Wugenzi - Journey of a Goddess: Chen Jinggu Subdues White Snake

Chen Jinggu Subdues the Snake Demon

Translated, edited, and with an introduction by

Fan Pen Li Chen

On the cover: Detail of photos of Chen Jinggu as a statue ( left ) and as a string puppet ( right ). Photos by Fan Pen Li Chen.

Published by State University of New York Press, Albany

2017 State University of New York

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Printed in the United States of America

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Wugenzi, active 1573 author. | Chen, Fan-Pen Li, 1953 translator.

Title: Journey of a goddess : Chen Jinggu subdues the Snake Demon / translated, edited, and with an introduction by Fan Pen Li Chen.

Other titles: Xin ke quan xiang xian fa jiang she hai you ji zhuan. English | Chen Jinggu subdues White Snake

Description: Albany, NY : State University of New York, 2017. | A translation of Haiyouji, a short Ming dynasty novel originally published in northern Fujian Acknowledgments. | The complete title of the novel (translated here as Journey of a Goddess) is Xinke quanji xianfa jiangshe haiyou jizhuan. However, it is generally referred to as Haiyouji. The version translated and reprinted here is based on a 1753 wood block reprint (which was itself most likely based on a version originally printed by Zhongzheng Tang during the Ming dynasty Introduction. | Includes bibliographical references.

Identifiers: LCCN 2016054532 (print) | LCCN 2017011496 (ebook) | ISBN 9781438467078 (hardcover : alk. paper) | ISBN 9781438467092 (ebook)

Classification: LCC PL2698.W86 X55413 2017 (ebook) | LCC PL2698.W86 (print) | DDC 895.13/46dc23

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2017011496

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Dedicated to my granddaughter, Matilda Stonechen

Inspiration for this project commenced during my attendance at the 2014 NEH Summer Daoist Seminar, organized by Terry Kleeman and Stephen Bokenkamp, at the University of Colorado at Boulder. Id casually brought along to the seminar a copy of Haiyouji , a short Ming dynasty novel I was considering translating. How very fortunate that I did. Chang Chaojan and Hsieh Shuwei , consultants at the seminar, met with me regularly to explain several difficult terms and assist with their translation. My sincere thanks to both of them. One of the slides Hsieh presented during the seminar was of a painting depicting priests wearing forehead mirrors (which were mentioned in the novel Id brought). Hsieh arranged for me to obtain a photo of the painting (which belonged to Li Fengmao ) for this book. I am deeply grateful to Terry Kleeman and Stephen Bokenkamp for providing me with the opportunity to meet Chang and Hsieh and to learn extensively about Daoist history and literature. I completed my first draft of the translation of this novel while I was at the seminar.

Ye Mingsheng was instrumental in assisting my research concerning this particular goddess. When he first agreed to conduct fieldwork with me about Chinese puppetry, he warned that I would eventually end up conducting research on local religions. Sure enough, the puppet theaters of southern China (particularly those of Fujian) ultimately opened up a rich and many-layered world of local religions to me. Three very extensive Fujian marionette plays (translations of two scenes from one of these plays are included in the appendices of this book), edited by Ye, are hagiographies of Goddess Chen Jinggu. While conducting fieldwork on puppetry, we also watched a marionette play about this goddess (in Zhejiang), and another about the snake god, Jiaomang (in northern Fujian). These plays inspired the main ideas in Subjugation of Snake Demons: The Snake Cult and the Hagiography of Goddess Chen Jinggu included in this book. A Chinese version of this article was presented at the first academic conference (organized by Ye), held at the site of the goddess ancestral temple in Gutian , Fujian. Although originally published in northern Fujian, the original text of the translated novel would have been lost to posterity if it had not been discovered by Ye in the remote reaches of western Hunan. His knowledge of local Fujian culture and religions is reflected in many of the footnotes of my translation. Indeed, I owe a deep debt of gratitude to Professor Ye (as I call him) for including me on many of his fieldwork trips, inviting me to many conferences he organized, and making available to me the less accessible of his prodigious published scholarship. The local gazetteer on Gutian and the numerous conference volumes and ritual texts edited by Professor Ye have all been essential for my gaining familiarity with the cult of this important goddess.

Huang Jianxing , a Masters Degree student when he first accompanied Ye Mingsheng and me on our fieldwork trips, has since obtained a PhD from the University of Hong Kong and is now an Associate Professor at the Normal University of Fujian. He remains a helpful friend and has generously provided many photos (from which I selected nine for this book).

Donna Albright, my college roommate and best friend, edited this manuscript for me. I thank her and her husband, Steve Strauss, for their friendship, generosity, and abiding encouragement.

I am also grateful to my daughters, Kimberley and Ingrid Chen, for their love and emotional support. This book is dedicated to my new granddaughter, Matilda Stonechen, the apple of my eye. May her life be filled with the joys of discovery!

Journey of a Goddess is a lively mythology of Chen Jinggu (766790), one of the most important goddesses in southeast China (the chief deity of the Lshan Sect ). A historical shaman the novel is filled with the beliefs and practices of Jinggus cult and asserts the importance of Shamanism as one of the four Chinese religions.

The complete title of the novel (translated here as Journey of a Goddess ) is Xinke quanji xianfa jiangshe haiyou jizhuan (New Woodblock Print of the Complete Travel Record and Biography of Manifesting Ritual Powers through Subjugation of the Snake and Journey among the Lakes But the reference to sea/s in the title is more difficult to comprehend since the novels protagonist, Chen Jinggu, a shaman priestess in real life, had never traveled to the sea (the way the character hai is usually understood). In the novel, however, hai clearly refers to any large expanse of water (with the only true sea being the South Sea, where the Bodhisattva Guanyin resides). Accordingly, the title may mean journey among the rivers and lakes. Like the other travel records mentioned, Journey of a Goddess is a hagiographic account of folk religious beliefs.

The title Haiyouju , literally, sea travel residence, is mentioned in a marionette play about the goddess, Biography of the Lady , found in Shanghang , western Fujian. In scene 9 of the play, the emperor decrees, after he has bestowed titles upon Chen Jinggu and members of her family: