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ASIAN CHRISTIANITY
IN THE DIASPORA
MEANING AND
CONTROVERSY WITHIN
CHINESE ANCESTOR
RELIGION
PAULIN BATAIRWA KUBUYA

Asian Christianity in the Diaspora
Series editors
Grace Ji-Sun Kim
Earlham School of Religion
Richmond, IN, USA
Joseph Cheah
University of Saint Joseph
West Hartford, CT, USA
Asian American theology is still at its nascent stage. It began in the 1980’s
with just a handful of scholars who were recent immigrants to the United
States. Now with the rise in Asian American population and the rise of
Asian American theologians, this new community is an ever-important
voice within theological discourse and Asian American cultural studies.
This new series seeks to bring to the forefront some of the important,
provocative new voices within Asian American Theology. The series aims
to provide Asian American theological responses to the complex process
of migration and resettlement process of Asian immigrants and refugees.
We will address theoretical works on the meaning of diaspora, exile, and
social memory, and the foundational works concerning the ways in which
displaced communities remember and narrate their experiences. Such an
interdisciplinary approach entails intersectional analysis between Asian
American contextual theology and one other factor; be it sexuality,
gender, race/ethnicity, and/or cultural studies. This series also addresses
Christianity from Asian perspectives. We welcome manuscripts that
examine the identity and internal coherence of the Christian faith in its
encounters with different Asian cultures, with Asian people, the majority
of whom are poor, and with non-Christian religions that predominate
the landscape of the Asian continent. Palgrave is embarking on a
transformation of discourse within Asian and Asian American theological
scholarship as this will be the first of its kind. As we live in a global world
in which Christianity has re-centered itself in the Global South and
among the racialized minorities in the United States, it behooves us to
listen to the rich, diverse and engaging voices of Asian and Asian American
theologians.
More information about this series at

http://www.palgrave.com/gp/series/14781
Paulin Batairwa Kubuya
Meaning and
Controversy within
Chinese Ancestor
Religion
Paulin Batairwa Kubuya
Fu Jen Catholic University
Taipei, Taiwan
Asian Christianity in the Diaspora

ISBN 978-3-319-70523-1 ISBN 978-3-319-70524-8 (eBook)
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-70524-8
Library of Congress Control Number: 2017959109
© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s) 2018

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Preface
This work focuses on ancestor-related praxes, specifically their riddles in

the context of a hermeneutic of contacts between cultures and religions.
Chinese ancestor-related praxes gave rise to numerous interpretations by
foreign interpreters. In China, they triggered a controversy whose conse-
quences are believed to affect the reception and rooting of Christianity on
Chinese soil. Elsewhere, they were regarded as merely pagan practices and
so condemned by missionaries, who nevertheless failed to eradicate them.
They resisted in subtle ways until they were identified as the nucleus of
so-called animism and/or African traditional religion. The aim of this
book is not only to present the available interpretations but to ponder
them in a way that directs us to the necessity of identifying other explana-
tions and hence broaden the hermeneutic field of the considered phenom-
ena. This broadening is made possible by applying a critical method
involving intrusive reading that is aware of the structural reins of power
which condition any effort to understand. An intrusive reader is not con-
tent to know what is said, what is apparent but also seeks to know what the
apparent is attempting to hide.
This book offers a comprehensive assessment of the perceptions and
interpretations of foreign observers—explorers, missionaries and scholars—
of Chinese ancestor-related praxes. The act of reading intrusively enables us
to situate each explanation in its original context. In this way, it sheds light
on the dynamics that determined the importance of a question and condi-
tioned the answer that was offered. The process shows the extent to which
the act of interpreting is dependent on the context in which it occurs.
v
vi PREFACE
There are no pure and completely disinterested explanations. Moreover,

explanations are answers in that they solve the inquirer’s riddles. This being
the case, the fundamental question regarding existing hermeneutics of
ancestor-related praxes is “whose questions do they answer?”
The exploration of this fundamental question leads us to acknowledge
two types of dynamics regarding the investigation of these phenomena.
Interest in ancestor-related praxes is driven by two different motives. The
first is an effort to provide a rational and systematic description of the behav-
iors of indigenous peoples vis-à-vis their dead relatives. The second motive
is to remain connected to and in harmony with the nucleus that nurtures
one’s existence. This desire is in fact what makes of ancestor-related praxes
a religion. The referential place of ancestors in the rites or liturgies and the
controversies surrounding their interpretation justify the title of this book.
One who looks deeply at this second form of hermeneutics will understand
why it is important to let go of generic terminology such as “ancestor wor-
ship,” “ancestor veneration,” “ancestor rites,” and even “traditional reli-
gions,” as if any religion in existence were not deeply “traditional.”
Taipei, Taiwan Paulin Batairwa Kubuya

