[ { "id": 204337, "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": 105, "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\n101\n\n(1) monastery management, which is further sub-divided into sections in charge of\n\na. finance\n\nb. food\n\nc. entertainment of lay visitors\n\n(2) guests, which not only passes on the qualifications for admission of itinerant monks, but also gives the monastery's own monks the permission they need to leave the premises\n\n(3) the observation of monastic rules\n\n(4) itinerant monks who, after they are admitted, must be provided with food, lodging, and instruction.\n\nAll told, there are 48 positions in the hierarchy—more than the total number of monks in any Hong Kong monastery. Therefore, this elaborate administrative structure exists here only in more or less skeletal form.\n\nHong Kong monasteries are nearly all \"father-to-son\" rather than \"ten directions\". This means that the abbot holds office for life rather than being elected by the monks every three years. Furthermore, he personally has title to the monastery premises. On both counts, there are problems of succession. Normally the abbot chooses his own successor, but some have died without doing so. Since there are often factions among the monks (with the Cantonese, for example, opposing the northerners), this can lead to conflicts that disrupt monastery life. Joint meetings of Buddhists and Taoists have been held to formulate a set of regulations for resolving such disputes. In one monastery, the Po Lin Tsz, there is underway a movement to transfer title of the property to a self-perpetuating committee.\n\nNot all of the difficulties arise because of hot competition for the post of abbot. It is a difficult post to hold. The abbot must keep his monastery operating on funds that are usually inadequate.1 He must maintain his competence as a dharma teacher. Most of the monks who are spiritually qualified for the post would prefer not to have it. In many cases, therefore, the abbot must not only choose his successor, but persuade him to accept. In the process, the abbot often consults the heads of other monasteries as well as the monks of his own. Usually his final choice lights on someone who is a close relative of his by family or religious lineage—hence the term \"father-to-son\".\n\n* Recently the abbot of one of the larger monasteries, having reached an advanced age, appointed his successor and retired. Almost at once the inflow of donations ceased. His successor apparently did not have the \"knack\" of winning lay support. After six months the old abbot had to resume his post to avert financial ruin.\n\nPage 105\n\nPage 106", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1961.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/vd6724704", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 205530, "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-1968", "page_number": 72, "title": "RAS-1968", "content_text": "67\n\nFURTHER NOTES ON THE SUNG WONG T'OI\n\nW. SCHOFIELD*\n\nThe very interesting paper by Professor Lo Hsiang-lin on the Sung Wong T'oi and the travelling courts of the Sung Dynasty, in Volume III No. 2 of the Journal of Oriental Studies,† and the partial wrecking of the historic site by the Japanese in the war,‡ have prompted the writer to put on record some notes made during the years 1918 and 1937 on the earthworks, inscriptions and relics found by him on and near the site, which may help to supplement Professor Lo's paper. In what follows the hill is described as it was in 1937, as the writer has not seen it since 1938.\n\nIt is a crescent-shaped hill, convex towards the east, where it rises steeply from the beach to a height of nearly 40 metres. It commands a good view of the south slope of the Kowloon hills and the plain beneath, the east half of the harbour, and of Lyemun channel and the west end of the Fat Tau Mun channel beyond, except for a few hundred metres at its north side by Slope Island (see Plate 5). A watch-tower on its summit would provide an observation post well over 40 metres above sea level. The concave side, on which lies the main path to the top, is terraced for cultivation up to 15 or 20 metres.\n\nThe objects investigated on and near the hill can be classed in three categories, earthworks, inscriptions, and pottery and other objects, and will be dealt with in that order.\n\nThe Earthworks (see sketch plan at Plate 3)\n\nThere are signs that the hill was formerly fortified. On its top from the south end above the 20 metre contour as far as the great inscribed rock on the summit, there is a gentle rise from which the ground falls away steeply to the east, and rather less so to the west and south. At the south end of the ridge traces of a bank at the edge appear to form a rough semicircle, presumably as a flank defence, for a clearly defined earth bank about a metre high by three or four wide at the base runs northward from it nearly straight along the centre of the hill crest to a point near the south-\n\n*See biographical note at the end of this article.\n\n† Published by the Hong Kong University Press, May 1958. [See also Mr. Jen Yu-wen's article \"The Travelling Palace of Southern Sung in Kowloon\" in JHKBRAS, Vol. 7, 1967, pp. 21-38. Ed.]