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Part 2

PHILOSOPHY

It may surprise those who think of Bruce Lee primarily as a martial artist that his true passion was philosophy. Even more surprising is the extent of his knowledge of both Eastern and Western philosophy.

These essays were largely composed during the years that Lee attended the University of Washington, where he majored in philosophy. This period of his life contributed immensely to broadening his intellect and his exposure to Western theoretical thought. He read Plato, David Hume, Rene Descartes, Thomas Aquinas (a church father whom Lee had also probably absorbed through osmosis during his Catholic school upbringing in Hong Kong during the 1950s).

Moreover, these essays reveal Lee’s thought processes with regard to his worldview or metaphysics. His earlier research and beliefs regarding Taoism, for example, particularly its metaphysic of monism, are not only left intact after being subjected to the barrage of the best of Western theoretical thought, but in fact they are strengthened by the exposure.

Of even more interest, however, is the fact that these essays reveal themes that Lee would come to understand and express even more succinctly as he grew older, serving to sow the seeds of independent inquiry and the need for rational justification. They remain among his most eloquent and thought-provoking writings.

2-A

WHY I TOOK TO PHILOSOPHY

When I returned from Thailand with the work crew of Golden Harvest Ltd. after the completion of The Big Boss, many people started asking me this: What was it that made me give up my career in the States and return to Hong Kong to shoot Chinese films?

Perhaps the general feeling was that it was all hell to have to work on Chinese films since the Chinese film industry was still so underdeveloped. To the above question I find no easy explanation except that I am Chinese and I have to fulfill my duty as a Chinese. The truth is, I am an American-born Chinese. That I should become an American-born Chinese was accidental, or it might have been my father’s arrangement. At that time, the Chinese inhabitants in the States, mostly from the province of Kwangtung, were very much homesick: nostalgia was held towards everything that was associated with their homeland.

In this context, Chinese opera, with its unmistakably unique Chinese characteristics, won the day. My old man was a famous artist of the Chinese opera and was popularly accepted by the people. Hence he spent a lot of time performing in the States. I was born when he brought my mother along during one of his performance trips.

My old man was a famous artist of the Chinese opera and was popularly accepted by the people. Hence he spent a lot of time performing in the States. I was born when he brought my mother along during one of his performance trips.

Yet my father did not want me to receive an American education. When I reached my school age, he sent me back to Hong Kong—his second homeland—to live with his kinsmen. It could have been a matter of heredity or environment; I came to be greatly interested in the making of films when I was studying in Hong Kong. My father was then well acquainted with lots of movie stars and directors. Among whom there was the late Mr. Chin Kam. They brought me into the studio and gave me some roles to play. I started off as a bit player and gradually became the star of the show.

That was a very crucial experience in my life. For the first time I was confronted with genuine Chinese culture. The sense of being part of it was so strongly felt that I was enchanted. I didn’t realize it then, nor did I see how great an influence environment can have on the molding of one’s character and personality. Nevertheless, the notion of “being Chinese” was then duly conceived.

I thought that victory meant beating down others, but I failed to realize that victory gained by way of force was not real victory. When I enrolled in the University of Washington and was enlightened by philosophy, I regretted all my previous immature assumptions.

From boyhood to adolescence, I presented myself as a troublemaker and was greatly disapproved of by my elders. I was extremely mischievous, aggressive, hot-tempered, and fierce. Not only my “opponents” of more or less my age stayed out of my way, but even the adults sometimes gave in to my temper. I never knew what it was that made me so pugnacious. The first thought that came into my mind whenever I met somebody I disliked was, “Challenge him!” Challenge him with what? The only concrete thing that I could think of was my fists. I thought that victory meant beating down others, but I failed to realize that victory gained by way of force was not real victory. When I enrolled in the University of Washington and was enlightened by philosophy, I regretted all my previous immature assumptions.

My majoring in philosophy was closely related to the pugnacity of my childhood. I often ask myself these questions:

• What comes after victory?

• Why do people value victory so much?

• What is “glory”?

• What kind of “victory” is “glorious”?

When my tutor assisted me in choosing my courses, he advised me to take up philosophy because of my inquisitiveness. He said, “Philosophy will tell you what man lives for.” When I told my friends and relatives that I had picked up philosophy, they were all amazed. Everybody thought I had better go into physical education since the only extra-curricular activity that I was interested in, from my childhood until I graduated from my secondary school, was Chinese martial arts. As a matter of fact, martial arts and philosophy seem to be antithetical to each other. But I think that the theoretical part of Chinese martial arts seems to be getting indistinct.

Every action should have its why and wherefore; and there ought to be a complete and proficient theory to back up the whole concept of Chinese martial arts. I wish to infuse the spirit of philosophy into martial arts; therefore I insisted on studying philosophy.

I have never discontinued studying and practicing martial arts. While I am tracing the source and history of Chinese martial arts, this doubt always comes up: Now that every branch of Chinese gung fu has its own form, its own established style, are these the original intentions of their founders? I don’t think so. Formality could be a hindrance to progress; this is applicable to everything, including philosophy. Philosophy brings my jeet kune do into a new realm in the sphere of martial arts, and jeet kune do brings my acting career to a new horizon.

