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The Sheng Yen Series in Chinese Buddhist Studies
Emperor Wu Zhao and Her Pantheon of Devis, Divinities, and Dynastic Mothers
Wu Zhao (624-705), better known as Wu Zetian or Empress Wu, is the only woman to have ruled China over the course of its 5,000-year history. How did she rise to power, and why was she never overthrown? Exploring a mystery that has confounded scholars for centuries, this multifaceted history suggests that Wu Zhao drew on China's rich pantheon of female divinities and eminent women to aid in her reign.
Wu Zhao could not obtain political authority through conventional channels, but she could afford to ignore norms and tradition. Deploying language, symbol, and ideology, she harnessed the cultural resonance, maternal force, divine energy, and historical weight of Buddhist devis, Confucian exemplars, Daoist immortals, and mythic goddesses, establishing legitimacy within and beyond the confines of Confucian ideology. Tapping into deep, powerful subterranean reservoirs of female power, Wu Zhao built a pantheon of female divinities carefully calibrated to meet her needs at court. Her pageant was promoted in scripted rhetoric, reinforced through poetry, celebrated in theatrical productions, and inscribed on steles. Rendered with deft political acumen and aesthetic flair, these affiliations significantly enhanced Wu Zhao's authority and cast her as the human vessel through which the pantheon's divine energy flowed. Her strategy is a model of political brilliance and proof that medieval Chinese women enjoyed a more complex social status than previously known.
Wu Zhao could not obtain political authority through conventional channels, but she could afford to ignore norms and tradition. Deploying language, symbol, and ideology, she harnessed the cultural resonance, maternal force, divine energy, and historical weight of Buddhist devis, Confucian exemplars, Daoist immortals, and mythic goddesses, establishing legitimacy within and beyond the confines of Confucian ideology. Tapping into deep, powerful subterranean reservoirs of female power, Wu Zhao built a pantheon of female divinities carefully calibrated to meet her needs at court. Her pageant was promoted in scripted rhetoric, reinforced through poetry, celebrated in theatrical productions, and inscribed on steles. Rendered with deft political acumen and aesthetic flair, these affiliations significantly enhanced Wu Zhao's authority and cast her as the human vessel through which the pantheon's divine energy flowed. Her strategy is a model of political brilliance and proof that medieval Chinese women enjoyed a more complex social status than previously known.
384 pages, Hardcover
First published June 1, 2015
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Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews
March 9, 2015
Wu Zhao, eighth-century emperor of China, has to be one of the most fascinating and enigmatic women in history.
She rose from a second-class concubine to become the first wife of Emperor Tang Gaozong, and at his death, seized power and ousted her own son to become the only female emperor in Chinese history.
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This book does not directly explore Wu Zhao’s history. Instead, Rothschild analyzes the mythical, religious, and historical figures that Wu Zhao used to bolster and justify her own position. In retrospect, I don’t think I was the target audience for the book. I know basically nothing about Chinese history, but the book assumes the reader is already very knowledgeable about both Wu Zhao and the Tang dynasty. The prose is dense, and I tended to have to stop and look up the references to cultural figures of the time. The closest the book gets to giving a biography of Wu Zhao is a few paragraphs in the intro; otherwise, knowledge of her story is generally assumed. I had to do a certain amount of research on Wu Zhao (Wu Zetian) just to catch up.
While I may have learned less about Wu Zhao herself than I would have liked, the book was far more enlightening about Wu Zhao’s “pantheon” of goddesses and historical figures. Rothschild asserts that Wu Zhao sought to connect herself to ancient goddesses such as Nüwa, the “were-snake Daoist goddess” who created mankind and “mended the sky” and the Luo River goddess, a being who symbolically related the dragon with the feminine element of water. Wu Zhao also performed sericulturist rites four times--of the total of eight times the rites were performed during the Tang dynasty--to honor Leizu, the goddess of silk and weaving. Before reading this, I had no idea how important weaving was to the medieval Chinese definition of womanhood. Yet while Wu Zhao used these as “starter goddesses” to gain ascendancy, she later discarded some of them once she became emperor.
