[ { "id": 208720, "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-1979", "page_number": 177, "title": "RAS-1979", "content_text": "150\n\nJULIAN F. PAS\n\nficant scale (17th century) till the period of Japanese control (1895-1945), one can see three successive waves of temple-building, each characterized by its own cult-symbols or deities. This phenomenon is in fact a manifestation of the relationships between the groups of settlers: competition between various groups of immigrants is reflected in the competition of their gods.\n\nDuring the first period of temple-building, the choice of universalistic gods, worshipped by various groups of settlers, points to a spirit of cooperation between them. This was a time of external pressures necessitating cooperation in order to face common threats. Examples given are the Matsu temple in Kuantu (1661), the Shennung temple near Feit'ou (1669) and the Kuan-yin temple whose location is not identified (1660-70).\n\nDuring the second period of temple building, there was a shift in cult-symbols: the choice of more particularistic deities goes hand in hand with strife and competition, or even hostility between groups of settlers of different geographical origins. Examples of such gods with a narrower appeal are K'ai-chang sheng-wang, Ch'ing-shui tsu-shih, Ting-kuang Fo, and the so-called Wang-yeh gods.\n\nThe third period of temple-development was occasioned by new political changes in Taiwan: the threat of foreign invasion (Sino-French war in 1885), and the Japanese occupation (1895-1945). A new consciousness unites the Taiwan population against these foreign threats. While some of the old universalistic gods regain popularity, new cult-symbols arise, such as the Taipei city god cult, \"emerging as the center of a consciousness that transcends particularistic interests\" (p. 40). During the Japanese occupation, great changes take place in the pattern of religious activity. Cut off from its roots on the Chinese mainland, and pressured by the Japanese rulers to undergo a process of acculturation, Taiwan religion follows a development of its own. Local cults and practices are often discouraged (e.g., second burial, spirit medium cults) and Buddhism enjoys a privileged position. Out of twelve temples built in the Peit'ou-Tamsui area during 1895-1945, ten are Buddhist.\n\n(Perhaps the author should have added a fourth period of religious activity: after 1945. The picture has been changing considerably and still is nowadays, especially since the author's research took place about ten years ago. Religious freedom has been restored: but moreover, the influx of a new wave of mainland im-", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1979.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/2801w5938", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 208732, "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-1979", "page_number": 189, "title": "RAS-1979", "content_text": "162\n\nJULIAN F. PAS\n\nare, of course, an enormous number of deities mentioned and described in Taoist ritual texts, of whom the common people do not even know the names. They belong to the esoteric tradition of Taoism and are only known to Taoist priests. But besides those, the majority of deities worshipped in the temples belong to the popular religion, although many border cases may exist of mutual absorption between the three traditional religions and the popular religion. Some of the most ‘popular' deities of Taiwan religion belong to the popular or community religion: examples are Matsu, Kuanti, the earth god(s), the Wang-Yeh gods, the city god(s), Prince Nat'o or T'ai-tzu, Pao-sheng ta-ti and even the so-called supreme god of Taoism, Yü-huang Ta-ti. A number of originally Taoist or Buddhist deities have been absorbed into the folk religion and have become part of it: Kuan-yin and Ti-tsang wang for the Buddhist side; the kitchen god, Yü-huang (Jade Emperor), the 8 Immortals for the Taoist side.\n\nAccording to the third criterium mentioned above, ownership of a temple, several categories exist greatly coinciding with the division based on the other two criteria. Temples may be government-owned (Confucian temples); owned by the local community on the neighborhood or town levels (these are the community temples); or privately owned, either by individuals, families, sectarian groups or monastic institutions.