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The government of China officially espouses state atheism,[3] though Chinese civilization has historically long been a cradle and host to a variety of the most enduring religio-philosophical traditions of the world. Confucianism and Taoism (Daoism), later joined by Buddhism, constitute the "three teachings" that have shaped Chinese culture. There are no clear boundaries between these intertwined religious systems, which do not claim to be exclusive, and elements of each enrich popular or folk religion. The emperors of China claimed the Mandate of Heaven and participated in Chinese religious practices. In the early 20th century, reform-minded officials and intellectuals attacked all religions as "superstitious", and since 1949, China has been governed by the Communist Party of China, an atheist institution that prohibits party members from practicing religion while in office. In the culmination of a series of atheistic and anti-religious campaigns already underway since the late 19th century, the Cultural Revolution against old habits, ideas, customs and culture, lasting from 1966 to 1976, destroyed or forced them underground.[4][5]:138 Under following leaders, religious organisations were given more autonomy. The government formally recognizes five religions: Buddhism, Taoism, Catholicism, Protestantism, and Islam (though the Chinese Catholic Church is independent of the Catholic Church in Rome). In the early twenty-first century there has been increasing official recognition of Confucianism and Chinese folk religion as part of China's cultural inheritance.



[58] In other accounts, such as the Huangdi Neijing, Leishen is the Yellow Emperor's foremost pupil. See also: Yellow God theology By the Han dynasty, the universal God of early Shang-Zhou theology had found new expression by the names of Tàiyi (?? "Great Oneness"), "Supreme Oneness of the Central Yellow" (???? Zhonghuáng Tàiyi), or the "Yellow God of the Northern Dipper (i.e. Ursa Major)" (???? Huángshén Beidou), other than by names inherited from the previous tradition. Although the name "Taiyi" became prominent in the Han, it harkens back to the Warring States, as attested in the poem The Supreme Oneness Gives Birth to Water, and possibly to the Shang dynasty as Dàyi (?? "Big Oneness"), an alternative name for Shangs' (and universe's) greatest ancestor.[59] Han theology focalised on the Yellow Emperor, a culture hero and creator of civility, who, according to a definition in apocryphal texts related to the Hétú ??, "proceeds from the essence of the Yellow God of the Northern Dipper", is born to "a daughter of a chthonic deity", and as such he is "a cosmic product of the conflation of Heaven and Earth".[60] In the myth, the Yellow Emperor was conceived by a virgin mother, Fubao, who was impregnated by Taiyi's radiance (yuanqi, "primordial pneuma") from the Big Dipper after she gazed at it. Through his human side, he was a descendant of ??? Youxióng, the lineage of the Bear (another reference to the Ursa Major). Didier has studied the parallels that the Yellow Emperor's mythology has in other cultures, deducing a plausible ancient origin of the myth in Siberia or in north Asia.[61] In latter Han-dynasty description of the cosmology of the five forms of God by Sima Qian, it is important that the Yellow Emperor was portrayed as the grandfather of the Black Emperor (?? Heidì) of the north who personifies as well the pole stars, and as the tamer of the Flaming Emperor (?? Yándì, otherwise known as the "Red Emperor"), his half-brother, who is the spirit of the southern Chinese populations known collectively as Chu in the Zhou dynasty.[62] "Heroic Gesture of the Awakened Being" from Tumxuk, 6th or 7th-century Buddhist Serindian art, which developed in what is now Xinjiang, whence Buddhism spread to China proper. Further information: Silk Road transmission of Buddhism Buddhism was introduced during the latter Han dynasty, and first mentioned in 65 CE.[71][72]:821–822 Liu Ying, a half brother of Emperor Ming of Han (57–75 CE) was one of the earliest Chinese adherents, at a time when the imported religion interacted with Huang-Lao proto-Taoism.[72]:821–822 China's earliest known Buddhist temple, the White Horse Temple, was established outside the walls of the capital Luoyang during Emperor Ming's reign.[72]:823 Buddhism entered China via the Silk Road, transmitted by the Buddhist populations who inhabited the Western Regions (modern Xinjiang), then Indo-Europeans (predominantly Tocharians and Saka). It began to grow to become a significant influence in China proper only after the fall of the Han dynasty, in the period of political division.[63] When Buddhism had become an established religion it began to compete with Chinese indigenous religion and Taoist movements, deprecatorily designated as Ways of Demons (?? Guidào) in Buddhist polemical literature.[73] The period of division of the Six Dynasties After the fall of the Han dynasty, a period of disunity defined as the "Six Dynasties" began. After the first stage of the Three Kingdoms (220–280), China was partially unified under the Jin dynasty (265–420), while much of the north was governed by sixteen independent states. The fall of the Han capital Luoyang to the Xiongnu in 311 led the royal court and Celestial Masters' clerics to migrate southwards. Jiangnan became the center of the "southern tradition" of Celestial Masters' Taoism, which developed characteristic features, among which a meditation technique known as "guarding the One" (shouyi), that is visualising the unity God in the human organism.[74]:3.2 Representatives of Jiangnan's indigenous religions responded to the spread of Celestial Masters' Taoism by reformulating their own traditions according to the imported religion. This led to the foundation of two new Taoist schools, with their own scriptural and ritual bodies: Shangqing Taoism (??? Shàngqingpài, "Highest Clarity school"), based on revelations that occurred between 364 and 370 in modern-day Nanjing, and Lingbao Taoism (??? Língbaopài, "Numinous Gem school"), based on revelations of the years between 397 and 402 and recodified later by Lu Xiujing (406-77). Lingbao incorporated from Buddhism the ideas of "universal salvation" and ranked "heavens", and focused on communal rituals.