East Meets West: Zhengming Zhu: Why is Guan Yu culture widely influencing overseas Chinese around the world?
Guan Yu, also known as Guan Gong, is a well-known historical figure both in China and abroad, and it is said that "Confucius is worshipped by scholars, but Guan Yu is worshipped by warriors". Guan Yu culture is an important part of traditional Chinese culture, and has become an important spiritual link between overseas Chinese at home and abroad.
How did the Guan Yu culture emerge? Why has it become so influential among overseas Chinese? Recently, Zhengming Zhu, former Deputy Secretary General of the Overseas Chinese Friendship Association of Hubei Province and visiting professor at Hubei University, was interviewed by the East Meets West and gave an in-depth analysis of his experience in exchanging and spreading Guan Yu culture for nearly 40 years.
Zhengming Zhu, a native of Danyang, Hubei Province, is the former Deputy Secretary-General of the Hubei Overseas Friendship Association and a visiting professor at Hubei University and Changjiang University. Over the past 40 years, Zhu has traveled to more than 50 countries and regions around the world, taken tens of thousands of pictures related to Guan Yu culture, and collected many precious materials. He has held photographic exhibitions on Guan Gong culture in the United States, France, Japan, Singapore, Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Macau, as well as lectured on Guan Yu culture at the University of Auckland in New Zealand, the University of Macau, and other universities in China and abroad.
Over the centuries, how did Guan Yu "escalate" from a warrior to a revered "icon" and then to a "saint"?
According to historical records, Guan Yu was born in Xiezhou on the east bank of the Yellow River in 160 AD, in the village of Changping, Xiezhou Town, Yuncheng City, Shanxi Province. According to The Romance of the Three Kingdoms, Guan Gong made friends with Liu Bei and Zhang Fei in the Peach Garden, and later built up a reputation for success in battle, leaving behind stories that have been told for thousands of years. He was known as a "tiger" and an "enemy of ten thousand men", and was praised by historians as a hero who "shook China".
An ancient monument at the former residence of Guan Saint under Zhongtiao Mountain in Yuncheng, Shanxi, where civil and military officials dismounted in ancient times to pay homage to Guan Yu. Credit: Zhengming Zhu.
Successive emperors took Guan Yu as the embodiment of "loyalty" and "benevolence and courage", and 16 emperors have been ennobled by imperial decree, elevating Guan Yu from a folk deity to a royal worshipper.
In 2021, the Shanxi Museum held the "World Yun Chang - Guan Yu Culture Exhibition", displaying more than 130 pieces (groups) of Guan Yu culture-related cultural relics. Credit: Junjie Wu.
For thousands of years, Guan Yu has even been revered by folk as Guan Emperor, Master Guan, God of Wealth and Lord of Grace ......
A ceremony to worship Guan Yu at Xiezhou Guandi Temple in Yuncheng City, Shanxi Province. Credit: Junjie Wu.
How did the Guan Yu culture emerge, and what are its spiritual connotations and outreach?
Guan Yu culture is a cultural system associated with Guan Yu, with "loyalty, justice, benevolence, courage, and honesty" as its connotation, which is highly compatible with the Confucian concept of morality and ethics, and an idealised realm of personality. Even in this new era, Guan Yu culture has become synonymous with the qualities of loyalty, justice, courage, filial piety and brotherhood, as well as integrity and honesty, and is in line with the core values that China advocates.
The culture of Guan Yu is manifested externally in the form of temple buildings, imperial plaques, temple rituals, poetry, calligraphy and painting, photography, sculpture, theses and monographs, and film and television productions.
Guan Yu Cultural Festival in Yuncheng, Shanxi. Credit: Yun Zhang.
With the widespread spread of Guan Yu culture, a large number of Guan Yu cultural relics and sites have survived and been protected for posterity. Among them, Guanlin in Luoyang, Henan Province, Guanling in Danyang, Hubei Province, and Guandi Temple in Xiezhou, Shanxi Province. These are the most famous, and are known as the three major ancestral temples of Guandi in mainland China. In 2008, the "Guan Yu beliefs and customs" declared by Shanxi and Henan were included in the second batch of national intangible cultural heritage list.
In 2010, Luoyang Guanlin's cultural exchange activities with Fujian and Taiwan began in southern Fujian. The local people carried the statue of Guan Yu from Luoyang Guanlin on a street tour. "It is a culture of folk beliefs and was designated as a national intangible cultural heritage by the State Council in 2008. Credit: Xiaoli Zhang.
How is Guan Gong culture gradually going overseas?
The Chinese people have a long history of venturing overseas. Particularly after the Opium War, numerous residents from the coastal regions of Guangdong and Fujian traveled to North America in search of gold in San Francisco; some also participated in the construction of the Great Trans-American Railway; while others journeyed to South America to contribute to the building of the Panama Canal. Additionally, many sailed to Australia in pursuit of a livelihood in the gold fields, and some migrated to South Asia. This massive migration of overseas Chinese commenced amidst great hardship.
