In between Japanisation and Christianisation

In today’s Bienjing village, the ancestral worshipping activity is called maho, ubong or pslkotas according to the Atayal dialect in each tribe. The younger generations (those under the age of 40), who are used to speaking Mandarin rather than their mother languages, now usually call it ‘zhulingji’ ( 祖 靈 祭 ), literally meaning ‘worshipping festival of the ancestors’ souls’. Its literal meaning almost defines the term zhulingji’s connotation to the modern Atayals today. It is a one-day activity of thanking utux for a good harvest by making offerings in the cemetery, and apart from the offering-making processes, it is more like a festive activity. The zhulingji of the Sawig tribe in 2011 was held a week before I entered the field. Luckily, one of the participants provided a copy of the project proposal of the activity, which was used to apply for funds from the government, in which it states the whole process of the activity, as follows:

1. 04:00: Gathering (males have to gather an hour before dawn, and head to the cemetery led by the elder of each clan, with offerings such as a small piece of fresh meat, a small piece of preserved meat, a few crops and wine). 2. 04:45: Worshipping (the host leads the elders of all clans to say prayers, to

3. 05:00: Calling the spirits of the ancestors (about dawn, taking turns to shout loudly to the ancestors’ spirits, from the host to the elders, and ask them to come back and share our offerings, taking care of the offspring).

4. 05:05: Prayers (by the host, and others repeat).

5. 05:10: Make offering (the elders lead their men in making the offerings). 6. 05:13: Finish and return home.

7. 10:00: Dance performance (by the dance group of the tribe).

Figure 8 (left) and 9 (right), the dance group formed by the women in Sawig performing a Japanese dance (left) and a traditional Atayal dance (right) at Zhulingji. Provided by Tseng De-Hua.

Figure 10 (left), hanging the offering of hunted birds.

Figure 11 (right), saying prayers led by the host (in white at the front). Provided by Tseng De-Hua.

The process of zhulingji was not much different from the maho or ubong in the Atayal tradition; however, its religious significance has shifted to more of a cultural level rather than a belief, and the meaning of utux to the modern Atayals also appears

to vary from the traditional sense. Describing the nature of zhulingji as more cultural than religious does not mean that it no longer contains belief in the religiousness or spirituality of utux, but indicates the degradation of sacredness and the cultural symbolisation of utux. This is due to the fact that, although the reason for holding zhulingji is perceived naturally by the participants to be part of the gaga, the idea of utux to them now usually refers to ‘spirits’, ‘ghosts’ or merely ‘souls’ that are different from utux kayal – the modern Atayal interpretation of the Christian God – and do not ‘watch over the world’ as the Atayals used to believe. This recognition towards the content of utux still carries the belief that the spirits of the dead might cause certain effects over the Atayal people who have disobeyed certain gaga. For example, most Atayal people believe that women should not touch the hunting guns or be in the hunting teams as it would, as a result of breaking the gaga, ‘bring bad luck’, and modern Atayals still follow what they might call ‘superstitious’ customs before they go hunting. The word ‘hunting’ can never be mentioned on the day of hunting, and simple offering-making rituals are made by putting cigarettes or wine at the gateway to the mountain, as otherwise utux might feel offended by their intrusion and cause accidents during hunting. Nonetheless, the sacredness of utux is being reduced in the conception of modern Atayals. For example, the symbol of utux – the diamond-shaped patterns (see below) – no longer possess the religious meaning of ‘the eyes of utux’, and the cultural – or religious – significance of the pattern, which was tattooed on the Atayals’ faces as the signature of both Atayal identity and the blessing of utux, has also been lost, as almost half of the villagers do not know what these patterns mean.39

39 _{In Bienjing village, the knowledge of the pattern has almost vanished in the age group of 30 to 70,}

which can be said to be the first generations after the KMT government took over the reign of Taiwan. Those under 30 usually have a better understanding of this knowledge, as the policy of aboriginal children’s education was modified in 1998 as a result of the cultural revitalisation movement of the aborigines in the late 1980s.

Figure 12, the diamond-shaped pattern in the Sawig tribe. This pattern used to be believed to be the ‘utux’s eye’ that was tattooed on the Atayals’ faces to ‘watch over’ the people, but now only functions as one of the cultural symbols to decorate the tribe or their own commodities to mark their ‘Atayalness’.

The idea of utux kayal experienced its first challenge with the Japanese authorities’ attempts to replace the Atayal people’s utux kayal with the Japanese Amaterasu-ōmikami, the kamisama. After years under the Japanese rule, the term kamisama was than appropritaed in the Atayal language to refer to the ultimate reality, instead of utux kayal. Such usage is especially pervasive amongst the elder villagers, as most of their childhoods were spent under the Japanese rule during the process of Japanisation:

Participant YK: When I was a child, they (the Japanese) came and took the plate of kamisama to our house. They told us to worship it, and said it was our utux kayal.

Participant SF: The Japanese told us to worship the plate of Amaterasu-ōmikami. It means ‘the god in the sky’ in Japanese, and some people would say it was like our utux kayal; but that was the Japanese’s God, (because) their gaga was different from ours.

Many elders could not tell me whether ‘kamisama’ means ‘utux’ or ‘utux kayal’, like the participant HK:

Kamisama means God, the church says it is Jesus … I don’t know that much, but they (kamisama, utux and utux kayal) are all the same … it tells us not to do bad things, like stealing or lying … I don’t know what the difference is. They are just different names, but mean the same.

In terms of the effects of Japanisation on religious matters, the Atayals seemed not to change too much with regard to the structure of religious practice and how this structure functioned in their way of life. It is true that the means of Atayal identity construction – the facial tattoo – was deeply damaged due to the Japanese policies, and that some critical rituals, such as the setting of common symmetry and obon macri, became syncretised with the Japanese interventions in traditional customs. However, most of the participants also suggest that the form of their ‘practices of life’ under these changes generally remained the same, and was still similar to that of their ancestors in the old times. They indicated that even with the altered details, through the practice of rituals gaga was still the way the Atayals framed their identities ‘ethnically’ and culturally.