\n\nFinal sub-section of Chapter Three. After this long digression, I had better return to my book review. In this last part of Chapter Three the author discusses the 'genesis of temples'. Although strictly speaking there is a difference between temple and cult, between temple and deity worshipped in it, still the two should be discussed together. In fact there is a special chapter on the Genesis of Gods. However, since the author prefers to discuss the genesis of temples separately, we had better follow him. He distinguishes several ways of temple development:\n\n(A) by process of fen-shen or \"splitting bodies\" (p. 125). The reason of the spread and construction of new temples is the god's efficacy.\n\n(ii) by process of proselytization or a conscious effort on the part of the believers to spread the cult. This applies to Buddhist temples (and Christian churches).\n\n(iii) by transformation of a private home or temple into a community temple.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1979.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/2801w5938", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 209956, "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-1983", "page_number": 215, "title": "RAS-1983", "content_text": "193\n\n* Shi Boxuan (Yuan dynasty) is the compiler of two books: the Sishu Kuanku 190 and the Guankui Waipian 7 lumped together as Kuankui in the Gujin Tushu Jicheng. See Bu Liao Jin Yuan Yishu Wenzhi WIGxARK ed. Shangwu, Taipei, 1966, pp. 28, 56.\n\n1차\n\n* Jing Fang (77 to 37 B.C.) was a famous Han philosopher and presumed author of a number of oracular works. Most of these are still listed in the Jingji Zhi, Chapter, part 3, section zi of the Suishu.\n\n\"The Liji refers to the ritual dismembering of a dog in connection with the annual Nuo exorcism. The animal's remains were then buried in front of the main gate of the capital. See S. Couvreur, Le Liji, Imprimerie de la mission catholique, Ho Kien Fu (1913), vol. I, p. 352.\n\n12 The charm, faintly visible near the end of column 22, may represent a model of an \"astronomical\" charm.\n\n\"Peach wood was thought to possess magical properties as early as 544 B.C. (D. Bodde, op.cit. pp. 128 ff.) while the wood of the tong tree was associated with the miraculous birth of the hero Yiying. See M. Granet, Danses et légendes de la Chine antique, Presses universitaires de France, reprint edition 1959, vol. II, p. 428.\n\nB. Laufer \"Bird divination among the Tibetans\", in Toung Pao, vol. XV (1914) p. 4, note 1. \"The Study of Tibetan divination is as wide as it is ungrateful and unpleasant for research”.\n\n* The same omen is found in the Gujin tushu jicheng, vol. 26, j.174, p. 1b, column 7.\n\n\"The prohibition against leaving the house for three years is mentioned three times in the Gujin tushu jicheng. It applies: when a pack of dogs howl in neighbourhood streets; when such a pack howls in city markets and, unless obeyed, portends death for a man who has (accidentally) been spattered with dog urine. Op.cit. pp. 1a,b.\n\n* The contradictory omens in brackets show that other dog divination systems were known at the time.\n\n18 The Gujin tushu jicheng has \"against a palace door\" op.cit. p. 11b, column 11.\n\n** \"Dreadful disasters\" instead of \"of the inhabitants will be harmed” Ibid.\n\n\"The last four characters of this column make no sense. \"Mu is probably an error for the numerator mei.\n\nAN ODE ON HONG KONG COMPOSED BY THE MAYOR OF CANTON IN 1845\n\nP. BRUCE\n\nA charming ode was published on December 13, 1845 by the Friend of China newspaper. It gives a rare Chinese view of the development of the young colony of Hong Kong.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1983.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/j9607p61v", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 210077, "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-1984", "page_number": 48, "title": "RAS-1984", "content_text": "27\n\nnormally consult the deity, and indicate the response of the deity in each area of concern in each oracle stick. This list is not uniform in the various collections of temple oracles. To illustrate this point, I want to refer to the samples listed in Appendix I:\n\nB-I, the sixty Matsu oracles (sample 1): contain between fourteen and twenty-six areas of concern, depending on the edition.\n\nB-2, the 100 Kuanti oracles (sample 2) only list seven or eight areas: fame (or reputation), happiness, litigation (in court cases), ailment, marriage, pregnancy and travel. One edition of B-2 has no listing at all.\n\nB-6, (sample 3) has an extended list of 36 concern areas. B-34, (sample 4) is a simplified set and reduces the areas of concern to six.\n\nB-54, (sample 5) is irregular in that it presents two separate lists: one of twelve concern areas, which look more or less like the traditional ones, and second, one of six, possibly adapted to the particular situation in Hong Kong. The latter list includes ‘geomancy' as one of the areas, which is amazingly not found in any other oracle collection available to me.