Jerome Yuchien's Ph.D Thesis
Chapter Five: The Deification of Stones and Tree (part VIII)
VIII. Conclusion:
Due to the lack of data, studies of stone and tree worship in the western world are difficult. So far only little literary and archaeological evidence can offer some indirect background for interpretation (cf. Graesser 1972). Therefore, the deification legends derived from my field research are relatively significant. They can help us understand why some stones and trees, while remaining their botanical or geological forms, are regarded as the sacred. They can also help us understand that it is vital to comprehend the significance of these deifications in their own cultural context, if we are to know why some forms can be treated as divine while others are not. However, people are sometimes attracted by certain stones and trees and thus worshipped them without any obvious cultural reason. Probably, it can only be explained from psychological points of view.
As far as the field of Chinese religious studies is concerned, the initiations of Chinese popular cults cannot be explained away by the phrase "because of the increasing recognition of their efficacy." Only through the collection of literary data and long-term field work can we comprehend them. In addition, the field data can help illustrate that some natural objects are themselves treated as animate, some are regarded as having gods inhabiting them, while others are simply considered as objects representing the deities similar to the function of deity statues. The difference between the natural objects (no matter whether they are themselves animate, having gods inhabiting them, or representing the deities) and the deity statues is that for the latter, before they are worshipped, a rite of inspiriting (rushen) should be performed, while for the natural objects it is not required.
It is also noteworthy that none of the stones and trees which were deified since they performed miracles are treated as the Land God.(note.18) It is perhaps because the Land God has a firm place in Chinese popular religion and is universally worshipped throughout Chinese world, he does not need to perform miracles in order to get deification. However, it might be because these divine stones and trees are not popular enough to attract the elites' notice to standardise them, their legends tend to be locally told and orally transmitted and thus still consist of certain miracles.
Furthermore, if putting our interpretation of the deification legends into Chinese cultural context, we will understand why people make efforts to historicise the deities' legends. History means something real and unchangeable. With historicisation, these legends, like Chinese understanding of history, become real and unchangeable. In order to keep these legends as real histories, the local leaders cannot tolerate divergent legends. For this reason, most of time I could get only one version of a temple's deification legend.
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(note.1)
For an excellent discussion of the tautology, please see Sangren (1984:10).
(note.2)
I am aware that the "stories" collected from field work can be categorized as "myths", "legends", "narratives", "history", or "tales" etc., However, as my informants regard what they told me as "chuanshuo", I shall translate these stories as "legends".
(note.3)
However, some told me that the divination was through a shaman and the depth he should dig for the cylindrical stone was 180 cm.
(note.4)
For the details of the lottery, please see Chapter Seven.
(note.5)
Yuan Chang-rue (1993:6-7) also documents the Mango King of Jiayi (Chia-yi) County, which was deified because of performing a miracle. Over 100 years ago, one day a farmer carried the dead body of his child to the cemetery to bury. Finding he had forgotten to bring his hoe with him, he laid the dead body of the child under a mango tree and headed home. When he returned, he found the child had recovered. On the night of that very day, he had a dream and learned that it was the mango tree god that had brought his child back to life. To repay the grace that the god granted him, he carved out a joss out of the mango tree to worship. Later on, because of the efficacy of the god in curing diseases, fund was raised by the local people to build a temple to honour the god. Now the god has become the patron god of the locality.
(note.6)
There are many examples indicative of the ability of Chinese living among non-Chinese peoples to incorporate local elements in their religion. In Malaya, Chinese are reported to worship at shrines to Malay saints and spirit medium cults have arisen at which Malay-speaking saints appear (Shepherd 1984:48).
(note.7)
For the term "dolmen", I shall follow the definition of Edsman (1987:50) and mean "a table stone or large, flat, unhewn stone resting horizontally on upright ones."
