Lesson 17: Buddhism’s view on the altar

Lesson 17: Buddhism’s view on the altar

「The concept of God has its own specific historical time and space. For the people's beliefs, God is just a convenient name.God, the inner meaning contains magic, authority, dominance, admiration, etc., which is beyond imagination and contemplation.The objects believed in the altar are based on the "Jiaqing Huidian" of the Qing Dynasty:

1.The gods of the country are only worshipped.

2.Respect merit and repay virtue, then sacrifice.

3.Protect the country and protect the people and sacrifice them.

4.Loyalty, filial piety, integrity and righteousness are sacrificed.

5.Famous officials and local wise men are sacrificed.

This is a sacrificial system that is officially advocated by the government, and it is generally a wise man who is beneficial to farming harvests or has made contributions to the country and society.The altar refers to a place where the people engage in worship ceremonies and activities without the requirements for temple registration.

The altars and ancestral halls that are everywhere among the people reflect the people's satisfaction in pursuit of various desires, forming a realistic theory of folk beliefs.The types of folk gods are quite complex and diverse.For example, nature worship, ancestor worship, god worship, sages of all generations, filial daughters and chaste women, regional gods, lonely souls without worship, and even worship of specific stones, trees and other spiritual objects.The people worship the gods of heaven and earth, worship the sages and ancestors, and respect the ghosts and gods of the world. This worship of gods originates from recognition of its magical power, which can protect the prosperity of the clan and dominate the good and bad fortune of the individual.According to the Ministry of the Interior's religious group survey in 1992 and 1995, the altar activity service projects include collecting shock, relieving disasters, eliminating evil, eliminating diseases, looking at geography, watching the day, fortune telling, divination, doing merit, restoring the fetus and media.

In terms of personal terms, the people's prayers for the gods are nothing more than praying for eliminating disasters and bringing blessings, long life, smooth work, extensive wealth, and peace of the family.In terms of the group, we pray for good weather and peace and prosperity.Folk belief is mainly to meet the needs of reality, which is the basic motivation of faith. It is understandable, but everything in the altar is used to explain the disasters and difficulties encountered in people's lives, but ignores people's independent ability to solve problems;If you try to use magic to drive away evil spirits and avoid evil spirits to change the good and bad fortune of life, you will easily get the disadvantages of utilitarianism without any effort.Since there is no standard or management method for setting up standards and management methods at present, it is inevitable that unworthy people will use evil words and evil words to deceive the public, engage in fraudulent money, sex, or use medical treatment to treat people, hinder public order, good customs and illegal behaviors, causing harm to society.It is also urgent to guide people's beliefs and ban the illegal altar.

The "Taiwan Province Altar Tutoring Key Points" formulated by the Civil Affairs Department in recent years stated that altar worship ceremonies and activities should be done in public. If there are any left-handed love affairs, they should be investigated and dealt with by laws of various powers:

1. Those who are suspected of committing crimes or violating social order and who are suspected of committing crimes or violating social order protection shall be dealt with in accordance with the law.

2. Those who violate the doctor's law by falsely administering talismans or other improper methods for performing medical behaviors shall be dealt with according to law.

3. If noise is caused by using amplification facilities, please handle it in accordance with the law.

In traditional society, temples can be said to be the social and cultural center, with community mutual assistance, the preservation of folk cultural relics, and the spread of historical monuments.In early Taiwanese temples, they had the following functions:

1. Promote the formation of settlements and regional prosperity.

2. Promote local stability and unity.

3. The center of autonomous defense.

4. A gathering place for business travelers.

5. Symbolism of public opinion.

6. Various social functions of the festival.

7. The functions of folk medical care.

8. Preservation and inheritance of culture and art.

9. Other social functions.

The functions of the temple should be injected with new faces as the social structure evolves.We should not overemphasize witchcraft, miracles, spiritualism, etc. We must cultivate talents in the altar, strengthen the concept of religious ethics, and edit the meaning of various sacrifices, rituals such as Dharma Assembly, and rituals into books to allow the people to have a correct understanding of their beliefs. We also hope that the folk altar can leave a rich record for traditional folk cultural relics through academic research.

The religious magic made at the altar actually carries out physiological and psychological counseling and treatment, which is indeed closely related to the lives of the people.However, since the altar has lacked the compliance with unified doctrines for a long time, there is no legal constraints of the ecclesiastical organization, and there is even a lack of perfect training courses for altar personnel. The quality of the altar media is of varying quality, and the unfilial charlatans perform all kinds of names and fake miracles to cater to the people's mentality of seeking blessings and avoiding evil spirits. Therefore, there are incidents of fraudulent money and defrauding sex often occur.

The altar has had certain therapeutic effects on the physiological and psychological treatment of the people over the years.But one should not assert himself as the reincarnation of a certain god and Buddha as authoritative.Using this deception of money and sex, he used the name of Buddhism to corrupt the reputation of Buddhism.We should not use false miracles to claim to be able to produce clones, and use repeated exposure and other synthetic techniques to create photos of clones showing their appearance, so as to absorb the majority of believers and seek them.We should not possess evil spirits to cause panic among believers, and use this fear to use exorcism to change our fortunes, so that innocent women will be harmed, and also to shame the altar of the decent.

The current altar has shown a complex phenomenon of diversity and complexity. The altar should be self-disciplined and self-clear, correct the kindness of society, and establish the concept of taking it from the society and using it for society, and engage in education that gives back to the society and various welfare and charity.In addition, a professional academy of the altar was established to improve the education level of the altar personnel, and to formulate organizational regulations to ban illegal charlatans and deceive people under the pretext of talismans, exorcising evil spirits, and suppressing evil spirits, causing panic among the people.The altar of pure and kind has its positive value to society. How to set legal altar personnel standards and qualified training courses, stop illegal altar villains from scrambling into it, endangering the kindness of society is an urgent issue for the altar group.