[74]:3.3 Evening market at the Temple of Supreme Brightness (??? Tàiqinggong), an urban temple of Zhengyi Taoism in Xiguan, Lanzhou, Gansu. China entered the 20th century under the Manchu Qing dynasty, whose rulers favoured traditional Chinese religions, and participated in public religious ceremonies, with state pomp, as at the Temple of Heaven in Beijing, where prayers for the harvest were offered. Tibetan Buddhists recognised the Dalai Lama as their spiritual and temporal leader. Popular cults were regulated by imperial policies, promoting certain deities while suppressing others.[85] During the anti-foreign and anti-Christian Boxer Uprising of 1900, thousands of Chinese Christians and foreign missionaries were killed, but in the aftermath of the retaliatory invasion, numbers of reform-minded Chinese turned to Christianity.[86] Between 1898 and 1904 the imperial government issued a measure to "build schools with temple property" (???? miàochan xingxué).[87]:3[88] After the Xinhai Revolution, with increasing urbanisation and Western influence, the issue for the new intellectual class was no longer the worship of heterodox gods as it was the case in imperial times, but the delegitimisation of religion itself, and especially folk religion, as an obstacle to modernisation.[88] Leaders of the New Culture Movement (1916–1923) revolted against Confucianism debated whether religion was cosmopolitan spirituality or irrational superstition, and the Anti-Christian Movement of 1923 was part of a rejection of Christianity as an instrument of foreign imperialism.[89] The Nationalist-governed Republic of China intensified the suppression of local religion. Temples were widely appropriated, destroyed, or used for schools.[90] 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.[91] Sun Yat-sen, the first president of the Republic of China, and his successor Chiang Kai-shek, were both Christians. During the Japanese invasion of China between 1937 and 1945 many temples were used as barracks by soldiers and destroyed in warfare.[82][92] People's Republic of China A Buddhist temple being refurbished in 2015 in Chongwu, Fujian. Statues and ceremonial complex of the Yellow and Red Deities in Zhengzhou, Henan. The People's Republic of China, proclaimed in 1949 under the leadership of Mao Zedong, established a policy of state atheism. Initially, the new government did not suppress religious practice, but, like its dynastic ancestors, viewed popular religious movements, especially in the countryside, as possibly seditious. The government condemned religious organisations, labeling them as superstitious. Religions that were deemed "appropriate" and given freedom were those that entailed the ancestral tradition of consolidated state rule.[93] In addition, Marxism viewed religion as feudal. The Three-Self Patriotic Movement institutionalised Protestant churches in official organisations that renounced foreign funding and foreign control as imperialist. Chinese Catholics resisted the new government's move towards state control and independence from the Vatican.[94] Later onwards, the Cultural Revolution (1966–1976) involved a systematic effort to destroy religion[82][91] and New Confucianism. The historian Arthur Waldron explains that "communism was, in effect, a religion for its early Chinese converts: more than a sociological analysis, it was a revelation and a prophecy that engaged their entire beings and was expounded in sacred texts, many imported from Moscow and often printed in English".[95] The radical policy relaxed considerably in the late 1970s. Since 1978, the Constitution of the People's Republic of China guarantees "freedom of religion". Its article 36 states that:[96][97] Citizens of the People's Republic of China enjoy freedom of religious belief. No state organ, public organization or individual may compel citizens to believe in, or not to believe in, any religion; nor may they discriminate against citizens who believe in, or do not believe in, any religion. The state protects normal religious activities. No one may make use of religion to engage in activities that disrupt public order, impair the health of citizens or interfere with the educational system of the state. Religious bodies and religious affairs are not subject to any foreign domination. For several decades, the party acquiesced or even encouraged a religious revival. Most Chinese were allowed to worship as they felt best. Although "spiritual practices" such as the Falun Gong were banned and practitioners have been persecuted since 1999, local authorities were likely to follow a hands-off policy towards other religions. In the late 20th century there was a reactivation of the state cults devoted to the Yellow Emperor and the Red Emperor.[98] In the early 2000s, the Chinese government became open especially to traditional religions such as Mahayana Buddhism, Taoism and folk religion, emphasising the role of religion in building a "Harmonious Society" (hexie shehui),[99] a Confucian idea.[100][101] The government founded the Confucius Institute in 2004 to promote Chinese culture. China hosted religious meetings and conferences including the first World Buddhist Forum in 2006 and the subsequent World Buddhist Forums, a number of international Taoist meetings and local conferences on folk religions. Aligning with Chinese anthropologists' emphasis on "religious culture",[87]:5–7 the government considers these religions as integral expressions of national "Chinese culture".[102] A turning point was reached in 2005, when folk religious cults began to be protected and promoted under the policies of intangible cultural heritage.[87]:9 Not only were traditions that had been interrupted for decades resumed, but ceremonies forgotten for centuries were reinvented. The annual worship of the god Cáncóng of the ancient state of Shu, for instance, was resumed at a ceremonial complex near the Sanxingdui archaeological site in Sichuan.[103] New deities have emerged, including Cheshén (??), the god protecting motor vehicles, and modern Chinese political leaders have been deified into the common Chinese pantheon.