Acknowledgments
One of the assertions of this book is that people are continuously searching
for meaning and that ancestor-related practices answer an existential
desire for significance. I would like to take this opportunity to thank
those who have helped me formulate my thoughts and bring this project
to a conclusion.
I thank Albert Poulet-Mathis SJ, Luigi Menegazzo SX and the Xaverian
Family who first encouraged me to undertake the academic study of reli-
gion and gave me the confidence to persevere. I am thankful for the sup-
port of my colleagues, Xaverian Missionaries of the Chinese Delegation.
I am also grateful to Fr Joseph Kim Chinh Vu for his advice and guid-
ance in the writing of this book. I also thank Pierre Diarra, Nicolas
Standaert, Mark Fang 房志榮, and Tsai Yi-Chia 蔡怡佳. They provided
helpful comments and professional assistance whenever I needed it.
I am grateful to the faculty members of the Department of Religious
Studies of Fu Jen Catholic University, as well as to those of Fu Jen
Academia Catholica. They provided the academic environment for this
research.
My gratitude goes to our study group in Chinese Confucian classics,
especially to Liu I-chun 劉怡君 and Chen Yi-yun 陳藝勻 for their insight-
ful comments and constant and unconditional support.
I am extremely thankful to Julian Perozzi SX and Edmund Ryden SJ
for editing and proofreading the first draft of this work; and to Vicky
Tseng for finalizing the manuscript. I am also grateful to Dan Bauer SVD
and Joseph Cheah OSM, who saw the value of this work and encouraged
its publication.
vii
viii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I express my deep appreciation to everyone whose friendship has been

so important to me throughout this period. I think especially of my family
members, companions, colleagues and friends; this work would not have
seen the light of day without their silent support and curiosity about what
I was doing.
Finally, I dedicate this book to all the deceased relatives and friends
whom I look to as ancestors, and to the missionaries and researchers work-
ing in cross-cultural contexts: may the awareness arising from this work
enrich their handling of the human quest for meaning.
Contents
1 Introduction: Are Ancestors a Problem? 1
2 The Hermeneutic Challenge of Ancestor-Related Practices 11
3 The Conflict of Interpretation of Chinese Ancestor Rites 55
4 “Our” Perspective: The Indigenous Explanation

of Ancestor Rites 125
5 Existential Practical Hermeneutics of Ancestor Religion 167
6 Conclusion 211
Bibliography 219
Index 229
ix
CHAPTER 1
Introduction: Are Ancestors a Problem?
While worship of ancestors constitutes 60 % of religious practices and

behavior in cultures around the world,1 the ancestor is the element par
excellence that integrates cultural and religious life among some African
peoples as well as the Han Chinese people. In those cultural and religious
contexts, ancestors are not dead people who have parted completely from
this world. They lead a different life, yet they can have an impact on the
lives of those living in the visible world. They can mediate graces and
enrich this worldly life with exotic favors from the other world. Moreover,
they delight in being remembered and suffer when they are forgotten.
Ancestor-related praxes, a vast and complex array of practices, convey,
actualize and maintain the relationship that exists between individuals and
the community of the living and some of their deceased members. They
affirm the overall triumph of life over death. Death does not have the last
word; it only operates as a transformation that affects the means of com-
munication between the two types of existence: one in the visible realm
and the other in the invisible world. It is up to the living to conceive
modalities to maintain the flow between these two worlds. Ancestral rites
and liturgies are an expression of a systematic worldview: such understand-
ing calls for actions which have specific purposes.
Ancestor-related practices, however, constitute a hermeneutical problem
for those attempting to assess and explain their place and role in traditional
societies. A multitude of attributes and theories are applied to them: they
© The Author(s) 2018 1

