Villain hitting
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Villain hitting | ||
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Hanyu Pinyin dǎ xiǎorén | | |
Yue: Cantonese | ||
Yale Romanization | dá síu yàhn | |
Jyutping | daa2 siu2 jan4 |
Villain hitting, da siu yan (
Villain hitting has been preliminarily included in the list of "
Villain
The concept of "villain" is divided into two types, specific and general.
Specific
Specific villains are individuals cursed by the villain hitter due to the hatred of their enemies who employ the hitter. A villain could be a famous person hated by the public such as a politician or could be personally known to their enemy, such as when the request is to curse a love rival.
General
Villain hitters may help their clients curse a general villain: a group of people potentially harmful to the clients.
Date
The period for villain hitting is different among temples, but
Location
Villain hitting is often done in gloomy places such as somewhere under an overpass. In Hong Kong, the
History in Hong Kong
The tradition of villain hitting can be traced back to an ancient custom from agricultural societies in the Guangdong region. According to the Chinese calendar, the year can be divided into twenty-four solar terms and spring is known as the "Awakening of Insects"—when hibernating animals awake from their slumber to forage and feed. To prevent the notorious white tiger from hunting and harming villagers, farmers will worship the white tiger by smearing pig's blood onto little paper tigers as a means of sacrifice and feeding the tiger. As time passed, "villains" gradually morphed into the role of the notorious white tiger and becomes the object of exorcisms and banishment.
Ceremony
Receiving orders from clients, villain hitters require human-shaped papers with or without some information of specific people. As part of the ceremony, they beat the papers with shoes or other implements. The whole ceremony of villain hitting is divided into eight parts:
- Sacrifice to divinities (奉神): Worship of deities by incense and candle.
- Report (稟告): Writing down the name and the date of birth of the client on the Fulu (符籙). If the client requests to hit a specific villain, then write down or put the name, date of birth, photo or clothes of the specific villain on the villain paper.
- Villain hitting (打小人): Make use of a varieties of symbolic object such as the shoe of clients or the villain hitter or other religious symbolic weapons like incense sticks to hit or hurt the villain paper. Villain paper can also be replaced by other derivatives such as man paper, woman paper, five ghost paper etc.
- Sacrifice to Bái Hǔ (祭白虎): The hitters have to make sacrifice to Bái Hǔ if they want to hit the villain on Jingzhe. Use a yellow paper tiger to represent Bái Hǔ, there are black stripes on the paper tiger and a pair of tooth shapes in its mouth. During the sacrifice a small piece of pork is soaked with pig blood and then put inside the mouth of the paper tiger (to feed Bái Hǔ). Bái Hǔ won't hurt others after being fed. Sometimes they will also smear a greasy pork on Bái Hǔ's mouth to make its mouth full of oil and unable to open its mouth to hurt people. In some regional sacrifice the villain hitter would burn the paper tiger or cut off its head after making sacrifice to it.
- Reconciliation (化解)
- Pray for blessings (祈福): Use a red Gui Ren paper to pray for blessings and help from Gui Ren.
- Treasure Burning (進寶): Burn the paper-made-treasure to worship the spirits.
- Zhi Jiao (擲筊) (or so-called "cup hitting" [打杯]): Zhi Jiao, to cast two crescent-shaped wooden pieces to undergo the Zhi Jiao ceremony.
See also
- Lingnan culture
- Chinese spiritual world concepts
Notes
- ^ *(in English) "Demon-exorcising Service at 'Goose-neck Bridge' " Archived September 27, 2007, at the Wayback Machine. My Heart, My Home – 18 Districts Reach Out Together for Lovable Sights in Hong Kong. Retrieved 11 June 2006.
- ^ Petty Person Beating – Hong Kong Tourism Board
- ^ Time to Beat Your Enemies – Time
- ^ The Best of Asia 2009 – TIME
External links
- (in English) Beating the Petty Person – Analysis by Chien Chiao – Live Curiously Magazine
- (in Chinese) "Speaking on Jingzhi (驚螫之談)". Hong Kong Mystery Exploration Society. Retrieved 11 June 2006.
- (in Chinese) Villain hitting report, by Chinese Civilization Centre, City University of Hong Kong. Retrieved 12 June 2006.
- (in Chinese) Villain hitting中國文化中心
- (in Chinese) 古代詛咒術「打小人」
- (in Chinese) 解構打小人 文化廣場
- The Hong Kong Agent a film by Robert Iolini. Watch episode "Pay-As-You-Go Shamanic Mobile Service Centre: Divine Intervention #3"