Source: A Taiwan newspaper article written by Bruce Lee, entitled “Me and Jeet Kune Do,” dated 1972, reprinted in the magazine Bruce Lee: Studies On Jeet Kune Do, (c) 1976, Bruce Lee Jeet Kune Do Club, Hong Kong, and reprinted in its entirety in Volume 1 of the Bruce Lee Library Series:Words of the Dragon.

2-B

REGARDING HUMAN UNDERSTANDING

With regard to human understanding there are simple impressions and simple ideas. A simple impression has a stronger and more vivid picture than a simple idea and is also the cause of a simple idea.

In other words, simple ideas are copies of the simple impressions. For example, I see something exciting, and that certain something moves me, and because of this impression I can later on have an idea of it. Therefore simple ideas are direct copies of simple impressions and cannot be broken into parts but are a unified whole.

Although complex impressions and complex ideas are in general a copy of the other (complex ideas are copies of complex impressions), in some unusual cases they are not so. For instance, I can imagine a place where I have never been, or in the case of a man who is color blind of the color blue, he may make up his own idea of that color based on his experience of the other colors.

The term “complex idea,” by the way, signifies something that is constituted of simple ideas. For instance, an apple that has color, taste, size, and so forth.

Source: Bruce Lee’s handwritten philosophy paper from the University of Washington, February 18, 1964. Bruce Lee Papers.

2-C

LIVING: THE ONENESS OF THINGS

Many philosophers are among those who say one thing and do another, and the philosophy that a man professes is often quite other than the one he lives by. Philosophy is in danger of becoming more and more only something professed.

Philosophy is not “living” but an activity concerning theoretic knowledge, and most philosophers are not going to live things, but simply to theorize about them, to contemplate them. And to contemplate a thing implies maintaining oneself outside it, resolved to keep a distance between it and ourselves.

In life, we accept naturally the full reality of what we see and feel in general with no shadow of a doubt. Philosophy, however, does not accept what life believes; it strives to convert reality into a problem. Like asking such questions as “Is this chair that I see in front of me really there?” “Can it exist by itself?” Thus, rather than making life easy for living by living in accord with life, philosophy complicates it by replacing the world’s tranquillity with the restlessness of problems. It is like asking a normal person how he actually breathes! That will immediately choke the breath out of him when he consciously describes the process. Why try to arrest and interrupt the flow of life? Why create such fuss? A person simply breathes.

The Western approach to reality is mostly through theory, and theory begins by denying reality—to talk about reality, to go around reality, to catch anything that attracts our senses—intellect and abstract it away form reality itself. Thus philosophy begins by saying that the outside world is not a basic fact, that its existence can be doubted, and that every proposition in which the reality of the outside world is affirmed is not an evident proposition but one that needs to be divided, dissected, and analyzed. It is to stand consciously aside and try to square a circle.

Rene Descartes (1596–1650), the great French philosopher and mathematician, raised the above problem. Since existence of anything, including my being, is not certain, what is there in the universe beyond any shadow of a doubt? When one has doubts about the world, and even about the whole entire universe what is left? Let’s “stand” outside this world for a moment and follow Descartes and see what is actually left.

According to Descartes, the doubt itself is left, because for something to be doubtful, it must seem to me that it is; and the whole universe may seem to me doubtful, except for the fact of its seeming to me. To doubt is to think, and thought is the only thing in the universe whose existence cannot be denied, because to deny is to think. When one says that thought exists, it automatically includes saying that one exists because there is no thought that does not contain as one of its elements a subject who thinks.

In Chinese Taoism and Ch’an (Zen) the world is seen as an inseparable, interrelated field, no part of which can actually be separated from the other. That is, there would be no bright stars without dim stars, and, without the surrounding darkness, no stars at all. Oppositions have become mutually dependent instead of mutually exclusive, and there is no longer any conflict between the individual man and nature.

So if thought exists, I who think and the world about which I think also exist; the one exists but for the other, there being no possible separation between them. Therefore, the world and I are both in active correlation; I am that which sees the world, and the world is that which is seen by me. I exist for the world, and the world exists for me. If there were no things to be seen, thought about, and imagined, I would not see, think, or imagine. That is to say, I would not exist. One sure and primary and fundamental fact is the joint existence of a subject and its world. The one does not exist without the other. I acquire no understanding of myself except as I take account of objects, of the surroundings. I do not think unless I think of things—and therefore, find myself.

It is of no use to talk merely about objects of consciousness, whether they are thought sensations or wax candles. An object must have a subject, and subject-object is a pair of complementaries (not opposites), like all others, which are two halves of one whole, and are a function each of the other. When we hold to the core, the opposite sides are the same if they are seen from the center of the moving circle. I do not experience; I am experience. I am not the subject of an experience; I am that experience. I am awareness. Nothing else can be I or can exist.

Thus we do not sweat because it is hot; the sweating is the heat. It is just as true to say that the sun is light because of the sun. This peculiar Chinese viewpoint is unfamiliar because it is our settled convention to think that heat comes first and then, by causality, the body sweats. To put it the other way round is startling, like saying “cheese and bread” instead of “bread and cheese.” This shocking and seemingly illogical reversal of common sense may perhaps be clarified by the following illustration of “the moon in the water.”