P. Batairwa Kubuya, Meaning and Controversy within
Chinese Ancestor Religion, Asian Christianity in the Diaspora,
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-70524-8_1
2 P. BATAIRWA KUBUYA
are rites or rituals, a form of worship, a cultic system with aspects that can
be found in other religious systems, and so forth. The plurality of explana-
tions not only testifies to the awareness of the central role of ancestors in
those cultures where they are objects of special treatment, it also confirms
the impenetrable character of these phenomena such that they cannot be
addressed in pure and clear language. They constitute a hermeneutical
problem, which we illustrate by a critical and historical overview of the
interpretations made of ancestor-related practices.
Those interested in deciphering the reasons and motivations behind
ancestral rites are usually foreigners: missionaries and researchers in the
fields of archaeology, ethnology and anthropology. Local practitioners, on
the other hand, are concerned with performing them in the right way,
employing the correct methods, attitudes and gestures to ensure their
efficacy.2 Thus the two groups approach the topic on different inquisitive
levels.
As a result of this difference in perspective and emphasis, the theoretical
quest for information and debate over the meaning of veneration and wor-
ship of ancestors initially attracted more foreigners than native practitio-
ners.3 Moreover, when foreigners sought to construct an accurate
description of ancestral rituals, it was a methodological strategy aimed at
accessing a more convincing explanation—a theory. Their endeavor was
not oriented toward producing manuals—as Chu Hsi and the Confucian
tradition did—but rather toward providing a better appraisal of Chinese
culture. Their findings not only depicted the Chinese as a religious people,
they also confirmed ancestral rites as occupying a dominant place in their
religiosity. A similar observation can be made regarding the attention mis-
sionaries and other European scholars have given to the study of what
came to be called African traditional religions.
The present work ponders on the plurality of interpretations of ances-
tor-related praxes. It explores the riddles inherent in those interpretations
in the context of a hermeneutic of contacts between culture and religion.
Chinese ancestor-related praxes gave rise to numerous interpretations by
foreign interpreters, which triggered a controversy in China whose conse-
quences are believed to still affect the reception and rooting of Christianity
on Chinese soil. Elsewhere, ancestor-related praxes were among the
“anchored pagan practices” against which missionaries fought but which
they nevertheless failed to eradicate. These practices were maintained in
subtle ways and were identified as the nucleus of “animism” and “African
Traditional Religion.”
INTRODUCTION: ARE ANCESTORS A PROBLEM? 3
The aim of this work is not only to present the available interpretations
but to ponder them in a way that directs us to the necessity of identifying
other explanations and hence broadens the hermeneutic field of the con-
sidered phenomena. This broadening is made possible by applying a criti-
cal method involving intrusive reading that is aware of structural reins of
power which condition any effort to understand. An “intrusive reader” is
not content to know “what is said, what is apparent” but also seeks to
know what “the apparent” is attempting to hide.
This book provides a comprehensive assessment of the perceptions and
interpretations of foreign interpreters of those praxes. Moreover, the act of
reading intrusively enables us to situate each explanation in its original
context. In this way, it sheds light on the dynamics that determined the
importance of a question and conditioned the answer that was offered.
The process shows the extent to which the act of interpreting is dependent
on the context in which it occurs. There are no pure and completely dis-
interested explanations. Moreover, explanations are answers in that they
solve the riddles of an inquirer. This being the case, the fundamental ques-
tion regarding the existing hermeneutics of ancestor-related praxes is
“whose questions do they answer?”
The exploration of this fundamental question leads us to acknowledge
two types of dynamics regarding the investigation of these phenomena and
prompts us to ponder the essence of Chinese religion, suggesting that ances-
tor-related practices could indeed be looked at as the essence of Chinese
religion. The interest in ancestor-related praxes is driven by two different
motives. The first is an effort to provide a rational and systematic description
of the behaviors of indigenous peoples vis-à-vis their dead relatives. The
second motive is to remain connected to and in harmony with the nucleus
that nurtures one’s existence. This desire is in fact what makes of ancestor-
related praxes a religion. In ancestor-related practices, every action and
thought works around the ancestors and addresses them as the main focus
of the liturgical action. One who looks deeply at this second form of herme-
neutics will understand why it is important to let go of generic terminology
such as ancestor worship, ancestor veneration, ancestor rites and even tradi-
tional religions, as if any religion in existence were not deeply traditional.
This book begins with a discussion of ancestor-related praxes as factors
that trigger interpretative curiosity—as facts that require systematic expla-
nations of ancestor-related practices.
Chapter 2 describes how, in the meeting of cultures (Western and
Chinese), ancestor-related practices attracted the intellectual curiosity of
many foreign interpreters who found in them a hermeneutic problem. It