[104] In 2012 Xi Jinping was elected as the General Secretary of the Communist Party of China. During his early political career in the 1980s, Xi was the secretary of Zhengding County in Hebei, where he allied himself with Chan master Youming and helped the reconstruction of the county's Buddhist temples, explicitly expressing interest towards Buddhism. Once he became president of China, fighting moral void and corruption through a return to traditional culture became the primary tasks of the new government.[105] The government's project also involved restricting Christian churches, which resulted in some removals of crosses from steeples and churches' demolition. At least one prominent pastor who protested was arrested on charges of misusing church funds. A lawyer who had counselled these churches appeared on state television to confess that he had been in collusion with American organisations to incite local Christians.[106] André Laliberté noted that despite there having been much talk about "persecution against religion (especially Christianity) in China", one should not jump to hasty conclusions, since "a large proportion of the population worship, pray, perform rituals and hold certain beliefs with the full support of the Party. Most of this activity affects people who subscribe to world views that are sometimes formally acknowledged by the state and are institutionalised, or others that are tacitly approved as customs". In this context, Christianity not only represents a small proportion of the population, but its adherents are still seen by the majority who observe traditional rituals as followers of a foreign religion that sets them apart from the body of society.[107] The Associated Press reported in September 2018 that "Xi is waging the most severe systematic suppression of Christianity in the country since religious freedom was written into the Chinese constitution in 1982.", which has involved "destroying crosses, burning bibles, shutting churches and ordering followers to sign papers renouncing their faith".[108] Demographics Demoscopic analyses and general results Temple of Mazu, the goddess of the sea, in Shanwei, Guangdong. Worshipers at the Temple of the City God of Suzhou, Jiangsu. Is it Taoism or folk religion? To the general Chinese public they are not distinguished, but a lay practitioner would hardly claim to be a "Taoist", as Taoism is a set of doctrinal and liturgical functions that work as specialising patterns for the indigenous religion.[109] Temple of Hebo ("River Lord"), the god (Heshen, "River God") of the sacred Yellow River, in Hequ, Xinzhou, Shanxi. Incense Snow Temple (??? Xiangxuesì), a rural Buddhist convent in Ouhai, Wenzhou, Zhejiang. A neighbourhood folk shrine festooned for a festival, in Chongwu, Fujian. Counting the number of religious people anywhere is hard; counting them in China is even harder. Low response rates, non-random samples, and adverse political and cultural climates are persistent problems.[110]:47 One scholar concludes that statistics on religious believers in China "cannot be accurate in a real scientific sense", since definitions of "religion" exclude people who do not see themselves as members of a religious organisation but are still "religious" in their daily actions and fundamental beliefs.[111] The forms of Chinese religious expression tend to be syncretic and following one religion does not necessarily mean the rejection or denial of others.[112] In surveys, few people identify as "Taoists" because to most Chinese this term refers to ordained priests of the religion. Traditionally, the Chinese language has not included a term for a lay follower of Taoism,[113] since the concept of being "Taoist" in this sense is a new word that derives from the Western concept of "religion" as membership in a church institution. Analysing Chinese traditional religions is further complicated by discrepancies between the terminologies used in Chinese and Western languages. While in the English current usage "folk religion" means broadly all forms of common cults of gods and ancestors, in Chinese usage and in academia these cults have not had an overarching name. By "folk religion" (???? mínjian zongjiào) or "folk beliefs" (???? mínjian xìnyang) Chinese scholars have usually meant folk religious organisations and salvationist movements (folk religious sects).[114][115] Furthermore, in the 1990s some of these organisations began to register as branches of the official Taoist Association and therefore to fall under the label of "Taoism".[116] In order to address this terminological confusion, some Chinese intellectuals have proposed the legal recognition and management of the indigenous religion by the state and to adopt the label "Chinese native (or indigenous) religion" (???? mínsú zongjiào) or "Chinese ethnic religion" (???? mínzú zongjiào),[117] or other names.[note 5] There has been much speculation by some Western authors about the number of Christians in China. Chris White, in a 2017 work for the Max Planck Institute for the Study of Religious and Ethnic Diversity of the Max Planck Society, criticises the data and narratives put forward by these authors. He notices that these authors work in the wake of a "Western evangelical bias" reflected in the coverage carried forward by popular media, especially in the United States, which rely upon a "considerable romanticisation" of Chinese Christians. Their data are mostly ungrounded or manipulated through undue interpretations, as "survey results do not support the authors' assertions".[120] According to the results of an official census provided in 1995 by the Information Office of the State Council of China, at that time the Chinese traditional religions were already popular among nearly 1 billion people.[111] 2005: a survey of the religiosity of urban Chinese from the five cities of Beijing, Shanghai, Nantong, Wuhan and Baoding, conducted by professor Xinzhong Yao, found that only 5.3% of the analysed population belonged to religious organisations, while 51.8% were non religious, in that they did not belong to any religious association. Nevertheless, 23.8% of the population regularly worshipped gods and venerated ancestors, 23.1% worshipped Buddha or identified themselves as Buddhists, up to 38.5% had beliefs and practices associated with the folk religions such as feng shui or belief in celestial powers, and only 32.9% were convinced atheists.[121] Three surveys conducted respectively in 2005, 2006 and 2007 by the Horizon Research Consultancy Group on a disproportionately urban and suburban sample, found that Buddhists constituted between 11% and 16% of the total population, Christians were between 2% and 4%, and Muslims approximately 1%.