You’re using a lot of Christian language here to describe a non-Christian tradition, which makes it tricky to really understand what’s going on here. Yes, these aspects of Chinese Folk Tradition may LOOK like aspects of Catholicism and may even function similarly in the wider society, but to use such uniquely Christian terminology muddies the water by assuming that Chinese religion or even society functions in any way like western society.
FrostyTheSasquatch t1_je0lux3 wrote
Reply to TIL that in Chinese Folk Religion, a mortal human being could ascend into godhood not through the decisions of a clergy/church, but by the sheer number of people who believe that their extraordinary achievements led to apotheosis, which forced Confucian/Taoists clerics to canonize a person as a God. by Khysamgathys
You’re using a lot of Christian language here to describe a non-Christian tradition, which makes it tricky to really understand what’s going on here. Yes, these aspects of Chinese Folk Tradition may LOOK like aspects of Catholicism and may even function similarly in the wider society, but to use such uniquely Christian terminology muddies the water by assuming that Chinese religion or even society functions in any way like western society.
Terminology either means something or it doesn’t.