Evening Republican, Volume 19, Number 173, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 23 July 1915 — HOLD SNAKES SACRED [ARTICLE]

HOLD SNAKES SACRED

CHINESE HAVE DEEP REVERENCE FOR THE REPTILES. Bplrit of the Dragon King, Which le Worshiped, Supposed to Reside Within Their Bodies—Rat Is Also Honored. * ' It Is not always safe to kill a snake in China. It doesn’t matter much whether the snake is of the water species or of the land variety, for within this reptile’s body is supposed to reside the spirit of what the yellow man worships as the dragon king. This latter is believed by the average superstitious “John” to have the power of ruling over floods. This dragon king represents one symbol in the ritual of worship of the Chinese religion called Taoism. China practically possessed three different forms of religion until the advent of the Christian missionaries. The first of these religions was in the form of a philosophy. This still exists to some extent and is known as Confucianism. The second form has been recognized as Buddhism, which still exists throughout China as symbolized in the worship of idols. As you travel through the country, here and there you will frequently run across idols of Buddha located on the hillsides or other quiet and sequestered spots conducive to reverential reflection. Plenty of worshipers yet pay their homage to these Buddhist idols, and you can see them conscientiously observing the formal ceremonies of their worship. But this form "of religion is steadily dying a natural death since the advent of Christianity. The third variety of religious observanse among the Celestials is that of Taoism. This was started by an old patriarch named Lao-tgu, who had surrounding him a group of “eight immortals” as his disciples. One of these latter was given the responsibility of representing the God of Barbers. The Taoist worshipers have temples erected in each native town. In these temples are pictures portraying the horrors of the future life. When the souls of the dead are buried across the river Styx the artist has painted a gruesome thought. Men and women are depicted as climbing towering mountains of ice, only to fall back into a gaping abyss as they nearly reach the top. As they fall their bodies are revealed as being caught upon spears and tossed backward and forward by deft executioners. These gruesome pictures show the sufferers to be finally ground up between millstones. Some of them show sharp swords slashing to pieces the bodies which have escaped the millstone process, and little dogs are pictured as running after the sufferers, lapping up the blood. On certain occasions after a death the family will proceed in a body to these temples and will hold a public wail. On the drum tower of the Taoist temple at Tientsin it has been common to see richly dressed native merchants kneeling to an iron pot containing incense burned in honor of his excellency the rat. Other similar disgusting procedures could be observed. It is hard to conceive that human beings can be so superstitious as to deliberately endure such empty practices of hallowed mockery. Yet this is one phase of China, the China of today. The few modernized Mongolians surely have their hands full in effectively combating this awful element of ignorance and bigoted superstition and in holding their newly organized republic to the main highway of progress.