\n\nMr. Schofield writes in the present tense, Unfortunately the hill has now disappeared completely, what was left by the Japanese being removed for the airport extension about 1958. Ed.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1968.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/66833948d", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 205957, "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-1970", "page_number": 37, "title": "RAS-1970", "content_text": "32\n\nSTEPHEN UHALLEY, JR.\n\nin answering a question it is always their chief endeavour to say what they suppose their questioner will be best pleased to hear. If therefore the knowledge of a fact is to be arrived at, it is, above all things, necessary that the inquiry bear a tint so neutral that the person to whom it is addressed shall find it impossible to reflect its colour in his reply. He will then sometimes, in his confusion, blunder into a truthful answer, but he does so generally with a bashful air, indicative of the painful consciousness that he has been reluctantly violating the rules of good breeding. A search after accurate statistics, under such conditions, is not unattended with difficulty,38\n\nElgin, however, never seemed to think equally critically of the information brought for his consideration about the Taipings. While it is of utmost importance what opinions such high-ranking English decision-makers were forming of the Taipings, it need not be supposed that the foreign community in general at this time was similarly influenced. We have the account of a relatively high ranking English naval officer which stated quite explicitly: \"When Lord Elgin returned from his expedition up the Yang-tze-kiang in 1858, his high-handed policy toward them at Nankin, Ngan-king, and elsewhere, was much disapproved of by a large section of the community, and it was thought that he had hardly done justice to them.\"39\n\nOne might legitimately raise the question again as to the purpose of the mission. We have already given the ostensible reason: to investigate suitable trading ports and trade conditions along the river. But this seems implausible. With a full-scale war taking place along the greater part of the lower Yangtze Valley, it was unlikely that such an investigation would prove of much value. The mission was premature in another respect as well, for it took place before the treaty was ratified, an observation that is especially to the point since the Ch'ing government did not, in fact, ratify the treaty. Actually, Elgin had two underlying purposes. First, he believed that the trip would confirm that the Emperor had in principle conceded the opening of the river, thus inducing the Chinese to take steps to put the treaty into effect. Second, Elgin reportedly believed that the trip would aid the Imperial cause against the Taipings since the \"opening", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1970.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/ww72j0241", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 206056, "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-1970", "page_number": 136, "title": "RAS-1970", "content_text": "A BRITISH WARTIME CHART SHOWING HONG KONG\n\n131\n\nThe name \"Iron River\" given to the present-day Hebe Haven may be related to the fact that Ma On Shan to the north has iron-ore (Magnetite) deposits on its south western side. It would seem to indicate that the deposits were known in the eighteenth century, if not worked.\n\nMers (Mirs) Bay is shown as being very small. A number of soundings near the entrance indicate the visit of a ship, so the error in its size and shape would seem to be yet another indication of poor visibility causing errors in observation.\n\nSuggested Identification of Place Names\n\n(Alphabetical Order)\n\n \n Botoe Is.\n East Brother (Siu Mo To)\n \n \n Cape Lintin and Bay\n South West Point and Deep Bay\n \n \n Castle Land\n Nam Tau Peninsula\n \n \n Chang Cheou Is.\n Cheung Chau\n \n \n Chin-falo\n Tsing Yi Island\n \n \n Co-chee\n Ma Wan Island\n \n \n Co-long\n Kowloon City\n \n \n False Hook\n Wong Chuk Kok (on Lamma Island)\n \n \n Fan-Chin-Cheou or He-ong-kong\n Hong Kong\n \n \n Furado or Poo Toy\n Po Toi Island (N.B. Fury Rocks, 1 Sea Mile to N.E. on modern charts)\n \n \n Hay-tae-man Bay\n Tai Shan Bay\n \n \n Ichou\n Chi Chau\n \n \n I of Gatto\n Shek Wu Chau\n \n \n Iron Point\n Fat Tau Point\n \n \n Keyzers Hook\n Fan Lau Point\n \n \n Lammon\n Lamma Island (Nam A Island)\n \n \n Lang Shitoe or Chato Id.\n Lafsami\n \n \n Lantoe or Magpyes Island\n Lantao Island\n \n \n Lantoe Bay\n Bay at Sham Tseng\n \n \n Lentua\n Lantao Island-Peninsula north of Cheung Chau\n \n \n Lintin\n Lintin\n \n \n Lon-ko\n Lung Kwu Chau", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1970.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/ww72j0241", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 207137, "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-1974", "page_number": 208, "title": "RAS-1974", "content_text": "202\n\nNOTES AND QUERIES\n\nmoon) by carpenters and varnishers (the latter generally worship his two wives).\" \n\n[Note the different date on which worship is carried on in Hong Kong. The above is given without the Chinese characters found in the original.]