(note.8)
Similarly, the Tree God of Peng-ho Ward (#T3; see figure 68), the Tree God of Thau-hun Village (#T4; see figure 69), the Tree God of Siong-tek Village (#T5; see figure 70), the Tree God of Kang-khau Ward (#T8; see figure 73), the tree Land God of In-suan Street (#T11; see figure 76), the tree Land God of the East Gate (#T12; see figure 77), the Banyan Grandfather of Ka-lo Ward (#T13; see figure 78), the Divine Tree of Pen-teng Ward (#T19; see figure 84), the Tree God of Cho.-su Lane (#T22; see figure 88), the Tree God of Uan-chip Road (#T23; see figure 89), the Tree God of Lo-chui Village (#T24; see figure 90), the Tree God of Po-san Ward (#T31; see figure 97), the Tree God of Chheng-bek Ward (#T32; see figure 98) and the Tree God of Chhau-o. Hamlet (#T38; see figure 104) are all deified by the same reason (see also Appendix).
(note.9)
Due to the lack of historical records and the limitation of the field interview, so far I am not able to figure out the reason for sacralizing the following stone and tree deities. They are: the Stone Goddess of Pak-biau Ward (#S1), the Stone Goddess of Ka-seng Ward (#S2; see figure 2), the Stone God of Jin-ho Village (#S11; see figure 11), the Stone God of Tho.-sian Ward (#S20; see figure 20), the Divine Stone of Giong-tek Boulevard (#S41; see figure 43), the stone Land God of Tiang-ken Village (#S53; see figure 58). Of course, as I have argued above, in many cases, there may have been no reason why a particular stone rather than another was chosen (see also Appendix).
(note.10)
Allan (1979:3), when doing research on religious belief of the Shang Dynasty, also maintains that it is impossible to tell whether natural objects were themselves considered animate or other gods inhabited them.
(note.11)
The question whether stones and trees are themselves deities or possessed by certain supernatural beings can be discussed by the academic terms "animism" and "animatism". However, due to the various degrees of definiteness of definition of these terms, I shall avoid using them.
(note.12)
Watson (1985:310) also reports a stone serving as the representation of a goddess:
Some time in the misty past, so the story goes, a cone-shaped stone was dredged up by a fishing net. The stone was taken to be the representation of a deity and installed in a shrine near the place where a small stream (Sand River) emptied into the sea. This minor deity, it is said, was worshipped by fisherpeople and itinerants who lived along the coast -- sedentary farmers were not involved in the cult.
(note.13)
"Hierophany (from Greek hiero-, 'sacred,' and phainein, 'to show')" is a term created by Eliade to designate the general manifestation of the sacred (Eliade & Sullivan 1987:313).
(note.14)
As mentioned in Chapter One, some cylindrically shaped stones are found in an Alizu temple at Beitouyang. They are readily interpreted as phalli (Shepherd 1984:39). But it is a Plain Aboriginal cult.
(note.15)
The legend is very much similar to the one recorded by Wei & Coutanceau (1976:96-98). The only difference is that the Land God, the protagonist of this legend, does not appear in Wei & Coutanceau's record. For convenience's sake, the wording of the legend is based on that of Wei & Coutanceau.
(note.16)
Cormack (1974:138-89) also records a similar legend of the Mid- autumn Ethnic Revolt. However, the revolt was not inspired by the Land God but by "a heaven-sent impulse".
(note.17)
The other cause that I could not get more versions of a temple's deification legend is, I think, due to the lack of historical records and the limitation of my field interview.
(note.18)
As far as I know, only the case reported by Liu Zhiwan (1961:127) is an exception:
In Nantou City, Taiwan, there is a stone venerated in a temple. I was told that in the eleventh lunar month of 1869, there were three stones suddenly shining in the night. The people of this locality considered it a miracle performed by the Land God and built a humble shrine to house and worship them for the well-being and harvest. In 1923, the shrine was enlarged and a statue of the Land God was positioned. Nowadays, people regard the statue as the Land God and the stone (the other two stones missing) as the Stone God (my translation).
