Religion of the Shang dynasty

RegionYellow River valleyLanguageOld Chinese

The state religion of the Shang dynasty (c. 1600 – c. 1046 BC) involved trained practitioners communicating with deified beings, including deceased ancestors and supernatural gods.^[3] Primary methods of spiritual veneration were written divinations on oracle bones and sacrifice of living beings. The Shang dynasty also had large-scale constructions of tombs,^[4] which reflects their belief in the afterlife, along with sacred places. Numerous Shang vessels, as well as oracle bones, have been excavated in the kingdom's capital Yin.^[5][6] They reveal a large number of honoured deities, most of which came from the Shang's extensive observations of the surrounding world. Headed by the god Di, the deities formed a pantheon.

The Shang kingdom's religion, accounting for a large portion of court life, played an important role to its adherents. The deities worshipped received various honorary ceremonies. The Shang astronomers created a sophisticated calendar system based on astronomical observations.^[7] Complying with the calendar, diviners and sacrificial practitioners conducted liturgical rituals aimed at the gods. Regional practice became existent, as personal estates maintained independent practitioners. Generally, they all worshipped the same deities for common purposes. Mass offerings to gods, formalized over time, were held for divine support and welfare of the state.

The Shang religion originated in the Yellow River valley, heartland of the Chinese civilization from 1600 to 1046 BC,^[a] and was the first thoroughly documented Chinese religion. Although its writing script is much older, the first inscribed oracle bones of this religion date from c. 1250 BC,^[11] during the reign of Wu Ding (c. 1250 – c. 1200 BC) ^[12][13][14] and over 1000 years before the end of ancient China in 221 BC. Throughout over two centuries, the dynasty increased its cultural influence and experienced cultural exchanges by means of war. After 1046 BC, the Zhou dynasty that replaced the Shang^[9][10] gradually assimilated elements of Shangdi into its governing beliefs.^[15][16] Over the following millennia, many elements of the ancient religion were reflected in the later religious system of the Zhou dynasty, as well as the systems of imperial China (221 BC – 1912 AD). Shangdi remains an important figure in Chinese culture, and the calendar originally used for religion is now important in traditional events of China and influenced countries.

Beliefs

Di

The highest of the Shang gods was Shangdi ̣(上帝),^[17] full form Di (帝).^[18][19][b] In many oracle bone inscriptions, Di is described as a being who controlled natural forces as if controlling individual spirits in a hierarchy, which made him distinguished from the other worshipped gods.^[18] Di did not give messages in preserved scriptures, and his will could only be known through oracle bones.^[21] There are various abilities attributed to the high god Di, mostly described on oracle bones not directly but through pairs of affirmative and negative statements.^[18]

Di exercised authority over the natural world by giving commands (lìng 令).^[15] The Shang kingdom's economy was based on agriculture, which relied heavily on climatic patterns. The Shang people believed that the weather was controlled under the power of Di, writing a lot on predictions about his decisions. Di also dictated harvests,^[15] and sometimes could supply humans with foods if proper "calling out" rituals were conducted. This god could give military supports by many ways, for example by indirectly helping royal forces in conquering hostile states, by protecting the Shang king in royal inspections, or by forecasting divine will to support by sending natural phenomena such as rains. ^[15] Furthermore, Di was the power that gave approvals (ruò 若) to humans' everyday decisions and actions, including constructions and army marches; unusual occurrences were perceived as signs of Di's disapproval.^[15][18] The Shang also believed that although Di could aid them in various aspects, he could also harm them by his power. Numerous Shang texts record disastrous events thought to be caused by Di's will, including droughts, defeat by enemies, or even the king's health deterioration.^[15] The Shang offered sacrifices and carried out divinations to ensure Di was appeased and to avoid calamities.

Di's identity has been a subject of debate.^[22]This system of structured spirits featured Di as the apex, hence making him corresponding with the "leading" role of Zeus in Ancient Greece and Tian in Zhou dynasty.^[23] There are many proposed approaches for this god's identification.

Some scholars link Di with the existence of the Emperor Ku,^[24] who was mentioned in Sima Qian's Shiji as the Shang dynasty's progenitor,^[23][16] and who was addressed "High Ancestor" in more than four oracle bone inscriptions. Many prominent scholars support the view that Di and Ku actually represent an identical power. Its implications for the current understanding of the religion's theology are additionally profound. Some historians assert that if the Shang system of gods featured the highest and supreme deity as a primal ancestor of the rulers, then the monarchs themselves would be acceptedly seen as possessing divine powers. In other words, the kings would be perceived as embodying the power of Di (or Ku), being the "thearchs" by birth.^[25]

There is another explanation, derived from studies of Di in linguistic contexts, that the religion did not possess a "High God" in its pantheon and that "Di" was a generic word for the collectivity of all divine powers.^[18][26] This suggestion partly results from debates among scholars on the presence of the word "di" in ancestral titles. Some claim that Di could not be a part of Shang ancestors, no matter how distant. Oracle bones indicate that Di could destroy the Shang capital, which Robert Eno perceived as impossible to be done by royal ancestors, reliant on sacrifices which were mostly conducted in the capital. Eno also argued that since "di" was included in some ancestral titles, then if it referred to a High God, the ancestors must have been perceived as rivaling Di in power, which he considered unlikely. He proposed a suggestion to explain this: "Di" was generic, referring to no specific god but to all the spirits including ancestral deities.