\n\nThe Kwong Yut Tong states that between 1000-1500 persons visit the temple annually on Lo Pan's birthday, drawn mostly from bosses and workers in the construction trades. The God must be considered to be effectual, since deities who perform no miracles soon lose support and patronage.\n\nThe hillside adjoining the temple has recently been cleared of squatter huts, and it is hoped to develop it as a public park,\n\nLady Ho Tung Hall, University of Hong Kong\n\nAccording to the HKU's Jubilee publication The First Fifty Years (HKU Press, 1962) this women's hall of residence was donated by Sir Robert Hotung a few years after the War, to be named after his deceased wife. The foundation stone was laid on 14th August 1950 and the hall opened on 16 March 1951. It provided accommodation for 85 of the 206 woman students then enrolled, and was in addition to two other halls of residence for women administered by religious bodies.\n\n(2) VISIT TO OLD WANCHAI\n\nFRIDAY, 5 APRIL 1974\n\nBackground and Early Development\n\nWanchai is one of the oldest districts of British Hong Kong. Under the name Ha Wan or 'Lower Bay', it was one of the 5 wan, alternatively 'bay' () or 'circuit' (#), a term used in the 1850's and 1860's to describe the residential and commercial areas largely developed by the new Chinese population of the Island. (See The China Review Vol. 1 (1872) p. 333 for an article \"The Districts of Hong Kong and the Name Kwan-Tai-Lo'.)\n\nThe area is described as follows in a list of the city districts, with boundaries, given in the Government gazette in 1857:\n\n'Ha Wan, District No. 5.\n\nFrom Murray Barracks to Observation Point',\n\nFootnote: Those members who visited the Lu Pan temple at Ching Lin Terrace, Kennedy Town, in January may wish to know that there is an article on this subject in Colonel V. R. Burkhardt's Chinese Creeds & Customs, Vol. 2, pp. 117-120. The statement therein that the temple was built in 1928 is misleading: the entrance is dated in 1884-85.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1974.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/x633mp077", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 207138, "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-1974", "page_number": 209, "title": "RAS-1974", "content_text": "NOTES AND QUERIES\n\n203\n\nAt this time the population of Ha Wan was 4861 (G.N. 21 of the Government gazette for 5th March 1859).\n\nObservation Point must be the Observation Place shown on the Map accompanying Mr. Chadwick's Report on the Sanitary Condition of Hong Kong, published by the Colonial Office in 1882. The map shows Ha Wan as District No. 6 and Wanchai as District No. 7. This indicates that Wanchai was taken from it at some date between 1857 and 1882. Observation Place is shown at p. 46 of the Index to the Streets, House Nos., and Lots in the Colony of Hong Kong, 1903, and may be identified with the lower end of the present Tin Lok Lane, near its junction with Hennessy Road, then seashore.\n\nWanchai was one of the first districts to be developed after the British Occupation of the Island in 1841. The Reverend Carl T. Smith has kindly provided an account of this development, based on his original researches into Hong Kong records. This is attached as a separate Note.\n\nThe Itinerary and Places of Interest\n\nThe party will follow a circuitous route among the back streets, steps and terraces of old Wanchai between Monmouth Path in the west and Stone Nullah Lane on the east.\n\nAmong the places of interest to be visited are several Chinese temples and shrines as follows:\n\n1) The Pak Kung Shrine at the side of No. 7, Star Street. This was established before the War, probably upwards of 70 years ago. The shrine is a To Tei Miu (±普普) or altar to the earth god. The main festival of the year falls on the 2nd day of the second lunar month when the management committee of local residents organises a religious and social celebration.\n\n2) Hung Shing Temple, Queen's Road East. This temple is one of the oldest of the area and may even have existed as a shrine before the British Occupation of the Island. According to Carl Smith there was a small settlement nearby which may have provided the body of regular worshippers, along with visiting boat people.\n\nThe present structure dates from Hsien Feng 10th year (1860-61), repaired in T’ung Chih 6th year (1867-68) when the persons responsible are listed as 'the whole body of devout Hong Kong believers'. These dates point to an earlier origin, and", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1974.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/x633mp077", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 207266, "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-1975", "page_number": 34, "title": "RAS-1975", "content_text": "26\n\nJOHN T. MYERS\n\nmanaged by members of one Chinese speech group, the Chiu-chow. The \"honorary\" committee members, the working committee members, the tan sang, and the kei tung are Chiu-chow. Observation of numerous possession ceremonies reveals that it is rare to discover a non-Chiu-chow among the worshippers. This de facto exclusivity is rendered more formal in a brochure advertising places for tablets of the deceased in the “Hall of 100 Surnames\" by the statement that the places are reserved for heung lei or fellow countrymen, i.e. fellow Chiu-chow.