Zwischen Sakralem und Säkularem: Bedeutung und Entwicklung religiöser Begriffe und Praktiken in China bis zur Han-Zeit (206 v.u.Z.-220) by Wolfgang Ommerborn (review)

WOLFGANG OMMERBORN, Zwischen Sakralem und Säkularem: Bedeutung und Entwicklung religiöser Begriffe und Praktiken in China bis zur Han-Zeit (206 v.u.Z.-220). edition cathay, vol. 61. Bochum, Freiburg: projektverlag, 2012. 397 pp. e24.50 (pb). ISBN 978-3-89733-268-3 The author of the monograph under review has published a number of works on the history of Confucian thought. With the present volume, he has set himself a greater task. The book, so the title suggests, traces the development of religious terms and practices from neolithic times to the Han period. The emphasis lies in fact on terms, less on practices, and much space is given to evidence from canonical texts and classical philosophical writings of the Warring States period. Ommerborn begins his book with an exposition of the formation of the modern Chinese term for religion, zongjiao 宗教, which emerged in the nineteenth century under Japanese influence. He points out distinctions between jiao with its prior religious connotations and the terms xue 學 and jia 家, which both tended to be used in intellectual contexts without specific religious overtones. This is followed by a brief overview of potential traces of neolithic religious beliefs and practices with reference to a few pieces of archaeological evidence and a larger number of transmitted texts dating from much later periods. These two introductory sections set the stage for the main body of the study, which falls into three parts: one is devoted to the Shang, the next to the Western and Eastern Zhou, and finally the Han. The thematic focus shifts with the period under investigation. The discussion of Shang religion centers on shamanism, ancestral cults, and the worship of di 帝, referring extensively to a monograph by Chang Tsung-tung (Zhang Congdong 張聰東).23 The concepts of Heaven (tian 天) and the Heavenly mandate (tianming 天命) are the dominant themes of the chapters on the Western Zhou, whose evidentiary basis largely consists of passages from the Songs (Shijing 詩經) and Documents (Shangshu 尚書). The Eastern Zhou chapters engage with a greater variety of themes. In addition to Heaven, the discussion extends to such terms as “virtue / auratic power” (de 德), “ritual / etiquette” (li 禮), and “mandate / fate” (ming 命). The main sources for this part are some of the well-known philosophical works of the time such as Lunyu 論語, Mengzi 孟子, Xunzi 荀子, and Mozi 墨子. The final part discusses Han state cults and Confucian thought as expressed mainly in the works of Dong Zhongshu 董仲舒 (179? 2104? BCE), with his attempt to integrate the moral and political order of the human realm into comprehensive cosmological schemes. On the whole, Ommerborn’s work attests to his familiarity with the received literature and his close attention to detail. The innumerable references that adorn the pages of this book are a testimony to the author’s meticulous scholarship and scope of learning. It is, therefore, hoped that the following remarks, offered in a spirit of constructive criticism, will be accepted as such. 23 Tsung-tung Chang, Der Kult der Shang-Dynastie im Spiegel der Orakelinschriften: Eine paläographische Studie zur Religion im archaischen China (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 1970). BOOK REVIEWS 113 The concept of religion remains vague throughout. Despite its intrinsic interest, the emergence of zongjiao as one among many newly coined terms in a period of both intense intellectual ferment and existentially threatening upheaval fails to address the wide range of beliefs and practices, attitudes, and institutions that can be covered by “religion.”24 To set the stage for the following study of concepts, rather than tracing the history of this term, it would seem more fruitful at least to hint at the multifarious manifestations of religious activity in early China.25 The strong emphasis on Eastern Zhou philosophers and their debates on a number of religiously colored notions imposes an intellectualizing perspective on this study. At the same time, many facets of ancient Chinese life that are arguably of religious significance by dint of their relationship with the numinous or supernatural fall outside the scope of the present volume. One may think, for instance, of such sources as hemerological texts and tomb contracts and the aspects of religious life they elucidate. The absence of such sources is symptomatic of another problem. Despite an unprecedented...