Natural powers

The Shang people paid particular attention to the winds compared to other natural occurrences, and associated them with the phoenix.^[27] The Shang identified four wind gods, corresponding to four types of wind, and assigned each god for a direction (eastern, western, southern, northern).^[27] These four winds as well as responsible deities together represent Shangdi's cosmic will.^[28] Winds carry Di's authority to affect agriculture, and were regularly prayed to for successful harvests. The Shang also designed various rituals concerning the winds' divine influence, such as ceremonies to appease the wind gods for favour in royal hunts, or to determine the message carried by unusual winds;^[27] four separated texts indicate that the main subjects for wind-sacrifice were dogs and hounds.^[23] Although there were wind gods, the Shang still separated them from "natural winds", winds happening to humans without divine manifestation. Those winds were often thought of as harmful, and were given different rituals that keep them at distance from humans.^[27]

The Sun was treated as a god and received sacrifices. It was also sometimes interpreted as a "guest", that is, it was sent by Di to the Shang king. Many texts of the Shang mention the importance of the rising / setting Sun. Clouds were believed to be sent by Di and also treated as deities. A religious text records that Que (a practitioner) was called to do a sacrifice to Di's clouds, the sacrifices being two hounds.^[23] For rain,^[23] dog dismemberment was the main sacrificial method. Prayers aimed at rains, unlike those for winds, specify the place of sacrifice: one ritual was done at Yue Peak, another at the "Altar of the Earth". The Shang also believed in snow powers which were associated closely with rains.^[23]

Because the country's agriculture was of crucial importance, the Shang people deified and worshipped many deities whose natural manifestations affected productivity. In particular, the "God of Earth" (She or Tu), with possible feminine gender,^[29] was associated with protection from misfortune.^[30] This deity might be manifested in the human world by representation of the Shang's tribal neighbour Tufang, with which the Shang maintained agricultural relationships.^[28] The Yellow River was another landscape feature that was deified. This exceptionally long river affected the agriculture greatly. Scribal works furthermore describe prayers other natural sceneries. ^[23] Importantly, spirits assigned to these locations were able to wield destructive powers, manifested through events like floods.

Ancestral powers

The Shang dynasty established a complex ancestral cult.^[c] They identified six foremost ancestral spirits: Shang Jia (上甲), Bao Yi (報乙), Bao Bing (報丙), Bao Ding (報丁), Shi Ren (示壬), Shi Gui (示癸); meanwhile, the royal line with kingly sovereignty started from Shi Gui's child Da Yi (Cheng Tang) and progressed to the last king Di Xin. The nearest previous generation of the monarch had spirits responsible for the monarch's well-being. Kings like Wu Ding were highly religious, believing that their health depended heavily on appeasing ancestral spirits, and often dreaming about them.^[32] Their rituals, therefore, was aimed at their immediate predecessors and conducted for the purpose of solving personal issues.^[18] Power of ancestral spirits, accordingly, varied in correlation with their seniority, and thus they were treated to some extent differently. Predynastic Shang leaders had power on state-significant aspects such as agricultural successes; the earlier the time frame of the ancestors, the greater their impact on the state. Shang Jia and his subsequent five predynastic leaders were addressed the "Six Spirits", and were thought to be the beings who dictated harvests.^[18]

There were several mysterious spirits addressed as ancestors, whose identity has not been fully comprehended. Studies concern spirits like Wang Hai (王亥)^[33][34] and Nao (獶),^[35] whose names are pictographic characters.^[36] There were also similar individuals revered along ancestors like Yi Yin and Mo Xi.^[37][38][39]

Ancestresses were also revered along with their male counterparts. Oracle bone inscriptions mention some of the most important female Shang ancestors, who were grand royal consorts of the kings. Inquiries to female deceased individuals illustrate beliefs in their spiritual role. They were perceived as being unfriendly and angry on some occasions, and after such divinations they received offerings.^{[40][41][42][43]} Some females who were mentioned in oracle bone divinations are, as demonstrated by oracle bone inscriptions:^[18]

• Bi Ji (consort of Zu Yi): "We shall protect the King's eyes against Grandmother Ji."
• Bi Geng (consort of Xiao Yi): "The King's son met with disaster on account of Mother Geng."
• Bi Bing: "We shall perhaps pray to High Grandmother Bing for a child."
• Fu Hao: grand consort of Wu Ding. She received a greater degree of veneration than other females after her death. She was referred to by her posthumous names "Mother Xin" and "Ancestress Xin".^[44][45][46]

Cosmology

The Shang believed in the divinity of an area surrounding the Ecliptic Pole, featuring a square shape (oracle bone script: 口). Observations of the sky made by astronomers and astrologers focused on a square of over four stars surrounding the pole at the time of the Shang dynasty, whose inscriptions contain implicit meanings considering their perception of a divine cosmos. "口" also denoted the modern stem "ding",^[d] and used in many collocations with personal titles such as Brother, Ancestor or Father,^[e][28] This shape also seemed to have been used as model in temple designs.^[49]

Taotie faces

The Taotie motif, which featured regularly on historical Chinese cultural artefacts, was present during the Shang dynasty.^[50][51] The Shang Taotie motif depicts spirits through representation of animals,^[52] a tradition inherited from synthesizing earlier cultures' designs like Yangshao and Liangzhu.^{[28][53][54][55]} While some speculate the Taotie motif to have conveyed no meaning to the Shang rather than serving for decorative purposes,^[56] most of the evidences point out that this was indeed a centrally religious aspect.^[57][28] Scholars claimed that since the Taotie appears on Shang ritual vessels and ceremonial axes,^[58] it was not carved for decorations. Several interpretation of the specific meaning of Taotie to the Shang have been given.^[59] These taotie faces all bear strong resemblances with the polar area concerned in Shang cosmology. For example, the Shang taotie features nasal ridges surrounded by dots, a similarity to the ecliptic pole and its adjacent stars. John C. Didier asserted that these similarities indicate that the depicted figures were divine spirits with crucial importance to the Shang people.

