(Scraps
from a Sinological Scrapbook 漢齋閒情異誌, fragment 27)
During our recent stay in Matsu, we were lodged in a
bed-and-breakfast owned by one of Katie’s former bosses, who is from Matsu. We
all call him Brother Tiger because the two characters of his name literally
mean Lucky Tiger. Brother Tiger was and is an administrator and advisor of
various cultural agencies including one of Taiwan’s most famous
traditional-style opera troupes. Like others from this particular part of
Matsu, from childhood up he has been a participant in the cult of a local god
called ‘The Marshal in Armor’ (in the military sense of a ‘field marshal’).
The Marshal is a
frog spirit. He is called Marshal in Armor because in the local dialect, the
word for ‘frog’ sounds like the Mandarin word for ‘armor,’ and being a god,
like a field marshal he has power and authority.
There are several
images of the Marshal. The main one is located in a subsidiary altar of the
local temple of the ‘Empress of Heaven,’ i.e. the goddess Matsu. The Empress of
Heaven, like our Holy Virgin Mary who is also called Queen of Heaven, is said
to have been a flesh-and-blood girl during her life on earth. Later she
achieved the status of a goddess capable of helping earthlings with many things
including saving fishermen in peril, helping women to become pregnant...in
short, she is a divine refuge figure who is worshipped by millions and I would
say is probably, maybe next to the Buddha in his or her various guises, the
single most universal religious focus of the Taiwanese people. I will not now elaborate
on the goddess Matsu as that is a whole story in itself...
As I was saying,
there are several images of the Marshal. The main one is worshipped at the
Empress of Heaven’s temple, but an important role is also played by a compact
mobile image, a wooden thing maybe a foot high, which is mounted on a wooden ‘litter’
or ‘sedan chair’ that can be carried around during processions or...as I will
go into shortly...on inspection trips or even airline flights. The sedan chair is
carried by four men, two in front and two behind. Besides serving as the
Marshal’s vehicle when he needs to go somewhere, it is also the instrument of
his ‘spirit writing’ when he chooses to communicate with humans. When this
happens, the procedure is that the bearers tilt the whole sedan chair 90
degrees while continuing to hold it from below...the Marshal can’t fall out
because he is mounted inside. The writing is done by placing a table under the
tilted sedan chair. The table is covered with ash from burnt incense. The
bearers bend over somewhat, enough so that a crossbeam of the sedan chair is in
close proximity with the top of the table. When a question is asked or the
Marshal wishes to make a pronouncement, the whole Ark, so to say, gets to
Moverin’...bearers plus chair plus crossbeam get to vibrating, heaving up and
down and sideways, till the end of the crossbeam bumps repeatedly into the ash
and makes markings in it. The markings are Chinese characters or other familiar
signs...although in reporting this, I am taking it on faith because when I
looked at the marks, it defied my imagination how anyone could read anything
out of them. This point is important, though, as it is a somewhat unusual
manner of spirit communication. It is not at all unusual for the Chinese to
receive guidance from gods or spirits, but oftentimes either the message is
spoken through a medium who is in trance, or writing is done by other means
including the ‘planchette,’ which is a mechanical device made up of connected
sticks that looks something like a pantograph.
The Marshal is a
testy character and not averse to letting his displeasure be known. One of the
stories about him is that when the County Chief was in town, the Marshal demanded
he should come to the temple for a visit. At the Marshal’s instruction, a very
large glass of the renowned local firewater (116 proof kaoliang) was prepared
for the County Chief and he was told to drink up and listen. What the Marshal
had to say was that certain repairs were needed on the local scene and would
the government please do something about it. (The story does not go on to tell
whether the repairs were all subsequently put through.)
One of the
Marshal’s quirks is that he loves opera. About two years ago, when Brother
Tiger was in town and went to see the Marshal, he said he was planning to take
early retirement. The Marshal said Hey, not so fast now, you’re not done yet.
Since you’re a big shot in the opera world, I want you to stay on long enough
to arrange a nice opera performance for me to watch. So Brother Tiger agreed!
(This was not the Marshal’s first interaction with their family...years
previously, when their daughter was having a difficult pregnancy, the Marshal
gave a medical prescription, a certain remedy to be drunk by the girl for a
certain period of time, after which the trouble disappeared. Another time, when
Brother and Auntie Tiger’s son was getting married in Taiwan, the Marshal was a
guest at the wedding...he had been flown over to Taiwan, sedan chair and all, in
a regular passenger plane.)
So at the Marshal’s
behest, Brother Tiger shelved his early retirement and busily set to work to
organize the opera – finding a suitable play, enlisting musicians etc. The
Marshal himself designated which performers were to play which roles. This all
took time, but by the time we got over to Matsu for a visit a few days ago,
things were at an advanced stage and the opera was being rehearsed at a locale
provided by a local school. We went to watch. The Marshal was present in his
chair rig, watching the whole time.
After the
rehearsal, a table was set up with incense ash on it so that the Marshal could
write out his reactions and suggestions. The bearers brought him over, tilted
his rig into writing position, and the bumping and marking commenced. Brother
Tiger, based on all his professional experience, gave the performance a ‘grade’
– 85 points out of a possible 100. Not good enough, said the Marshal; next time
I want you to get it up to 95.
Certain
performers were singled out as needing improvement. This time they got by with
a mere admonishment, but on other occasions the Marshal has been known to demand
‘punishment’ in the form of making the deficient performer kneel on the cold
stone floor for the time it takes one stick of incense to burn to the end –
about one full hour.
The cult of the
Marshal in Armor is not practiced in Taiwan proper or even in Matsu as a whole.
It is specific to the locality of Qinbi where we were staying, and (I have been
told) to certain spots on the Chinese Mainland.
--Lloyd Haft
February 4, 2015
