You can define greatest in any manner you choose. For example you can say that the greatest is the one that is most useful in self defense. You can also say that the greatest is the one that is most original. You can also say that the greatest is the one that is the most beautiful.

The key here is to explain first your definition of 'greatest' and then name the martial art you believe best describes this definition and explain why.

My definition of "greatest" would be most "practical" and useful in both self defense and offensivly.

I pick krav maga. There's nothing pretty about it, but it does what it's meant to. It is a martial art that can protect you from both armed and unarmed enemies. Your always defending and attacking at the same time. It's proven and very effective.

That is, in fact, a lie.
Even Krav Maga training is based on hypothetical situations that are extremely not likely to happen in real life, even though it seems like the opposite.
Want an example, try to pull off a groin kick against someone who knows how to defend himself. It's almost impossible.

Most of Krav Maga fame is actually media. Same goes for Muay Thai.

In terms of reall (street) fighting, the martial art matters not, only the fighter. Also because only about 1% of what you learn in a martial art is really useful in a brawling situation.
I could write a 999999-word essay about this, but it's getting late and I'll elaborate on the subject tomorrow. ^^

Good night!

A machine gun is hard to beat.

I honestly don't really think that any martial art is the best. The reason I say that is because I think that one form would fit one person better than another. If you pick a martial art and say it's the greatest, I'm sure you can find someone using it that still will get their ass handed to them by someone of another style.... and the same about him... ect.

... That's where you are wrong. Remember, fate will always choose the person using the Hiten Mitsurugi style as the victor. ^_^

I actually agree. There's really no way to say what is the "greatest." I was just following the rules set forth for the thread. I'll still stick by krav maga. Nearly all martial arts training are based of off hypothetical situations. You say a groin kick is hard to do to someone who knows how to defend themself, well try something like an ax kick or a flying knee. A groin kick is a lot more practical. It has to be pretty efficient to be used by the Israeli military.

Sk, that's one of the only animes I really enjoy. But the Gatotsu would have beat kenshin if Saito weren’t messing with him at first. The rest is history

Thing is, people have a funny idea of real fighting.
[spoiler]I say this not because I'm trying to sound wise, I really personally don't know this first-hand, I'm only repeating the words of people with whom I've spent a lot of time with in the past months, people who really have put their physical integrity on the line out in the street. People who like it.[/spoiler]

The first thing you need to know about brawling is that you are never going to use "a style" when fighting. You will spend 95% of the time improvising. In maybe 5% of the times you'll be able to perform a movement you've trained beforehand, the way you trained it.
It all comes down to your ability to improvise (creativity), physical conditioning and quick reflexes.

People tend to think real fighting either looks like:
two people doing kung-fu like in the movies; or
two people flailing their arms madly at the opponent while kicking each other's groins.
Both conceptions are very wrong.

a) You have, in brawling, movements that do indeed look like they've come from a kung-fu movie. People say moves don't work but it's only because they aren't creative enough to use those moves themselves.
b) And most "this is a REAL FIGHTING move biatch" moves are much more flawed than people think.

Examples?
a) I've seen this one with my own eyes. Someone goes for a double-leg takedown or a tackle, the defender leaps sideways into the back of the tackler and instantly locks a rear naked choke.
If this was ever done in MMA, people would think the person who did it is God.
It sounds fishy but it's deadly, and it is truly useful. You only need (what did I say?) physical prowess, quick reflexes and, most of all, creativity.
b) An easy way to counter a jiu-jitsu triangle choke is to grab the opponent's scrotum and do your thing with it (twist, pull, squeeze, everything).

The conclusion I've taken from this last few months of my existence, which have revolved around fighting, is that real real fighting is more beautiful and more deadly than what 99% of the people in the world believe. Trust me in this.



But, of course, that wasn't about martial arts, that was about fighting.
In the context of their own systems and rules of sparring, this is what I think:

Taekwondo - Beautiful and cool as bananas. I love taekwondo. Especially the more creative fighters.

Judo - watch the Japanese fight judo. Forget Germans and Brasilians and the rest. Watch the discipline of the oriental art. It's really something else.

Capoeira - Won't talk about it here because I can't stop talking about capoeira after I start.

MMA - Yeah, interesting. If want a blast, look for Cung Le videos. Now that's a guy who rocks.

Movies - Look for Donnie Yen, especially his most recent works. And Wu Jing.

Greco-Roman Wrestling - Cool because of how limited it is. People can only grab, and only form the waist up. The really specific set of rules makes this interesting.

Wing Chun - Beautiful and awesome. Just look for it.

And there's more, but I've written too much already.

Or you can just Rambo it. Rambo is the true master.

Can I ask what fighting you've been around the last few months? First let me say I don’t claim to know that much about fighting. I have been in fights. Not exactly a brawl situation, but me and a large group of friends have been having fight nights for the last year or so. Just to point out it’s MMA style of fighting. Only rules are no eye or nut shots. I’ve been in maybe 15 or so fights.


