāng Sān as the first in rank among his 31 inner-chamber disciples, becoming the 7th Generation of Six Harmonies Mantis Fist; and by Liú Yúnqiāo as a member of the "武" (Wǔ) generation of the Wu Tan Martial Arts Development Center. The photograph below captures this historic moment.
The significance of this double-discipleship extends beyond the personal. It meant that when Dài Shìzhé transmitted to his own students, he carried two complete lineage streams that had historically been separate — the Wu Tan Baji-Pigua-Bagua system from Liú, and the Six Harmonies Mantis system from Zhāng. His eight years of training before the ceremony (1964–1972) — first in southern arts under family elders, then in northern arts under both grandmasters — meant that by the time of the formal bàishī, he had already developed a remarkable breadth and depth of martial understanding.
Five Arts, Two Masters, One Complete System
Dài Shìzhé's martial education spans two great regional traditions. His southern foundation — Taizu Quan, Crane Fist, Wing Chun, and Da Zun Quan from family elders — gave him roots in the close-range, structurally powerful Fujian systems. His northern training under Zhāng Xiāng Sān and Liú Yúnqiāo added the long-range explosive power of Baji, the windmill arcs of Pigua, the circular walking of Bagua, and the seizing strategy of Six Harmonies Mantis. Six Harmonies Mantis and Bagua Zhang emerged as his two supreme specialties — arts he has studied and practiced for over fifty years at the highest level.
On Six Harmonies Mantis & the Realm of Bagua
Dài has described his teaching method as the direct continuation of what his masters taught him: "I first recite the formula (kǒujué 口訣), then guide the student through the key principles. This is the method my teacher used to transmit the art — so I must pass these traditions to my own students." He has expressed his deepest hope: "I hope my students will be able to transmit everything that is truly ours — completely — not just the technical side, but the spirit."
Eleven Years, Seventeen Schools, Seventeen Thousand Students
In 1976 (Republic of China calendar year 65), Dài Shìzhé was recommended by the Overseas Chinese Affairs Commission (Qiáo Wěi Huì 僑委會) of the Republic of China government to travel to Venezuela and teach traditional Chinese martial arts to the overseas Chinese community there. What began as a government-sponsored cultural mission became an extraordinary eleven-year chapter in the global transmission of Chinese martial arts.
The Overseas Chinese Affairs Commission's recommendation of Dài for this mission reflected the Republic of China government's recognition of his standing as one of Taiwan's foremost traditional martial arts ambassadors. His dual lineage from both Liú Yúnqiāo and Zhāng Xiāng Sān — covering the complete spectrum from Baji Quan's explosive close-range combat to Six Harmonies Mantis's internal silk-reeling sensitivity — gave him a curriculum broad enough to serve a diverse population with varied interests and physical profiles.
When Dài returned to Taiwan after those eleven years, he brought with him something that could not be counted: decades of teaching experience across cultures, in a language not his own, with students whose bodies moved differently and whose martial arts intuitions had been formed by an entirely different physical culture. That cross-cultural teaching experience informed everything he did in Taiwan afterward — including his ongoing willingness to teach international students who found their way to his door.
Transmission Across Continents
When Luis Mendez traveled for the first time to Taiwan in 2006 to meet and deepen his training with Master Dài Shìzhé — studying directly at the source of the transmission that had reached him through Yuri Jimenez and with his authorization — this photograph taken after a long day of practice captures something important: the lineage chain made visible in a single image. What had passed from the old masters to Dài Shìzhé now reaching across the Pacific to Venezuela and the United States of America through a student who had crossed the ocean to stand face-to-face with his teacher's teacher.
台灣，2006年
From Li Shu Wen to The USA
Dài Shìzhé stands at the center of the transmission chain that connects the founding generation of northern Chinese martial arts in the early 20th century to the students of Wu Tan New England today. Every technique in the school's curriculum — every Baji explosion, every Pigua arc, every Bagua spiral, every Mantis seizure — carries within it the direct lineage that runs through his hands.
Master Dài Shìzhé in His Own Words
This interview segment was produced by New Tang Dynasty Television (新唐人電視台, NTD) for the NTD International Traditional Chinese Martial Arts Competition (全世界華人武術大賽) — the largest international competition dedicated exclusively to authentic traditional Chinese martial arts, held in New York. In this interview, Master Dài demonstrates Bagua moves singing a classic Chinese poem and speaks directly about his understanding of the art's principles: the distinction between hard and soft, the nature of silk-reeling force, the philosophy of Bagua's Truth-Kindness-Beauty, and his aspirations for transmission to the next generation.
Courtesy: New Tang Dynasty Television (NTD) · 新唐人亞太電視台 · NTD International Traditional Chinese Martial Arts Competition · 全世界華人武術大賽