Shangdi and Xiadi

The Shang dynasty believed that Di was bipolar, that is, he was divided into two counterparts, of which Shangdi was the heavenly representation. Shangdi, as Di's component, was a manifestation of the sky through the polar square.^[28] In the Shang people's perception, the counterpart Shangdi was housed by the sacred northern pole.^[60] Also in Shang beliefs, indicated by oracle bones, this squared polar area on the sky, containing the god's cosmic divinity, was composed of main-lineage ancestral spirits through the generic name Shangdi,^[28][61] representing Di's will to act favourably towards humans. Already in oracle bone script, there are two frequent characters depicting Shangdi,^[62] one features the squared shape at its centre, and the other has two horizontal parallel lines, which in turn was associated with heavenly divinity and thus to the square itself.^[63][64]

Conversely, the Shang believed that Shangdi, as Di's manifestation of "heaven", had a negative counterpart associated with "earth". Many character versions depict the earthly counterpart of Shangdi, named Xiadi, composed of adopted deities and opposing people, and represented Di's negative actions towards the human realm.^[28] For example, one of Shang's long-term opponent, the Tufang ("Earth Territory"), seemed to have been seen as a part of Xiadi themselves. Therefore, Di was believed to be both Shangdi – heaven and positive – and Xiadi – earth and negative,^[28] which was why Di possessed the power to cast destructive power on the Shang.

Practices

Divination

Divination was one of the most important aspects of the Shang religion. Oracle bones, which consist of ox scapulae, tortoise plastrons^[3] and carapaces, were the main materials for divinatory documents.^[f][g] The oldest bone texts were radiocarbon dated to c. 1254 – 1197 BCE, belonging to Wu Ding's reign.^[13] The king and his court wrote about various topics, including warfare, agricultural successes, personal well-being, and weather.^[3][h][i] Because Shang gods exercised power over human actions,^[70] numerous divination rituals were held by the king^[71] (and his court scribes (多卜)) to acquire godly assistance. Writers inscribed inquiries on the bones, then heated the bones and interpreted bone cracks. Inquiries (or "charges") contain particles implying desired preferences,^[72] and some contain more detailed information such as verification.^[73] On many oracle bones, the king and his scribes prognosticated upcoming days that were thought to be "unanimous".^[18][74][j] The Shang's mature calendar system was used for denoting and arranging days on oracle bones.^[76]

Many Shang divinations were concerned with warfare. It was characterized by numerous military expeditions to all directions, especially to Guifang.^[78][79][80] Regional governors, who had their local commoners serving as military conscripts, were required to prepare to assist the royal army in combat.^[81] Divination was made to determine the regional chief suitable for countering enemies. Numbers mattered significantly: the Shang inquired about the sufficient number of soldiers to gain advantages, and the number of war captives they could obtain.^[23] Military officers' responsibilities were determined by oracle bone consultation. ^[23] Response to the questions were used as orders for the officials' mobilization of the army. Aside from these, prognostications about enemy offences also featured themselves on bones. In a particular case, a prediction claimed that "disasters" would be brought upon the state; five days later, the Tufang destroyed two walled Shang cities.

Additionally, divinations were carried out to determine suitable days for construction of regional city walls, which was important to defend the area's urban centres from foreign invasions. Conscripts from personal fiefs were recruited to carry out such buildings.^[23] Court civil officers, tasked with agriculture, received orders decided by divination to monitor agrarian activities. Some texts include divinatory responses which required the responsible officials (sometimes the kings) to make farmers plant grains or to supervise cultivation of crops in newly opened lands. The kings also divined occasionally about issuing orders to supervisors of craftsmen.

It has been recognized that there are divinations not made on behalf of the king.^[82][83]The aristocracy could have specified groups of diviners. Wu Ding's son or nephew,^[84][85] whose oracle bones lie in modern-day Huayuanzhuang East, made divinations on affairs happening in his estate; his inscribed bones numbered up to 537,^[86] containing personal divinations and bone receipt records.^[87] For example, one of the prince's inscribed divinations inquires about construction of an ancestral temple tended to store tapestries for Fu Hao's upcoming visit.^[88][89] Another oracle bone inscription describes the supervision of completing his land's guesthouse used to store sacrifices. Counts of modern scholars show that the prince honoured more than 20 royal ancestors in his inscriptions.^{[90][91][92][93]}

Liturgical sacrifices

The Shang religion is a typical example of a sacrificial system. Sacrifices were offered mainly to seek divine support or for the gods' appeasement.^[94] The Shang paid particular attention to the number of beings sacrificed.^[95]

The sacrifices that were not living beings were mainly bones, jade, and bronzeware items. Some of the bone products were shaped into hairpins or arrowheads. The tomb of Fu Hao contains over 560 such bone products. Jade was present through inheritance with previous cultures in China proper, such as Longshan and Liangzhu.^[96] The material was treated as precious, and sometimes the jade sacrifices were buried with their initial royal owners. Bronze came in plenty;^[97] the number increased during the Wu Ding period, which saw a major advancement in bronzemaking technologies.^[98]The offering ceremonies involved bronze vessels with short inscribed characters.^[71][99] If the sacrifices were intended to be accompanying the dead in their tombs, bronze weapons (like arrows and spears) together with decorative products could be added. At the last Shang capital Yin, thousands of bronze items have been unearthed, revealing the importance of this metal in Shang's procedure of honouring. There were also other minor materials that came in much smaller amounts. In particular, stones, ivory and even cowry shells were sacrificed.^[100]

