Sculpting Divinity: Liuyang's Teaching of Mount Hua Masters' Ritual for Spirit Mediums

This paper explores the ritual practices of ritual masters that facilitate the transition of ordinary individuals into spirit mediums in the eastern district (dongxiang 東鄉) of Liuyang, Hunan. A particular liturgical tradition, known as the Teaching of Mount Hua (Huashan jiao 華山教), is prominent among sculptors specializing in creating god statues in the Hakka communities of Liuyang. In the Hakka community of Liuyang, ritual masters from the Huashan jiao tradition invariably occupy the highest positions during the consecration of god statues. These masters of Huashan jiao were the sculptors and the masters of the consecration-related rituals in history. According to the villagers' and ritual masters' understanding, the Teaching of Mount Hua's masters is akin to that of the gods' parents, as they created the gods' physical forms through their sculpting work and consecrated them through the ritual of consecration. These ritual masters carved wooden statues that depicted the gods' forms. Moreover, Huashan jiao ritual masters are essential in consecrating the statues, which transfers the wooden statues into gods. Alongside the consecration, two other rituals, the ritual of Soldier Recruitment (zhaobing 招兵) and Opening the Horse Servant (kai matong 開馬僮), will complete the divinity of a village temple. In the absence of readily available Daoist priests or Buddhist monks, the spirit medium, whom Huashan jiao ritual masters consecrated, served as the religious specialist for the community.  

In her pioneering research, Lin Wei-Ping (2015) advanced the concept that god statues and spirit mediums serve as two primary material forms of spirit power in Chinese religious practices. She contends that god statues serve as a means to materialize abstract concepts, relying on cultural mechanisms to bestow magical power upon non-sacred entities (2015:32). In the eastern district of Liuyang, Hunan, villagers worship various deities. Spirit mediums are crucial to receive the revelation of these deities' titles, names, and origins, showing the importance of spirit mediums in Liuyang's local religious life. The possession of spirit mediums by local deities, often demons in their initial manifestation, serves as a crucial mechanism in the bestowal of their backgrounds and the establishment of cults. During the consecration of a village temple's new god status, a newly emerging god is believed to deliver this specific revelation to villagers, thereby personifying and localizing the concept of the divine. As outlined in her 2015 monograph, Lin Wei-Ping's research argues that personification and localization are cultural mechanisms that bestow efficacy on god statues and spirit mediums. Additionally, Lin argues that the popular Chinese religion is distinct from Daoism, Buddhism, and Christianity (2015: 171). 

Liuyang's local liturgy, the Teaching of Mount Hua (Huashan jiao 華山教), offers a divergent perspective. In Liuyang, spirit mediums do not possess a tradition of transmitting from generation to generation, nor would the senior medium train the ne. Instead, Huashan jiao masters collaborate with local temple gods to create new spirit mediums for the village through the Opening the Horse Servant (kai matong開馬僮) ritual. This ritual is typically performed with consecration (kaiguang開光), during which the Huashan jiao master bestows the efficacy of the statue and summons the deity whose statue is consecrated and his divine minions, thereby creating the optimal conditions for producing a new spirit medium. Huashan jiao masters rely on their manuscripts and oral teachings from their masters to perform all these rituals. This practice diverges significantly from the observations made by Lin Wei-Ping in Taiwan, where spirit mediums are less readily available to villagers due to their inability to be created as needed. Consequently, Liuyang's tradition of spirit mediums may have stronger connections with Daoism and Buddhism. 

This paper will meticulously reconstruct the ritual using textual records, photographic documentation, and video footage. These materials will be collected during the interviewer's fieldwork from March 14, 2025, to March 18, 2025, to depict the Opening the Horse Servant (kai matong開馬僮) process. The interviewee, Master Gao Cheng (高程), is a disciple of Master Chen Jiding (陳濟丁, 1936-2022), who hailed from the Dawei mountain (大圍山) in Liuyang. Prior to his passing, Master Chen was invited by numerous temple establishments in the eastern district of Liuyang to perform a variety of rituals, including consecration (kaiguang 開光), the ritual of Soldier Recruitment (zhaobing 招兵), and Opening the Horse Servant (kai matong開馬僮). Master Gao Cheng pursued the study of Mount Hua's liturgy, building upon his foundation in other liturgical traditions found in Hunan and Hubei. Therefore, Master Gao did not receive Master Chen's transmission until he made an oath to Master Chen that he would not learn from other masters. Master Gao has become a specialist in Opening the Horse Servant (kai matong 開馬僮). Intriguingly, people from various religious backgrounds seek Master Gao's expertise in performing this ritual for them. 

Furthermore, the ritual of Opening the Horse Servant (kai matong 開馬僮) is performed after previous spirit mediums or when gods no longer possess the spirit medium for specific reasons. In such cases, the scheduled ritual is conducted. The spirit medium seeking assistance from Master Gao is the spirit medium of a village temple. However, the temple's deity no longer possesses the spirit medium's body, precipitating a crisis for the spirit medium, the villagers, the temple, and the village. Consequently, the spirit medium sought assistance from Master Gao. This paper will, therefore, textually reconstruct the ritual of Opening the Horse Servant (kai matong 開馬僮) using all the materials collected during fieldwork, including but not limited to manuscripts. The study will also tentatively examine the interactions between Liuyang's spirit mediums, the Teaching of Mount Hua, and, implicitly, Daoism.