民族学刊

中国的宗教与仪式一直以来都是西方社会科学界关注的焦点,近代以来涌现的大批西方汉学家们致力于对中国社会与历史的某些片段进行细致、长期深入的研究,以期能够解释中国人的信仰和实践。由美国汉学家武雅士主编的《中国社会中的宗教与仪式》是一本集结了20世纪50-70年代以来十五位西方学者在台湾与香港等地关于中国宗教与仪式研究成果的著作,从该书收录的文章来看,中国宗教与仪式的多样性和整体性是学者们争论的焦点,而在多样性和整体性背后所展现的宗教的秩序与帝国的隐喻是学者们的最终共识。

Western social scientists have focused on the religion and ritual of China for a long time. Since modern times,a number of western sinologists have committed themselves to conducting detailed and in-depth research on aspects of Chinese society and history in order to explain the beliefs and practices of Chinese people. It is within such an academic background that Religion and Ritual in Chinese Society,edited by Arthur Wolf,an American anthropologist,compiled a series of studies on the religions and rituals of Taiwan and Hong Kong done by fifteen western scholars from the 1950 s to the 1970 s. The advent of this book not only characterizes the western academic study of Chinese society and culture of that era,but also causes us to reflect on current research. This book is a work of great academic value, as well as serves as a model for the study of sinology in the field of western anthropology.The origins of this book lie in a conference on Chinese studies held in California in 1971,and it was the final result of the conference. From the collected articles in this book,we can see that the scholars focused their debate on the themes of diversity and integrality of Chinese religion and ritual. In addition,the orderliness of religion as well as the metaphor of the Chinese empire were also part of the final consensus of the scholars. The authors in this book mainly conducted their fieldwork in different villages or small communities in Hong Kong and Taiwan. Although their different focuses resulted in different conclusions,they reached aconsensus, and jointly raised three questions:First,is Chinese folk religion a system of integrality,or is it composed of various elements exhibiting a high degree of variability? In a discussion between Maurice Freedman and Robert Smith,Maurice Freedman having combed through a series of studies from J·J·M·De·Groot to Marcel Granet to C · K · Yang,acknowledged that these studies used the approach of a traditional sociology of religion which treated Chinese religion as a single entity. As such,he thought attention should be paid to those religious orders shared by all Chinese. Robert Smith,on the other hand,wanted to focus on the diversity of Chinese religions because it was both observable,and could not be ignored.Second,what is the social and cultural significance of Chinese folk religion? Arthur Wolf, Stephan Feuchtwang, Wang Sung-hsing, Stevan Harrell and other scholars felt that Chinese folk beliefs were a metaphor for the imperial bureaucracy; correspondingly,religious rituals were used to symbolize real life; Third,what is the social logic that supports the Chinese folk religious belief system?Most scholars agreed that behind the complex,superficial phenomenon there was a religious order that supports China's social structure. The religious order was closely related to Chinese real life scenarios,and the Chinese concepts of the universe.Therefore,discussions focusing on the generality and differences of religion and ritual in Chinese society,the metaphor of empire,the symbolism of ritual,religious order and social structure are thethemes of this book,and are also the greatest value of the book.Since its publication,this book has become one of the classic models of sinology in the field of anthropology. Even when we reread this book after40 years,it is still inspiring and has academic value. This does not mean,however,that every viewpoint found in this book is correct,or unique.Nonetheless,these studies proposed a series of meaningful questions which have given rise to further thinking and deeper research. All of this has directly influenced and promoted the progress of follow-up socio-anthropological studies on Chinese folk beliefs. However,it should be pointed out that the book still exhibits some shortcomings that are worthy of reflection. Firstly,most of the authors in this book had a western-centric perspective in their treatment and understanding of the religion of China. They discussed the integrity and diversity of Chinese religion from the perspective of deconstructionism, which dismantled Chinese religious beliefs and rituals into cultural fragments.Significantly, Arthur Wolf said that interpreting these differences was the theme of the conference.Yet,there was no further meaningful understanding and interpretation for the deconstructed Chinese folk beliefs. Most authors only presented the problems,but did not give us reasonable answers. In this sense,the book falls a bit short. Secondly,some of the theories of the scholars in this book were based upon prior assumptions,and only then were researched. This caused them to be at risk of relying upon first impressions,for example,Maurice Freedman's presumption that a Chinese religious system really did exist,H·G·H·Nelson's assumption that localized Chinese clan structure was decided by peoples' political and economic ties. Thirdly,due to the historical circumstances of the time,most of the authors did not the opportunity to enter mainland China to do field investigations. According to the differential patterns of Chinese culture,Taiwan and Hong Kong,as the peripheral cultures within the Chinese cultural system,their religion and ritual could hardly represent the integrity of religion and ritual in Chinese society. Now,the "society"in China that we are talking about is a multi-ethnic of pluralistic society which has a historical sequence and an entire structure from the former "Hua-Yi " to today's multi-ethnic pattern. In such a pluralistic society,religion is characterized as a multivariate mixed bag,and some aspects of religious beliefs and rituals also contain ethnic and local characteristics.From this level,most discussions about the integrity and diversity of religion drawn by the scholars in this book are two aspects of one problem. Moreover,the metaphor of "empirical China "and the symbolism of ritual are merely related to the entire symbolic system of Chinese religious culture.There is no real impact on to China's total social structure,historical sequence,and the sense of a macro-culture system. As a result,these studies did not completely understand the reasons why Chinese people did like they did,and did not provide a Clifford Geertz's "thick description "and interpretation of the Chinese world schema and cultural system from the perspective of "understanding the other' understanding".Society and culture are a dynamic process of constant development and change,an as such,today's Chinese religion and ritual obviously differ from what it was forty years ago. Nowadays,however,when we reread Religion and Ritual in Chinese Society,it still has a methodology for guiding us on how to establish a more suitable way to study China's society and culture. Religious studies in anthropology need to be done from the perspective of the local people in order to understand their own understanding of religion,and for an in-depth explanation of the cultural significance of religious systems. Writing religious ethnography is a process of thick description rather than a simple accumulation of material and description of the phenomenon itself. Therefore,we need to clarify that what culture shows to us filters down in Chinese history. In its social structure,historical sequences and cul-tural systems,beliefs and rituals are a part of the life of every Chinese, and religious beliefs and practices proceed according to their own life and order. The most thorough understanding and the most authoritative explanation of Chinese religion may come from those Chinese who are living it. It is their life experiences and inspiration that construct the significance of the system of Chinese religious culture. This is why C·K·Yang treats folk beliefs as "diffused religion". He thinks that it is the key idea of Chinese religion because the special quality of "diffused religion"is to connect its doctrine,ritual,and organization with aspects of secular social life and the system as a whole. Maybe it will be helpful to distinguish Chinese religion from the "religion "of the Chinese people which includes interpretation with localization and a system of cultural meaning.