Some species of animal, after being hunted,^[101] served as offerings (犧牲),^[102][100] both to the ancestral and supernatural sections of the religion's pantheon.^[103] There are four types of animal sacrifices, regarding position and completeness.^[104] Usually, canine species were killed to be consumed by both natural and ancestral deities.^{[105][106][18]} Body dismemberment was the main method to consider when sacrificing dogs, while hounds were often simply killed.^[18] The way animals were offered did not affect the expected actions of the supernatural deities: dogs were offered similarly in order to both maintain and end rains. Shang royal ancestors' sacrificed faunas also consisted of several other species from husbandry. Sheep were intended for a wide range of individuals, spanning through generations (e.g. Shang Jia and Pan Geng were both recipients of sheep). Occasionally, domesticated goats and ox would be slaughtered and sacrificed on certain typical rituals. Elephants did not appear in daily sacrificial ceremonies, but instead are found in royal tombs^[100](from those elephants, the Shang also obtained ivory). These sacrifices became increasingly institutionalized among social classes.

The Shang dynasty also practised human sacrifice.^[107] Guo Moruo asserted that people were sacrificed on a large scale.^[108][109] However, the source of humans served for this purpose was not the state's citizens; instead, the court sacrificed neighbouring polities' people who had been previously captured in battles.^[110] The Shang usually obtained a large number of captives, a small percentage of which were spared to be slaves, with most expected to produce religious artefacts. The rest, including women,^[111][112] were killed and their remains sacrificed to Shang ancestors. A single sacrifice alone could require hundreds of individuals killed,^[113] some numbered up to thousands.^[114][k] Regarding subjects for offering, the Shang did not distinguish the opponent's common people from their leaders, the latter were often reserved for highly honoured ancestors. Human sacrifices to supernatural deities (except Shangdi) were subject to rules of offering. The people sacrificed had to be buried when the recipient was the earth deity, drowned when offered to water spirits, and dismembered when offered to wind spirits.^[116]

Sacrificial terminology

Examples in various oracle bones show different names designated for specific types of sacrificial materials. Overall, animals offered would be called xisheng (犧牲), and humans called rensheng (人牲). There are plenty of Shang terms used specifically for female human sacrifices. Such women were designated nü (女 'females'), while the more specific qi was used to refer to 'dependent women'. Fu referred to captives of war, such as the Qiang. Shang scribes added prefixes to those indicatives, often to differentiate their origins; usually, names of the tribes from which humans were caught would be used for this purpose. There are numerous other particular terms that Shang used to designate types of humans offered to spirits.

Some oracle characters denote terms for general sacrificial methods. For example, the Shang word for dou (豆) refers to methods of killing sacrificial humans in bronze vessels,^[117] while shan (刪) was used to mention a single human slaughtered. The Shang wrote shi (氏) for ritualized offering at temples.^[118]

Liturgical year of sacrifice

In every day of a Shang week, a deceased ancestor would be chosen to be the recipient of specific sacrifices. On the gui day, the weekend, the reigning king and his assistants specialized in rituals would make a typical inscription that announced the sacrifices for the next day.^[119] A year was sectioned into three periods, the first of which usually lasted 13 xun.^[119] The first third was to perform ji, zai and xie sacrifices, the second for yong sacrifice, and the last for yi sacrifice. At the beginning of each third, a common ceremony honoring all the targeted recipients (gong dian) was held.^[119] Some argue that ji was the opening ritual.^[120]

In his 2011 work, Adam Smith tabled the sacrificial schedule of the late Shang practitioners, inscribed on a group of oracle bones by Huang, a scribe living during the reign of the last three kings.^[7] During this period, the Shang's planned sacrifices evolved into a liturgical year of 36 weeks. Five "opening" weeks were intended to announce upcoming rituals. Each sacrifice commenced the week right after the announcing one. The thirty-sixth week was left blank as to prepare for a new offering cycle.^[121]

Using recording texts of Chu and Huang (living at different periods), A. Smith also found out about the rules of arranging days for sacrifices. The Shang specified every royal ancestors to the certain days, and many other rules were made to fairly distribute the offerings between the days.^[122] The basic principle is that one's stem name would dictate his or her chosen day of sacrifice. Other rules structured the schedule in an orderly way.

Shamanism

Inscriptions on Shang oracle bones suggest a complicated religious system which communicated with the spiritual world via ritual performance (bin 賓) and the utilization of "numinous" media like bones and bronze.^[123] This type of communication, as some scholars point out,^[18] can be interpreted as communication "without direct encounter". Other interpreters of Shang ritual bronzes, such as K.C. Chang, assert that this perception is not satisfactory, and that the Shang dynasty's religion must have borne considerable shamanic elements.^[124]

Studies of oracle bone script yielded a character that corresponds with the later term "wu"^[125] (巫 'shaman').^{[126][127][128]} The same terminology could be found in the state of Chu's religion. Additionally, the Shang written records mention several people whose names bore the character. Nevertheless, it is uncertain whether "wu" actually referred to shamans or to another kind of religious practitioners who used other types of practices to communicate with the spirits (Shamans achieve this goal by getting into altered states of consciousness). Victor Mair supported the view that the "shamanic" practices of the Shang dynasty resulted from earlier connections with other ethnicities.^[129] He examined archaeological and linguistic evidences, and concluded that the word "wu" was etymologically and culturally related to the term "maguš" (plural form "magi"),^[l] a term used for priests in the Persian Zoroastrian religion. The term "magi" does not denote shamans; instead, it refers to priests that communicated with the spirits through the media of ritual and manipulative arts rather than trance and mediation. David Keightley also disagreed with the interpretation of "wu" as "shaman".^[130] Overall, the roles of wu during the Shang dynasty is yet to be fully clarified.^[131]