[122] The surveys also found that ~60% of the population believed in concepts such as fate and fortune associated to the folk religion.[122] 2007: a survey conducted by the East China Normal University taking into account people from different regions of China, concluded that there were approximately 300 million religious believers (˜31% of the total population), of whom the vast majority ascribable to Buddhism, Taoism and folk religions. 2008: a survey conducted in that year by Yu Tao of the University of Oxford with a survey scheme led and supervised by the Center for Chinese Agricultural Policy and the Peking University, analysing the rural populations of the six provinces of Jiangsu, Sichuan, Shaanxi, Jilin, Hebei and Fujian, each representing different geographic and economic regions of China, found that followers of the Chinese folk religions were 31.9% of the analysed population, Buddhists were 10.85%, Christians were 3.93% of whom 3.54% Protestants and 0.39% Catholics, and Taoists were 0.71%.[123] The remaining 53.41% of the population claimed to be not religious.[123] 2010: the Chinese Spiritual Life Survey directed by the Purdue University's Center on Religion and Chinese Society concluded that many types of Chinese folk religions and Taoism are practised by possibly hundreds of millions of people; 56.2% of the total population or 754 million people practised Chinese ancestral religion[note 6], but only 16% claiming to "believe in the existence" of the ancestor;[note 7] 12.9% or 173 million practised Taoism on a level indistinguishable from the folk religion; 0.9% or 12 million people identified exclusively as Taoists; 13.8% or 185 million identified as Buddhists, of whom 1.3% or 17.3 million had received formal initiation; 2.4% or 33 million identified as Christians, of whom 2.2% or 30 million as Protestants (of whom only 38% baptised in the official churches) and 0.02% or 3 million as Catholics; and an additional 1.7% or 23 million were Muslims.[126] 2012: the China Family Panel Studies (CFPS) conducted a survey of 25 of the provinces of China. The provinces surveyed had a Han majority, and did not include the autonomous regions of Inner Mongolia, Ningxia, Tibet and Xinjiang, and of Hong Kong and Macau.[127]:11–12 The survey found only ~10% of the population belonging to organised religions; specifically, 6.75% were Buddhists, 2.4% were Christians (of whom 1.89% Protestants and 0.41% Catholics), 0.54% were Taoists, 0.46% were Muslims, and 0.40% declared to belong to other religions.[127]:12 Although ~90% of the population declared that they did not belong to any religion, the survey estimated (according to a 1992 figure) that only 6.3% were atheists while the remaining 81% (˜1 billion people) prayed to or worshipped gods and ancestors in the manner of the folk religion.[127]:13 Four surveys conducted respectively in the years 2006, 2008, 2010 and 2011 as part of the Chinese General Social Survey (CGSS) of the Renmin University of China found an average 6.2% of the Chinese identifying as Buddhists, 2.3% as Christians (of whom 2% Protestants and 0.3% Catholics), 2.2% as members of folk religious sects, 1.7% as Muslims, and 0.2% as Taoists.[127]:13 2012-2014: analyses published in a study by Fenggang Yang and Anning Hu found that 55.5% of the adult population (15+) of China, or 578 million people in absolute numbers, believed and practised folk religions, including a 20% who practised ancestor veneration or communal worship of deities, and the rest who practised what Yang and Hu define "individual" folk religions like devotion to specific gods such as Caishen. Members of folk religious sects were not taken into account.[128] Around the same year, Kenneth Dean estimated 680 million people involved in folk religion, or 51% of the total population.[note 8] In the same years, reports of the Chinese government claim that the folk religious sects have about the same number of followers of the five state-sanctioned religions counted together (~13% ˜180 million).[130] The CFPS 2014 survey, published in early 2017, found that 15.87% of the Chinese declare to be Buddhists, 5.94% to belong to unspecified other religions, 0.85% to be Taoists, 0.81% to be members of the popular sects, 2.53% to be Christians (2.19% Protestants and 0.34% Catholics) and 0.45% to be Muslims. 73.56% of the population does not belong to the state-sanctioned religions.[10] CFPS 2014 asked the Chinese about belief in a certain conception of divinity rather than membership in a religious group, for this reason it is considered one of the most accurate surveys to date.[2][note 1] Besides the surveys based on fieldwork, estimates using projections have been published by the Pew Research Center as part of its study of the Global Religious Landscape in 2010. This study estimated 21.9% of the population of China believed in folk religions, 18.2% were Buddhists, 5.1% were Christians, 1.8% were Muslims, 0.8% believed in other religions, while unaffiliated people constituted 52.2% of the population.[131] According to the surveys by Phil Zuckerman published on Adherents.com, 59% of the Chinese population was not religious in 1993, and in 2005 between 8% and 14% was atheist (from over 100 to 180 million).[110] A survey held in 2012 by WIN/GIA found that in China the atheists comprise 47% of the population.[132] Yu Tao's survey of the year 2008 provided a detailed analysis of the social characteristics of the religious communities.[123] It found that the proportion of male believers was higher than the average among folk religious people, Taoists, and Catholics, while it was lower than the average among Protestants. The Buddhist community shew a greater balance of male and female believers. Concerning the age of believers, folk religious people and Catholics tended to be younger than the average, while Protestant and Taoist communities were composed by older people. The Christian community was more likely than other religions to have members belonging to the ethnic minorities. The study analysed the proportion of believers that were at the same time members of the local section of the Communist Party of China, finding that it was exceptionally high among the Taoists, while the lowest proportion was found among the Protestants. About education and wealth, the survey found that the wealthiest populations were those of Buddhists and especially Catholics, while the poorest was that of the Protestants; Taoists and Catholics were the better educated, while the Protestants were the less educated among the religious communities. These findings confirmed a description by Francis Ching-Wah Yip that the Protestant population was predominantly composed of rural people, illiterate and semi-illiterate people, elderly people, and women, already in the 1990s and early 2000s.