World

Finding spirituality—and kindness—on a mountaintop in Beijing

The Chinese are too materialistic—but one spiritual festival offers a welcome change

May 20, 2016
©Shizhao
©Shizhao
Read more by Yuan Ren: A new age of Chinese travel

Few think of Beijing as where folk religion thrives today. Sure, religions like Christianity are booming in the Chinese capital, and in the Niu Jie quarter of the old city Islam remains alive: Muslims serve halal snacks and call for prayers in the quarter’s centuries-old mosque.

But in Beijing’s countryside, some two hours out of the city centre in the Western Hills, on what many Beijingers would consider a remote mountaintop, spiritual folk of all different types converge in a 700-year-old Daoist temple for two weeks of each year. Beginning on 1st April in the Chinese Lunar calendar (which is the 7th May this year), the Miaofengshan (this is the name of the mountain) Temple Fair represents the height of spiritual life in the capital. An explosion of colourful performances, along with incense burning, prayers and servings of porridge makes it one of the richest cultural affairs in Beijing.

On the first day of this year’s festival we made our way up to the mountain—which is located in Beijing’s Mentougou District—at 7am, the time that it officially opens. We were hardly starting off authentically, however, in our car: pilgrims to the festival originally reached the mountaintop from one of five trails that extended out to neighbouring areas; many parts of these paths still remain. Tea culture is closely associated with the festival, as teashops originally lined the trails. Wealthy visitors could also pay to be carried up in chairs.

At 8am we arrived at Niang Niang Miao, or “Goddess Temple” at the top of the mountain. The festival was already in full swing. Heavy incense burning quickly awakened the senses as fumes swirled around performance troupes making their way around the temple site. These folk performances aren't just for show; they are the pilgrims’ own offerings to the Gods, with specialisms ranging from martial arts, to stilt walking, to pole throwing, undertaken in traditional, coloured costumes. Some dresses are extremely theatrical, representing demons, saints and mortals.

Centuries ago civic associations (in practice these were often families with a certain level of wealth) set up camp inside the temple, providing free sustenance to pilgrims and visitors throughout the festival. Associations offering mantou (white flour bun), porridge, tea, and apples among other simple goods filled many of the buildings in the temple this year.

Today these foods are cheap and not especially healthy, and so not quite the same treat for the visitors that they once were. Still, these philanthropic societies are an integral part of the Miaofengshan temple fair: the offerings made by them are symbolic of generosity and giving, and are clearly still appreciated, since long queues formed for porridge and pickled condiments throughout the morning.

Despite the well-preserved authenticity of the fair and the thousands of visitors on the first day, the festival is tiny compared to the popular Chinese New Year temple fairs of Beijing. Ditan (this means “Temple of Earth”) Park temple fair saw just under 10 million visitors this February. Most of these fairs are are highly commercialised; many are not even held inside temples.

But the 400-year-old Miaofengshan temple affair is something different altogether. It is at its heart a folk congregation that was once hosted by the rural community—for the rural community, primarily.

“Even today it’s set up by the people for the people, unlike the other temple fairs that are sponsored by the government,” says one of the members of a tea society. “There is nothing here for sale.”

Dr Yang Yuan, a Chinese historian with the China Academy of Social Science, thinks that in the post-Mao era of the late 1980s when China’s political climate permitted the revival of traditional rituals, there was a hunger for the Miaofengshan fair from the rural community. “The spiritualism of folk life was the essence of community cohesion for people back then. With little money and material possession, performances were an important form of expression for the rural community.”

Folk religion in China has strong roots in village life, and unlike organised western religions such as Christianity, is a blend of philosophy and faith that doesn’t centre around a particular ideology: it's Buddhism, Daoism, and ancestral worship as well as superstition.
"Those flocking to the fair are not the same crowd as they used to be. It’s increasingly more urban, more middle-class"
Things are different today. Walking around the temple, you hear critical tones from elders—former performers and or those whose lives are intricately linked with folklore. One elderly gentleman tells those huddled around him that the stilt-walkers are merely “swinging about” when they ought to be engaged in a more complicated task.

Ian Johnson, a veteran journalist with the New York Times who is publishing a book on the resurgence of religion in China next year, says that the performances are "no doubt less sophisticated compared to twenty years ago." One reason is that teenagers in their performance prime are more preoccupied with school grades than practising. A modern diet has clearly not helped some of the performers, either, who are moving rather sluggishly.

“The key is that people still want to go there and find deeper meaning in the experience," says Johnson.

Those flocking to the fair are not the same crowd as they used to be. It’s increasingly more urban, more middle-class, partly due part to urbanisation, partly growing wealth. Most of the rural families who have supported the festival since its revival are integrated into city life, with city jobs, living in apartments. Yet, each year they still set up on Miaofengshan temple offering free tea to all. One such tea society family clan invited me to eat with them inside the temple the night before the festival. In modern China, where the obsession with material possessions has dominated people's lives for the past decades, true acts of kindness are hard to come by. But kindness thrives at a mountaintop temple, where you can drink as much free tea as you want.