This sounds more like a random person fighting. If we’re talking about people who know what their doing it’s going to look a lot more like MMA. If it’s just some Joe fighting of course they’re not going to be using a style. They don’t have one. If you put someone like Tito Ortiz in a brawl you can be sure he’ll use a style. He could use wrestling to dominate someone in a brawl. 95% of a fight is instinct.

In a fight you’re really not going to be creative. Once your hit a few times your adrenaline takes over. You’re not thinking about what your going to do, you just do it. That’s why in all martial arts you train the same thing over and over. Especially like in jiu-jitsu. They train until it becomes second nature. They train so they instinctively react a certain way without having to think about it.

Actually, if anything what you described sounds like krav maga. which is more of a mantality/attitude then a style.


There’s really nothing creative about that. It’s just basic reflexes. The reason you don’t see something like that in MMA is because from that position a rear naked choke isn’t that hard get away from. People in MMA are trained to scramble away from something like that. From a missed double leg you’d probable be on your hands and knees. When someone is caught in a rear it’s generally because they were mounted and tried to spin away from being punched, giving up their back. But from a lower, flat position. That makes it harder to move.

You see people on their hands and knees and someone have their back a lot in MMA. It's not where you want to be, but it's not impossible to get out of.


Even out of their context or rules, if someone knows how to fight in a certain style their not going to abandon it in a “brawl. Against just a normal person that one style will be plenty to beat someone. They could use 100% style. You put a judo master in a “brawlâ€

I've been watching UFC for years, and I noticed that the majority of fights are won by submission techniques rather then striking. So I guess I will vote for "wrestling" in all it's multiple forms.
It is boring in comparison to a good slugfest though.

I've been training capoeira 6 times a week for the past months.
Capoeira is, in itself, not "real fighting", it's a martial art. But I've been dedicated enough so I've been to the special training sessions dedicated to brawling. My mestre (master) has shown me a lot.
It's mostly learning from him, who has loved to fight since he was 15, and a Belarussian friend of mine who also trains capoeira but who is a fighting aficionado who has even once fought back against an armed robber.



The key to what I mean is "one" style.
You can't go into a fight with a karate base, doing karate strikes and defenses. You can use something you've learned at karate, but you will need to be flexible about the way you do things.
The more "styles" you know, the better.

[qupte]In a fight you’re really not going to be creative. Once your hit a few times your adrenaline takes over. You’re not thinking about what your going to do, you just do it. That’s why in all martial arts you train the same thing over and over. Especially like in jiu-jitsu. They train until it becomes second nature. They train so they instinctively react a certain way without having to think about it.[/quote]

There's indeed no time to think, but there is time to be creative.
It's really much harder, to be fast and effective and still be creative. That makes really tough fighters.
That Belarussian guy, he is a true genius of special forces combat and knows about 10 different styles of martial arts (no exaggerations), but he was fascinated by capoeira when he came to Brasil, because in the nucleus of capoeira training is this almost otherworldly ability to improvise while not thinking about it at all.


Well, it wasn't a missed double-leg, it was a double-leg in motion.
Also, to end the story, the choker in question had some difficulty locking the leg to take the choke to the ground, so the chokee managed to slam him into the wall a few times, but eventually passed out.

[quote]Even out of their context or rules, if someone knows how to fight in a certain style their not going to abandon it in a “brawl. Against just a normal person that one style will be plenty to beat someone. They could use 100% style. You put a judo master in a “brawlâ€

I'll just stick to using improvised weapons...

Hm.
I've personally had no training in anything, but I've fought against enough men who have to logically extrapolate a few precepts from it.

The birth of a style of martial arts comes from martial situations, violence, not hypothetical scenarios. They are expanded and solidified and made tangible by hypothetical scenarios to the successive generations, but there is something too rigid in an interpretation of martial artists as practicing particular moves or styles directly and solely. This seems to belie the actual root of martial arts, which is the diplomacy of chaos.

In fact, while you are of course right in deriding modern day stereotypes of fighting, it would seem you operate out of what could be a reverse stereotype, that of the rigidity of martial arts. It is most common in the practitioners of martial arts, those who lack the fluidity of motion and thought and instinct to truly comprehend what it is they are being dealt in their lessons, as well as being handed down and dealt incorrectly by the instructors themselves often enough, but in your case it seems to arise from viewing brawls and being trained and seeing the major difference. In any case, I'm not here to demean your experiences or knowledge.

Each style of martial arts is a kind of <i>emphasis</i>, emphasis on movement, emphasis on strengths, weaknesses. Out of so many possible movements to make, which do I? - Is the question all varieties of martial arts have been developed in response to. Therefore, there are hypothetical scenarios etc established and transferred in each system, but all of these are established in order to better transfer, convey, translate that system, as each true martial art is at its core a philosophy of motion. You're supposed to take in that philosophy, that economy, that aim - for instance, and I'm inexperienced enough in this to not know the name of the system I speak, there is a system of martial arts which rarely, if at all, teaches direct offense, rather choosing to defend offensively, and maim or disarm by accommodating for the trajectory or weight of the opponent so as to completely destroy their balance and self-possession with the sleightest of touches, the most suggestive of taps, making the opponent apply most of the effort necessary to his own downfall.

