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In the case of the New Territories, he observes that it was to a large extent introduced from outside and was in this process filtered downwards from the richer to the poorer villages over four centuries." According to Faure, such a pattern can be found in other parts of China, for example, a study of Anhui province shows that contemporary opinions before the Ming merely saw lineages as 'living together generation after generation', while Ming opinions show that from the sixteenth century onwards, ancestral halls became much more common, that written genealogies of the format advocated by Song dynasty proponents became more popular, and that the ancestral rites that the neo-Confucians considered fitting for the common people came to be accepted practice."
One is tempted to postulate that the worship conducted by lay descendants, of ancestors as ideally imperial degree holders / officials, was a practice adopted in the period when new ordination names ceased to be included in Hakka genealogies, and the new practice replaced the worship of ancestors as ideally immortals/ magicians, sometimes conducted by religious experts.
The same period may have seen other changes in village culture as the result of the adoption of what for convenience's sake can be called "Confucian" attitudes which probably come together with the new style of ancestral worship associated with claims of descent from official/scholars. Although a thorough test would take a separate article, this hypothesis helps to explain the mystery of the Mountain Songs often associated with the Hakka. It is a well-received idea deriving mainly from study of the texts of such songs and folklore studies under the influence of anti-Confucianism that, violating the "Confucian ethic", pre- and extra-marital love affairs are common among the Hakka. But as I have pointed out, among the indigenous Hakka people of the New Territories Mountain Songs were far less commonly sung than one would expect. My general impression is that Mountain Songs were more popular among the Hakka worker immigrant to the British colony than among indigenous Hakka villagers. Information about Mountain Songs in the village Luk Keng indicates that the lineage leaders who upheld a version of Confucian morality did manage to stop their womenfolk...
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In the case of the New Territories, he observes that it was to a large extent introduced from outside and was in this process filtered downwards from the richer to the poorer villages over four centuries " According to Faure, such a pattern can be found in other parts of China, for example, a study of Anhui province
shows that contemporary opinions before the Ming merely saw Imeages as 'living together generation after generation', while Ming opinions show that from the sixteenth century onwards, ancestral halls became much more common, that written genealogies of the format advocated by Song dynasty proponents became more popular, and that the ancestral rites that the neo-Confucians considered fitting for the common people came to be accepted practice."s
One is tempted to postulate that the worship conducted by lay descendants, of ancestors as ideally imperial degree holders / officials, was a practice adopted in the period when new ordination names ceased to be included in Hakka genealogies, and the new practice replaced the worship of ancestors as ideally immortals/ magicians, sometimes conducted by religious experts.
The same period may have seen other changes in village culture as the result of the adoption of what for convenience's sake can be called "Confucian" attitudes which probably come together with the new style of ancestral worship associated with claims of descent from official/scholars. Although a thorough test would take a separate article, this hypothesis helps to explain the mystery of the Mountain Songs often associated with the Hakka. It is a well- received idea deriving mainly from study of the texts of such songs and folklore studies under the influence of anti-confucianism that, violating the "Confucian ethic”, pre-and extra- marital love affairs are common among the Hakka. But as I have pointed out, among the indigenous Hakka people of the New Territories Mountain Songs were far less commonly sung then one would expect. My general impression is that Mountain Songs were more popular among the Hakka worker immigrant to the British colony that among Indigenous Hakka villagers. Information about Mountain Songs in the village Luk Keng indicates that the lineage leaders who upheld a version of Confucian morality did manage to stop their womenfolk
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