further defines the methodological framework for a reassessment of the
explanations they offered.
Ancestor-related practices are ritual performances enacting a symbolism
whose meanings are intertwined with, and circumscribed within, a given
context. Their meaning, however, cannot be easily defined since key con-
cepts such as ancestor, rites and tradition derive from different disciplines
and convey nuances which complicate any definition. Moreover, ancestor-
related practices are also a tradition, that is, praxis received from elders and
handed down through generations. For insofar as this transmission is
mechanical, it can only be concerned with questions of orthopraxis—
doing the right thing at the right time and the right place. But foreign
curiosity regarding ancestor-related practices has not so much been pos-
ited on orthopraxis as it has been concerned with orthodoxy. Why?
The methodological framework for addressing this question is inspired
by Nicolas Standaert’s views on the interpretation of cross-cultural inter-
actions4 and Michel Foucault’s considerations on the relation between
power and understanding. In light of their insights, I delineate three ele-
ments that are particularly involved in and related to the interpretation of
ancestor-related practices. These are: (1) tradition, that is, what is received
in order to be passed on; (2) reins of power that influence, condition and
orient a choice; and (3) salvation, understood as the quest for existential
meaning. An awareness of how these elements are intertwined in every
interpretation will prevent simplistic generalizations and facilitate an
enriching dialogue among the existing explanations.
Chapter 3 develops at length answers to the question of what has been
said regarding Chinese ancestor-related practices. Though their descrip-
tions differ, the observations share a common epistemic concern. They
provide evidence of the important role ancestor rites played and of foreign
interpreters’ perceptions of the realities and practices related to them.
Ancestor rites are a basic component of Chinese culture. Any serious and
in-depth encounter with that culture eventually leads to a recognition of
the felt need to honor one’s deceased relatives. In Chinese history, this
goes hand in hand with a philosophy of filial piety, inspiring an elaborate
ritual system that stresses the necessity of caring for and showing reverence
to parents—while they are still alive and even after they are dead. In practi-
cal terms, this philosophy has inspired sophisticated and ritualized forms
of relating to elders, especially those already dead. Ancestor rites fulfill a
need to communicate with and relate to departed relatives.
The expressions of that need for communication not only piqued the
curiosity of foreign interpreters, but also defied their assumptions. Many
of the interpretations were dependent on a theological, specifically mono-
theistic, mindset. They sought to establish whether such practices consti-
tute a religion, using concepts such as “worship,” “sacrifice,” “offering,”
“prayer,” “God,” “divinity,” “idolatry” and “superstition.”
The place and role of ancestors constitute a reference point not only for
the analysis of intercultural interactions in China but also for developing a
history of religious movements in China. Every religion that has entered
China has in one way or another taken up a position with regard to an
aspect of practices related to ancestors. Buddhism, despite its well-
developed eschatology (elaborated around the notion of reincarnation
and different layers of retribution), had to deal with Chinese ancestor-
related issues. Islam and Judaism adopted Confucian views of filial piety in
order to accommodate the claims raised by the problematic of ancestors
within the Chinese religious and cultural worldview.5
As for the West, Matteo Ricci was the first to consider seriously the
important role the Chinese assign to their ancestors. He treated the ven-
eration as part of a civil rite that Chinese neophytes could continue to
practice. From that time on, the question of rites devoted to ancestors has
continued to attract the attention of foreign minds striving to compre-
hend the core of Chinese culture. Among the notable foreign sinologists,
there have been Catholic and Protestant missionaries as well as scholars
who backed up their interest with methodological techniques developed
in the field of the human sciences.
Because of the diversity of motives and methodological techniques,
each approach has its own features and interpretation of ancestor rites. As
a result, there is a plurality of interpretations that create what Paul Ricoeur,
in his technical language, has called a conflict of interpretation. Here, the
conflict refers not only to the distance between the interpreter and what is
to be interpreted; it also alludes to the plurality of voices and emphases
emanating from different explanations. This conflicting situation calls for
an appropriate method, which in our view can be provided by the latest
development in the field of hermeneutics.
The positions and theories formulated by these scholars differ in their
nuances. However, we note that their endeavors created a plurality of
views of the phenomena they investigated. The present study will consider
that plurality as a starting point, engaging each of its tenets in an ongoing
critical dialogue. For instance, consideration of the predominant place of
ancestors in Chinese customs has led some interpreters to theorize it as