Funerary practices

The largest place for the afterlife lay in the Royal Cemetery, located in what is now Xibeigang (西北岡), Anyang. The site, located in Yin, served as the resting place for almost all royal family members. Lay within the cemetery are many tombs, each of which contains numerous Shang artefacts; the most notable tomb being that of Queen Fu Hao, with hundreds of bronze objects.^[132] The burial objects along with sacrificial animals were interred in designated positions relative to the deceased's coffin, with each position bearing a specific meaning. Several tombs also served for the purpose of rites, and were topped by ancestral shrines.^[133] Wu Ding's reign in the 13th century BC saw the cemetery's partition into the East and West zones, as a result of polishing Wu's image as a distinguished Shang king.^[4]

Using radiocarbon dating and other techniques, researchers have constructed a list of genealogy of the individuals buried. The study reports of Koji Mizoguchi and Junko Uchida, published in 2018, reveal that the Royal Cemetery's tombs were intended to built in a complex manner that indicates the buried individuals' relationships to each other.^[4] Some tombs bear striking resemblances, which the authors interpreted as attempts to imitate virtuous royal ancestors by the kings.^[4] Studying the cemetery's overall structure, scholars also pointed out that tombs' positions harmoniously aligned with the northern celestial pole, which housed the power of the ancestors in the form of a collective Shangdi.^[28]

On 20 January 1046 BCE, the last Shang king Di Xin lost the decisive Battle of Muye^[10] in which his forces was crushed by the Overlord of the West, Ji Fa. Di Xin set fire to his palace and committed suicide. The fact that he was not buried in accordance with Shang's tradition was due to his immoral and impious images made up by the Zhou dynasty.^[134]

Posthumous naming

Aside from the supernatural beings, the ancestors of the Shang kings were also revered. The recipients of honours included both dynastic and pre-dynastic ancestral individuals, honoured with were given posthumous names.^[119] The religion used a structured system of naming kings, which uses calendrical names for days.^[136][9] There were 10 weekdays whose names were used for ancestors: jia (甲), yi (乙), bing (丙), ding (丁), wu (戊), ji (己), geng (庚), xin (辛), ren (壬), and gui (癸).

There were several religious rules that dictate the naming decision.^[7] The Heavenly Stems used as one's title had to be the first day of his reign (in the Shang calendar). Besides, the king restrained from having gui as his posthumous name.^[119] If the first year of reign began with gui, the next day jia was used as an alternative. For distinguishing different kings with the same stem name, a set of prefixes was used, each of the prefix carried a specific meaning. Royal consorts of the Shang kings were given stem names not compliant with limitations as for the kings.^[137]

Posthumous names have strong connections with the ancestors' attributed powers. The majority of Shang ancestors possess names with the stems jia, ding and yi, which represent celestial divinity.^[28] By being referred to by such stems, the spirits became perceived as powerful gods whose will significantly affected the living realm.

Some prefix indicates the addressed subject's familial relationship with the reigning ruler, and often with a much broader sense than their modern meanings:^[122]

• Relatives who were two or more generations before the incumbent ruler would be referred to as zu (祖) (for males) and bi (妣) (for females). In this context, zu means (great) grandfather or patrilineal great uncle; bi means grandmother and other consorts of zu. Sometimes, "zu" could be used officially as the posthumous name's first component.
• The previous generation: fu (父) was used for males and mu (母) for females. The masculine indicative means the father or paternal uncles, and the other denotes the mother or the father's other wives.
• The same generation: only the character for males has been found, which is xiong (兄, "older brother"). This word could also be applied to paternal cousins.
• The next generation: the king's sons and nephews were referred to as zi (子). The word is sometimes understood as the surname of the rulers, while some understand it as "Prince".^[138]

Temple prayers

The court employed officials to plan and carry out constructions of sacred places. The general design of temple compounds (zong 宗) consisted of an elevated hall (tang 堂), a courtyard (ting 庭), a gate (門), and sacrificial pits (keng 坑).^[139] There were possible connections between the shapes of Shang sanctuary, whose layout was squared, to its beliefs. Chen Mengjia saw the word 口 as a notation for an altar;^[m] others also see it as a kind of temple ritual.^[141] Wang Guowei offered that 口 resembled an ancestral tablet (dan 匰) and an altar or shrine to an ancestor (shi 祏).^[142] The squared form features twice in the Shang character for 'temple' (宮).

The king and his priests were responsible for hosting temple praying rituals, sometimes using foreign labour for preparation processes. It was a prerogative of the Shang king, as the chief priest, to perform special prayers aimed at invoking spirits:^[143] in fact, the rituals' common name portrays the king praying in a sanctuary holding ritual objects. Additionally, praying ceremonies involved many dancers, mediators and scribes, who were granted exclusive access to the sanctuaries. Different temples were intended for hosting deities; for example, the Great Altar (大示) hosted Shang royal members of the main lineage.^[28][144] There were also separate temples, each reserved for a single spirit. Rituals were dedicated to the gods on a regular basis.^[28]

Practitioners

The Shang king was seen as the religious apex. He actively involved himself in communication with the pantheon's gods by praying, divining and hosting rituals. The king would try to assure that the spirits would give him guidance.^[18] The Shang court had a developed bureau for assisting the ruler; it consisted of several groups, each of which was specialized in a specific aspect. The officials include:^{[145][better source needed]}

• Diviners (duobu 多卜) Each diviner group was supervised by a chief diviner (guanzhan 官占). They worked with the inscribers and shamans (wu 巫). Many were named on bones.^[146]
• Record keepers (taishi ling 太史令): tasked with documenting the rituals.
• Astronomers (xi 羲, he 和) and astrologers (shi 史), tasked with determining days and months. They also made observations of Mars and many comets, a notable achievement.^[147]
• Dancers (wu 舞), and music directors (gu 瞽). Music was an important part of the offering process.

