Gong soo do

**seeker of truth** · Posted On: 5/02/2005 2:37pm

Ok a freind of mine from south korea(bb in tae kwon do and JUDO) was telling me about the best style out there. He told me it was better than karate, tang soo doo and hapkido (he is judo and hapkido nutrider). He told me of this amazing style doing amazing feats, however I can't find anything out about it. Any links or info would be greatly appreciated....

The style is called Gong Soo Do, there may be spelling variations I'm not sure.

**EternalRage** · Posted On: 5/04/2005 4:18pm

Being Korean myself, sometimes romanizations of Korean language can be confusing. For example, the character for the hard 'g' sound (like in "go" or "garbage") can often also be romanized to a softer, less accentuated 'k'.

So my point is that yes "gong soo do" does not bring up anything on a google search, but "kong soo do" does. Apparently it is the Korean translation for "karate" or "empty hand." You should also probably check with Miguksaram if I am correct.

**seeker of truth** · Posted On: 5/04/2005 4:32pm

He looked into it. He said it was Kuk Jin Karate, and that the person in fighter in the wind was the creator. I found out he was talking about Kyokushin.

**Miguksaram** · Posted On: 5/05/2005 12:52pm

Originally Posted by EternalRage

Being Korean myself, sometimes romanizations of Korean language can be confusing. For example, the character for the hard 'g' sound (like in "go" or "garbage") can often also be romanized to a softer, less accentuated 'k'.

So my point is that yes "gong soo do" does not bring up anything on a google search, but "kong soo do" does. Apparently it is the Korean translation for "karate" or "empty hand." You should also probably check with Miguksaram if I am correct.

Sorry I didn't get to this earlier. However, you are right ER Gong Soo Do = Kong Soo Do = Karate Do. It is really just the romanization of it. So the guy is teaching traditional Korean karate or as it was already stated Kyukoshin.

**ojgsxr6** · Posted On: 5/05/2005 1:01pm

I thought Tang Soo Do was the Korean pronounciation of Karate.

**seeker of truth** · Posted On: 5/05/2005 5:33pm

I beleive that Tang Soo do is "hand of the chinese"...

**meng_mao** · Posted On: 5/05/2005 11:11pm

Tang Soo Do == Tang Shou Dao in Chinese == Way of the Tang (Dynasty) Hand

Kong Soo Do == Kong Shou Dao == Karate == Way of the Empty Hand
This is what Japanese renamed the art to nationalize it.

**Patrick Baas** · Posted On: 8/06/2009 8:46am

If you need any information on Gong Soo Do (or Kong Soo Do as we prefer) you can take a look at www.samlungdojang.nl
Like Kung Fu is sometimes pronounced as Gung Fu, the same thing happend with the Korean art of Kong Soo Do. Alldough indeed familiar with eachother, Kong Soo Do is deffinitly totaly different from Tang Soo Do or Tae Kwon Do.

**Dan Anderson** · Posted On: 11/02/2009 7:55pm

Hi. My 'mother art' was Kong Soo Do. It is the Korean pronounciation of the Japanese ideograms for 'kara te do'. What I learned was fundamentally a Korean Shotokan. A number of Koreans went to Japan to go to school and learned the art there and brought it back to Korea. As it wasn't too cool for Koreans to be teaching essentially a Japanese martial art, it began to be reconstructed into what later became Tae Kwon Do. A good book on the how the formation of Tae Kwon Do came out of both Kong Sood Do and Tang Soo Do is called "A Killing Art'.

Yours,
Dan Anderson

**Patrick Baas** · Posted On: 11/03/2009 3:00pm

Hello Dan,

Thanks for the tip about the book. What kind of style are you practising at the moment? And may I ask why did you left Kong Soo Do? Within six months I am at the roots of Karate at Shuri Castle in Okinawa were they will also examin my 6th dan-degree (ofcause not at Shuri Castle but at Hanshi Tetsuhiro Hokama's dojo). The fact why I am still using Kong Soo Do instead of the modernised version Taekwondo is because 1.) The modern taekwondo is pure balerina-sports and is not being very realistic when it comes to modern combat situations. 2.) According to my opinion: Taekwondo is incomplete. One needs to practise Hapkido as well to make it a little more complete wich is insane. The old day Kong Soo So was a complete battleground fighting system since karate, at the time it was given birth, was not for fun or competition. It was purely developed for protecting their families and the royal family of Shuri Castle. Therefore true Karate needs to stay improved and modernised to new times without losing any effect to sports, competition and (like Miyagi said) plastic trofees ;-)

Best regards,

Patrick Baas