fundamental for the study of Chinese religion(s). Our follow-up questions
concern the understanding of the term “religion” and the hermeneutic
conflict triggered by the definition, all in relation to the appraisal of ances-
tor rites. How should religion be defined? Should it be in reference to the
divine, to a cult, to the content or the object of the worship, to the coher-
ence of the teaching and worldview proposed, to its scriptures, to the
internal organization of the worshipping community, to the liturgical
actions or gestures through which the worshipping community is sancti-
fied? All these questions are implied in the simple attempt to define
ancestor-related praxes as religious.
As a follow-up to the lack of consensus regarding the appraisal of vari-
ous interpretations and theories that foreigners have elaborated with
regard to ancestor-related practices, Chap. 4 focuses on native Chinese
awareness of the problem. More specifically, it investigates the explana-
tions they have offered as well as the methods developed to sustain those
explanations.
Native Chinese are unanimous about the central place of ancestors in
the life of a Chinese person. In their view, interacting with one’s ancestors
is not only a personal need but also a normal observance of filial piety,
which is the backbone of Chinese etiquette.
Seventeenth- and eighteenth-century Chinese Catholics provided their
own interpretations of ancestor-related practices in the hope that they
might help to resolve the rites controversy. Three centuries later, Yü Pin
(于斌) and Luo Kuang (羅光) proposed a Chinese Catholic version of
ancestor rituals in jitianjingzu 祭天敬祖. The same endeavor has also
been undertaken among Chinese Protestants, who have attempted to pro-
pose appropriate “Christian alternatives to ancestor worship.” Additionally,
those exposed to foreign interpretations through academic channels have
offered subtle responses. Their adoption of foreign methods has enabled
them to shed light on other angles of interpretation and to provide means
to directly criticize previously accepted explanations. Finally, academic
interest in the topic among native Chinese offers a different epistemic
framework—far from the concerns of Church and faith—for the appraisal
of Chinese ancestor-related practices.
Why do we study ancestor-related practices? Despite the many systematic
theories offered by foreign interpreters, a different perspective is also demanded.
Chapter 5 brings to light the result of intrusive reading that combines
Standaert’s remarks on the specificity of the interpretations of cross-cultural
interactions and Foucault’s warning about the implications of power at play in

