Status Updates From The Cult of the Fox: Power,...

Good question: Why is it almost impossible to find fox depictions in actualy fox form in chinese temples but they are common in Japanese ones?

First foxes become agents of retribution and social uplift and now in late Qing times, they even play roles in official positions to pacify disturbances.

I wonder, how many of these fox stories are actually due to people pranking each other or working in secrecy

Taoists using captured foxes to do their bidding and gain fame and fortune... that sounds familiar

Oh. the old claim of prostitutes as lewd and lecherous again. These people had no clue about prostitution.

So local cults like these fox cults where generally labelled as illicit during imperal times and feudal superstitions later.

The local lore claims that the 4 main characters from Journey to the West where at this stone buddha temple? That story is pure fiction!

1997. That is the most modern date the author gave so far. I always wondered when he spoke of modern times.

So in this train of thought, only the foxes who successfully take the examinations under Mother Taishan are allowed to gain the higher levels of transcendence.

So the people worshipped gods like Guandi "merely as a sheet of paper" but for real and efficacious help they turned to magical animals. That is ironic.

In North China, those who became fox spirit mediums were considered genetically inferior by the other villagers? Is he sure? He mentioned that in Republican Beijing suburbs 3 kinds of people were most likely to be chosen as mediums:
1) mental/physical deficiencies
2) being an animal in previous life
3) transgressed against prohibitoons of the animal spirits
But what about that suggests genetic inferiority except 1?

These are the foxes? They look completely human and dessed as qing officials and those five animal spirits for wealth are the same. Prior I noticed a similarity to older german beliefs that also have snakes as bringers of wealth and fortune but in those it was at most a snake with a crown, not a snake in human form. With these here you have to be told what they are.

As interesting as it is to read about female power that fox-worshop and mediums could bestow on a woman and how literati reacted to it, I really wonder: Did people really belief that so many so many mistresses, concubines etc. were transformed foxes?

When the book talks of the cult of the Eighteen Lords in Taiwan, does he refer to the Temple of the Eighteen Lords in Taipei?