[133] A 2017 study of the Christian communities of Wuhan found the same socio-economic characteristics, with the addition that Christians were more likely to suffer from physical and mental illness than the general population.[134] The China Family Panel Studies' findings for 2012 shew that Buddhists tended to be younger and better educated, while Christians were older and more likely to be illiterate.[127]:17–18 Furthermore, Buddhists were generally wealthy, while Christians most often belonged to the poorest parts of the population.[127]:20–21 Henan was found hosting the largest percentage of Christians of any province of China, about 6%.[127]:13 According to Ji Zhe, Chan Buddhism and individual, non-institutional forms of folk religiosity are particularly successful among the contemporary Chinese youth.[135] vte Graphic representations of various analyses Geographic distribution Geographic distribution of religions in China.[143][144][145][146] ¦ Chinese folk religion (and Confucianism, Taoism, and groups of Chinese Buddhism) ¦ Buddhism tout court ¦ Islam ¦ Ethnic minorities' indigenous religions ¦ Mongolian folk religion ¦ Northeast China folk religion influenced by Tungus and Manchu shamanism, widespread Shanrendao Geographic distributions and major communities of religions in China.[145][146] The varieties of Chinese religion are spread across the map of China in different degrees. Southern provinces have experienced the most evident revival of Chinese folk religion,[147][95] although it is present all over China in a great variety of forms, intertwined with Taoism, fashi orders, Confucianism, Nuo rituals, shamanism and other religious currents. Quanzhen Taoism is mostly present in the north, while Sichuan is the area where Tianshi Taoism developed and the early Celestial Masters had their main seat. Along the southeastern coast, Taoism reportedly dominates the ritual activity of popular religion, both in registered and unregistered forms (Zhengyi Taoism and unrecognised fashi orders). Since the 1990s, Taoism has been well-developed in the area.[148][149] Many scholars see "north Chinese religion" as distinct from practices in the south.[150] The folk religion of southern and southeastern provinces is primarily focused on the lineages and their churches (zongzú xiéhuì ????) and the worship of ancestor-gods. The folk religion of central-northern China (North China Plain), otherwise, is focused on the communal worship of tutelary deities of creation and nature as identitary symbols, by villages populated by families of different surnames,[151] structured into "communities of the god(s)" (shénshè ??, or huì ?, "association"),[152] which organise temple ceremonies (miaohui ??), involving processions and pilgrimages,[153] and led by indigenous ritual masters (fashi) who are often hereditary and linked to secular authority.[note 9] Northern and southern folk religions also have a different pantheon, of which the northern one is composed of more ancient gods of Chinese mythology.[154] Folk religious movements of salvation have historically been more successful in the central plains and in the northeastern provinces than in southern China, and central-northern popular religion shares characteristics of some of the sects, such as the great importance given to mother goddess worship and shamanism,[155] as well as their scriptural transmission.[150]:92 Also Confucian churches and jiaohua organisations have historically found much resonance among the population of the northeast; in the 1930s the Universal Church of the Way and its Virtue alone aggregated at least 25% of the population of the state of Manchuria[156] and contemporary Shandong has been analysed as an area of rapid growth of folk Confucian groups.[157] Goossaert talks of this distinction, although recognising it as an oversimplification, between a "Taoist south" and a "village-religion/Confucian centre-north",[150]:47 with the northern context also characterised by important orders of "folk Taoist" ritual masters, one order being that of the ???}} yinyángsheng,[150]:86[158] and sectarian traditions,[150]:92 and also by a low influence of Buddhism and official Taoism.[150]:90 The folk religion of northeast China (Manchuria) has unique characteristics deriving from the interaction of Han religion with Tungus and Manchu shamanisms; these include the practice of chumaxian (??? "riding for the immortals"), the worship of Fox Gods and other zoomorphic deities, and of the Great Lord of the Three Foxes (???? Húsan Tàiyé) and the Great Lady of the Three Foxes (???? Húsan Tàinai) usually positioned at the head of pantheons.[159] Otherwise, in the religious context of Inner Mongolia there has been a significant integration of Han Chinese into the traditional folk religion of the region. Across China, Han religion has even adopted deities from Tibetan folk religion, especially wealth gods.[160] In Tibet, across broader western China, and in Inner Mongolia, there has been a growth of the cult of Gesar with the explicit support of the Chinese government, Gesar being a cross-ethnic Han-Tibetan, Mongol and Manchu deity—the Han identify him as an aspect of the god of war analogically with Guandi—and culture hero whose mythology is embodied in a culturally important epic poem.[161] The Han Chinese schools of Buddhism are mostly practised in the eastern part of the country. On the other hand, Tibetan Buddhism is the dominant religion in Tibet, and significantly present in other westernmost provinces where ethnic Tibetans constitute a significant part of the population, and has a strong influence in Inner Mongolia in the north. The Tibetan tradition has also been gaining a growing influence among the Han Chinese.