\n\nWhile from a ritual point of view Tai Wong Ye is correctly described as a spirit-medium temple, from a social point of view it is akin to a type which Feuchtwang2 designates a \"Compatriot” temple. It is a place where members of the Chiu-chow minority speech group can gather to converse freely in their native tongue, exchange useful information, and enjoy that sense of solidarity which Durkheim posits as the chief product of shared ritual. The low-keyedness of the ritual offerings is understandable when one realizes that the target population is one already predisposed by regional socialization to accept the reality and effectiveness of the kei tung's mediumship. Our conclusion therefore is that the success of the Kwun Tong spirit-medium temple is due more to the social selectivity of its appeal than to a heightened interest in spirits and their mediums on the part of the general population.\n\nNOTES\n\n1 Firth 1959, p. 141.\n\n2 Feuchtwang, no reference details available.\n\n3 Elliott, 1955.\n\n4 Jordan, 1972.\n\n5 Ahern, 1973.\n\n6 Potter, 1974.\n\n7 This observation is based on casual questioning of Hong Kong residents over a three-year time period.\n\n8 Potter, op. cit.\n\n9 The Chiu-Chow and Hoi-Luk-Fung people's native regions are the eastern coastal counties of Kwangtung Province. The Hokkien are natives of Fukien Province which is immediately east of Kwangtung Province.\n\n10 Tak Kaau is a syncretic cult which claims tens of thousands of supporters from the Chiu-Chow communities in Southeast Asia. Although more ritual attention is awarded to Chinese deities the Tak Kaau pantheon includes Christ, Allah, and deities from the Hindu religion.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1975.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/j0995146d", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 207838, "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-1976", "page_number": 226, "title": "RAS-1976", "content_text": "SOCIAL RESEARCH IN THE N.T. OF HONG KONG, 1963 211\n\n35. Village Representatives differ among themselves in respect of the 'constitutional' conditions in which they come into office. In some communities, perhaps the majority, elections never take place, the Village Representative commanding enough general influence to enter unopposed. In others a ballot is held and then the question of the franchise arises, especially in regard to the newly immigrant population who can lay no claim to be established villagers and whose interests have nevertheless to be represented. If they are in fact given the vote then it must be because each candidate has decided that he can win their support. In the Tai Po District, and I suppose generally in the New Territories, the vote is given to the heads of households, so that the electorate may be said generally to represent mature male opinion.\n\n36. Who would be a Village Representative? He draws no pay and belongs to a body, the Rural Committee, which has no formal powers. But in fact candidates are forthcoming, and there is evidence that many men are willing to work hard in office. They gain prestige, and if they are ambitious enough, they may eventually reach the Heung Yee Kuk. Certainly, Village Representatives give the impression of being very busy men, running constantly to the District Office, mediating between the Administration and their constituents, and consulting with one another. From the Administration's point of view Village Representatives are what their name implies, but it is a matter of common observation that in their own communities they are called 'village heads' (ts'uen cheung). What power do they in effect have? They are not a sole channel through which relations between the villagers and the Administration flow, for any individual is free to approach the District Office or one of its staff in the field, and many exercise this right freely, especially in areas where communications are good. But a villager's claim on the attention of officials is presumably strengthened when he has his Representative (his headman from his point of view) to speak for or stand by him, and from this position the Village Representative is able to extract a power advantage which in reality raises him above the status of a mere mouthpiece for his constituency. Again, when he is called upon to represent to the Administration the state of opinion in his community on a particular issue or to aid in conveying to the community an instruction from the Administration, the Village Representative is able to some extent to manipulate the reactions of his people, perhaps sometimes for his own ends,", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1976.