That is their philosophy of motion, but they do indeed teach hypothetical scenarios, moves to be taken in, and other such norms of the trade. So it seems to me that the point of it were rather to acquire an emphasis, a direction, a guiding principle to your motion, rather than a series of repeatable stylistic motions, though those of course will have their uses in both being occasionally practical and further instilling that guiding principle.

Not understanding that is why 95% of the people who are trained in the martial arts are rather ineffective with them.

So to say that a 'real' fight is 5% style really seems to be outside of what is meant by actually learning a style. The entire aim, at the crux of martial arts, is to direct and economize your creativity into a more effective brand of chaos. All 'real' fights are necessarily unpredictable, and martial arts were formed with this in mind, seeking to funnel a bit of that unpredictability into your favor.

It all began with men pummeling each other. So to discuss the martial arts in a way which does not take into account that these martial arts are, by their very design, to be implemented in a 'real' fight, is to discuss something which does not pertain to the martial arts themselves.

Granted, I'm probably talking out my ass on this one, but with the lot of this said I would probably vouch for points from both of your statements.


As to the 'greatest' of them, I would have to go for the one I used as an example, as I first learned of it by losing to a man who used it, and my 'definition' of the greatest martial art is the one that kicks my ass. It's also exceedingly beautiful to watch, for those on the receiving end as well, perhaps. Heh.

You can be talking about Aikido / Aikijutsu, Tai Chi, or in fact any other of the 'internal' oriental styles. Those two are the ones we know the most about in the Occident, but the Orient has refined the mentality you described to perfection in a variety of more obscure systems.

All in all, if I understood correctly what you said, I completely agree with you.

The thing about 5% style is relative. I said it having in mind the way martial arts are normally taught nowadays.
If you are imprisoned by the style you practice, you won't be able to use it.

The martial artist needs to be creative. He needs to be picky about what he learns in a martial arts training.
He needs to discard the things he doesn't find useful, and work to improve on the ones that he does. He needs to experiment with varied situations. He needs to learn to think beyond what the people say and show. He needs to think for himself.

The objective is not to follow a style but to create your own personal philosophy of fighting, one that is built by yourself for yourself.
Once you aren't imprisoned by any specific style, you won't be 5% style anymore. You'll be 100%.
Doing this requires a great deal of training. It requires you to know fighting; it's a never-ending process of self-improvement.
Not coincidentially, this is what Bruce Lee wanted with his Jeet Kune Do.


For people who want it, to give an example of how not being imprisoned by a style is essential, the other Thursday we were doing training of how to finish someone off in a roda, a process triggered when a capoeira game turns from capoeira-like aggressive into no-rules all-out fighting.
A friend of mine was going against my mestre, and managed to lock him in a guillotine. The way my mestre escaped was by biting my friend's ribs.
Yes, biting ribs.
My friend was at the moment imprisoned by the jiu-jitsu conventions he thought were being followed, but never existed in reality.


And since I already gave up on making a true point in this post, I'm going to go farther and just share something I find wonderful.
This Belarussian friend of mine, he was a teacher of combat back in his country, and he described to me how he worked to adapt his system to each student.

A guy who lifted weights a lot, my friend passed on to him strikes that used arm movements of great amplitude that used the strength of biceps and triceps.
Another guy who was an electrician and spent his days doing fine work with his arms outstretched, my friend taught him not to punch effectively but how to strike with his hands through fist movements.

And just to wrap things up, I think you describe perfectly the way martial arts should be taught. You described the training we do in my relatively small capoeira group.
Sadly, in my opinion, very few teachers (and, consequently, schools) around the world actually follow those principles.

I have never had any training in martial arts but I have always been fascinated with them and always 'planned' to (maybe) study martial arts 'someday'.

For a long time I have known that I was most fascinated with Kung Fu. The reason is that to me, Kung Fu has it all. It is a preservation of styles and forms that emphasize both internal and external energies. I have always loved the diversity of forms and the formal consistencies themselves.

My favorite has always been drunken money kung fu.

I have always trusted that kung fu had a time honored history, an original ancient pedigree, and a useful practice including the potential to properly balance both internal energy with external energy such that in its harmony would lie the ability to assess any situation, maintain balance and defeat any foe. Its energy was to be found in its movement to music...in its dance.

Now I realistically look at Kung Fu as having its own potential for success and failure in any actual combat. I do not trust that anyone who understands Kung Fu will always win but I do trust that anyone who understands Kung Fu will never lose.

But one day I came to learn more about Jeet Kune Do. I began to realize that Bruce Lee was not just a martial artist but a true philosopher. I realized that what he sought in life was what I sought in life, that the only limitation is no limitation, that one would do well to learn to formlessly shapeshift and to be like water, that the key is to conserve energy and waste no motion and that all training is individual.

I realized that much of the way I philosophically thought about how to do argumentation was analogous to the way he philosophically thought to do martial arts.

Since Jeet Kune Do is the formless combination of any art form that works with an original foundation in Kung Fu but with contrary intention away from its foundation, by diverting from the wide diversity of formal variation for the sake of individually embracing the essence of the original musical theme, I consider Jeet Kune Do to be the greatest martial art.

But that is just me and that is just now.