Se-Jong: The Odd Form

Se-Jong is named after the great King Se-Jong.  He oversaw the creation of Hangul, the Korean alphabet, and instituted many scientific policies in Korea.  The form has 24 movements, one for each letter of the Korean alphabet.

I call Se-Jong the odd form for two main reasons.  First, the architecture of the form is totally unique in the Chang-Hon pattern set.  It is the only form that has absolutely no repeating moves.  Although you do technically throw three punches, they are all different types of punch (high section, tension-mid and horizontal reverse).  Because of the 24 individual techniques, some students struggle to learn this form.  Where as many if not all of the forms are somewhat symmetrical, Se-jong can't be.  The form itself follows a symetrical pattern, but since none of the techniques repeat you cannot call it symmetrical. This is little comfort for people who need symmetry to aid in learning a form.  This first reason for my title of the "odd" form plays into the second reason -- namely the placement of the form in various schools and organizations around the world.  

It may shock some of my readers to learn that my federation of schools has Se-Jong as a 2nd to 3rd dan required form, and not in it's traditionally placed 5th to 6th dan position.  This gets to the crux of why this is my second reason for calling it an odd form.  Depending on your point of view, the difficulty of this form may, or may not warrant such a high placement.  I'll do my best to draw an objective argument and let you decide where the form should rest.  Along with the placement of Eui-Am, Se-Jong, is well off the mark compared to my ITF brothers and sisters. 

As I have stated in the past, when I think of difficult forms, I take several things into consideration.  First, the physical aspect of the form -- the movements, and their transitions, and the toll they take on the practitioner.  Hand in hand with the physical is the mental aspect of the form -- how much repetition and how much symmetry is present in the form.  Typically a form with a lot of symmetry and a lot of repetition is not going to rank very high on my difficulty scale, of course there are exceptions like Moon-Moo where the difficulty is maxed via the physical side of my equation.  Se-Jong is hard to pin point though. 

While not containing many physically demanding techniques, Se-Jong asks for quite a lot of precision.  This is best demonstrated on the main line returning to the starting point in the back half of the form.  From a horse stance we launch a left round kick and on the re-chamber of the kick we move forward into an X stance.  This requires a great deal of body control, and the case can be made that a 3rd dan candidate might not have the necessary skill set developed to land such a precise movement.  Following this we see a rare diagonal stance -- or a horse stance with one foot slightly in front of the other.  To make matters worse you step into it while moving horizontally from another X stance. That subtlety trips up our candidates testing for 3rd and often times that subtlety isn't mastered until well past the 3rd dan level.  This form is also (in our configuration) the first time a student has to land from a one legged stance while executing a two handed technique in real speed.  Landing the reverse pressing block is a place where many a candidate's timing is slightly off. 

Although the form requires a great deal of subtle body control, the form is only 24 movements - making it as short as To-San, a yellow belt form.  Because of these two conflicting areas: the lack of physically demanding techniques, but the overwhelming need for excellent precision, I find it hard to accept it's placement as either a 5th to 6th dan form or as a 2nd to 3rd dan form.  It is also because of this "oddness" that Se-Jong is one of my favorite forms.  It is a monument to the subtle lessons built into all forms that don't reveal themselves until you've practiced it many times.    What do you think of the form, if you know it?