Many overseas Chinese, far from their homeland, carry the incense of Guan Yu to pray for peace and good fortune. As a result, the cultural spirit of "loyalty, righteousness, benevolence, courage and honesty" has spread overseas and Guan Yu temples have begun to be built all over the world.
A ceremony is held at the Man Mo Temple in Sheung Wan, Hong Kong, to commemorate the "birth of Guan Yu". Credit: Wei Zhang.
Over the past 40 years, as I have been exchanging and spreading Guan Yu culture around the world, I have found that there are Guan Yu temples and halls connecting many overseas Chinese and local believers, whether in Asian regions such as Southeast Asia, Japan and Korea, or in American countries such as the United States, Canada, Cuba and Panama, as well as in African countries such as Mozambique, Seychelles, Mauritius and Madagascar, and even in the French overseas department of Réunion.
Singapore is a small country with over 30 Guan Yu temples. Hong Kong, China, has over 40 Guan Yu temples. The ancient temple of Guan Yu in Tai O was first built in the Ming Dynasty, the Man Mo Temple is the most popular Guan Yu temple in Hong Kong, and the Wu Di Temple in Sham Shui Po, Kowloon, has a history of over 130 years. Many shops and restaurants are dedicated to Guan Yu as you stroll around the streets of Hong Kong. If the roots of the veneration of Guan Yu lie on the mainland, then the flourishing branches lie on the treasure island of Taiwan.
In 2013, the "Cross-Strait Guan Yu Cultural Tour - Ancestral Temple of Guan Yu in Shanxi" was held in Taiwan. The event lasted for 21 days and attracted 4 million people along the way to see the real statue of Guan Yu at the ancestral temple. Credit: Huifeng Dong.
According to incomplete statistics, the influence of Guan Yu culture has spread to 160 countries and regions around the world. Guan Yu culture has gone beyond the borders and enriched the diversity of the world's cultures.
What role does Guan Gong culture play in promoting the integration of traditional Chinese culture with the cultures of other countries?
Today, if there are overseas Chinese, there is a belief in Guan Yu, which is becoming a source of spiritual strength for overseas Chinese. The Guan Yu culture has also fused with cultural exchanges around the world.
The first is to gather strength and serve the economic development of the host countries. For example, the Malaysia International Guan Yu Cultural Festival has expanded to eight states (Federal Territories) since 2015, namely Johor, Malacca, Negeri Sembilan, Kedah, Selangor, Perak, Penang and Kuala Lumpur. The country's Guan Yu Festival also hosts a diverse range of traditional Chinese cultural activities such as calligraphy, painting, chess and academic seminars, which have become a new impetus to boost the development of the tertiary sector.
Malaysia hosts the International Guan Yu Cultural Festival in 2019. The photo shows the golden body of Guan Yu from Jingzhou Guandi Temple in Hubei (second from left) and the golden body of Xiezhou Guandi Temple (first from left), whose spirit was distributed to Malaysia last year, parading around various places in Malaysia and being warmly greeted by local people. Credit: Yue Chen.
Secondly, it promotes exchanges and enhances the friendship between China and the host country. For example, for 13 consecutive years, the Panamanian Chinese Chamber of Commerce has organised Guan Yu worship activities in Panama and invited Panamanian government officials to participate, so that local political circles and people can enhance their knowledge of Chinese culture through traditional cultural exchanges. According to Wenzhi Zhong, President of Guan Yu Temple in Panama, the Temple on the Chinese street has become a window for Panamanian officials and people to understand Chinese culture and promote cultural exchanges. Nowadays, many Panamanians spontaneously go to the Guand Yu Temple to worship incense on the occasion of Guan Yu’s birthday.
The more than 100-year-old Guan Yu Temple in Panama's Chinatown. Credit: Ruidong Yu.
More than 160 years ago, the first large Guan Yu Temple in Oceania was built in Melbourne, Australia. On the right side of the hall is the Chinese Righteousness Temple, where more than 8,000 Chinese ancestors are placed, making it a "sacred place" for overseas Chinese to remember their homeland, pay respect to their ancestors and help each other. In Sydney, I once saw a woman kneeling in the lobby to worship incense, her eyes were filled with tears. It turned out that it was the anniversary of her father's death and she could not go home to pay her respects, so she came to the temple to offer incense.
Fourthly, it promotes harmony and advocates the idea of a community of human destiny. With China's deep integration into the world, Guan Yu culture has also attracted the world's attention with its unique charm. The spirit of Guan Yu culture embodies the ethics, morals and ideals of the Chinese culture. We should vigorously promote the Guan Yu culture and use Eastern wisdom to bring more harmonious ways of living together for mankind, and jointly promote the building of a community of human destiny.
It can be said that Guan Yu culture is not only Chinese, but also global. The culture of Guan Yu, which has been rooted in the fertile soil of China for thousands of years, is showing more and more vitality in places where overseas Chinese live on all continents of the world.
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