When early settlers came from the Chinese mainland to
Taiwan they used to pray to the goddess Matsu for
protection from the elements. Now she is just as popular
on the island as she was four hundred years ago, and
never more so than during the annual pilgrimage of the
third lunar month.
The Republic of China Yearbook contains twenty-five chapters, the last of which is "Religion." Its place at the back of the book, however, belies the topic's importance to the twenty-two or so million people who inhabit Taiwan. There are Buddhists and there are Taoists, there are Christians and Muslims, Presbyterians, Baptists and Roman Catholics. And then there are the devotees of folk religions--often the very same people who attend mass on Sunday morning or piously worship Buddha.
It is impossible to say with certainty how many of Taiwan's inhabitants follow a folk religion, particularly since many of them follow two or three. Folk temples usually occupy huge downtown lots, where transportation is convenient and crowds are prone to gather. Even amid the modern high-rises of Taipei, it is not hard to find shrines tucked next to apartment buildings and glossy high-tech "temples" dedicated to that other great universal god, Mammon. This paradoxical placement reflects the hardships that islanders encountered in past centuries. Taiwan's difficult pioneer environment generated a strong need for spiritual support, and folk religion was the choice of most immigrants from the Chinese mainland. Old habits die hard, so people still visit temples to solicit divine intervention whenever they feel the need.
Of all the island's folk deities, none holds such powerful sway over the popular imagination as Matsu, the patron saint of seafarers. Given the huge competition, outsiders are frequently heard to wonder why this goddess has risen to the top of the pile, so to speak. Part of the answer is that, unlike many mainstream faiths, folk religions tend to come stripped of difficult philosophical concepts and teachings. The most popular achieve success because they began with real historical figures whose brave or even miraculous undertakings earned them divine status. Matsu is in this mold, and it is not hard to understand why, in her role as Goddess of the Sea, she achieved rapid dominance. Early Chinese settlers had to cross the often wild and windswept Taiwan Strait to reach the island, so what could be more natural than that they should pray to the sea's own spirit for guidance and protection?
This person-turned-goddess was born in Putian County, Fujian Province, on the twenty-third day of the third lunar month in the year 960. Because she never cried until she was more than a month old, her parents named her Lin Muo ( muo meaning silence) and often referred to her as Muo-niang ("the silent girl"). But silence was not to be equated with low intelligence. Right from an early age, Muo-niang was known to be exceptionally smart. When she was only ten years old, she devoted herself to the study and practice of Buddhism, burning incense, reciting Buddhist teachings, and worshipping every morning and evening. She also became a vegetarian.
At some point, legend takes over. According to the "classical" version, when she was sixteen years old she received some kind of initiation from Heaven and was given a bronze amulet. After that she could ward off evil spirits, forestall calamities, heal the weak and the sick, and save imperiled fishing boats. The people of her village regarded her with awe, sensing that here was a girl of formidable supernatural power.
Muo-niang's father died when she was twenty-eight, the victim of a maritime accident. The Matsu legend relates how one day she fell asleep while she was weaving and dreamed of her father and two brothers being hurled from their fishing boat in a terrible storm. She dived in to rescue them, clutching one brother under each arm and hanging on to her father's clothes with her teeth. At that point, Muo-niang's mother saw her dozing at the loom and woke her up. When the startled girl opened her mouth to explain, she "let go" her father. Unfortunately, the dream turned out to be true. Muo-niang, heartbroken, took a vow of chastity as penance for her unfilial conduct in losing her father.
The Double Ninth Festival is so called because it falls on the ninth day of the ninth lunar month. It is also known as Senior Citizens' Day, because the Mandarin word for "nine" sounds like the corresponding word for "longevity." When the Double Ninth Festival came around, Muo-niang told her family that she would like to fulfill her lifelong wish of climbing to the top of Mt. Mei. As she reached the peak, she heard celestial music and saw the clouds part. A young girl and boy, both immortal, escorted her up to Heaven, where she became a goddess. Ever since then, she has been helping boats and ships in peril and has saved numerous seafarers from watery graves. As her fame spread, fishermen and other sailors began to worship Matsu and build temples dedicated to her. Before long, her fame had spread as far as the imperial court, and in 1684 the Ching Emperor Kang Hsi bestowed on her the honorific "Empress of Heaven," just one of the many exalted titles now attached to her name.
Several of the most venerable Matsu temples in Taiwan, such as Feng Tien Temple in Hsinkang, Chiayi County, Chao Tien Temple in Peikang, Yunlin County, and Tien Hou Temple in Luerhmen, Tainan County, originally brought their own statues and even their own incense ashes from the mainland. Over the past four centuries Matsu has become the guardian deity of all Taiwanese, revered and held in the highest affection. Few inhabitants have not turned to her for solace at some point in their lives.
One of the constant elements in the Matsu legend concerns her origins as an ordinary girl growing up in a humble household--something to which many of Taiwan's inhabitants can relate even today. Because she was female, her worshippers feel strongly that she would want to do what all good daughters are bound to do, and return home to visit her parents now and then. Matsu herself is not available for that purpose, but numerous statues of her are, and over the years her devotees evolved a tradition of carrying the goddess's representation back to her hometown in Fujian whenever possible.
Chen Lan Temple in Tachia, Taichung County, in particular spared no effort when arranging these regular pilgrimages. Even before the start of the Japanese occupation (1895-1945), every twelve years the Tachia Matsu was borne across the sea to Meizhou, an offshore islet in Fujian said to be Lin Muo-niang's birthplace. The Japanese, however, discouraged all travel between Taiwan and the mainland, and the pilgrimage to Meizhou fell into desuetude. But rather than abandon the tradition entirely, Chen Lan worshippers began to take their statute on tours of Taiwan itself.