[162] Christians are especially concentrated in the three provinces of Henan, Anhui and Zhejiang.[133] The latter two provinces were in the area affected by the Taiping Rebellion, and Zhejiang along with Henan were hubs of the intense Protestant missionary activity in the 19th and early 20th century. Christianity has been practiced in Hong Kong since 1841. As of 2010[163] there are 843,000 Christians in Hong Kong (11.8% of the total population). As of 2010 approximately 5% of the population of Macau self-identifies as Christian, predominantly Catholic.[164] Islam is the majority religion in areas inhabited by the Hui Muslims, particularly the province of Ningxia, and in the province of Xinjiang that is inhabited by the Uyghurs. Many ethnic minority groups in China follow their own traditional ethnic religions: Benzhuism of the Bai, Bimoism of the Yi, Bön of the Tibetans, Dongbaism of the Nakhi, Miao folk religion, Qiang folk religion, Yao folk religion, Zhuang folk religion, Mongolian shamanism or Tengerism, and Manchu shamanism among Manchus. Religions by province Mapping of religions in China, by province Centring and ancestrality See also: Chinese ancestral religion Han Chinese culture embodies a concept of religion that differs from the one that is common in the Abrahamic traditions, which are based on the belief in an omnipotent God who exists outside the world and human race and has complete power over them.[176] Chinese religions, in general, do not place as much emphasis as Christianity does on exclusivity and doctrine.[177] Han Chinese culture is marked by a "harmonious holism"[178] in which religious expression is syncretic and religious systems encompass elements that grow, change, and transform but remain within an organic whole. The performance of rites (? li) is the key characteristic of common Chinese religion, which scholars see as going back to Neolithic times. According to the scholar Stephan Feuchtwang, rites are conceived as "what makes the invisible visible", making possible for humans to cultivate the underlying order of nature. Correctly performed rituals move society in alignment with earthly and heavenly (astral) forces, establishing the harmony of the three realms—Heaven, Earth and humanity. This practice is defined as "centring" (? yang or ? zhong). Rituals may be performed by government officials, family elders, popular ritual masters and Taoists, the latter cultivating local gods to centre the forces of the universe upon a particular locality. Among all things of creation, humans themselves are "central" because they have the ability to cultivate and centre natural forces.[179] This primordial sense of ritual united the moral and the religious and drew no boundaries between family, social, and political life. From earliest times, the Chinese tended to be all-embracing rather than to treat different religious traditions as separate and independent. The scholar Xinzhong Yao argues that the term "Chinese religion", therefore, does not imply that there is only one religious system, but that the "different ways of believing and practicing... are rooted in and can be defined by culturally common themes and features", and that "different religious streams and strands have formed a culturally unitary single tradition" in which basic concepts and practices are related.[178] The continuity of Chinese civilisation across thousands of years and thousands of square miles is made possible through China's religious traditions understood as systems of knowledge transmission.[180] A worthy Chinese is expected to remember a vast amount of information from the past, and to draw on this past to form his moral reasoning.[180] The remembrance of the past and of ancestors is important for individuals and groups. The identities of descent-based groups are molded by stories, written genealogies (zupu, "books of ancestors"), temple activities, and village theatre which link them to history.[181] This reliance on group memory is the foundation of the Chinese practice of ancestor worship (?? bàizu or ?? jìngzu) which dates back to prehistory, and is the focal aspect of Chinese religion.[181] Defined as "the essential religion of the Chinese", ancestor worship is the means of memory and therefore of the cultural vitality of the entire Chinese civilisation.[182] Rites, symbols, objects and ideas construct and transmit group and individual identities.[183] Rituals and sacrifices are employed not only to seek blessing from the ancestors, but also to create a communal and educational religious environment in which people are firmly linked with a glorified history. Ancestors are evoked as gods and kept alive in these ceremonies to bring good luck and protect from evil forces and ghosts.[184] The two major festivals involving ancestor worship are the Qingming Festival and the Double Ninth Festival, but veneration of ancestors is held in many other ceremonies, including weddings, funerals, and triad initiations. Worshippers generally offer prayers through a jingxiang rite, with offerings of food, light incense and candles, and burning joss paper. These activities are typically conducted at the site of ancestral graves or tombs, at an ancestral temple, or at a household shrine. A practice developed in the Chinese folk religion of post-Maoist China, that started in the 1990s from the Confucian temples managed by the Kong kin (the lineage of the descendants of Confucius himself), is the representation of ancestors in ancestral shrines no longer just through tablets with their names, but through statues. Statuary effigies were previously exclusively used for Buddhist bodhisattva and Taoist gods.[185] Lineage cults of the founders of surnames and kins are religious microcosms which are part of a larger organism, that is the cults of the ancestor-gods of regional and ethnic groups, which in turn are part of a further macrocosm, the cults of virtuous historical figures that have had an important impact in the history of China, notable examples including Confucius, Guandi, or Huangdi, Yandi and Chiyou, the latter three considered ancestor-gods of the Han Chinese (Huangdi and Yandi) and of western minority ethnicities and foreigners (Chiyou). This hierarchy proceeds up to the gods of the cosmos, the Earth and Heaven itself. In other words, ancestors are regarded as the equivalent of Heaven within human society,[186] and are therefore the means connecting back to Heaven as the "utmost ancestral father" (??? zengzufù).