Sitnikov, Igor
(2011)
Common Symbols In Eurasia-pacific
Unconscious Cultural Heritage:
A Case Study Of The Taiwanese
18 Deities' Cult.
International Journal of Asia Pacific Studies (IJAPS), 7 (1).
ISSN ISSN: 1823-6243
Abstract
The case study of the "Temple of 18 Deities" demonstrates a row of stable
Eurasian-Pacific religious symbols which were preserved in the Taiwanese
religious cult. In the article, the author claims that the traces of those long-lived
elements could be found in many other religions and cultures all over EurasiaPacific area, from Ireland to China, Taiwan and Oceania. In the paper, the
"Temple of 18 Deities" origin mythology is analysed, the author's fieldwork
described, a set of stable symbols in the cult of 18 deities' revealed, and
researches devoted to Taiwanese and Chinese popular religion genesis
overviewed. In the end, the traces of those symbols in mythologies of other
cultures in Eurasia-Pacific cultural area are illustrated, main symbols common
meanings analysed, and their origins and stages of transformation reconstructed.
In the article on example of the 18 deities' cult in northern Taiwan, the author
observes how ideas, beliefs, and values were created and transmitted in religious
cultures during the periods of cultural changes. The author suggests that invisible
Eurasian-Pacific common cultural heritage is hidden under umbrellas of different
variants of popular religions and superstitions in different cultural traditions all
over Eurasia-Pacific, and the case of the Taiwanese 18 deities' cult is an example
of such heritage inside Chinese popular religion and folk Buddhism.
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