It is agreed that scribal professions of the Shang had to be acquired through forms of schooling.^[148][149] Texts written by Wu Ding's scribal officials contain the word 學 'to learn'^[150] that could act both as a verb and a noun; in most cases it comes with an important musical ritual called shang.^[148] The two characters imply that the subjects were being trained for musical roles. In terms of religious literacy training, there are inscriptions described by Guo Moruo as "finely written and orderly, as though engraved by a teacher (xiānshēng 先生) to serve as a model (fànbĕn 範本)". There is another interpretation: the learners must have already known the characters and practiced writing them just for learning engraving techniques;^[151] however, some scholars argue for its impossibility. There are also other suggestions.^[152] It is also generally believed that the Shang might have had some kinds of institutionalized training locations for religious teaching.^{[153][154][155][156][157]}

Regional practices

Religious activities during the Shang dynasty was not restricted to the urban area of Yinxu. There are instances of regional practice, although they are vague and much less known than the largest cult center at the capital city. Divinatory practices were present at the pre-Yinxu city in present-day Zhengzhou,^[3] where four separated oracle bones inscribed with characters have been excavated. These inscriptions are relatively short and have a similar style to Yinxu writings. Other than Zhengzhou, oracle bones have also been unearthed in Jinan^{[158][159][160]} and Shaanxi, the original homeland of the Zhou dynasty, and believed to be from the last decades of the Shang's existence. Additionally, many oracle bones have been found in river management constructions.

Religious constructions were commissioned by royal members in areas outside of the royal domain at Yinxu. The prince possessing the Huayuanzhuang oracle bones resided in Rong, a conquered region by the Shang dynasty and was probably west of Anyang, and ordered an ancestral temple with spirit tablets to be built there.^[161] He made sacrifices with both local and imported materials.^[161] The king at the time, Wu Ding, allocated to him resources such as sacrificial prisoners and grains.

It is believed that common people during this period played a role in religious activities. There are possibilities that the populace might have participated in seasonal festivals and sacrificial offerings.^[162] Commoners might as well have been involved in religious activities carried out by regional lords.

Effect on royalty

Kingship and sovereignty

The Shang king entrusted lords to govern Shang provincial regions; they were ordered to assist him in important affairs. Many of the lords were initially chiefs whose lands had been conquered and merged into Shang's territorial extent.^[n] The royal house nominally possessed the lords' lands – in fact, the kings always referred to all the regions as "our lands" – but he largely depended on the lords' loyalty.^[o] Kingly sovereignty over the lords is argued to have resulted from the spirits whom the king worshipped.

Scholars have studied Kui, a mysterious deity,^[23] and presented a theory suggesting that Kui's cult was the result of incorporating other beliefs. As Shang's neighboring polities themselves gradually submitted, their gods were "adopted" by the Shang religion and treated equally with Shang spirits. The king's role helped him keep the regional chiefs' loyalty by mediating among the spirits of both their gods and his own.

The nature of kingship was also derived from the deified beings. Ancestors such as Shang Jia (and generally the Six Spirits) had great influences over important national affairs, like other non-ancestral deities. In other words, they were universal deities. The Shang kings could be considered (and claimed to be)^[167] "living deities on earth".^[p]

Favor of masculinity

The system furthermore affected the continuation of kingship. The Shang tradition allowed female individuals to participate in government; however, it was overall a patriarchal society.^[170] Influences of male ancestors overwhelmed that of their feminine counterparts in scale. The person responsible for functioning as head of the clan and head of religious practice had to be a male. Males would carry the ancestral surname "Zi" and pass it to subsequent generations.

Conception of male children was considered a serious matter by the Shang dynasty, which expensed a considerable of divinations on this aspect. Ancestral intervention played a role in deciding the children's gender. Oracle bones show that the Shang considered another factor, the birthday, to be related to gender formation. In particular, the conception of Fu Hao, Wu Ding's second primary consort, was of interest to his court. Diviners carried out numerous divinations all predicting the baby's birthday.^[23]; occasionally, verifications were also inscribed, as demonstrated in the particular bone inscription by Wu Ding's diviner Que.

History

Precursors

Before the dawn of organized states in China, the area was inhabited by various tribal confederations. Each of the tribes practiced its own system of beliefs. The religious beliefs in prehistoric China were based on ideas of animism, totemism and shamanism.^{[172][173][174]} Many ancient tribes in pre-dynastic China shared a common belief in the spiritual world.^[q] The spirits were thought to possess divine powers. As such, they were able to intervene in and dictate the lives of the living realm's beings. That led to the necessity of direct communication with the spirits, through means of mystics. A group of specified individuals, known as shamans, arose and took responsibility for conducting their respective tribe's religious rituals.^[176] The cultures in the future heartland of the Shang dynasty had practiced sacrifices and funerals.^[177][178] In many regions of China, Neolithic cultures had utilized bony materials from cattles for divination.^{[3][179][180][r]}