[187] Theological and cosmological discourse Like other symbols such as the swastika,[30] wàn ? ("myriad things") in Chinese, the Mesopotamian ?? Dingir/An ("Heaven"),[31] and also the Chinese ? wu ("shaman"; in Shang script represented by the cross potent ?),[188] Tian refers to the northern celestial pole (?? Beijí), the pivot and the vault of the sky with its spinning constellations.[189] Here is an approximate representation of the Tianmén ?? ("Gate of Heaven")[190] or Tianshu ?? ("Pivot of Heaven")[191] as the precessional north celestial pole, with a Ursae Minoris as the pole star, with the spinning Chariot constellations in the four phases of time. According to Reza Assasi's theories, the wan may not only be centred in the current precessional pole at a Ursae Minoris, but also very near to the north ecliptic pole if Draco (Tianlóng ??) is conceived as one of its two beams.[192][note 13] Ceremony at a Temple of the Jade Deity in Hebi, Henan. Main articles: Chinese theology and Wufang Shangdi Tian ? ("Heaven" or "Sky") is the idea of absolute principle or God manifesting as the northern culmen and starry vault of the skies in Chinese common religion and philosophy.[189] Various interpretations have been elaborated by Confucians, Taoists, and other schools of thought.[193] A popular representation of Heaven is the Jade Deity (?? Yùdì) or Jade Emperor (?? Yùhuáng).[194]{{refn|group=note|The characters yu ? (jade), huang ? ("emperor, sovereign, august"), wang ? ("king"), as well as others pertaining to the same semantic field, have a common denominator in the concepts of gong ? ("work, art, craft, artisan, bladed weapon, square and compass; gnomon, interpreter") and wu ? ("shaman, medium")[195] in its archaic form ?, with the same meaning of wan wikt:? (swastika, ten thousand things, all being, universe).[196] A king is a man or an entity who is able to merge himself with the axis mundi, the centre of the universe, bringing its order into reality. The ancient kings or emperors of the Chinese civilisation were shamans or priests, that is to say mediators of the divine rule.[197]|?]] (swastika, ten thousand things, all being, universe).[196] A king is a man or an entity who is able to merge himself with the axis mundi, the centre of the universe, bringing its order into reality. The ancient kings or emperors of the Chinese civilisation were shamans or priests, that is to say mediators of the divine rule.[197]]] Tian is defined in many ways, with many names, other well-known ones being Tàidì ?? (the "Great Deity") and Shàngdì ?? (the "Highest Deity") or simply Dì ? ("Deity").[note 14] Tengri is the equivalent of Tian in Altaic shamanic religions. By the words of Stephan Feuchtwang, in Chinese cosmology "the universe creates itself out of a primary chaos of material energy" (hundun ?? and qi), organising as the polarity of yin and yang which characterises any thing and life. Creation is therefore a continuous ordering; it is not a creation ex nihilo. Yin and yang are the invisible and the visible, the receptive and the active, the unshaped and the shaped; they characterise the yearly cycle (winter and summer), the landscape (shady and bright), the sexes (female and male), and even sociopolitical history (disorder and order).[179] While Confucian theology emphasises the need to realise the starry order of the Heaven in human society, Taoist theology emphasises the Tao ? ("Way"), which in one word denotes both the source and its spontaneous arising in nature.[202] In the Confucian text "On Rectification" (Zheng lun) of the Xunzi, the God of Heaven is discussed as an active power setting in motion creation.[203] In the tradition of New Text Confucianism, Confucius is regarded as a "throne-less king" of the God of Heaven and a savior of the world. Otherwise, the school of the Old Texts regards Confucius as a sage who gave a new interpretation to the tradition from previous great dynasties.[204] Neo-Confucian thinkers such as Zhu Xi (1130–1200) developed the idea of Li ?, the "reason", "order" of Heaven, which unfolds in the polarity of yin and yang.[205] In Taoist theology, the God of Heaven is discussed as the Jade Purity (?? Yùqing), the "Heavenly Honourable of the First Beginning" (???? Yuánshi Tianzun), the central of the Three Pure Ones—who represent the centre of the universe and its two modalities of manifestation. Even Chinese Buddhism adapted to common Chinese cosmology by paralleling its concept of a triune supreme with Shakyamuni, Amithaba and Maitreya representing respectively enlightenment, salvation and post-apocalyptic paradise,[206] while the Tathata (?? zhenrú, "suchness") is generally identified as the supreme being itself.[207] In Chinese religion, Tian is both transcendent and immanent,[208] inherent in the multiple phenomena of nature (polytheism or cosmotheism, yuzhòu shénlùn ????).[209] The shén ?, as explained in the Shuowen Jiezi, "are the spirits of Heaven. They draw out the ten thousand things".[210] Shen and ancestors (? zu) are agents who generate phenomena which reveal or reproduce the order of Heaven. Shen, as defined by the scholar Stephen Teiser, is a term that needs to be translated into English in at least three different ways, according to the context: "spirit", "spirits", and "spiritual". The first, "spirit", is in the sense of "human spirit" or "psyche". The second use is "spirits" or "gods"—the latter written in lowercase because "Chinese spirits and gods need not be seen as all-powerful, transcendent, or creators of the world". These "spirits" are associated with stars, mountains, and streams and directly influence what happens in the natural and human world. A thing or being is "spiritual"—the third sense of shen—when it inspires awe or wonder.[211] Shen are opposed in several ways to gui ? ("ghosts", or "demons"). Shen are considered yáng ?, while gui are yin ?.[211] Gui may be the spirit or soul of an ancestor called back to live in the family's spirit tablet.[212] Yet the combination ?? guishén ("ghosts and spirits") includes both good and bad, those that are lucky or unlucky, benevolent or malevolent, the heavenly ad the demonic aspect of living beings. This duality of guishen animates all beings, whether rocks, trees, and planets, or animals and human beings. In this sense, "animism" may be said to characterise the Chinese worldview. Further, since humans, shen, and gui are all made of ? qì (pneuma or primordial stuff), there is no gap or barrier between good and bad spirits or between these spirits and human beings. There is no ontological difference between gods and demons, and humans may emulate the gods and join them in the pantheon.[213] If these spirits are neglected or abandoned, or were not treated with death rituals if they were humans, they become hungry and are trapped in places where they met their death, becoming dangerous for living beings and requiring exorcism.[214] Concepts of religion, tradition and doctrine "Chief Star pointing the Dipper" ???? Kuíxing dian Dòu Kui Xing pointing the Big Dipper.svg Kuixing ("Chief Star"), the god of exams, composed of the characters describing the four Confucian virtues (Sìde ??), standing on the head of the ao (?) turtle (an expression for coming first in the examinations), and pointing at the Big Dipper (?)".[note 15] There was no term that corresponded to "religion" in Classical Chinese.[216] The combination of zong (?) and jiao (?), which now corresponds to "religion", was in circulation since the Tang dynasty in Chan circles to define the Buddhist doctrine. It was chosen to translate the Western concept "religion" only at the end of the 19th century, when Chinese intellectuals adopted the Japanese term shukyo (pronounced zongjiao in Chinese).[217] Under the influence of Western rationalism and later Marxism, what most of the Chinese today mean as zongjiào are "organised doctrines", that is "superstructures consisting of superstitions, dogmas, rituals and institutions".[218] Most academics in China use the term "religion" (zongjiao) to include formal institutions, specific beliefs, a clergy, and sacred texts, while Western scholars tend to use the term more loosely.[219] Zong (? "ancestor", "model", "mode", "master", "pattern", but also "purpose") implies that the understanding of the ultimate derives from the transformed figure of great ancestors or progenitors, who continue to support—and correspondingly rely on—their descendants, in a mutual exchange of benefit.[220] Jiào (? "teaching") is connected to filial piety (xiao), as it implies the transmission of knowledge from the elders to the youth and of support from the youth to the elders.[220] Understanding religion primarily as an ancestral tradition, the Chinese have a relationship with the divine that functions socially, politically as well as spiritually.[176] The Chinese concept of "religion" draws the divine near to the human world.[176] Because "religion" refers to the bond between the human and the divine, there is always a danger that this bond be broken.[220] However, the term zongjiào—instead of separation—emphasises communication, correspondence and mutuality between the ancestor and the descendant, the master and the disciple, and between the Way (Tao, the way of the divine in nature) and its ways.[220] Ancestors are the mediators of Heaven.[221] In other words, to the Chinese, the supreme principle is manifested and embodied by the chief gods of each phenomenon and of each human kin, making the worship of the highest God possible even in each ancestral temple.[176] Chinese concepts of religion differ from concepts in Judaism and Christianity, says scholar Julia Ching, which were "religions of the fathers", that is, patriarchal religions, whereas Chinese religion was not only "a patriarchal religion but also an ancestral religion". Israel believed in the "God of its fathers, but not its divinised fathers". Among the ancient Chinese, the God of the Zhou dynasty appeared to have been an ancestor of the ruling house. "The belief in Tian (Heaven) as the great ancestral spirit differed from the Judeo-Christian, and later Islamic belief in a creator God". Early Christianity's Church Fathers pointed out that the First Commandment injunction, "thou shalt have no other gods before me", reserved all worship for one God, and that prayers therefore might not be offered to the dead, even though Judaism, Christianity, and Islam did encourage prayers for the dead.[222] Unlike the Abrahamic traditions in which living beings are created by God out of nothing, in Chinese religions all living beings descend from beings that existed before. These ancestors are the roots of current and future beings. They continue to live in the lineage which they begot, and are cultivated as models and exemplars by their descendants.[223] The mutual support of elders and youth is needed for the continuity of the ancestral tradition, that is communicated from generation to generation.[220] With an understanding of religion as teaching and education, the Chinese have a staunch confidence in the human capacity of transformation and perfection, enlightenment or immortality.[224] In the Chinese religions, humans are confirmed and reconfirmed with the ability to improve themselves, in a positive attitude towards eternity.[224] Hans Küng defined Chinese religions as the "religions of wisdom", thereby distinguishing them from the "religions of prophecy" (Judaism, Christianity and Islam) and from the "religions of mysticism" (Hinduism, Jainism and Buddhism).[224] The cults of gods and ancestors that in recent (originally Western) literature have been classified as "Chinese popular religion", traditionally neither have a common name nor are considered zongjiào ("doctrines").[225] The lack of an overarching name conceptualising Chinese local and indigenous cults has led to some confusion in the terminology employed in scholarly literature. In Chinese, with the terms usually translated in English as "folk religion" (i.e. ???? mínjian zongjiào) or "folk faith" (i.e. ???? mínjian xìnyang) they generally refer to the folk religious movements of salvation, and not to the local and indigenous cults of gods and ancestors. To resolve this issue, some Chinese intellectuals have proposed to formally adopt "Chinese native religion" or "Chinese indigenous religion" (i.e. ???? mínsú zongjiào), or "Chinese ethnic religion" (i.e. ???? mínzú zongjiào), or even "Chinese religion" (??? Zhonghuájiào) and "Shenxianism" (??? Shénxianjiào), as single names for the local indigenous cults of China.[226]


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