CHAPTER VII.RELIGIONS.
In talking about religion in China, I need hardly remind you that Christianity is of recent introduction and that many things belonging to it, such as the Sabbath, churches, ministers, regular meetings for worship, are unknown to the great mass of the people. The Chinese do not divide the year into weeks, nor do they have Christmas or Easter. In the place of those Christian days they observe other festivals.
We have three systems of religion: Confucianism, Taoism, and Buddhism.
Confucianism, the religion taught by Confucius, a great philosopher who lived about five hundred years before the birth of Christ—is the religion of the Emperor, of the large body of officials, and of the educated classes generally. This system is mainlymoral and practical, in opposition to the spiritual and the speculative. It teaches mankind to perform certain duties; for instance, to honor and serve one’s parents, to be obedient and deferential towards one’s elders, to be loyal to one’s lawful sovereign and to live harmoniously with one’s wife. These precepts are expanded and extended so that they are adapted to all the requirements of modern society. Confucius never taught the existence of God, for he felt that he did not know anything about Him; nor did he advance any theories concerning heaven and hell. He simply taught men to love goodness for its own sake. But this lofty philosophy, however it might have suited the character of the philosopher and his personal disciples, never was popular in the sense that people generally accepted it and practised it. Still the Chinese have a real reverence for Confucius and his precepts, and, excepting the few who are professed Buddhists and Taoists, will call themselves Confucianists, although they may not understand all that this master taught, and in spite of the fact that they worship gods of the other systems ofreligion. The gods of the Confucianists, pure and simple, are heaven and earth, the spirits of the winds and of the five great mountains, the household gods (answering to the Penates of the Romans) and one’s ancestors.
Taoism was formerly a pure system of philosophy, but it by degrees sadly degenerated into a sect which borrowed its doctrines from Buddhism and Confucianism and has had engrafted upon it from time to time innumerable superstitions. The priests of this sect are men whose business is to impose on the people, and who make a living out of their superstitious fears. Thus, if a person falls sick, or is supposed to be possessed by an evil spirit, a Taoist priest is summoned to intercede for him and to offer up vows for his recovery. So also when a person dies, one of them rings a bell in front of the corpse, and, by mumbling a lot of gibberish, pretends to open the gate of the lower world for the departed soul to enter. A piece of silver is previously put in the mouth of the dead person to pay toll with. Almost everything imaginable is worshiped by the Taoists and those whobelieve in the efficacy of their intercessions. Everything has a spirit or spiritual counterpart in the next world; and this spirit, according as it is propitiated by offerings, or offended by lack thereof will work good or evil to the man. There are the gods of war, literature, wealth, and medicine; and there are the goddesses of married women and of seamen. These are a few of the nobler specimens of the idols which are worshiped. The fertile imagination of the Chinese fills every lake and river with spirits, every street and house with ghosts, and every wood and mountain with deities. They believe the next world to be a shadow of this; that the dead have everything in the world below which they had on earth—only these premises exist as shadows instead of substance.
Buddhism entered China about the time of Christ. One of the Emperors of the Han dynasty, having heard of the rise of a great sage in the West, sent an embassy to see him and to bring back his teachings. Doubtless the reputation of the marvelous Nazarene had been spread in the northern part of China by European and Arabiantraders and had reached the ears of the Chinese monarch. The embassy set out on their long, tedious and perilous journey. But while passing near India, they heard of Buddha and his sublime teachings. They supposed him to be the sage they were seeking, and they turned aside into India. Buddha had by that time been absorbed in Nirvâna—he was dead; and the embassadors contented themselves with carrying back his books to China. Under the lead of the emperor, Buddhism was accorded a cordial reception in the empire. But modern Buddhism is not what Buddha intended it to be. For instance, idolatry which he never taught, is practised.
Buddhist priests and nuns live apart from other people in monasteries and nunneries. They wear a different costume, and have their heads entirely shaven. They live on a vegetable diet, and obtain their food by their chants, by singing masses and often by begging. People believe that wealth, happiness and longevity can be procured through them, and so, according to their means, they offer these priests and nuns money with which to buyincense for Buddha and oil to burn in his lamps, also that a number of prayers shall be offered up in their behalf. Accordingly these priests and nuns are enabled to live a life of sloth. Sometimes, however, as if to break the monotony of their existence, they commit crimes which expose them to the vengeance of outraged law. The Buddhist monasteries and nunneries were formerly houses of refuge for a certain class of criminals. Those who went there and became professed Buddhists were exempt from punishment.
The educated classes despise both Taoists and Buddhists. Nevertheless in sickness, or in death, they patronize them. This shows that our religious instinct is so strong that a man will worship anything rather than nothing.
As I said, there is nothing in Chinese religions corresponding to the Christian Sabbath. In none of our festivals, holidays or anniversary celebrations, does the idea of rest enter. Instead of churches, we have temples which embody the highest architectural skill of the Chinese. They are built of brick, one story in height, oftentimesvery spacious, comprising a series of buildings with alternate courts, and flanked by others designed as living-rooms, for the priests or nuns. The presiding idol is enshrined in the innermost hall, and dressed in real clothes fashioned in accordance with its character. There are usually placed in every temple a large number of idols inferior in power to the chief idol. Before the chief idol is burnt incense-sticks and candles and costly sandalwood. Food is offered on stated days, as well as on ordinary days; the worshipers believe that the essence of the food is eaten by the spirit of the god and that the substance remains for their own enjoyment. From the fact that the devotees themselves eat the food offered to the idol, people reconcile economy with profuse expenditure, by pretending to be religious with the view to gratifying their own appetites. Idolatry in China isnotfounded on the belief that wood and stones and other inanimate objects are in themselves worthy of worship; but on account of the spirits which reside or take up their abode therein.
Thus the idolatry of the Chinese is superior to thebrutal worship of India, and to the brutish worship of the Egyptians. But still it exerts a baneful influence on the minds and hearts of its subjects.
In considering all systems of idolatry and superstition, one significant fact stands prominent,the utter neglect of religious training of the young. China’s three great religions have nothing answering to the Christian Sunday school. Of course, boys and girls pick up some religious ideas in their intercourse with those about them. But nobody ever deliberately sits down to tell them of this god and that god, their origin, character and power. Only incidentally is such knowledge conveyed. There are many religious books; but from the difficulty of learning to read, they are necessarily sealed to the young mind. If the young are told to worship this idol and that idol, they never understand why and wherefore they should do this. In time they comprehend that they do it to obtain favor and to gain merit.
I well remember the first time I was led to a temple and there told to bend my knees to the idol decked out in a gorgeous robe, its face blackenedby the smoke from the incense. On either side of the room stood four huge idols, with stern and forbidding faces. One of them was especially frightful. It was the God of Thunder represented by an image having the body of a man and the head of a highly caricatured rooster. This idol had a hammer in one hand and a large nail in the other, with which he is supposed to strike wicked persons. This god made such an impression on me that I had a horrible dream about it that very night. I saw him clad in fierceness; he moved his hands threateningly. Almost choked with fright though I was, I managed to cry out and that awoke me.
On account of the conservative spirit of the Chinese, their traditions, the pure morals which Confucius taught, the peculiar school system, and the prejudices which they justly entertain against foreigners, the work of missionaries must progress slowly. Somethinghasbeen done during the last fifty years. The land has been surveyed and its needs and capabilities made known.