Chinese temple

Guangyou Temple at Liaoyang, Liaoning, China.
Temple of Guandi and Yue Fei in Quanzhou, Fujian.
Temple of Bao Gong in Wenzhou, Zhejiang.
Night view of the Dalongdong Baoan Temple in Taipei, Taiwan.
Chinese temple incense burner

Chinese temples are structures used as place of worship of Chinese Buddhism, Taoism, Confucianism, or Chinese folk religion, where people revere ethnic Chinese gods and ancestors. They can be classified as:

Gōng (宮), meaning "palace" is a term used for a templar complex of multiple buildings, while yuàn (院), meaning "institution," is a generic term meaning "sanctuary" or "shrine". Táng (堂) means courtyard or room, and ān (庵) means dome or nunnery.

Overview

Shen temples are distinct from Taoist temples in that they are established and administered by local managers, village communities, lineage congregations and worship associations. They do not have professional priests, although Taoist priests, fashi, Confucian lisheng, and also wu and tongji shamans, may perform services within the temples. Shenist temples are usually small and decorated with traditional figures on their roofs (dragons and deities), although some evolve into significant structures.

Chinese temples can be found throughout Mainland China and Taiwan, and also where Chinese expatriate communities have settled. An old name in English for Chinese traditional temples is "joss house". "Joss" is an Anglicized spelling of deus, the Portuguese word for "god". The term "joss house" was in common use in English in the nineteenth century, for example in North America during frontier times, when joss houses were a common feature of Chinatowns. The name "joss house" describes the environment of worship. Joss sticks, a kind of incense, are burned inside and outside of the temple.

History

In 1898, Kang Youwei persuaded the Emperor to issue an edict confiscating folk religion temples which were not performing state sacrifices and turn them into schools.: 28  The temple confiscations were shortly reversed.: 28  The policy set a precedent for future campaigns in China.: 28 : 308 

Beginning in 1901, and more so after 1904, local officials and reform activists seized temple land and infrastructure to build schools, self-administration bureaus, barracks, police stations, post offices, and other newly mandated public buildings.: 307–308 

The Republic of China continued the Qing-era drive to convert temples into other institutions.: 46  Yuan Shikai supported the conversion of temples into public property.: 100 

As part of its campaigns against temples, the Nationalist government issued standards for whether temples should be preserved or eliminated.: 116  Temples tied to religions that were deemed legitimate were acceptable, as were those for the worship of "former worthies" (religious figures deemed socially or nationally useful).: 116  The 1928 "Standards for retaining or abolishing gods and shrines" formally abolished all cults of gods with the exception of human heroes such as Yu the Great, Guan Yu and Confucius. Regulations for the campaigns against temples were amorphous and whether a temple's deity was deemed legitimate could be a matter a debate; implementation of the campaigns was accordingly uneven.: 116 

After 1928, the ROC campaign to against folk religion temples became more intense, particularly in north China, and increasingly emphasized the physical destruction of temples.: 46  The ROC temple conversion campaign lasted until the start of the Second Sino-Japanese War.: 46 

Warfare during the ROC era resulted in the decline of temple fairs.: 56 

The Nationalist government of the Republic of China sought to tax commerce at temple fairs; its efforts to do so were limited by warfare and the deterioration of economic conditions.: 56 

In the early People's Republic of China, the government sought to use temple fairs as an opportunity to promote trade, agricultural practices, and the Chinese Communist Party's policies and goals.: 57 

Between 1951 and 1958, the Ministry of Culture repaired more than a hundred monasteries, pagodas, and stupas.: 48 

During the Great Leap Forward, the PRC used temple fairs as events to promote scientific education, and new technology and inventions.: 58 

Most temples closed during the Cultural Revolution, as religious life ceased to become public and religious practice became a household or semi-secret matter.: 61 

Estimates hold that between the end of the Mao era and 2016, from one to million temples had been rebuilt or restored.: 315 

The practice of temple fairs revived quickly in the 1980s in the PRC.: 61 

See also

References

  1. ↑ R., J (Supercargo) (1822). Diary of a journey overland, through the Maritime Provinces of China from Manchao, on the south coast of Hainan, to Canton in the years 1819 and 1820. Sir Richard Philips & Co.
  2. 1 2 3 Wong, Stephanie M. (2025). Making Catholicism Chinese: the Catholic Church in a Modernizing China. New York, NY, United States of America: Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/9780197623725.001.0001. ISBN 978-0-19-762369-5.
  3. 1 2 Goossaert, Vincent (2006). "1898: The Beginning of the End for Chinese Religion?". Journal of Asian Studies. 65 (2): 307–366. doi:10.1017/S0021911806000672.
  4. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 Smith, S. A. (2026). Communism in an Enchanted World: Chinese Folk Religion under Mao Zedong. Cambridge Studies in the History of the People's Republic of China series. New York: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-1-009-60093-4.
  5. 1 2 3 4 Schumann, Matthias (2026). "Shifting Boundaries: Spirit Writing and Superstition in Republican China". In Baum, Emily; Wu, Albert (eds.). Uncanny Beliefs: Superstition in Modern Chinese History. Harvard Contemporary China series. Vol. 22. Cambridge (Massachusetts) London: Harvard University Asia Center. ISBN 978-0-674-30340-9. JSTOR jj.45767069.
  6. ↑ Overmyer, Daniel L. (2009). Local Religion in North China in the Twentieth Century the Structure and Organization of Community Rituals and Beliefs (PDF). Leiden; Boston, MA: Brill. p. 51. ISBN 978-90-474-2936-4. Archived from the original (PDF) on 16 June 2015. Retrieved 18 May 2015.