To combat the Tang stereotype of powerful women as “the unnatural anti-mother,” Wu Zhao identified herself with women who embodied the Confucian ideals of motherhood while still wielding a certain amount of political power. She raised stele to the Woman of Tushan, the Mother of Qi (“Beginning”) and a figure known as both a dutiful wife and mother. She claimed Jiang Yuang (“she who gave birth to our people”) as an ancestor. Jiang Yuan had her own interesting bit of propaganda: originally, she is known for abandoning her baby and only taking him back after a series of miraculous occurrences; however, she was recast as a Confucian “Model of Motherly Deportment” who only left her baby because she believed it to be the gods’ will. Perhaps the most interesting woman that Wu Zhao claimed as ancestor was Mother Wen, who raised ten sons and was considered by her husband to be one of his “ten capable ministers,” but valued by Confucians only for her fecundity. (Confucius’s response in the analects was that “With a woman amongst them there were, in fact, only nine.”) Wu Zhao named Wenmu as First Ancestress, used her to talk her way into sharing the crucial feng and shu rites with her husband, and utilized her example as justification for her own political role.
Wu Zhao also wrote books of rules on Confucian deportment, which seemed to reflect upon her the authority and embodiment of these virtues. She especially focused on the metaphor of weaving. Although women and weaving were inextricably tied, weaving and government also shared a common vocabulary, from “zhi” (“to govern”/”to weave silk”) to “lun”(“philosophical discourse”/”silk yarn”) to luan (“civil disorder”/”raveling a skein”). She highlighted as examples several matriarchs who used their weaving or their duties to their families to justify interfering in politics, emphasized loyalty as the primary virtue, and used the title “Sage Mother” to emphasize her maternal role.
Rosthchild suggests that Daoism was a two-edged sword for Wu Zhao: though it elevated female power--”dao” can even be interpreted to mean “mother of the world”--it was deeply connected with the rival Li clan who claimed Laozi as Great Ancestor. All the same, Wu Zhao elevated the Mother of Laozi, reaffirmed her title, and adopted the similar title of “Sage Mother.” She also connected herself the Daoist deity Queen Mother of the West, possibly because of Wu’s own fascination with immortality in her declining years. She also used the Queen Mother’s own habits with young boys to excuse her own.
Buddhism was one of the friendliest religions to Wu Zhao’s goals, and during her reign she declared it to be China’s primary religion. Buddhism embraced androgynism: Buddha was declared to be “beyond gender” and gender roles tended to be fluid and dynamic. Wu Zhao connected herself to Maya, the sage and “divine mother” of Buddha and the “mother of all bodhisattvas,” and to Vimalaprabha, the bodhisattva-goddess of pure light. In the Great Cloud Sutra, Buddha had prophesied that the devi Jingguang would descend to the world in the body of a woman and become a ruler and champion of Buddhism. Wu Zhao capitalized on this and similar prophecies; although the Five Impediments restricted the role of women, the fluidity of gender roles allowed her to skirt around the restrictions. She added Golden Wheel to her title and even claimed to be the reincarnation of the (male) Buddhist divinity Maitreya, but the festival in honor of her new title was so disastrous--a fire burned the festival complex to the ground--that she dropped the title. Although this connection was disastrous, Buddhism’s tendency to embrace androgyny and fluid gender roles bolstered Wu Zhao’s position throughout her reign.
Overall, although the book was somewhat dense and assumed far more knowledge than I possessed, I was intrigued by the analysis. In general, I found many of Rothschild’s claims rather tenuous. Much of his argument rests upon interpretations of poetry coming out of Wu Zhao’s court; although she may have had as much direct influence over this as Rothschild claims, it seems impossible to prove. All the same, much of the evidence of her political acumen is far more direct and often astounding. I think the most fascinating and important thing I learned from the book was the social complexity and tensions between the three main religions, and their different viewpoints on the role of women in society. Although I knew Confucianism wasn’t precisely friendly towards women, I had no idea that Confucius was so virulently sexist that he made Augustine look like a radical feminist. While I probably wasn’t the right audience for the book, it certainly gave me a new curiosity about the society of medieval China and about Wu Zhao herself.
Cross-posted on BookLikes, where there may be additional comments and pictures that it was too hard to copy over.
~~I received this ebook through Netgalley from the publisher, Columbia University Press, in exchange for my honest review.~~
She rose from a second-class concubine to become the first wife of Emperor Tang Gaozong, and at his death, seized power and ousted her own son to become the only female emperor in Chinese history.
