碑林斜阳:无生老母信仰的民间化

Look at the Inscriptions:The Popularization of the Immortal Mother Belief

本文通过考察山东平度大泽山碑铭探讨八卦教流变之一环——无生老母信仰民间化的过渡形态。平度大泽山地区拥有中国现存规模最大的民间功德碑林,这些碑刻反映的是清康熙年间到民国时期这一地区的民间信仰活动。其中,碧霞元君和无生老母是当地供奉的最重要的神灵。从大泽山功德碑的有关记载来看,当地民众曾经受到八卦教的影响,无生老母信仰的出现和兴盛与八卦教有关。但是,这种信仰与碧霞元君等民间信仰相混杂,教门背景不突出,可以视之为清代至民国无生老母信仰民间化或民俗化的一个典型。或者说,大泽山无生老母信仰的特殊性在于,与其说无生老母是罗教产生以来的中国主要民间宗教的最高神,不如说她是正在由民间宗教最高神向更泛化、更世俗的民间信仰的一种过渡。

In this paper,one of the changes of the Eight Diagrams Religion(bagua jiao),the transition form of the folk conversion of the faith of the Immortal Mother(wushang laomu)is discussed by studying the inscriptions on Daze Mountain in Pingdu,Shandong Province.Pingdu Daze Mountain area has the largest existing folk merit inscriptions in China.These inscriptions reflect the folk belief activities in this area from the reign of Emperor Kangxi of Qing Dynasty to the period of the Republic of China.Among them,the Grandmother Taishan(bixia yuanjun)and Immortal Mother are the most important gods worshipped locally.According to the records on the Daze Mountain Merit Tablets,the local people were once influenced by the Eight Diagrams Religion,and the emergence and prosperity of the belief in the Immortal Mother is related to the Eight Diagrams Religion.However,this belief is mixed with the folk beliefs such as the Grandmother Taishan,and the background of the religion is not prominent.It can be regarded as a typical example of the folk or folkloric belief from the Qing Dynasty to the Republic of China.In other words,the particularity of the belief in Daze Mountain is that the belief in the Immortal Mother is the highest god of the main folk secret religions in China since the emergence of Luo Religion(luo jiao).Rather,she is in transition from the supreme deity of folk religions to a more general,secular folk belief.