Reflections | Why for some Chinese, ninth day of Lunar New Year is the most important: it’s the day they worship the Jade Emperor – and sugar cane is involved
- The Jade Emperor or Lord of Heaven is the supreme god in the Chinese pantheon, and the ninth day of Chinese New Year is a day to worship the deity
- Among worshippers’ offerings is sugar cane – because long ago on the Lord’s feast day, villagers hid from Japanese pirates in sugar cane fields and were spared
This Sunday, February 18, is the ninth day of the Chinese New Year, a day when many of us will frankly be quite sick of the festive cheer and rich foods. But for people from Fujian province and some of its neighbouring regions in China’s southeast, or those whose ancestries can be traced back to these places, it may be the most important day of the year.
This is the day that they worship the Lord of Heaven.
The Lord of Heaven (tih kong in the southern Fujian language, tiangong in Mandarin) is also known as the Jade Emperor and the Deity Most High. He’s the supreme god in the Chinese pantheon of divinities and other supernatural beings in the universe.
How exactly he exercises his supremacy is unclear because Chinese folk religion doesn’t have a fixed canon. Depending on which book or regional tradition one refers to, the Lord of Heaven can either be a passive, nominal leader, or a powerful god of gods whose commands are obeyed by all.
In some stories, even “immigrants” like the many Buddhas, bodhisattvas and gods from the Indian subcontinent defer to the Chinese Lord of Heaven. On other occasions, he extends the same courtesy to the Buddhas of multiple cosmic aeons as a terrestrial monarch would to rulers from other states.