This book does not directly explore Wu Zhao’s history. Instead, Rothschild analyzes the mythical, religious, and historical figures that Wu Zhao used to bolster and justify her own position. In retrospect, I don’t think I was the target audience for the book. I know basically nothing about Chinese history, but the book assumes the reader is already very knowledgeable about both Wu Zhao and the Tang dynasty. The prose is dense, and I tended to have to stop and look up the references to cultural figures of the time. The closest the book gets to giving a biography of Wu Zhao is a few paragraphs in the intro; otherwise, knowledge of her story is generally assumed. I had to do a certain amount of research on Wu Zhao (Wu Zetian) just to catch up.
While I may have learned less about Wu Zhao herself than I would have liked, the book was far more enlightening about Wu Zhao’s “pantheon” of goddesses and historical figures. Rothschild asserts that Wu Zhao sought to connect herself to ancient goddesses such as Nüwa, the “were-snake Daoist goddess” who created mankind and “mended the sky” and the Luo River goddess, a being who symbolically related the dragon with the feminine element of water. Wu Zhao also performed sericulturist rites four times--of the total of eight times the rites were performed during the Tang dynasty--to honor Leizu, the goddess of silk and weaving. Before reading this, I had no idea how important weaving was to the medieval Chinese definition of womanhood. Yet while Wu Zhao used these as “starter goddesses” to gain ascendancy, she later discarded some of them once she became emperor.
To combat the Tang stereotype of powerful women as “the unnatural anti-mother,” Wu Zhao identified herself with women who embodied the Confucian ideals of motherhood while still wielding a certain amount of political power. She raised stele to the Woman of Tushan, the Mother of Qi (“Beginning”) and a figure known as both a dutiful wife and mother. She claimed Jiang Yuang (“she who gave birth to our people”) as an ancestor. Jiang Yuan had her own interesting bit of propaganda: originally, she is known for abandoning her baby and only taking him back after a series of miraculous occurrences; however, she was recast as a Confucian “Model of Motherly Deportment” who only left her baby because she believed it to be the gods’ will. Perhaps the most interesting woman that Wu Zhao claimed as ancestor was Mother Wen, who raised ten sons and was considered by her husband to be one of his “ten capable ministers,” but valued by Confucians only for her fecundity. (Confucius’s response in the analects was that “With a woman amongst them there were, in fact, only nine.”) Wu Zhao named Wenmu as First Ancestress, used her to talk her way into sharing the crucial feng and shu rites with her husband, and utilized her example as justification for her own political role.
Wu Zhao also wrote books of rules on Confucian deportment, which seemed to reflect upon her the authority and embodiment of these virtues. She especially focused on the metaphor of weaving. Although women and weaving were inextricably tied, weaving and government also shared a common vocabulary, from “zhi” (“to govern”/”to weave silk”) to “lun”(“philosophical discourse”/”silk yarn”) to luan (“civil disorder”/”raveling a skein”). She highlighted as examples several matriarchs who used their weaving or their duties to their families to justify interfering in politics, emphasized loyalty as the primary virtue, and used the title “Sage Mother” to emphasize her maternal role.
Rosthchild suggests that Daoism was a two-edged sword for Wu Zhao: though it elevated female power--”dao” can even be interpreted to mean “mother of the world”--it was deeply connected with the rival Li clan who claimed Laozi as Great Ancestor. All the same, Wu Zhao elevated the Mother of Laozi, reaffirmed her title, and adopted the similar title of “Sage Mother.” She also connected herself the Daoist deity Queen Mother of the West, possibly because of Wu’s own fascination with immortality in her declining years. She also used the Queen Mother’s own habits with young boys to excuse her own.
Buddhism was one of the friendliest religions to Wu Zhao’s goals, and during her reign she declared it to be China’s primary religion. Buddhism embraced androgynism: Buddha was declared to be “beyond gender” and gender roles tended to be fluid and dynamic. Wu Zhao connected herself to Maya, the sage and “divine mother” of Buddha and the “mother of all bodhisattvas,” and to Vimalaprabha, the bodhisattva-goddess of pure light. In the Great Cloud Sutra, Buddha had prophesied that the devi Jingguang would descend to the world in the body of a woman and become a ruler and champion of Buddhism. Wu Zhao capitalized on this and similar prophecies; although the Five Impediments restricted the role of women, the fluidity of gender roles allowed her to skirt around the restrictions. She added Golden Wheel to her title and even claimed to be the reincarnation of the (male) Buddhist divinity Maitreya, but the festival in honor of her new title was so disastrous--a fire burned the festival complex to the ground--that she dropped the title. Although this connection was disastrous, Buddhism’s tendency to embrace androgyny and fluid gender roles bolstered Wu Zhao’s position throughout her reign.
