Meeting a monk and Hell’s messenger over a beer

Only in Singapore? What a strange experience last night…

I got back late from work last night, pretty tired, but decided to go out and practice anyway; I’m wary of letting my routine lapse. So, I did about six repetitions of the CMC-37 routine, noticing something new each time. Then two sets of the Xuan Xuan Dao form, one of bagua sword, and about five of the wuji bagua set I’m learning from Master Zhou. I finished up with two sets of the Zhang Sheng Li’s long xing bagua form from Beijing.

After that, I badly needed to sit down for a while! I went to a nearby coffeeshop where quite a few people from the local martial arts scene were hanging out. I ordered a beer, and wound up sitting on a busy table next to a Buddhist monk (who was drinking tea, not beer!). I’ve seen him around before, as he’s friendly with a lot of these guys, but never spoken to him before. We chatted for a while, and then he moved on to another table. I started talking then with people on the other side of me, and eventually discovered that I was talking to one of Hell’s messengers.

Some readers might need a bit of background here. In the Chinese tradition, Hell doesn’t mean the same thing as the Christian Hell. Both are places where spirits of the dead suffer for their sins during their life. However, there are big and important differences. In the Christian Hell, souls go there for eternity, and their tormentors are innately evil, sadistic and malevolent demons. In the Chinese hell, souls are not there for ever; the spirits inflicting punishment can be regarded as prison guards and judges, implementing (very severe) punishments laid down by law – in other words, innately moral and defenders of justice, not sadists. So bear this important distinction in mind.

In the Daoist tradition, the spirits of both Heaven and Hell are able to visit Earth to communicate with us. They do this through the possession of spirit mediums, who act as the messenger of one particular god. I’ve previously written a review of a book that studies this phenomenon in Singapore, as well as some video links of the same thing in Thailand. I think it’s gradually dying out in Singapore, unfortunately. Here’s a clip from the 1970s – you don’t see crowds like this any more:

Anyway, so I got talking to this guy who turned out to be a tang-ki, one of the mediums. His story was very interesting. He and his family had traditionally prayed to a certain spirit, a general of Hell. One day, a member of the family became very seriously ill. Unknown to the rest of the family, this man prayed to the spirit, asking for his relative to recover; in return, he would act as the spirit’s messenger.

The spirit intervened, and the family member recovered. The deal had to be honoured, and the guy I was talking to now had to act as the vehicle for the god, for a period of three years. Now, every week, the god occupies his body in order to talk to worshippers. He remembers nothing from these periods. These rituals are actually held very close to where I live; I hope I might be able to go along as an observer at some point, although I’m not sure of the etiquette here, so I feel I need to tread carefully for the moment.

Anyway, after three years, the contract with the spirit will expire, and he won’t have to do this any more. However, it seems that every officer in the ranks of Hell has an equivalent in the bureaucracy of Heaven. It’s possible that the General’s heavenly counterpart (who is also the family’s protector), will seek this guy out and require three years’ service himself, although this won’t necessarily happen.

In any case, it was a fascinating conversation. Once again, I’ve been amazed at how much ancient tradition and knowledge survives behind Singapore’s glass-and-aircon facade…