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in Singapore but not elsewhere, and the temple keeper was unwilling to offer any further information. A year or so later under a little pressure he revealed that he, personally, called them White Crane Mothers (Bai He Mu).
Recently his son, who has now set up his own establishment, was more forthcoming. He began by saying that he did not agree with his father's description; the images were neither spirits (shen) nor demons (kuei) but were rather a substitute for the individual human (Ti-shen). Such images were carved by him for people who brought the description of the image required written, usually on red paper, by a spirit medium. He claimed that the practice was not unique to Hokkiens (people from the southern coastal province of Fukien) and that he had heard of it ‘all over China' including Taiwan (which is predominantly Hokkien speaking). He himself is a Hokkien though his clients in Singapore included local Ch'ao-chou, Cantonese, Hakka and Hainanese people.
The son explained that a living human may suffer from an unidentifiable ailment and having been to a western trained doctor and consulted a Chinese physician or herbalist, neither of whom has been able to diagnose the cause, in desperation he consults a temple spirit medium who, in a trance, discovers the cause, usually an 'unpaid debt from a previous life. Immediately after death souls are judged on the misdeeds done during their lifetime on earth and after purging their sins they are reborn. Occasionally misdeeds are missed and only discovered after the individual has been reborn, hence the ailment as punishment. The spirit medium is tasked to discover the identity in his or her previous life of the human now suffering from the unknown ailment and to record his or her likeness in that previous existence which will then be carved into an image. The surname of the individual in his or her previous life is also recorded on the reverse of the image. This image is unique to the family of the individual now alive, almost always with an entirely different surname to the one of the previous incarnation, and is kept on the family altar. It is never placed on a public altar for public reverence. After a ritual performed by the spirit medium the image is considered to house the spirit of the living individual with the ailment but with the identity of the previous incarnation, and it is expected that the spirit now residing within the image will absorb the 'unpaid debt' lifting the punishment from the living individual.