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/hq382988q", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 208746, "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": 203, "title": "RAS-1979", "content_text": "RELIGIOUS LIFE IN PRESENT-DAY TAIWAN: A PRELIMINARY REPORT'\n\nJULIAN F. PAS*\n\nThis report is a preliminary attempt to describe and interpret the present-day religious situation in Taiwan. It is based on my personal field work observations and data collected in Taiwan during 1977-78 (ca. 12 months); but is supplemented by a great variety of recent publications both in Chinese and in Western languages. The reason why Taiwan was chosen as the observation field is practical and has nothing to do with political viewpoints or preferences. Besides, it is my belief that the religious practices observed in Taiwan reflect, if not the whole of China, at least a large area of South China, where many of the modern Taiwan practices actually originated. We may here apply the saying that many people in Taiwan quoted to me when discussing their religions: Ta-t'ung hsiao-yi ★ identity in the main lines, with variations in detail. However, oversimplification would not do justice to the complex situation. The picture, indeed, is complex but significant: its complexity will be shortly discussed; its significance is manifest from the fact that Taiwan, although the smallest province of China, has maintained and developed religious practices which once were observed on the mainland but have probably become extinct there. Who knows, whether these practices flourishing today in Taiwan are perhaps also an “endangered species”?\n\nFor the time being, however, religious life in Taiwan is flourishing as perhaps never before. The situation is hard to describe and interpret to its full extent. This report mainly reflects my own experiences and is therefore by its very nature limited and perhaps, occasionally biased.\n\nMy report consists of three parts: first I shall point out and analyse various reasons of complexity; secondly, discuss one by one the participants on the religious scene; and in the third place attempt to pinpoint, by process of induction and by intuition, some of the major characteristics of modern Chinese religion as practised in Taiwan.\n\n* Dr. Pas is Associate Professor, Department of Far Eastern Studies at the University of Saskatchewan, Saskatoon, Canada.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1979.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/2801w5938", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 209036, "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-1980", "page_number": 198, "title": "RAS-1980", "content_text": "BOOK REVIEWS\n\nANCESTRAL IMAGES, MORE ANCESTRAL IMAGES, ANCESTRAL IMAGES AGAIN Dr. Hugh Baker, Hong Kong, South China Morning Post Ltd., pp. viii, 162, viii, 164, viii, 186.\n\nThe first volume in this series was reviewed in the Journal by Dr. Marjorie Topley a few years ago. Since then, two more volumes in this popular series have appeared and I have no doubt that they will be reprinted frequently to meet public demand.\n\nThe three books' main asset is their easy style and readability. This is due to the wide observation of the anthropologist - Dr. Baker's own discipline - a good command of Chinese and Cantonese dialect - Dr. Baker is also a teacher of Chinese language and the added benefit of his wide reading in older books which provide a wider background to his stories. \"I have spent hours trapped inside some of the books\", he writes. In addition, there are excellent photographs from his own collection, most of which are reproduced in colour.\n\nThe result is far and away the best and most enlightening introduction to the history and customs of the New Territories. The books show the reader what to look out for, and give him some idea of background and wider connections.\n\nTo my mind each volume is better than the one before. In the third, in particular, Dr. Baker's familiarity with his subject leads to a great ease that, combined with his excellent sense of humour and sense of timing, provides some really entertaining reading. See pages 36-37, 65, 92, 122 (with photograph), 128, 150 to cite only a few examples. But let no one think that this means \"light\" content. I have found many illuminating things in these volumes, and enjoyed stories and situations from life which gave added point to things I have half understood for years. This arises largely from Dr. Baker's eighteen-month stay in Sheung Shui village in the New Territories in the mid 1960s, and his keen observation of the Hong Kong scene in later visits.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1980.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/kh04md207", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 209787, "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": 46, "title": "RAS-1983", "content_text": "24\n\nintellectual effort of redefining religious aims and methods and it is doubtful whether monks in Hong Kong have embarked on this soul-searching trip yet.\n\nThis article is about how Hong Kong has provided a unique challenge to the Buddhist sangha and a report of its response to these challenges. Hong Kong is unique in the sense that it is a rare meeting point of Chinese and Western cultures and a highly developed city where technology and science have taken hold. One can imagine that because of this Buddhism would have had to make dramatic changes. However, the case is not so simple. The changes made to Buddhism in Hong Kong should be seen in context. Many of the temples in Hong Kong have long connections with those in China. The changes in the sangha are better seen as a continuation of the adjustments to modern life which have arisen in China generally since the latter half of the nineteenth century. Holmes Welch's observation a little over twenty years ago is still basically valid:\n\nWe may say that Buddhism in Hong Kong fits into the pattern of Chinese Buddhism as a whole over the past hundred years: revitalization of faith and practice among laymen, sparked by a few really able monks, whose talents stand in all the greater contrast to those of most of their brethren.1\n\nOf course, the march of time has forced what twenty years ago were recognized merely as tendencies to become vastly more powerful currents, some of which have reached critical proportions.