This session brings together five papers exploring 20th and 21st century Chinese religions at the "intersections" where different forms of practice (unofficial and state-sanctioned, religious and non-religious, traditional and modern, for instance) meet.
This text discusses the interaction and relationship between a local ritual master and a spirit medium. It includes a case study of a spirit medium named Hu Guanglin, who turned to a local ritual master (fashi 法師) for a solution when he was having trouble maintaining a stable connection with his deceased patriarchs (yinshi 陰師). Master Wu proposed a ritual known as Consecration, Confinement, and Stabilization (kaiguang fengding 開光封定) to stabilize Guanglin’s connection. Master Wu showed his autonomy from Daoism and authority over spirit mediums. However, using Daoist characters and bureaucratic communication methods in their talismans and documents suggests a Daoist influence. The masters of the Mount Mao Divine Arts (maoshan shengong 茅山神功) exhibit their power over low-ranking spirits and spirit mediums, demonstrating a continuation of the “master of gods” phenomenon within Schipper’s hierarchy of gods, ritual masters, and Daoism.
Recent studies suggest that evangelism beyond social networks is more important for spreading religion in China than previously thought. Drawing upon neglected English- and Chinese-language sources and the author’s own interviews, this paper aims to enhance our understanding of how outreach to strangers in China occurs by examining the methods used by Hare Krishnas since 1977. It argues that the proselytization strategies employed by members of unofficial religions, like the Hare Krishnas, often differ significantly from those utilized by practitioners of state-sanctioned ones. While the latter rely on “strategies of attraction”—techniques designed to lure individuals to sacred sites where they can be engaged legally, the former actively seek out potential converts in secular spaces and at sites belonging to other religious institutions. It is difficult to generalize about religion in China as a whole, but comparing official and unofficial religions shows promise for making discussions more manageable and productive.
Building the Road to Modernity within Tradition: The Construction and Consecration of Vajra-bodhi Stupa in Chongqing in 1931
By focusing on the case of the Vajra-bodhi Stupa constructed in Chongqing in 1931, this research examines how Buddhism navigated its way between tradition and modernity to reconstruct its identity in Republican China (1911-1949). The stupa was built under the patronage and supervision of Pan Wenhua (1886-1950), a lay Buddhist and the mayor of Chongqing. To modernize the city, Pan ordered the relocation of thousands of tombs in order to build roads and improve transportation in the city. In response to the local residents’ tradition of ancestor worship and fear of dislocated haunting ghosts, the stupa was built. This paper will discuss how Buddhists creatively intergrated traditional views and practices into their conception of modernity in Republican China through the construction and consecration of the stupa.
This project follows Chinese Buddhists who traveled to Japan studying Esoteric Buddhism from 1910 to the 1930s, returning to China spreading their teachings among monastics and laity. It will start with Gui Bohua’s (桂伯華 1861-1915) turn to Esoteric Buddhism to deal with the death of his family and then consider a series of monks and laypersons who sought ought initiation at the Shingon headquarters of Koyasan 高野山. These Buddhists sought not only to study a lost part of Chinese Buddhism but also to develop a potential alternative to western modernity. They spread Esoteric Buddhism throughout the Chinese Buddhist landscape while simultaneously improving Sino-Japanese relations during the spread of Japanese colonies throughout the Sinosphere. Finally, a case study of Taixu’s 太虚 Wuchang Buddhist Studies Academy *foxueyuan* 武昌佛学院 highlights its lay community’s shift from academic to Esoteric Buddhism.
The incorporation of Buddhist temples into urban redevelopment within China’s market transition became phenomenal after the 2000s. Domestic and international real estate developers collaborated with local governments and state-owned-enterprises in the construction of commercial complexes by converting under-used spaces around renowned Buddhist temples. Among these scattered projects of temple-centered redevelopment across China, this article identifies two during which the Hong Kong-based developer, Swire Properties, consecutively built open, low-density shopping centres in Chengdu and Xi’an around the Daci temple and Jianfu temple respectively since 2010. Named as the “Taikoo Li”, these two projects attest to unique logics of planning and operation, while nurturing discursive, cultural, and material practices, religious as well as non-religious, in people’s everyday life. Drawing upon an extensive ethnographic study in urban contemporary China, this article bridges a dialogue with postsecularist debates in Euro-American contexts, and proposes a methodological experiment that reinvents "postsecularity" as plural, contextual, and subjective.