A Question of Balance

Film Summary

The narrator begins by talking about how the investigation of Chinese religion (in Taiwan) challenged his Western assumptions as had no other stop on The Long Search.

Meets first with the editors of a new magazine "Echo" (Of things Chinese) who serve as his informants and guides on the search. They talk first on the diagram of the yin and yang on the wall-yin and yang emerge from chaos, and give rise to the four directions and the 8 trigrams. No creator or creation, but rather the movement from chaos to order. Yin/Yang do not correspond to good/evil--Balance is good, imbalance is evil.

They travel first to the temple of a local earth god, to observe the festivities for the god of earth and the springtime. The Chinese folk deity pantheon was parallel to the imperial Chinese bureaucracy, and in this Tu-ti Kung (Earth God) is comparable to a low-level functionary (the god of a locality, responsible for keeping order there). Earth god is served by the people as long as he does his work, but if not, he can be dismissed.

Problem of Religion in China-Defining religion as involving a single God and the worship of that God. This way of defining it makes it difficult to see the workings of religion in Chinese society, where it often takes more mundane forms-balancing flavors in cooking, bowing to an elder, siting houses and graves harmoniously. All of these stress the notion of gaining/regaining balance, as does Chinese medicine (regain balance in the body)

Narrator and Linda travel to a community temple, where they observe a large addition being built (750,000 pounds). Community temple, and the additions clearly show that the community was doing well. Part of the temple display shows the gods of Longevity, Prosperity, and Posterity (3 basic Chinese ideals)

Temple Séance to contact the spirit of a dead man-who sits in a paper effigy in the room, and when the moment is right speaks through two men holding a chair (tracing characters onto the table, which are interpreted by a priest)

Popular Gods-Had once been people, and because of calamities/disappointments in their lives, become a source of disharmony (haunting) after death. Turned into gods to balance the forces of disharmony with those of piety and worship. Most celebrated example is that of Ma Tsu, a fisherman's daughter who by the 17^th century was proclaimed the "Queen of Heaven."

Confucius-Lived in a chaotic time, and his solution was a return to conservative social values-strong government, and stressing the need for people to fulfill their obligations to each other (which would make a strong and harmonious society). To see Confucianism in Action, they go to the Ching Ming Festival (sweeping the ancestors' graves on the first day of spring). Family comes together as a unit, festival stresses the obligations of the family to each other, including their obligations to the dead

Search for Taoism-Difficult from the start-Popular vs. Philosophical Taoism. Starts by going to a "church Taoist" funeral-a ritual to repair the disharmony in a family caused by the death.

Taoist Clergy-No parish or congregation-when you hire him you get his vestments, his men, and his expertise. Taoist priests usually learn their trade from their fathers-family business.

Funeral-49 days in all, cost 20,000 pounds. Extended ritual of the priest concocting an elixir of immortality, and then sending the priest down to the underworld with a writ of pardon, to free the soul of the dead person who was trapped there. Public grieving by the relatives, but by no one else. Relatives model a new "mansion" out of colored paper, and burn it (along with special "funeral money") so that it can be transferred to the soul of the dead person.

Ritual-full of drama; Taoist priest changing roles from a conjuror, to a compounder making elixirs, to a ringmaster directing a the movements/drama of the acolytes.

Tao itself-Difficult to define, since it is meant to be elusive (anything you can point to is not the ultimate Tao). Exegesis of Taoist images in Tai Chi-showing the movement and balance of forces-movement as yang, and the natural adjustment/balancing as yin.

Growing interest in Taoism in the West-perhaps because of extensive translations of the Tao Te Ching, perhaps because of its indirect influence through Zen Buddhism, or perhaps because it is a natural reaction to any society grown to mechanical and rigid.

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Page maintained by James G. Lochtefeld.
Last modified 6 September 2004