China’s “united front” gets involved in almost every aspect of Taiwan. In the case of Taiwan’s folk culture, this takes the form of “your deities and Buddhist figures all came from China.” Although the organizers likely did not have this intention in mind, this year’s “Welcoming the Wangye Royal Lords” festival in Pingtung County’s Donggang Township (東港) offered a clear response: Taiwanese folk beliefs are not only 100 percent Taiwanese, but one could even say they are “anti-Chinese.”
One of the highlights of the ceremony this year was the creation of a huge dragon mosaic out of slices of dried mullet roe, a local specialty. In ancient China, images of dragons were reserved exclusively for members of the imperial family. Even ministers and eunuchs close to the emperor in the late Ming Dynasty were only allowed to wear mangpao (蟒袍) “python gowns,” commoners were certainly not allowed anything even approaching a dragon image.
For ordinary people to appropriate so blatantly the image of the dragon or phoenix is tantamount to revolt against the throne. The same is true for any reference to “Heaven” and “Earth.” Theoretically speaking, worship of Heaven and Earth was the responsibility of the Son of Heaven; commoners were only supposed to worship their own ancestors. This is why the Ming and Qing emperors would refer to themselves as “Prime Minister of the Mountains and Seas” in their dealings with Heaven.
Many ordinary people in Taiwan worship the sea goddess Matsu, with no intermediary, as if they are usurping the role of “prime minister.” One could only imagine how eminent figures such as Han Yu (韓愈) or Ouyang Xiu (歐陽修) would react if they had served in Taiwan as government officials: They would surely dismantle all of the offending temples and shrines in which commoners worship the goddess.
The fact that these religious festivals thrive in Taiwan is precisely because this is Taiwan, a land beyond the reach of the imperial court. The court sucks the life out of religion. It is common to hear people calling on the gods to protect Taiwan during folk religious events, but one would only have heard calls for the gods to protect China during the Boxer Rebellion, with officials such as Xu Jingcheng (許景澄) petitioning Empress Dowager Cixi (慈禧) to do more to suppress the rebellion. The very existence of a folk religion tradition is anti-imperial court.
If the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) ever does succeed in annexing Taiwan, the dragon and phoenix imagery in the Donggang “welcoming the Wangye Royal Lords” festival would surely be accused of offending China.
Cultural activities such as religious festivals belong to the realm of soft power, whereas geopolitics is usually more concerned with hard power instruments such as weapons, technology and economics.
Sino-Japan tensions are also running high at the moment. There are historical traces throughout Japan, such as shrines, historic sites and stele inscriptions, of Qin Dynasty minister Xu Fu (徐福) sent across the seas by the First Emperor of China in search of the elixir of immortality (most of the references to the legend of Xu Fu’s arrival in Japan were taken to China by returning Sui Dynasty and Tang Dynasty envoys).
During the recently concluded election for the new Japanese prime minister, did China drum up the Xu Fu legend again? Did the CCP say to Japan: “you are all the descendants of Xu Fu, and by extension, all of your ancestors and gods all came from China”?
Jimway Chang has a master’s degree in history from National Tsing Hua University and is a high-school history teacher.
Translated by Paul Cooper
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