The Moon in the Water

The phenomenon of the moon in the water is likened to human experience. The water is the subject, and the moon the object. When there is no water, there is no moon in the water, and likewise when there is no moon. But when the moon rises, the water does not wait to receive its image, and when even the tiniest drop of water is poured out, the moon does not wait to cast its reflection. For the moon does not intend to cast its reflection, and the water does not receive the moon’s image on purpose. The event is caused as much by the water as by the moon, and as the water manifests the brightness of the moon, the moon manifests the clarity of the water.

Everything does have a real relationship, a mutuality in which the subject creates the object just as much as the object creates the subject. Thus the knower no longer feels himself to be separated from the known; the experiencer no longer feels himself to stand apart from the experience. Consequently, the whole notion of getting something out of life, of seeking from experience, becomes absurd. To put it in another way, it becomes vividly clear that in concrete fact I have no other self than the oneness of things of which I am aware.

Master Lin-Chi of the T’ang dynasty said, “Just be ordinary and nothing special. Eat your food, move your bowels, pass water, and when you are tired, go and lie down. The ignorant will laugh at me, but the wise will understand.” A person is not living a conceptually or scientifically defined life; for the essential quality of living life lies simply in the living. Do not, as when in the midst of enjoying yourself, step out for a moment and examine yourself to see if you are getting the utmost out of the occasion. Or not content with the happy feeling, you want to feel yourself feeling happy—so as to be sure not to miss anything.

Living exists when life lives through us—unhampered in its flow, for he who is living is not conscious of living and, in this, is the life he lives. Life lives; and in the living flow, no questions are raised. The reason is that life is a living now! Completeness, the now, is an absence of the conscious mind striving to divide that which is indivisible. For once the completeness of things is taken apart, it is no longer complete. All the pieces of a car that has been taken apart may be there, but it is no longer a car in its original nature, which is its function or life. So in order to live life wholeheartedly, the answer is, life simply is.

Source: Bruce Lee’s handwritten essay entitled “Living:The ‘Oneness’ of Things,” circa 1963. Bruce Lee Papers.

2-D

THE UNITY OF FIRMNESS AND SOFTNESS

Firmness (Yang) and gentleness (Yin) are two complementary and interdependent facets in the art of gung fu. It is because one singles out firmness and looks at it as distinct from softness that the idea of “opposite” is formed. Once a distinction is made about something, that certain something will suggest its opposite.

On the surface, softness and firmness appear to be opposites, but in reality they are inter-dependent—the complementary parts of a whole.

On the surface, softness and firmness appear to be opposites, but in reality they are inter-dependent—the complementary parts of a whole. Their meaning (softness/firmness) is obtained FROM each other, and they find their completion THROUGH each other. This “oneness” of things is a characteristic of the Chinese mind. In the Chinese language, events are looked on as a whole because their meanings are derived from each other. For example, the Chinese character for “good” and the Chinese character for “not good,” when combined together will reflect the “quality” of something (whether good or not good). Likewise, the Chinese character for “long” and the Chinese character for “short,” when brought together mean “length”; or the character for “buying” when combined with the character for “selling” forms the new word “trade.”

Not only does everything have a complementary part, but even within that “one” special thing it, too, should have the characteristic of the other component part. In other words, softness is to be concealed in firmness and firmness in softness.

All these examples show us that everything has a complementary part to form a whole. Now we can look at the “oneness” of firmness and softness, without favoring either side too much so that we can truly appreciate the “good/bad” of them. Not only does everything have a complementary part, but even within that “one” special thing it, too, should have the characteristic of the other component part. In other words, softness is to be concealed in firmness and firmness in softness. In either case, be it softness or firmness, it should never stand alone; for standing alone will lead to extremes and going to extremes is never best.

Source: Bruce Lee’s handwritten paper entitled “The Union of Firmness and Softness.” Bruce Lee Papers.

2-E

TAOISM

Taoism is a philosophy of the essential unity of the universe (monism), or reversion, polarization (Yin and Yang), and eternal cycles, of the leveling of all differences, the relativity of all standards, and the return of all to the primeval one, the divine intelligence, the source of all things.

From this philosophy naturally arises the absence of desire for strife and contention and fighting for advantage. Thus the teachings of humility and meekness of the Christian Sermon on the Mount find a rational basis, and a peaceable temper is bred in man. Taoism emphasizes nonresistance and the importance of gentleness.

The basic idea of the Tao Te Ching is NATURALISM in the sense of wu wei (inaction), which really means taking no unnatural action. It means spontaneity; that is, “to support all things in their natural stage” and thus allow them to “transform spontaneously.” In this manner Tao “undertakes no activity and yet there is nothing left undone.” In ordinary life it is expressed in “producing and rearing things without taking possession of them” and “doing work but not taking pride in it”—thus the natural Way stands in complement to all artificial ways such as regulation, ceremonies, and so forth. This is the reason that the Taoists don’t like formalities and artificialities.