Abstract
During the Tang dynasty, thunder worship in the Lingnan coastal region exhibited highly distinctive regional characteristics. First, the Leizhou Peninsula was home to the areas with the most profuse thunder worship in all of China. Second, unlike the numinous beasts that appeared elsewhere, the God of Thunder on the Leizhou Peninsula was born from an egg and appeared in human form. Third, while the God of Thunder was regarded as a low-grade god throughout most of China, on the Leizhou Peninsula, it was the most important god, and deeply influenced all aspects of local society. After the Tang dynasty, governments from the Nan Han dynasty to the Qing also paid much attention to this remote god formed in South China, and granted it increasingly degrees of esteem in the state-sanctioned pantheon. It is a rare historical phenomenon that the Thunder temple in the Leizhou Peninsula has existed for thousands of years and continues to have many believers to this day. This article is based on the records of the Tou huang zalu, and explores the background of the development of thunder worship and the evolution of associated beliefs. Furthermore, the article explains the manner in which “Instructing According to the Sacred Way”(神道設教) was used by successive central governments, and this phenomenon’s interaction with the folk religion of Southern China by focusing on a specific aspect of this.
Keywords
Tang and Song dynasties, Lingnan coastal region, thunder worship, Instructing According to the Sacred Way
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