religion in chinese history
This chapter shows how the complex diversity of contemporary Chinese religious life is the product of layers of tradition that appeared at different phases of Chinese political and social history, from the third millennium BCE until the early twentieth century CE. Several religious movements and themes appear and recur at different periods of Chinese history, including the ruler’s relationship with Heaven as a source of political legitimacy; the importance of virtue and ritual propriety in social relations and government; millenarian movements sometimes associated with rebellions; interference by the Chinese state in the authority of religious institutions; a commercial ethic associating morality and material prosperity; and the tensions and mutual interactions between the teachings of Confucianism, Daoism, and Buddhism, as well as with the later additions of Islam and Christianity. In spite of over one century of reform movements, revolutions, and modernizing campaigns from the nineteenth century until today, these themes continue to influence much of the religious life and sociopolitical relationships in the contemporary Chinese world.
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Article available at: https://www.academia.edu/8278430/Religion_in_Chinese_Social_and_Political_History
Linking the current to the past
Visit any Chinese temple and you will easily find worshipers kneeling while shaking a bunch of divine sticks -- he or she will stop at the point when one of the sticks fall on the ground. Auspicious or Bad? You need to check the number marked on the stick, and go ask a fortune teller to which sacred message does it refer. "Wait. I see your worries on your forehead" will be what the teller tells, before you are advised to take the "palm reviewing" service (watch the YouTube clip filmed in the famous Wong Tai Sin Temple in Hong Kong). The lines on your palm will be carefully scrutinized, and then you may start to think about your career and health in future.
The Vagabond Project - How to Get a Fortune Teller in Hong Kong Wong Tai Sin - July 2012
A Tortoise Shell for Divine Tellings
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And that's what we do in the modern era. But amazingly, what we follow nowadays highly resembles the traditional practices dated back to the period more than thousands of years ago. The practice of examining lines on one's palm is just like the Shang dynasty custom of interpreting the patterns and cracks on the burnt tortoise shell. The ancient prophets might also insert tiny fragments of stone into the emptied shell, and shook the vessel up and down and left and right until objects escaped from it -- this is just like what we do with the divine sticks in today's rituals.
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rule by the mandate of heaven
In the imperial times, Chinese emperors made use of the above tools to gain their legitimacy of the reign. They employed prophets who might shake the tortoise shell and obtain certain divine messages favorable to the rule of the kingdom. The emperors themselves would also make pilgrimages to sacred mountains, so as to carry out sacrificial rituals to the Heaven through which communication between the worlds of the common and the deities was made. And so, the emperor was the "Son of Heaven" deemed to have sufficient virtues to rule the land.
BONTV China - Worshiping Ceremony at the Temple of Heaven - March 2013
In the Qing dynasty, one of the sacred spots where the emperors conducted worshiping ceremony to the Heaven was the Temple of Heaven (天壇), in the capital city of Beijing. Nowadays, though the ruling authority of China is now in the hands of the atheistic CCP members, we can still see the rituals concerned, which are now presented as tourist attraction with formidable parades whose marchers play the roles of imperial officials and servants, escorting the emperor to the Temple of Heaven. Notably, the architecture design of the Temple of Heaven embodies the view of Chinese cosmology -- the Temple in cylindrical shape represents the Roundness of the Heaven (天圓), and its foundation being a square platform symbolizes the Flatness of the Earth (地方).
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The Temple of Heaven in Beijing
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millenarian Rebellion
True that the emperors held the mandate of Heaven, but sometimes they might lose the virtue to rule, in dreadful times when calamities and invasion by the northern tribes threatened the prosperity of the country. Mayhem might be viewed as the punishment made by the Heaven owing to emperor's loss of virtue, which could be ascribed to his orgiastic life or fatuous policy making. Rebellions came in form of millenarian movements, whose leaders often proclaimed that they possessed the divine fate of overthrowing the incumbent authority.
Zhang Jue 張角 in Sanguosha
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The Yellow Turban Rebellion
After the relatively stable unity lasted throughout the Easter Han dynasty (AD 25-220), the Yellow Turban Rebellion (黃巾之亂) led by Zhang Jue (張角) rose to oppose the rule of the imperial court. Zhang, being a charismatic healer, proclaimed his power of summoning natural forces and envisioned the Way of Ultimate Peace (太平道) to be achieved. In the battles, his followers wrapped their heads with yellow turbans for recognition. Soon the revolts were soon suppressed, but the Rebellion had stirred up wars that split the country in fragments, and this was how the Three Kingdom Period (三國時期) commenced (AD 184-280). Zhang Jue is just a minor actor in history, but his Daoist charisma lives on. A popular online card game Sanguosha (三國殺 - visit sanguosha.com) includes his character, bearing a Daoist master image who can manipulate lightning that strikes the adversaries in the game.
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The Taiping Heavenly Kingdom
Another example of the numerous millenarian movements is the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom (太平天國), whose leader Hong Xiuquan (洪秀全) was a peasant in the south and had claimed to be the incarnation of Jesus Christ's younger brother. Despite the Christian background, the Movement appeared to be more millenarian alike, forming healing groups and militarizing regional forces that fought against the imperial court of Qing. The army soon conquered the key city Nanjing (南京) at the mouth of Yangtze River, and its Kingdom lasted in the southern part of the country for less than twenty years from 1852 to 1864.
TV Series- The Taiping Heavenly Kingdom - produced by the official channel CCTV in 2000.
For the shamanistic possession played by the actor, please watch from 1:02:12 to the end of the 9th episode.
For the shamanistic possession played by the actor, please watch from 1:02:12 to the end of the 9th episode.
One of the Daoism traces in the Movement is the shamanistic possession conducted by the high-rank members of the Kingdom. Yang Xiuqing (楊秀清), who was in the political struggle with Hong Xiuquan, often entered the trance state of being possessed by The Father (天父) and would command Hong by his higher divine authority (watch the YouTube Clip).
vincent goossaert - millenarian tendencies
Thousand years of Chinese history has shown religion is always present in the competing fields of China, between the state and the local, so as between the imperial rule and millenarian movement. Vincent Goossaert, one of the authors of Chinese Religious Life, mentions that the Chinese society always has "a strong impulse for Millenarian regimes, political regimes that would fulfill a hope of a perfect world, a perfect world order, being in complete harmony with the moral order of the universe." The Yellow Turban Rebellion, the Taiping Heavenly Movement, and even the Chinese Communist Party have shared the communistic and apocalyptic belief of building a uptopian society with perfect moral order where religion may play an important role. That's why Vincent Goossaert, from the perspective of a historian, advocates the need of putting back religion to the mainstream history of China. Please check the clips below to learn more.
CRL interview - Vincent Goossaert - Millenarian tendencies in Chinese religion and politics
CRL interview - Vincent Goossaert - Putting religion back into modern Chinese history
kristofer schipper - Religion and history in china
Kristofer Schipper presents us another view China history -- the macro-history. He explains the east-and-west interactions in the Ming and Qing dynasty. From Father Matteo Ricci to Embassy of Lord Macartney, Schipper tells us the story of how China makes its way to nation building. He ends with a thought-provoking question, "China would have to become a state, wouldn't it? That's how we wanted China to be. But in fact, has China really changes?" Please check the clip.
CRL interview - Kristofer Schipper - Brief History of China