Is a Master the same thing as a Grandmaster?

Question

Im talking about martial arts. Do they have more or less skill than each other or ist it just , one is consider a grandmaster because he is teaching a traditional martial art and he is a master. Is there really much diffrence from each other.

Answer 1

a person's skill at fighting does not corralate with thier title- and it SHOULD NOT in most cases.

a person's skill in understanding and bieng able to apply and teach thier system SHOULD directly correlate with thier title.

and no, they are not the same, IMO- the terms master and grandmaster are outdated and should not be used anyway.

the terms teacher and coach far more describe the instructor's role.

a coach or teacher might not be able to fight as well as you, simply because of age and physical ability difference, but they do at least need to be able to make you a better fighter by bieng able to apply thier system well enough to pass it on do you with actual demonstration.  

As for the master/grandmaster distinction.  Anyone can be a grandmaster- all you have to do is make up your own style.  I just made one up in my head, its called kriss-krossjitsu.

you stand on your head and do all the techniques with your legs kicking while upside down- will it work?

not even against a blind parapeligic- but I'm still the grandmaster.

these are (unfortunately) the many situations that actually do exist. people do pass this kind of untested bunk off just to call themselves a grandmaster.

generally the grandmaster title will be the person who "founded" or significantly modified the system (so its something new and branched off).

a master is anyone with superior knowledge over you or is a "senior" of the system.

this definition can vary from school to school and culture to culture.  one well known dispute between wma practitioners (sword arts) plays on this term, one calling himself a "master" the other saying that historically he couldn't be a master because one would need to be given the title by a living master.

sounds stupid no? well this kind of distinction, IMO is what has caused many misconceptions about what people should be striving for in all martial arts. not a title- but knowledge and skill.

it also tends to reinforce the erroneous idea that the "oldest" guy is the best unarmed fighter (with blade weapons that can actually be very true). shouldn't a "master" teach you to be better than them? if not you have a declining scale of skill within the school that inevitably leads to it becoming crappy training. like a copy of a copy of a copy.

Answer 2

No. They are in most of the traditional arts not the same. Any one who has qualified to teach at a rank above the first black belt rank can be called in most arts a master. A grand master is a master of masters and is for example in Taekwando awarded grandmaster as an honor for contributing to the art. and is at the 10th dan level. The time requiered for each dan level in Taekwando gets longer with each sucessive rank.

A grandmaster in any traditional art that I know of is very fare advanced over the master level. Some arts only allow one grand master and is usualy designated by the curent grandmaster to replace him when he so desires or dies.

Sufice to say you will know a grandmaster when you meet one they probably won't even have to tell you that they are. I have only met one in my years with martial arts. I did not know he was a grand masters until I was formaly introduced I just knew there was someting diferent about him. He was so quiet relaxed and kind  while he made me look totaly usless on the mat. I met his designated replacement  and he is the same in person a little less quiet perhaps.

Answer 3

I believe a Grandmaster is a master who has helped and taught their students to become masters themselves.

Answer 4

Traditionally a Master was the top level teacher at a school or in a discipline.  This student would have been "a descendant " of the original master by virtue of his learning and the blessing of his master.  This heirarchy became diluted as students felt dishonored by their masters (they weren't chosen to be the next master for whatever reason) so they opened their own schools and called themselves master.  The watering down of the term "Master" continued as some of the students at these new schools eventually became teachers.  If that teacher then opened a school they became "Master" at their own school.  Even then these "little masters" still called THEIR teacher by the honoriffic "Master" and so did their students. (That's a lot of masters.)

Eventually there were Masters who had so many "master" level students with their own schools that they needed a distinction, so the term Grand Master was created.

Honorary titles like that are becoming less and less meaningful.  There is no universal definition for either Master or Grand Master.  Because of this many greedy and undeserving martial artist call themselves Master or Grandmaster or 9th Degree Grand Master, etc. to sound more knowledgable and sell more tapes/books/DVD's.  Look in any issue of Black Belt and you'll see dozens of grand masters, 15th degree black belts (there is no such thing in traditional martial arts), Grand Dragon Masters, etc.  These titles are usually self-bestowed and meaningless.

This is not to say that Master is a meaningless term, I am just warning you that it means different things to different people.  I still call my instructors "sifu" or "si heng" depending on their rank.  Tradition is vital to martial arts, but I think it is wise to know who a person is and how they got their title before you call them "Master".

Answer 5

There is no exact answer for this question. In general a Master is 5th degree black belt or higher. In some cases the title may be awarded to someone as low as 4th degree black belt.

Grand Master is a term not used by all tradition MA. when it is used in Japanese or Okinawan arts it usually refers to someone of high masters rank such as someone of 8th, 9th, or 10th degree black belt.

NOTE:  Masters titles are not automatic because of a belt rank. They are issued by the head of an organization to some and not to others.  So what I'm saying is that many people incorrectly assume that once they reach 4th degree black belt that they are a master. No so. If they hold a rank of 4th degree or above and are awarded the title by the organization, then they can claim to be a master.

Answer 6

In Kung Fu (at least in my system), the levels are:

Jau Gow (disciple of the system)

Sifu (Instructor Level)

Master (has a student become a Sifu)

Grand Master (has a student become a Master)

There are also certain time limits on it as well.  IE, to be a Master, you must have also been a Sifu for a certain amount of time:

From starting Kung Fu;

Black belt about 3 yrs

Jau Gow about 4-5yrs

Sifu around 10yrs

Master, around 25 yrs

Grand Master around 40+yrs

The difference is experience.  In a quality system, experience is directly related to skill.  You may also notice that after Sifu, your "rank" is entirely dependent on having quality students.

Each step up is EXTREMELY humbling, so you will almost never hear a Master or Grand Master refer to themselves as such.

Answer 7

Actually, master and grandmaster are terms that come from chess, where the levels are determined by your rating points, and your rating points are determined by how well you did against your competition.

Most martial arts use the colored belt system, and Japanese martials use levels 1-10 for black belts.

Some martial arts - like boxing and wrestling - don't use any such system at all. They rely on won/loss records.

My cynical experience is that the people using the terms master and grandmaster to refer to themselves as martial artists are same ones who hand out "red belt" contracts, "brown belt" contracts, and "black belt" contracts - in other words, pay me $x,x*x and I'll give you a black belt.

Would you hire a doctor or lawyer on that basis?

You should be able to SEE the difference in skill levels, regardless of the person's "title."

Didn't we all see that in the Kimbo Slice fiasco?

Answer 8

No, they are not the same a grandmaster is someone who has trained someone to become a master, a master is just a teacher.