[ { "id": 204305, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1961", "page_number": 73, "title": "RAS-1961", "content_text": "Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society Hong Kong Branch\n\nRASHKB and author\n\nVol. 1 (1961)\n\nISSN 1991-7295\n\n69\n\nChou of Shang\n\nby King Wu of Chou about 2100 B.C. However, this merely serves as the basic skeleton of the novel, to which many supernatural incidents are added. Some of these supernatural incidents in the novel are taken from the prompt-book Wu-wang Fa-Chou P'ing-hua ENT (\"King Wu's Expedition against King Chou\"), which was current in the Yüan period, about 1321-1323.\n\nHowever, the author of the Féng-shên took his material from various other sources, for he was an extraordinary character. He was at first a Confucian scholar; then, after failing nine times to pass the official examination, he became a Taoist priest. But in his last years he showed a leaning to Tantric Buddhism, and his work on the Surangama-sutra (VR) is included in the Second Collection of the Tripitaka in Chinese. Even now in Hong Kong he is regarded by Taoists as one of their patriarchs and referred to as \"Lu tsu Hsi-hsing\", or \"Patriarch Lu Hsi-hsing\", though in fact he combined the teachings of Confucianism, Taoism, and Buddhism. In his novel, he divided the Taoist gods into two categories. The benevolent ones he called Shan Chiao W, or The Promulgating Sect, led by Yüan-shih T'ien-tsun, or The Celestial Honoured Primordial, and Lao-tzu; the malevolent ones he called Chieh Chiao #, or The Intercepting Sect, led by T'ung-t'ien Chiao-chu #, or The Patriarch of All Heaven. When, in the novel, King Chou and King Wu are going to fight a decisive battle, the gods come down from heaven to take part. Naturally, the gods of the Promulgating Sect help the good King Wu, while those of the Intercepting Sect lend their aid to the wicked King Chou. All kinds of magic weapons are used, everything that the sixteenth century Chinese mind could conceive, even plague-carrying seeds (a sort of germ warfare!). The climax is reached after \"the battle of ten thousand gods\", when the leader of the Intercepting Sect is badly defeated. However, the common master of all the three leaders appears and makes peace among them. The author thereupon concludes:\n\nLike the red lotus flower, its white root, and its green leaves,\n\nThe Three Teachings are really one and the same.\n\nNow, the term \"the Three Teachings\" usually refers to Confucianism, Buddhism, and Taoism, but in the novel the usage of this term is not always clear. Sometimes it seems to refer to the Promulgating Sect, the Intercepting Sect, and common mortals. At other times, Buddhism seems included. The author has included among Taoist gods of the Promulgating Sect certain Buddhist deities such as Mañjusri (Wên-shu), Samantabhadra", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1961.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/vd6724704", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 215110, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-2000", "page_number": 206, "title": "RAS-2000", "content_text": "163\n\nto teach him a lesson. In yet another rendition it is suggested that he had the crab painted on his forehead by his fellow pupils as a joke whilst he was asleep and who, at the same time, stuck two willow branches behind his ears. When he woke up his chagrin was so great that he committed suicide. Another story maintains that he was a most beautiful child and his sister-in-law in a fit of jealousy painted a crab around his mouth whilst he slept preventing his soul from returning [meaning that he died as a result because Chinese know only too well that one's soul roams far and wide whilst one is asleep]. The Jade Emperor took pity on him and, so the story goes, adopted him as one of his sons, or in another version, allowed his soul to return to his body. In yet another legend he was a Suzhou man who supported troupes of actors. Another legend, related in a Chaozhou temple in Indonesia, tells of a boy who had been working in the fields, stomach empty and very hungry. He fell asleep at the side of the field whereupon a small crab crawled into his open mouth giving him sufficient sustenance to continue. He grew up to be a good farmer, a good neighbour who helped protect his community and who loved music more than anything else. He was, however, conscripted into the army and sent north to fight the Xiongnu [Huns] of central Asia, where he rose in rank until as a marshal and undefeated he returned to his home in Fujian province. He was deified after death as a local community protector. One of the major factors of his victories over the Xiongnu had been the impressive uniforms he had provided for his men which completely over-awed the central Asian barbarians. These uniforms became the stuff of actors' outfits and because of his love for music, and as the crab had saved his life, his image has the crustacean painted around his mouth and he is now the patron of actors and musicians [Photograph 10].\n\nThe legend of the Marshal Tian, better known as San Tian Dou Yuanshuai, the third of the three Tian brothers, another form of this deity, has also been confused by devotees somewhere along the line with the well-known legend of the 360 musicians and the Pestilence Wangye. In the Tian Brother's story they were said to be musicians engaged by the Xuan Zong emperor as his music masters. The emperor, whilst sick, dreamed that their playing had restored him to good health which on waking he found to be true. He then ordered them to stop a plague which was ravaging Fujian province, which again they did and were deified by the Celestial Master Zhang, the Daoist deity.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2000.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/nk328168n", "rank": 0 } ]