In the Zhou dynasty's historical narrative, the tradition of honoring and venerating deities had already been existent during the Shang's predecessor Xia dynasty (c. 2070 – 1600 BCE).^[182][s] The Book of Documents also mentions the Shang high god Shangdi receiving annual sacrifices by Emperor Shun, even before the Xia dynasty.^[187] Although these periods are often considered mythical, their corresponding site of Erlitou (c. 2100 – 1500 BCE) has evidence of bronze-using religious activities that were later adopted and developed by the Shang dynasty.^[56]

Shang dynasty

The Shang dynasty's religion inherited the characteristics of its predecessors. Its beliefs, rituals of sacrifices and funerals bore resemblances with those of prehistoric beliefs. Early Shang kings created bureaucratic positions for religious practice, which were later diversified and further specialized. The religion was widespread, influencing other major Shang cities aside from Yinxu.^[7][188]

During the late Shang period (1300 - 1046 BCE), the religion achieved its mature status. Many kings of the late Shang were deeply religious and actively involved themselves in those matters. Some monarchs made alterations to the tradition. The first notable change took place during Wu Ding's regnal era. This change was documented by the Book of Documents, compiled centuries after its supposed time.^[189] Oracle bone script from the mid-12th century BC indicate that Wu Ding's youngest son Zu Jia also altered sacrifices.^[190] Changes also occurred in practitioners. Gradually, diviners of the Late Shang period were divided into schools, each of which were employed by several late Shang kings. Modern scholars classify Shang diviners by two methods based on periodization^[191][192] and employment.^{[193][194][195]} Both ways group diviners into two main schools.

The Shang kingdom showed religious interactions with other cultures in China proper. In most cases, the religious influences of the Shang dynasty left an impact on its vassal states. For example, the vassal Dapeng also practiced human sacrifice^[196][197] and also included Sheji ("God of Earth") in the Shang pantheon into their list of worshipped deities.^[198][199] From the 1200s BCE onward, religious influence of the Shang reached its largest vassal state Zhou. The polity embraced Shang theology into its beliefs, and the Shang also likely included Zhou dead ancestors into the collective Di godhead as well.^[200]

Evolution under the Zhou

In 1046 BCE, the Shang dynasty under the regime of Di Xin collapsed and was replaced by the victorious Zhou dynasty. This succeeding dynastic family used the practices of Shang religion to explain Di Xin's fall. The Book of Documents contains a chapter claiming that Di Xin discarded all the sacrificial traditions and therefore lost the blessings of his royal ancestors^[201][t] as well as of the Zhou supreme god.^[204]

Calendar

The Shang liturgical calendar was adopted by the Zhou,^{[u][207][208][209]} although it is uncertain whether the Zhou court reset the day counting after the dynasty's establishment.^[210][211] It was greatly revised and altered through the regime's eight centuries of existence. The diversification of its use took place during the Warring States period when cultural distinctions became more apparent.^[212] The Shang name for the count of years, si (祀), was replaced by the Zhou term nian (年) which originally meant "harvest" but the meaning was altered by Zhou. Uses of calendrical means by the new regime's kings was more complex than their predecessors Shang in that astronomical observations became integrated extensively to calculate and predict important forthcoming events.^[213] The Zhou monarchs invented a different terminology and separated methods for their own ancestors' veneration.^[7] A new system for posthumous naming dead relatives was devised, based on the virtues of rulers; still, some people during the early Zhou used the old tradition, including exceptional Zhou kings.^{[214][215][216]}

Worshipped deities

The head of the Shang pantheon, Di, became assimilated and identified with Heaven (Tian) of the Zhou dynasty,^[78] while still keeping its original meaning in early Zhou times. Through time, the original figure and the Shang-attributed powers of Di was forgotten, since Heaven was more philosophically complicated and was associated with more terminology as well as legendary tales. But overall, Tian still recalled Di's meaning as a driving force of the kings' reigns: the Mandate of Heaven, invented by the Zhou dynasty,^[217][218] was the key concept of a monarch's right to rule over the country^[219][220] up until the end of monarchy in China in 1912 CE.^[221] Di was identified with the Jade Emperor by practitioners of Taoism; also possibly, the counterpart of Shangdi became transformed into the form of the Yellow Emperor during the Zhou dynasty.^[222] During imperial Chinese dynasties, the tradition of "Sacrifice to Heaven" became popular, and Shangdi was made the main recipient of the event's sacrifices. In 221 BCE, when Qin Shi Huang created the title "Emperor" for himself,^[223] he combined Di with the character Huang (皇, "august") to obtain the term.^[224]

The early Western Zhou kept the Shang tradition of inscribing, on oracle bones, inquiries to Shang ancestral deities, such as Di Yi,^[225] indicating their former status as a state recognizing Shang suzerainty over them.

Other practices

There is evidence that religious activities of the state of Chu during the Eastern Zhou were related to the Shang religion, due to similarities between their artistic motifs. Mass human sacrifices practiced by Shang was critically reduced, though still employed.^[226][227] Oracle bones gradually ceased to be inscribed once the Zhou dynasty began, and the regime compiled a new way of divination and prediction, the I Ching (written between the 10th and 9th century BC).^[228] The populace in later dynasties practiced different funeral and sacrificial traditions,^[229] mainly due to the influence of Confucianism, Taoism, and other currents; however, there were still some parallels between the two dynasties regarding sacrifices.^[230] The role of women in religion notably changed after Shang.

Modern influence

The Shang high god Di remained to the present day through his identified figure Shangdi, who is still worshipped in countries of the Sinosphere. The word "Shangdi" is sometimes used to denote the Christian God,^{[231][232][233][v]} and the Jade Emperor.^[234]

Traditional festivals in China, Vietnam and other influenced countries make use of the sexagenary cycle.^[235] The lunar calendar's organization of days names the years, months,^[236][w] days and even hours after the 10 Heavenly Stems and 12 Earthly Branches. There are various folk tales attributed to this calendrical system, many of which appeared much later during post-Shang dynasties.