Overall, although the book was somewhat dense and assumed far more knowledge than I possessed, I was intrigued by the analysis. In general, I found many of Rothschild’s claims rather tenuous. Much of his argument rests upon interpretations of poetry coming out of Wu Zhao’s court; although she may have had as much direct influence over this as Rothschild claims, it seems impossible to prove. All the same, much of the evidence of her political acumen is far more direct and often astounding. I think the most fascinating and important thing I learned from the book was the social complexity and tensions between the three main religions, and their different viewpoints on the role of women in society. Although I knew Confucianism wasn’t precisely friendly towards women, I had no idea that Confucius was so virulently sexist that he made Augustine look like a radical feminist. While I probably wasn’t the right audience for the book, it certainly gave me a new curiosity about the society of medieval China and about Wu Zhao herself.
Cross-posted on BookLikes, where there may be additional comments and pictures that it was too hard to copy over.
~~I received this ebook through Netgalley from the publisher, Columbia University Press, in exchange for my honest review.~~
December 23, 2017
Fantastic scholarly history. I wrote a 9000 word essay on Empress Wu for my MA in Chinese history at SOAS and this reminded me why she is such a fascinating subject. It was handled in much more depth with great analysis of how she used religion to legitimise her power and position. It challenged the older ideas that she simply used Buddhism to secure her position in opposition to the use of Taoism by the Tang. The best history book I read this year.
October 26, 2015
Not quite the biography that I was expecting.
September 18, 2017
A primary note, since this seems to be a common misconception in the reviews-- this isn't a biography of Wu Zhao/Wu Zetian. It's a monograph on her political uses of legends, religious cults and mythological beings to support and abet her careers as Empress and Emperor.
The book was at time a difficult read. There was some dense information, especially for a lay person whose knowledge of Wu Zhao is limited mainly to Chinese period dramas and a handful of books on general Chinese history. I picked it up because I have an abiding interest in political uses of religion, as well as the politics of female politicians.
That said, the information was laid out in a way that was enjoyable and made the thesis easy to follow. Rothschild is clearly passionate about the subject and has both a soft spot for and clear-eyed perspective on Wu Zhao and her life. This was a pleasure to read.
The book was at time a difficult read. There was some dense information, especially for a lay person whose knowledge of Wu Zhao is limited mainly to Chinese period dramas and a handful of books on general Chinese history. I picked it up because I have an abiding interest in political uses of religion, as well as the politics of female politicians.
That said, the information was laid out in a way that was enjoyable and made the thesis easy to follow. Rothschild is clearly passionate about the subject and has both a soft spot for and clear-eyed perspective on Wu Zhao and her life. This was a pleasure to read.
December 9, 2024
This book took me by surprise. Empress Wu is well known for being ruthless and the only female Empress Regnant in China. What is less known is how to use various strategies and imagery in many forms in order to cultivate your legitimacy. It has been done for centuries to maintain strangleholds on power and is still being done to this day. I highly recommend this book to anyone who wants more than just a life story of potential murders and palace intrigue.
July 1, 2015
Wu Zhao became China’s first and only empress. She rose from obscurity to become the emperor much to the shock of the country. It was evident that she was a political genius because she not only rose to the throne but also had a stable reign. One of the ways that she used her political acumen was through religion. She created a pantheon of female deities, and used them to help legitimize her reign. The author then divides the book into three faiths- Taoism, Confucianism, and Buddhism. In each chapter, he writes about the specific deity and how she uses them to her advantage.
While I was hoping to learn more about the life of Wu, I did find this book to be particularly interesting. I liked learning about these female goddesses, and I could see how they personally attracted Wu when she was empress and how she later used them as Emperor. I also liked as Zhao represented herself as these goddesses by having her as model for the goddess in the Buddhist temples. I also like how she also used poetry to help accomplish her goal.