\n\nB-55, (sample 6) does not have any detail at all; only sample 13 of the same B-55 has additional commentaries, which, however, do not include the concern areas.\n\nB-0, not included in Banck's collection, (sample 7), lists eight concern areas, which are almost identical with B-2.\n\nA comparison between the various lists makes it clear that worshippers go to the temple to ask the deity's advice (and forecast) about any of the more important issues in life: health and happiness, marriage, birth, education, longevity, wealth, success in business enterprises, success in career, travel, building or renovating the house, the weather, especially about rain, visitors and lost property. For medical advice they can consult the medical oracles, which are usually differentiated into several groups: man, woman, child; sometimes there is a special set for eye diseases.\n\nThe answers to their questions are of course stereotyped: they are printed on leaflets and apply to all cases in general terms. Worshippers may eventually wish to consult diviners inside the temple or sometimes in the neighbourhood to obtain more indi-", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1984.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/5h73wh572", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 213898, "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-1996", "page_number": 250, "title": "RAS-1996", "content_text": "224\n\nMy doubts about the purely utilitarian nature of hou fu stones were reinforced at the Diamond Hill cemetery. Space at this burial ground is at a premium and plots are often so tiny that stones, where they exist, are jammed together at the back of graves, which relegates them to the role of token boundary markers. Given the overcrowding at Diamond Hill, the discovery of a tomb which by virtue of its size and age had little in common with its neighbours was unexpected. The tomb belonged to the Liang family and was probably built at a time when graves were not yet piled up on top of each other. Not only was the Liang plot a good deal larger than that of the surrounding graves, but the family had clearly tried to ensure that it would always remain so. Set into the ground was a plaque which announced \"Domain of the Liang [family's] funeral abode\". (Liangzhai shanjie). More unusual still was a stone in front of the tomb which bore the words \"quantu\" or \"front of the grave\". What is relevant in this connection is that one expects to see such a stone in front of other graves, since it is both the logical counterpart of hou tu and a confirmation of its marker function, but that is not the case. For reasons that will become apparent below, the stone is unique.\n\nBut the tomb's most remarkable feature was located at the back of the grave. Here a small-scale replica of the main tomb, adorned with the usual inscription (Liangshan Houtu), had been erected. In view of the special nature of the Liang tomb, it was reasonable to assume that the structure represented a shrine to Houtu.\n\nBy installing a plaque, a quantu stone and a shrine, the Liang had attempted to reproduce, above ground, a funerary document called diquan. This was a land contract, written on a durable surface (clay, stone or jade) which included a plot's exact measurements. As of the first century BC, diquan were interred with the deceased to attest his or her ownership of the land in which s/he was buried. According to A. Seidel:\n\n\"From the third century on, the religious character [of the contracts] becomes more pronounced; supernatural beings start to appear as sellers of the land or as witnesses.\n\n(A. Seidel, \"Traces of Han Religion in Funeral Texts found in Tombs\" in Dokyo to shukyo bunka, ed. by Akizuki Kan`ei Hirakawa)", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1996.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/3n209j641", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 214285, "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-1998", "page_number": 143, "title": "RAS-1998", "content_text": "106\n\nAsura, one of the Hindu deities in the cave-tunnel under the Kuantu Kung, Pei T'ou, Taiwan", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1998.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/1g05n0794", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 216449, "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-2003", "page_number": 208, "title": "RAS-2003", "content_text": "5. A Red Cross attendant placing a dying soldier at the foot of the big josses in the Buddhist Temple at Kwantu\n\n158", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2003.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/2v242g390", "rank": 0 } ]