Assessments by Chinese dynasties

After the end of the Shang, various Chinese dynasties have presented their perceptions about the religion. While there are praises, especially by those who held favorable views on traditional values of the past, there are also thorough assessments and even different interpretations of Shang religious activities.

Zhou dynasty

During the Western Zhou period, the perception of Di, as presented, was mixed with that of Tian. Di's divinity was praised by the early Zhou kings, and the two words were even used interchangeably in the same inscriptional contexts. For example, King Li of Zhou (reigned 857 – 842 BCE),^[237] commented on the power of Shangdi:

The king said: I am but a small child, yet unstintingly day and night, I act in harmony with the former kings to be worthy of august Tian .... [I] make this sacrificial food vessel, this precious kuei-vessel, to succor those august paradigms, my brilliant ancestors. May it draw down the spirits of those exemplary men of old, who now render service at the court of Di and carry forth the magnificent mandate of august Di...

— King Li of Zhou, casting inscriptions on bronze in the 9th century BC^[238]

The Book of Documents, one of the most important Chinese classical texts composed during the Zhou dynasty, critically presents the Zhou's interpretation of various Shang religious practices. For example, the text points out the important of ancestral reverence to the Shang rulers, in that ancestral spirits exercised great authority over the living. Pan Geng was described in the Book as a perspicacious ruler, believing in the powers of the Shang high ancestor Tang to send down calamities on unworthy men. Additionally, this text highlights Shang divination by shells and bones, by referring to alleged events such as Pan Geng emphasizing on his officers who did not "presumptuously oppose the decision of the tortoise shell".^[239]

Many texts also evaluate Shang sacrificial traditions' alleged negative sides. The Shujing quotes: "Dignities should not be conferred on men of evil practices. (If they be), how can the people set themselves to correct their ways? If this be sought merely by sacrifices, it will be disrespectful (to the spirits). When affairs come to be troublesome, there ensues disorder; when the spirits are served so, difficulties ensue." That is, sacrificial rituals were sometimes conducted on unsuitable occasions, when they were counterproductive. The Liji also contains a similar passage, which asserts that Shang sacrifices should have been made in the right times.

Some Zhou people also mentioned the lack of available Shang religious texts, which caused inadequate understanding of their rituals. Confucius, in particular, asserted that the documents preserved by the Shang dynasty's royal members in Song were not enough for him for an extensive comprehension of the ancient ceremonial codes.^[240]

Han dynasty

Han dynasty historian Sima Qian, writing 1,000 years after the Shang dynasty's collapse, commented about its religiosity. He wrote that the Shang had practiced different traditions from the Zhou, and had been, on the extreme level, superstitious.^[241] He also noted about various Shang kings who received spiritual advice from their ministers, such as the case of Wu Ding (with his minister Fu Yue) and Tai Wu (with his minister Yi Zhi). They were possibly men with shamanic capabilities. Sima Qian went on to describe the sacrificial rituals of the Shang dynasty, commenting on virtuous kings who emphasized on worshipping high ancestors, and detailing the negative impacts of ignoring the gods (Wu Yi,^[242] Di Xin).

By the time of the Han dynasty, the perception of the god Di had been significantly altered. While the character retained its meaning as "High Deity", it was used mainly as a prefix or suffix to add to another word for deifying its meaning. Some examples from Han dynasty texts containing such combinations are Huangdi and Yandi. Nevertheless, the Han dynasty also worshipped a cosmologically associated god titled "Di", whose divinity was similar to that believed by the Shang dynasty. In particular, the Han-era Huainanzi, a compilation of debates led by imperial prince Liu An, presents an interpretation of Di: "The Celestial Thearch (Di) stretches out over the four weft-cords of Heaven...". "Di" also lay on a polar referential star like in Shang dynasty, the star Kochab (Beta Ursa Minoris). Han texts identify Di with Taiyi (太一), the "Great One".^[243] Believed by the Han people as having been worshipped by the early Zhou kings, Di (or Taiyi) was highly revered.

Sima Qian, in chapter 27 of his work, stated that his attempts to identify the celestial power of Di used references from Wuxian, the early Shang mediator. Wuxian was believed to be one of the most notable Shang religious figure, and a revered astrologer. He was positively viewed in other Han and post-Han texts, and his attributed star maps were often used in Chinese astronomy.

Notes

References

Citations

Bibliography

Further reading

• Chen, Mengjia (1936). Guwenzi zhong zhi Shang Zhou jisi..
• Shelach, Gideon (1996). "The Qiang and the Question of Human Sacrifice in the Late Shang Period". Asian Perspectives (1).
• Huang, Zhanyue (1990). Zhongguo gudai de rensheng renxun. Beijing: Wenwu chubanshe.
• Keightley, David N. (1978). "The religious commitment: Shang theology and the genesis of Chinese political culture". History of Religion. 17 (3–4): 211–225. doi:10.1086/462791..
• Ken-ichi, Takashima (1980). "The early archaic chinese word "yu" in the Shang oracle-bone inscriptions : word-family, etymology, grammar, semantics and sacrifice". Cahiers de linguistique-Asie orientale (1)..
• Michael, Thomas (2015). "Shamanism Theory and the Early Chinese "Wu"". Journal of the American Academy of Religion. 83 (3): 649–696. doi:10.1093/jaarel/lfv034..
• Wang, Tao (2007). "Shang ritual animals: Colour and Meaning". Bulletin of SOAS. 70 (2)..