Overall, this book was about how Wu used religion to rise to the throne. This book is not really comprehensive, and it for scholars who know more about the history, politics, and religion of the Tang era, and the emperor Wu. Still it was interesting in how the myths of the goddesses helped Wu rise to the throne when the idea of a woman ascending the throne held much opposition. This book only covers a small part of how Wu rose to power and how she stabilized her reign, and it is a small glimpse of the complexities of the religion in the reign. This was great introduction into the three faiths that I really do not know a thing about until I read this. It is obvious that the author loves the Chinese emperor, and that he is fascinated by how she accomplished this daunting task. I think that is one of the reasons why he decided to study her further. However, this book left me wanting to know more about the life of Wu Zhao. This book is for those that have a deep knowledge in religion, history, and politics for I believe this was more for academic scholars and not for the general reader.
(Note: I read an ARC copy of this book in courtesy of Netgalley.)
While I was hoping to learn more about the life of Wu, I did find this book to be particularly interesting. I liked learning about these female goddesses, and I could see how they personally attracted Wu when she was empress and how she later used them as Emperor. I also liked as Zhao represented herself as these goddesses by having her as model for the goddess in the Buddhist temples. I also like how she also used poetry to help accomplish her goal.
Overall, this book was about how Wu used religion to rise to the throne. This book is not really comprehensive, and it for scholars who know more about the history, politics, and religion of the Tang era, and the emperor Wu. Still it was interesting in how the myths of the goddesses helped Wu rise to the throne when the idea of a woman ascending the throne held much opposition. This book only covers a small part of how Wu rose to power and how she stabilized her reign, and it is a small glimpse of the complexities of the religion in the reign. This was great introduction into the three faiths that I really do not know a thing about until I read this. It is obvious that the author loves the Chinese emperor, and that he is fascinated by how she accomplished this daunting task. I think that is one of the reasons why he decided to study her further. However, this book left me wanting to know more about the life of Wu Zhao. This book is for those that have a deep knowledge in religion, history, and politics for I believe this was more for academic scholars and not for the general reader.
(Note: I read an ARC copy of this book in courtesy of Netgalley.)
July 29, 2015
From Netgalley for a Review:
Wu Zhao is one of the most fascinating women in Chinese history, and if you want to learn about her life and who she was, find a different book. This book is for the hard core scholars who want to delve into the blending of religion and politics during her time as Empress, Dowager Empress, and Emperor.
See, when you rule a country as big and as rife with intrigue as Tang Dynasty China, everything you do is watched, recorded, weighed, and used to shape your legacy...or overthrow you, depending on how things turn out. So it is no surprise that Wu Zhao's reign(s) had a lot of iconography associated with her, using Confucianism, Taoism, and Buddhism.
Of course how much of these religious beliefs she had and how much of them were part of state functioning or used as building up her image is unknown, all we can do is speculate. And read books that light the fire of speculation.
Wu Zhao is one of the most fascinating women in Chinese history, and if you want to learn about her life and who she was, find a different book. This book is for the hard core scholars who want to delve into the blending of religion and politics during her time as Empress, Dowager Empress, and Emperor.
See, when you rule a country as big and as rife with intrigue as Tang Dynasty China, everything you do is watched, recorded, weighed, and used to shape your legacy...or overthrow you, depending on how things turn out. So it is no surprise that Wu Zhao's reign(s) had a lot of iconography associated with her, using Confucianism, Taoism, and Buddhism.
Of course how much of these religious beliefs she had and how much of them were part of state functioning or used as building up her image is unknown, all we can do is speculate. And read books that light the fire of speculation.
December 31, 2015
2.5/5 stars, closer to a 2.
A lot of the information was interesting, especially as standalone accounts, so I felt severely disjointed at the end of each section, even when there was attempt at linking everything to Wu Zhao. It would have been fine reading about the divinities themselves on a separate historical book, and equally fine reading about Wu Zhao herself on a more biographical tone, as opposed to learning about her in comparison to a divinity.
A lot of the information was interesting, especially as standalone accounts, so I felt severely disjointed at the end of each section, even when there was attempt at linking everything to Wu Zhao. It would have been fine reading about the divinities themselves on a separate historical book, and equally fine reading about Wu Zhao herself on a more biographical tone, as opposed to learning about her in comparison to a divinity.
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews