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Procursus:
George MacKay had been a Canadian missionary in Taiwan (Formosa) for 23 years when the fourth edition of his autobiography, From Far Formosa was published in 1895, the same year in which the island was ceded by the Chinese emperor to Japan. He had travelled much and was well acquainted with local life. It is for him that the famous MacKay hospital was named.
He had no use whatever for the religious customs that he witnessed, however, which he described as a "poisonous mixture" and "damning nightmare," "degrading the intellect, defiling life, and destroying all religious sentiment." And he was scornful of English writers who admired Asian religions based on a western reading of their texts, but ignorant of how they were actually practiced.
To exemplify the kinds of practices that so bothered him, he included some quite vivid descriptions in From Far Formosa. Although people today would perhaps describe these things more sympathetically, there is little doubt that people today (including Taiwanese today) would, like MacKay, have found them troubling.
For on-line reading, I have added numbered subtitles, have broken long paragraphs into shorter ones, and have guessed at the probable Chinese characters. I have also modernized spellings for identifiable Chinese terms and place names.
DKJ
Source:
- MacKAY, George Leslie
- 1895 From far Formosa: the island, its people and missions. Fourth edition. New York: Fleming H. Revell Company. Pp 126-131.
The Chinese in Formosa have innumerable gods and goddesses, many religious festivals, and countless superstitions that burden their life. The names of their idols would fill pages, and the details of their beliefs and worship volumes. There are gods having authority over each of the various powers of nature, departments of industry, relationships of life, states of feeling, physical conditions, and moral sentiments. Some have been worshiped for centuries; others are of recent date. Some are universal, receiving the adoration of all classes throughout the Chinese empire; others are local or special, and are reverenced only in particular localities or by certain orders.
The origin of the worship of many of the idols is a mystery, but modern instances are suggestive. In 1878 a girl living not far from Tamsui [Mandarin: Dànshuǐ 淡水, Hokkien: Tām-chuí] wasted away and died, a. victim of consumption [tuberculosis]. Some one in that neighborhood, more gifted than the rest, announced that a goddess was there, and the wasted skeleton of the girl became immediately famous. She was given the name Sien-lu-niu [possibly: Mandarin: Xiānnǚ Niáng 仙女娘, Hokkien: Sian-lú-niûⁿ] ("Virgin Goddess"), and a small temple was erected for her worship.
The body was put into salt and water for some time, and then placed in a sitting position in an armchair, with a red cloth around the shoulders and a wedding-cap upon the head; and seen through the glass, the black face, with the teeth exposed, looked very much like an Egyptian mummy. Mock money was burned and incense-sticks laid in front. Passers-by were told the story, and as they are willing to worship anything supposed to have power to help or harm, the worship of this new goddess began.
Before many weeks hundreds of sedan-chairs could be seen passing and repassing, bringing worshipers, especially women, to this shrine. Rich men sent presents to adorn the temple, and all took up the cry of this new goddess. But the devotees were disappointed, for the divining-blocks gave no certain answers; and while they might continue to reverence an unanswering goddess whom their ancestors had worshiped before them, they had not the same respect for a new candidate.
One woman who had heard the gospel several years before, while we were preaching in the town of Kim-pau-li [possibly: Mandarin: Jīnbāo lǐ 金包里, Hokkien: kim-pau-lí, today part of Hépíng Cūn 和平村, Jīnshān Xiāng 金山鄉 in Táiběi Xiàn 臺北縣], was being carried to worship at this temple; and when on a high narrow path, through some accident she was tumbled down the bank in her sedan-chair. She returned home very much displeased with herself, and angry at those who introduced this new object of worship. Her confidence in the idol was all the more easily shaken because of the secret working in her mind and heart of the gospel heard years before. Indeed, all attempts to make the worship of this new goddess popular and universal failed, and failed because "the light of life was in the field." A hundred years ago, however, she would soon have had millions before her presenting their offerings and beseeching her favor.
Idol-temples are common throughout the country, and idols may be seen under trees and near bridges for travelers and chance devotees to burn money and toss the divining-blocks. Their method of petition is saddening to behold. Divining, blocks are used. These are made of bamboo roots split into two pieces, each piece having one side convex, the other fiat. With these two blocks, two or three inches in length, the petitioner stands before the idol and offers his prayer. The petition is presented in the form of a question; e.g., "O idol, will you give me wealth? "
The blocks are then waved in the hands three times and tossed on the floor. If either the two convex or the two flat sides are turned upward the answer of the idol is in the negative; but if one convex and one flat side be upward the answer is in the affirmative.
If the petition be granted the blocks are returned to their place, and vows may be made and mock money either burned or placed in front of the idol. The offerings presented are in accordance with the favors granted. Should the divining-blocks return a negative answer from the god, the petitioner, if very importunate, will try again and again, and this "heads or tails" form of prayer may be kept up until the desired answer is obtained.
