When talking about Feng shui and Yi Jing in class and was asked what do Chinese people believe in, I think about it and find an interesting phenomenon, only from my perspective, most of we Chinese claim that we are free-thinker and believe in no-god but we sometime believe in something that is regard as superstition in our mind. It sounds contradictive but it is not a rare phenomenon in China.
One thing is that I think most of us have one or more amulets. Although we may not believe in it or even do not carry it along with us, we still got one from parents or friends. One common amulet is necklace with a small Buddhist statue. Some of the amulets had specially ceremony called kaiguang for them before given away. Monks recite prayers toward the amulet during the ceremony to make mystical power to protect the holder. We should not let others touch amulet which is kaiguang because it is believed that the power would be destroyed if other touch it.
In the other case, when it comes to an important turning point or big event in one’s life, he and his family are likely to pray to the god which is relevant and hope the god help. Take myself for instance, when my college entrance exam was about to come, although there is no problem for me to get enough grade to be enrolled by university, my mother, as a member of the Communist Party of China and do not believe in superstitions, still travelled far to go to a famous temple and pray for me to get good grades.
I think such contradictive thing that we do not believe in god but still pray to it happens is because we need something to rely on sometime. Since there is no specific god for us, it turns out to be confused when we turn to the god. Another interesting phenomenon is a lot of people only turn to the god they need when they pray. If one wants a child, he would definitely pray to Guanyin instead of Rulai or Yuhuangdadi because Guanyin is considered would to give child to people. This phenomenon also indicates that many Chinese do not believe in god but regard it as a power from supernatural to rely on when they need. Sometime we also believe in Laotianye, Chunge or Renpin when exams are coming.
Well, I think people need a belief to live in the world because there are so many things out of our control. And most of the time we can do nothing about them but pray. It's a way to comfort ourselves and makes us have a faith. Also such peace in heart and confidence usually help us perform well in big events.
ReplyDeletei agree with you. most times,i don't believe in god but under great pressure and uncertainty, i will also turn to god for help,like CEE.we we are said to believe in nothing, but sometimes we choose tend to choose a certain object to carry our wishes.your idea is really realistic.
ReplyDeletei quite agree with you. i think this phenomena in china is quite special. maybe it's because we have no specific god ,the specific idel to rely our wishes on so we just find some common ones to comfort ourselves
ReplyDeletethe phenomenon is really common. i have seen so many people do this in my life . more specific , there is really such people around me ,who believes in science ,but still prays for others. i can not understand in certain way. there are real close people beside us , can we not find someone to throw our hearts? kind of confused...
ReplyDeleteSometimes we need something to believe in order to let us feel safe. The universe is so great that we have to admit that we know very litter about it. Someone thinks that science itself is also a belief. I think it is somehow right. Whatever, we all need something to believe in.
ReplyDeleteAlthough we don't want to believe things that are not based on science, we still tend to believe something. Why? Because we still don't know all and we want safety, just as Zhipeng said. Such things can give us a feeling of safety.
ReplyDeleteThis is a perenial question that all of us will turn to now and then. At some critical point, or at some point of epiphany, we will begin to question this existential issue seriously. We are baffled by the contradictions in life about faith and beliefs; more so in a closed society like China where state ideology denies the existence of the supernatural or supranatural. Yet, in times of need people who deny the very existence of gods seek comfort in their blessings and protection. There are lots of things science can't explain. Our very existence in conveniently rationalised by the Big Bang. But who started the Big Bang? How do we go back to first principle?
ReplyDeletein my opinion, the majority of the Chinese do not believe in certain specific god or whatever. The old-sky-god we sometimes pray to is a collection of the laws of nature and all good things such as justice, fairness. We, Chinese, may never need something or somebody to believe in but only believe in ourselves.
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