At first, it was customary for the statue to be escorted to Chao Tien Temple in Peikang, a practice that prevailed right up to the end of the 1980s. Then between 1987 and 1990 Matsu once again sailed across the seas to Meizhou, during a brief thaw in cross-strait relations, but although one goddess left, another came home again. In other words, in 1987 the temple committee brought a completely new statue back from Meizhou. At that point there was a break with Peikang, which (it was said) had failed to treat the Chen Lan Matsu with sufficient respect, and ever since then Matsu has been on annual pilgrimage to Feng Tien Temple at Hsinkang.
These trips are viewed by the Chen Lan temple committee as excellent ways of winning more devotees, but the fact is that they attract believers and tourists alike. Many people believe that a small temple's powers will be enhanced if it sends an imposing delegation on a pilgrimage. At the same time, of course, these occasions provide numerous opportunities for social exchanges among temples and worshippers.
There are more than five hundred Matsu temples scattered around Taiwan. Many celebrate Lin Muo-niang's birthday by putting on operas in the temple's plaza. Some even parade their Matsu statues around the town, to afford the maximum number of people an opportunity for worship. The palanquin goes forward to the beat of bronze drums, gongs, cymbals, and deafening fire crackers, while performers improvise folk theater nearby. And a few even imitate Chen Lan by sending their statue on a truncated pilgrimage of its own.
But things really come to a head during the third month of the lunar year. There is even a Taiwanese proverb about it: "The third lunar month is when people go crazy about Matsu," and indeed throughout the month the entire island does seem to be a little "Matsu mad." The piety to be seen in believers' eyes at this time provides a rare insight into the population's innate humanity, whereas the pilgrimage itself allows younger generations to learn something about the cultural content of traditional religious rituals and folk festivities.
An important aspect of the celebration is the emphasis it places on local diversity. Each town or village can present its unique view of Matsu through a series of carnival-like programs. Even the Tourism Bureau of the Ministry of Transportation and Communications now highlights the Matsu Cultural Festival as a must-see for April in an attempt to bring in more tourists and show them something of Taiwan's eclectic folk religions.
When all is said and done, however, the most popular event is undoubtedly the grand parade of the Matsu statue which normally resides in Tachia's Chen Lan Temple to Feng Tien Temple in Hsinkang, 322 kilometers away. Chen Lan Temple is more than two hundred years old and is the principal folk-religion center in the Taichung area. Its pilgrimage is always the most spectacular of the many events timed to coincide with the goddess's birthday, with tens of thousands of worshippers accompanying Matsu's palanquin, rain or shine. Devotees who want the goddess to help with health problems usually walk, while those who are more interested in securing a blessing for their business activities ride in buses or even on trucks. Many participants go on the pilgrimage to fulfill a vow. Some have participated for twenty years in a row.
The itinerary crisscrosses Taichung, Changhua, Yunlin, and Chiayi Counties, taking eight days and seven nights to complete. Along the route, enormous crowds make offerings and pray. It is almost certainly the biggest annual organized event in Taiwan, religious or secular, and certainly the oldest surviving one.
A typical follower will be carrying a pilgrim's flag, a triangular piece of embroidered cloth attached to a two-foot-long pole topped with a bell and a temple charm. The bearer's name and address are written on a narrow strip between pole and flag. This flag must pass through the smoke rising from the temple's censer three times, to make sure that it is truly suffused with the spirit of the goddess. The same flag is used year after year, so it is hardly surprising that many of them are almost in tatters.
At the height of the festivities it is almost impossible for those with business in Hsinkang to enter the town, because kneeling supplicants block the roads. They have a common aim: to crouch beneath the palanquin so that it passes over them. If they succeed, it means that they have dedicated themselves to Matsu and will be protected by her ever afterward. The climax comes on the morning of the fourth day, when the Chen Lan Matsu statue reaches Feng Tien Temple. Although it is not yet five o'clock, devotees who have managed to snatch a little sleep in pilgrims' hostels or even on the streets will rise and converge on Hsinkang's main temple. There are rituals to conduct: praying for blessings, reading Buddhist scripts, averting calamities for those who have lighted special devotional lamps for the purpose, and generally preparing for the goddess's birthday celebrations.
For many years the eve of Matsu's departure for home saw a most important rite, when the visitors would take some burning incense from the host temple. This was the real rationale for the whole trip, because it symbolized that the goddess from Tachia had been strengthened by the goddess who lived in the "mother" temple at Peikang. With the change in destination to Hsinkang, how ever, this ritual was dropped, presumably because the Chen Lan goddess was deemed stronger than her other incarnation at Feng Tien Temple. But another last-night ritual does survive. Ten live boars are wheeled into the temple precinct, and people rush to pluck a hair from their hides. The hairs are believed to symbolize wisdom, although this is of little comfort to the boars, who enter the cooking pot shortly afterward. A feast follows, the first time since the start of the pilgrimage that devout worshippers will have tasted meat.
On the night when the Chen Lan Matsu statue arrives home again, Tachia township is invariably packed with believers and tourists who merely want to savor the excitement. It will take them more than six hours to escort the statue along the four-kilometer road from the town's boundary to Chen Lan Temple.
For Matsu worshippers, the eight-day, seven-night pilgrimage is a lifetime "must," in much the same way that all Moslems able to do so should go to Mecca. These religious rituals are thought to bring down the protection of the Goddess of the Sea on people and enable them to overcome all obstacles in life. Viewed in that way, they become an important stabilizing force in a rapidly changing and markedly secular society.
Eugene Yeh formerly worked as an editor at the MOTC's Tourism Bureau. He is now retired.
Copyright (c) 2001 by Eugene Yeh.