Abstract
Religious life in Taiwan has experienced a great revival since the political relaxation in 1980's; especially the popular religion and new religious movements have been blooming. New temples and shrines are being built; temples that got over the adverse period of time restore their activities.
Not only because of the political relaxation, but also in connection with the economic growth, temple festivals are growing again; restored or newly established events organized by temples emerge. The reconstruction of traditions still continues, and brings new development to the temples.
But it also brings new questions: Are the temples restoring the old traditions or are they rather establishing new ones? Who does reconstruct or build these traditions and why? How does the restoration and perpetuation of traditions comply with the present way of life? I want to explore these questions on an example of a particular event organized by the Fengtian temple in Xin'gang (a town close to the city of Jiayi in Taiwan); it is "Shanhai youxiang" - a pilgrimage to the mountains and seas. In spite of its name, it is actually an inspection tour (raojing) by the main goddess of the temple - Mazu - of belief sphere (xinyang quan), and brings peace and blessing to the believers living in the particular area matching the historical administrative region.
Nowadays, the pilgrimage is held once a year and takes about 10 days. Even though it has been organized in this form only since 2009, the temple committee and believers claim the tradition to be centuries old, and a hallmark of the Fengtian temple.
In their opinion, they are simply restoring the tradition and upholding it. On the other hand, they have added new details and features that have given it a more contemporary feel.
Is this a case of reconstructing of a tradition based on memories of the elders and historical records, or rather a construction of a new tradition shaped by the current expectations placed on the temple cults and their role in the society?