\n\nThe problems confronting the practical aspect of this research are many. The concept of 'self-perception' is not a frequent item within the monk's vocabulary. None of the monks I interviewed could give a satisfactory answer when the question was put to them directly. My conclusions are deductions based on the above interviews and on magazine articles.\n\n11. General situation faced by Buddhism in Hong Kong\n\nWe need a general description of the sangha in order to provide the context in which specific issues can be discussed.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1983.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/j9607p61v", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 209800, "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": 59, "title": "RAS-1983", "content_text": "37\n\nhas apparent existence because of the apparent union of countless dust particles. Aside from the dust particles, there is no world. Similarly, according to modern scientific view, the world is made up of atoms. Aside from the atoms, there is no world.23\n\nThe third argument is that since the Buddha's teaching is the truth, it must contain all the knowledge ever discovered by science. However, the Buddha's words do not contain every detail of science, but they do contain the principles from which science is derived. One writer puts it: \"Although Buddhism is not science, it is science and philosophy on a higher level.\"24 Another writer puts it: \"Buddhism is the philosophy from which science is derived.”26 Since Buddhism is super science, it fulfills the a priori conditions of not getting into conflict with science.\n\nThe fourth kind of argument is the reconciliation of apparent contradictions between science and Buddhist teaching. One problem discussed is the existence of Amitabha's western paradise. The conviction that the world is a globe spinning round the sun has rendered the interpretation of the term \"west\" rather problematical. Two essays have been written to solve this problem and I leave the reader to reconstruct the arguments for themselves.20\n\nIV. The Self-perception of the Monks\n\nAt the outset of this paper, the observation was made that the monk's self-perception changes in relation to his perception of the reality around him. At whatever point in time, monkhood must maintain its sense of purpose. The monk must find his own life attractive and his sense of value adjusted to his perception of reality, which cannot be totally cut off from the community's perception of it. Hong Kong has experienced a lot of changes in recent decades and these changes posed challenges to the sangha and I have documented some of its major responses. Here I shall discuss the monks' self-perception in terms of these responses.\n\nDuring the last two or three decades, monks in Hong Kong have experienced great changes in material conditions. There have been great fluctuations in the numbers of monks when immigrant monks came from mainland China and later dispersed", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1983.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/j9607p61v", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 214369, "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": 227, "title": "RAS-1998", "content_text": "193\n\nThese communist iconoclastic campaigns are by no means unique in Chinese history. Over the centuries one or other of the beliefs have found favour at the expense of others, temples have been razed, religious communities dispersed and images destroyed. Within the past century and a half we have seen the Taiping Rebellion of the mid 19th century which covered much of central-southern China; the Boxer Rebellion of the turn of the century in northern China; and the nationwide Anti-Superstition Campaign of the Republican Kuomintang in the late 1920s, all of which destroyed temples and their contents. From an historic preservation point of view it is worth recalling that temples within the two foreign colonies at the mouth of the Pearl River, held by Portugal and Britain, remained unscathed during these years and, in Macau for instance, some of the images and temples date back three to four hundred years.\n\nWe look forward then with great interest to see what will happen in the future to the urban and rural temples and shrines in Hong Kong and Macau. They are sure to survive though I have a horrible suspicion that sooner or later they might be converted to electronic devices.\n\nNOTES\n\nIt is not difficult to see how the confusion rose in Chinese minds. During the 19th and early 20th centuries Catholic and Protestant missionaries rarely co-operated and, in many places, actually denounced the other as heterodox. Also, the Catholic priests, berobed bachelors, with prayers and chants in a dead language, with church images and incense, were sufficiently similar to the Buddhists for the Chinese to empathise. Protestant missionaries on the other hand tended to be married and live isolated from their parishioners; they dressed either as pseudo-Chinese or in dark heavy western suits, and lived frugally whilst preaching of hell fire and damnation. To the Chinese these were two entirely separate religions.\n\nIf we take as a very rough estimate 6,000 temples in present day Taiwan where religious freedom is permitted and temples have been flourishing, then the figure of 20,000 in the coastal province in mainland China opposite to Taiwan across the Straits must include every possible shrine, never mind how small.\n\n3 I have to thank Professor K Dean of McGill University for this observation.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1998.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/1g05n0794", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 215869, "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-2002", "page_number": 168, "title": "RAS-2002", "content_text": "101\n\nSURVEY OF THE DEVIL'S PEAK REDOUBT\n\nAND\n\nGOUGH BATTERY\n\nLAWRENCE LAI WAI CHUNG, DANIEL HO CHI WING AND LEUNG HING FUNG\n\nPurpose of this note\n\n1\n\nThis short note presents the key land and building survey findings about the existing physical forms of the sites and building structures for the redoubt (the Devil's Peak Redoubt) and Gough Battery on Devil's Peak,1 an ex-British military site in Hong Kong. It elaborates from a surveying point of view on pioneer works of Bard (1988); Ko and Wordie (1996); and Ko (2001) known to the authors.\n\nBackground of survey\n\nConducted in June, July, August, and November 2002 by a local chartered land surveyor, the said survey was sponsored by a grant obtained by the first two authors from the Lord Wilson Heritage Trust. This grant has been awarded for a study of the disused military sites on Devil's Peak as part of the heritage of Hong Kong and to promote their conservation and better future use.\n\nPart of the study is the detailed land surveying and filming2 of four clusters of sites. They are the Devil's Peak Redoubt on the highest ground of Devil's Peak (generally at about 222m), which has a satellite pentagonal pillbox3 with loopholes of the same design adopted for the firing walls of the redoubt; a site at 196 m further down (possibly an observation and fire command post) along the ridge line of Devil's Peak; the Gough Battery (at about 160 m); and the Pottinger Battery (at about 81 m). Figure 1 shows the present environment of Devil's Peak, Figure 2 shows a bird's eye view of the redoubt, the 196 m site, and Gough Battery.\n\nA dugout connects the redoubt and the 196m site and there was an old military path that linked the latter site with the Gough Battery. The Kwun Tong District Board has re-paved this path, converted the mud track from Gough Battery to the redoubt into a cement path, and", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2002.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/mp4901278", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 215900, "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-2002", "page_number": 199, "title": "RAS-2002", "content_text": "indicated the establishment for the battery observation post (BOP), battery plotting room (BPR), and Eastern Fire Command. A total of 88 officers and soldiers were proposed.\n\n30 December 1936 The 12 Heavy Battery dismantled the 9.2-inch gun at Gough Battery (The two 9.2-inch guns at Pottinger were left for the moment).\n\n23 October 1937\n\n1939/1940\n\nJoint Overseas and Home Defence Committee considered re-fortification or de-militarisation of Hong Kong, assuming that it took 90 days for the fleet to relieve Hong Kong. Bokhara Battery constructed.\n\n1940\n\nThe guns at Pottinger Battery removed.\n\nA Japanese military map shows the details of defence deployment at Devil's Peak. It states that for the Devil's Peak defence works, \"underground passages have been altered and barbed wire added.\"\n\n12 December 1941 During the early hours, the 5/7 Rajputs and 1 Mountain Battery took up positions at Devil's Peak. The six 3.7-inch howitzers of the 1st Mtn Bty fired 400 rounds at the advancing Japanese, who were at Black Hill.\n\nThe 5th Anti Aircraft Regiment also moved to Devil's Peak with 6 Lewis Guns\n\nAt 1800 hours, the garrison received orders to withdraw to Hong Kong Island. The evacuation took place the next morning.\n\nRollo, 1992, p.119\n\n2\n\nRollo, 1992, p.113\n\nRollo, 1992, p.120, p.201\n\nEmpson, 1992, p.146 (Plate 2-12)\n\nThe arcs of fire of Devil's Peak's batteries can be found in Rollo, 1992, at p.123\n\nRollo, 1992, p.130, p.171, 173\n\nPRO 16947\n\nPRO 17849\n\n15 December 1941\n\n13 December 1941 Coast defence batteries on Hong Kong Island shelled Devil's Peak, now in Japanese hands.\n\nPak Sha Wan Battery hit by Japanese light artillery fire from Devil's Peak.\n\nRollo, 1992, p.131\n\n18 December 1941\n\nPak Sha Wan Battery fired at Devil's Peak Village.\n\n1944\n\nA USAAF aerial photograph shows Hong Kong Island and Kowloon, including the Devil's\n\nRollo, 1992, p.133\n\nRollo, 1992, p.135\n\n132", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2002.