How Ancient Chinese Cultures Influence Modern Chinese: #1 Praying to Spirits and Ancestors
It started at least 3500 years ago
Shang Dynasty’s religious beliefs and practices laid the foundation of the Chinese religion. Pleasing gods and ancestors was a matter of security to Shang aristocrats and all tribal members. Shang people were obsessed with finding better ways to conduct rituals and delivering the best shows in rituals. Their obsession influenced the culture of the next dynasty Zhou and of the modern Chinese people. Even Communism cannot stop people from going to temples, seeking answers or security from gods and ancestors, and participating in huge parades in their local community.
Divination and oracle on animal bones and turtle plastrons
A Shang priest would carve one or more questions or statements about a major event on the bones along with the date and his/her name. Then, they would heat the bones at the location of the oracle characters Bu卜 until they cracked. The Shang priests and kings had a way to read the cracks. The Shang king would present the sacrifice to gods and ancestors.
Quite often divination questions or statements on the bones were looking for yes/no answers. This is where modern Chinese divinations originated. Modern Chinese also ask gods yes/no questions but use a faster way than burning bones to receive answers. They use a pair of poes 筊杯, and the act of doing this is called poe divinations 擲筊. Poe divinations are also influenced by later development of religion in China. If you have not watched the news clip at the beginning of this section, you should do that to see how important poes are in the modern Chinese religion.
Ritual sacrifices
Modern Chinese also make sacrifices to gods and ancestors although they no longer cook meat during the ritual or offer wine. Sacrifices today are mainly meat and water but we will see later how some people adopted Buddhist ideas of sacrifices. Whether meat or vegetarian sacrifices, modern Chinese believe that sacrifices are blessed after the ritual and eating them gives more positive energy to one’s body. Moreover, modern Chinese burn incense and paper currencies of the spiritual world during rituals; they believe that smoke from burning can establish communication with the spiritual world. We have no way to know if this is also what Shang people believed but it could explain why Shang did what they did in general.
We also see the obsession of conducting rituals on time in modern Chinese culture. It is still caused by the fear of the negative consequences if gods and ancestors are not pleased. Chinese businesses would especially follow a tradition of sacrificing twice a month of the Chinese lunar calendar to ensure good luck in business.
Ritual utensils matter because they mean political power — for the individual and for the family/clan
The social meaning of ritual utensils in ancient China can explain the obsession over fine materials among modern Chinese. Many scholars say that fine materials are symbols of social status for the Chinese, and I believe it is more than just social status.
The Harvard Art Museum wrote about bronzes in the Zhou Dynasty:
Inscriptions on these objects expanded, from single clan marks to longer memorializing inscriptions, signaling a shift in the function of bronze vessels from purely sacred objects belonging to powerful Shang clan members, to status symbols commemorating the accomplishments of Zhou kings and nobles.
Bronzes were the state of the art at the time (before the Iron Age) and because bronzes shine like gold, ancient Chinese aristocrats highly desired them.
Bronze was first used in the military to replace bones and stones for weapons such as spear heads. As bronze making techniques advanced, tribal leaders ordered to have their ritual and burial artefacts made in bronze instead of clay. For example, in the center of the Shang palace in Yin stood 9 huge bronze dings 九鼎 that represented the status of hegemon of the Central Plain civilization. When Zhou defeated Shang, it transported all of these dings back to its capital Haojing 鎬京 in the hope of convincing other fangs that it had become the new leader of the civilization.
By Zhou, bronzes would be completely covered by decorative patterns, sculpted animals, and/or bear a much longer text. For example, compare these two musical bells for rituals during Shang and Zhou:
[Bell instrument in late Shang] vs. [Bell instrument in Western Zhou]
vs.
