Head High and Energy Lifted

 What Does "Xu Ling Ding Jin" Mean?

"One of the most vexing phrases in this body of texts appears in Wang Zongyue's "The Taijiquan Treatise."  This is the phrase that I've translated "An intangible and lively energy lifts the crown of the head."  The actual phrase in Chinese is xu ling ding jing.  Xu means "empty," "void," "abstract," "shapeless," or "insubstantial."  Ling can mean "neck," "collar," "to lead," "to guide," or "to receive."  Ding here means "the crown of the head."  Jin is a word that should be familiar to most Taijiquan practitioners, meaning "energy" or "strength."  To translate this phrase literally in a way that makes sense is seemingly impossible. ...  To demonstrate the difficulties presented in translating the phrase, I've assembled for comparison a number of different renderings:

Yang Jwing-Ming translates xu ling ding jin as:
"An insubstantial energy leads the head upward."

T.T. Liang renders it:
"A light and nimble energy should be preserved on the top of the head."

Benjamin Pang Jeng Lo translates the phrase:
"Effortlessly the jin reaches the headtop."

Douglas Wile translates the phrase variously:
"The energy at the top of the head should be light and sensitive."
and
"Open the energy at the crown of the head."

Guttmann gives one rendering as,
"... the head is upheld with the intangible spirit."
Elsewhere, he gives it a fairly plausible if incomprehensible literal rendering as a noun phrase:
"Empty dexterity's top energy."

Huang Wen-Shan translates it as:
"The head-top should be emptied, alert, and straight."

Robert Smith's version has it:
"The spirit of vitality reaches to the top of the head."

Jou Tsung Hwa's rendering is similiar:
"The spirit, or shen, reaches the top of the head."

Finally, in one of the freer renderings I've seen, T. Y. Pang renders the phrase:
"The spine and the head are held straight by strength, which is guided by the mind."

As the reader can see, the range of nuance in these diverse translations of this one phrase is considerable.  Virtually all of the readings are interpretive; that is, the four-character phrase as it has been handed down will not yield a dependable reading based on the characters alone.  One can only conclude that this phrase is a remnant of an oral formula whose original structure eludes our knowledge.  Our understanding of it inevitably depends upon the context─ the following phrase about sinking the qi to the dantian─ and upon commentaries of former masters, including Yang Chengfu's elaboration in the first of his "Ten Essentials."  The concept is also linked to differently worded but related phrases appearing in other classics, for example, "the spirit (shen) threads to the crown of the head" (shen guan ding) in the "Song of the Thirteen Postures," and the phrase about "suspending the crown of the head" (ding tou xuan) appearing in both "The Mental Elucidation of the Thirteen Postures" and the "Song of the Thirteen Postures." "

Mastering Yang Style Taijiquan  By Fu Zhongwen, pp. 182-183. 

Mastering Yang Style Taijiquan  By Fu Zhongwen.  Translated by Louis Swaim.  Berkeley, California, Blue Snake Books, c 1999, 2006.  Bibliography, glossary, 226 pages.  ISBN: 9781583941522.  VSCL.  Fu Zongwen (1919-1994) was a student of Yang Cheng Fu.  Translations of many Tai Chi classics are included.  A list of 85 movements are provided.  251 movement analysis illustrations.  Over 76 of the illustrations are traced and drawn from photographs of Yang Chengfu.  Detailed descriptions of the long form, pp. 26-162.  Push hands information.  Yang Tai Chi essentials.


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