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/mp4901278", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 216166, "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-2002", "page_number": 465, "title": "RAS-2002", "content_text": "A NOTE ON THE JAPANESE GUN EMPLACEMENT AT TATHONG POINT, TUNG LUNG CHAU\n\nROBERT HORSNELL\n\n399\n\nAt Tathong Point, also known as Nam Tong Mei, a small rocky peninsular at the extreme southern tip of Tung Lung Island, there still exists the remains of a little known war-time Japanese gun emplacement. Its purpose was probably to protect the south-eastern approaches to Victoria Harbour. This gun emplacement is not mentioned in the book Ruins of War by Tim Ko and Jason Wordie and is not listed in the Gazetteer of the Batteries of the Fixed Defences of Hong Kong in Denis Rollo's book The Guns and Gunners of Hong Kong, although Rollo does mention an observation post for the Devil's Peak Battery at the southern end of Tung Lung Island built in 1935/36. From information in an old Public Works Department file it appears that the gun emplacement was built by the Japanese during the Occupation (1941-1945).\n\nIn 1965, the gun emplacement was converted by the Public Works Department's Architectural Office into an engine room for the Marine Department's Tathong Point Lighthouse Station to house the electric marine light, foghorn engines, light standby engine and switchboard. The staff quarters adjacent to the engine room were built later in 1973/74 to replace the old lighthouse keeper's quarters built in 1949 lower down near the jetty and landing stage. The old vacated quarters were used as stores for some time then later demolished. The remains of the concrete platforms on which these old buildings were built can still be seen amongst the rocks.\n\nFrom the original P.W.D. drawings for the conversion works, it is possible to learn something about the construction of the gun emplacement. It was built of concrete with a floor area of about 40 square metres. The walls are about one metre thick but the roof is much thicker especially over the rear part which contained the expense magazines. The chamber which housed the gun consists of a rectangular room with a semi-circular bow front in which the wide angle embrasure for the gun was formed. The armament is not known but from the size of the gun embrasure it was probably a large coastal defence gun.\n\nPage 465\n\nPage 466", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2002.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/mp4901278", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 216167, "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-2002", "page_number": 466, "title": "RAS-2002", "content_text": "400\n\nequivalent to the 9.2 inch guns at Mount Davis and Stanley Fort Batteries. The gun embrasure was bricked up as part of the 1974 conversion works and steel dead shoring erected to provide extra support for the overhanging cantilevered canopy. A new door opening was also formed in 1974 in the rear wall. The original door opening is still there and leads to a small rear compartment with three recesses in the wall noted on the P.W.D. drawing as 'voids' which would have been the expense magazines. The original rear entrance staircase to the gun emplacement was filled in with compacted earth and slabbed over with concrete.\n\nThe 1968 Hong Kong Government 1:1,000 scale Survey Sheet (Sheet Number 16-NW-2D) shows several small rectangular structures near the gun emplacement, but there is no indication what they were originally. One was probably a searchlight emplacement and another one near the cliff edge may have been a forward observation post. Another rectangle marked 'R' for ruin on the inland side of the hill may have been the main magazine as it appears to have what looks like a separate blast wall constructed along one side of it. Still yet another structure further down the hillside may have been a barrack block for the gun crew. All this is of course conjecture and independent verification and further research are needed.\n\nA report on the gun emplacement was prepared in 1999 by the writer and submitted to the Antiquities and Monuments Office for record purposes. It is however unlikely that the structure will be graded as a historical building or receive cultural heritage status. Due to its remoteness Tathong Point is not easily accessible and with its dangerous steep and rocky cliffs it is not recommended to encourage the general public to visit the site. Permission from the Marine Department would be necessary anyway.\n\nTo illustrate the hazards involved in visiting Tathong Point, an incident recorded in the Public Works Department file should be mentioned. The file contains a memorandum (Memo) from the Director of Marine to the Director of Public Works reporting that at 11:00 hours in September 1966 (exact date not given) the launch “Ming Kee” carrying 12 'light-house workers' capsized off the Tathong Point Light House. All were saved by a sampan which was fishing in the vicinity. Enquiries revealed that the workers were employed by the Fook Lee", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2002.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/mp4901278", "rank": 0 } ]