Idolatry is the mother of a very extensive industry, as the manufacture of idols is a thriving business. There is little art about it, as the Chinese idols are inartistic in form, grotesque, hideous. They are made sometimes of stone or bronze, generally of wood or clay. The wood of the camphor-tree is often used in idol manufacture.
After much use the idol is taken back for repairs —repainted, regilded, an arm or head to be replaced, an ear reset, or the eyes to be touched up or made new. The various parts are cut out or moulded into shape and put together by the idol-maker, and the devotee walks out of the place with the God of War or the Goddess of the Sea! The paper money used in worship is made out of tinfoil, beaten thin, and sold in packages. A great number of men are employed in the manufacture of candles for idolatrous purposes.
Many of the Chinese, especially the women, are devout worshipers; many others are skeptical, and the majority are careless. Idolatry has a powerful hold on their minds, but it is only when reverses and troubles come that the average man will resort to the temple. They believe the gods have power to help or to injure them, but so long as things go well they are careless about their devotions. There are great occasions when a feast is held or a general offering made, and then all devotional arrearages are wiped out.
I once attended an immense gathering in honor of the God of Medicine, when an offering of two hundred hogs was made. It was on the birthday of the god, and in a grass hut on a small plateau five miles north of Tamsui the idol was seated. In front of the god, pork, fowl, rice, fish, eggs, tea, and spirituous liquors were set. A Tauist priest performed incantations, bowing, chanting, and beseeching the god to be favorable and to partake of the feast provided. Fragrant incense-sticks were burned, and at intervals mock money was offered.
Outside the hut men were busy preparing the great feast for the god. Two hundred dressed hogs, on frames prepared for the purpose, were ranged all around in rows, an orange in the- mouth of each, and a large knife stuck in the back of the neck. These hogs varied in weight from fifty to four hundred and eighty pounds.
Fully four thousand men, women, and children were present, each family displaying its own articles to the best advantage. In the evening torches, music, and theatrical performances added to the honor done to the poor camphor-wood god in the grass hut.
The most elaborate and hideous scene I ever witnessed was the "Seventh Moon Feast." The seventh month was the time for making offerings to all departed spirits. It was a time of great festivity and excitement. The custom prevailed in all the cities and towns in North Formosa of erecting, in an open space of several acres, great cone-like structures of bamboo poles, from five to ten feet in diameter at the base, and sometimes fifty or sixty feet high.
Around these cones, from bottom to top, immense quantities of food, offered to the spirits, were tied in rows. There were ducks and smaller fowl, dead and alive, pork, fish, cakes, fruits, bananas, pineapples, and all manner of delicacies in season; and fastened everywhere in the mass were hundreds of huge fire-crackers.
On one occasion I saw fifty such cones at a feast at Bang-kah [possibly: Měngjiá 艋舺, Hokkien: Béng-kah, today a district of Táiběi 臺北]. It was a gruesome sight. When night came on and the time for summoning the spirits approached, the cones were illuminated by dozens of lighted candles. Then the priests took up their position on a raised platform, and by clapping their hands and sounding a large brass gong they called the spirits of all the departed to come and feast on the food provided. "Out of the night and the other world" the dead were given time to come and to gorge themselves on the "spiritual" part of the feast, the essence, that was suited to their ethereal requirements.
Meanwhile a very unspiritual mob — thousands and thousands of hungry beggars, tramps, blacklegs, desperadoes of all sorts, from the country towns, the city slums, or venturing under cover of the night from their hiding-places among the hills — surged and swelled in every part of the open space, impatiently waiting their turn at the feast. When the spirits had consumed the "spiritual" part, the "carnal" was the property of the mob, and the mob quite approved of this division. But the time seemed long.
At length the spirits were satisfied, and the gong was sounded once more. That was the signal for the mob; and scarcely had the first stroke fallen when that whole scene was one mass of arms and legs and tongues. Screaming, cursing, howling, like demons of the pit, they all joined in the onset. A rush was made for the cones, and those nearest seized the supports and pulled now this way, now that. The huge, heavily laden structures began to sway from side to side until with a crash one after another fell into the crowd, crushing their way to the ground. Then it was every man for himself. In one wild scramble, groaning and yelling all the while, trampling on those who had lost their footing or were smothered by the falling cones, fighting and tearing one another like mad dogs, they all made for the coveted food.
It was a very bedlam, and the wildness of the scene was enhanced by the irregular explosion of the fire-crackers and the death-groan of some one worsted in the fray. As each secured what he could carry, he tried to extricate himself from the mob, holding fast to the treasures for which he had fought, and of which the less successful in the outskirts of the crowd would fain plunder him. Escaping the mob, he hurried to his home, expecting every moment to be attacked by those who thought it easier to waylay and rob the solitary spoilsman than to join in the general scramble in the plain.
One cannot estimate the demoralizing effects of such feasts; and it is to the credit of that progressive governor, Liu Ming Chuan [Liú Míngchuán 劉銘傳], that the barbarities of the "Seventh Moon Feast" have been entirely abolished in Formosa. Such a sight as has been described will never again be witnessed there.