any interpretative process. This enables us to compare the two types of herme-
neutics, namely that of foreign interpreters and that of locals.
While the perspective of foreign interpreters is theoretical, that of local
people is existential, that is, concerned with the questions asked by every
authentic religion: who am I, where do I come from, where am I going
and how do I ensure that I reach my goal. The answers are found in one’s
interaction with ancestors. In other words, ancestors are not cut off from
the human quest for existential meaning. Just as one is meant to include
ancestors in every significant moment of one’s life, so they are an impor-
tant part of answering the religious and existential questions pertaining to
the human condition. It is exactly for this reason that the religiosity har-
bored here is called ancestor religion. The structural foundation of
existential/practical hermeneutics opens up other possibilities for a deeper
understanding of religion, especially Chinese religion. From the compari-
son of the two types of hermeneutics, it appears that interaction with
ancestors is a central element in Chinese religiosity, and existential interac-
tions with ancestors are indeed the key to the claims made by J.J.M. de
Groot, Marcel Granet, Maurice Freedman, Laurence Thompson and oth-
ers about the existence of a “Chinese religion.”6 In other words, interact-
ing with one’s ancestors has always been the essential and integrative
element of Chinese religiosity.7 The shape and content of the rites might
differ from one culture to another, from one period to another, but a sub-
stratum of that constant need for communication and interaction between
the two worlds will persist.8 For this reason, ancestral worship, veneration
of the dead, sanctification and canonization rites, and so on are referred to
as homeomorphisms. They aim at facilitating communication with a rela-
tive who, though dead, is still felt as present.
Finally, what is meant by an ancestor religion, and why should Chinese
religiosity be considered as such? The term refers to the predominant
place certain cultures or customs give to ancestors and the concrete prac-
tices that make them indispensable players in the life of a person, a family,
a community. The use of the term religion is justified as far as it replicates
similar functional patterns found in other religions. The usage of this ter-
minology has an African origin; nonetheless, it can be extended to the
Chinese situation in connection with the Chinese observance of filial piety.
The extrapolation being made here deserves a longer explanation that
takes into account the ongoing debate on what characterizes Chinese reli-
gion, specifically by looking at the contributions of Chinese thinkers.9
Notes
1. De Phyllis G. Jestice, ed. Holy People of the World: A Cross-Cultural
Encyclopedia (Santa Barbara: ABC-CLIO, 2004), pp. 51–52.
2. Chinese culture has a tradition of providing guidelines for conducting ritu-
als. The most ancient were the Zhou Li and Liji, but one of those who
standardized ancestor rituals was Chu Hsi (1130–1200), who compiled a
manual which, as the title reflects, was designed for conducting family
rituals.
3. The situation has changed remarkably. This is observable especially among
Chinese scholars who have embraced and adopted Christian and Western
methods of inquiry. Their contribution consists in shedding light on
aspects that foreign researchers, because of the limitations inherent in their
status, could not have access to. Their inquiries extend to classical litera-
ture, archaeological materials and so forth. A few cases of this change are
illustrated by Liu Yuan and his research on ancestors rituals during the
Zhou and Shang dynasties, Liu Yuan 刘源, Shangzhou jizuli yanjiu《商周
祭祖礼研究》(北京 : 商务印书馆, 2004) and Khiok-Khng Yeo, Ancestor
Worship: Rhetorical and Cross-Cultural Hermeneutical Response (Hong
Kong: Chinese Christian Literature Council, 1996); Bong Rin Ro, ed.
Christian Alternatives to Ancestor Practice, (Taichung: Asian Theological
Association, 1985).
4. The basis of this highly acclaimed methodological insight was discussed in
a paper wherein Nicolas Standaert assessed the different predominant ways
of interpreting intercultural encounters. See Nicolas Standaert, Methodology
in View of Contact between Cultures: The China Case in the 17th Century
(Hong Kong: CSRCS Hong Kong University, 2002). After showing the
shortcomings of the existing models, he presented his interactive and
cooperative model. A few years later, he wrote The Interweaving of Rituals:
Funerals in the Cultural Exchange between China and Europe, (Seattle:
University of Washington Press, 2008), in which he applies his theory to
the appraisal of funeral rituals among Chinese converts and missionaries
during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.
5. For further explorations of the different responses, see Tian Zhen 田真,
《世界三大宗教与中国文化》(北京市 : 宗教文化, 2006).
6. See J.J.M. de Groot, The Religious System of China, vols. 1–4 (Leiden:
E.J. Bill, 1892–1910); J.J.M. de Groot, The Religion of the Chinese, (New
York: McMillan, 1912); Marcel Granet, La Religion des chinois (Paris:
Allbin Michel, 1922); Laurence G. Thompson, Chinese Religion: an
Introduction, 4th ed. (California: Wadsworth, 1989) and Maurice
Freedman, “On the Sociological Study of Chinese Religion,” in Religion
and Ritual in Chinese Society, ed. Arthur P. Wolf (California: Stanford
University Press, 1974), pp. 19–41.
7. This hypothesis can also be sustained in the light of a Chinese Confucian

classical view of family rituals. In fact, ancestral rites and funerals—an
intermediary step towards ancestor status—predominate in the manual or
vade mecum for the religious conduct of a Chinese family. See Chu Hsi,
Chu Hsi’s Family Rituals: A Twelfth-Century Chinese Manual for the
Performance of Cappings, Weddings, Funerals, and Ancestral Rites, trans.
Patricia Buckley Ebrey (New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 1991).
8. See in this regard the assessment by Vincent Goosaert and David A. Palmer
of ancestor worship in the twentieth-century China, a time of systematic
reforms of funeral legislation in answer to prevailing ideological changes
such as those following the May Fourth Movement, the communist revo-
lution, the transition from an agrarian to an industrialized urban setting
and so on. In the name of ecology, hygiene, space management and the
fight against superstitions, traditional burial was progressively replaced by
cremation (huohua 火化), followed by the option of interment of ashes
(rutu 入土), dispersal of ashes in the sea (haizang 海葬), or memorial tree
planting (shuzang 樹葬). Evaluating the implementation and reception of
those changes, they note that “the central state may have won the moral
battle on creation thanks to scientific and environmental arguments, but it
clearly lost in the case of ash burial and its significance for filial piety.”
Vincent Goossaert and David A. Palmer, The Religious Question in Modern
China, (Chicago: The University Press of Chicago, 2011), p. 237.
9. See Xinzhong Yao and Yanxia Zhao, Chinese Religion: A Contextual
Approach, (New York: Continuum, 2010), pp. 1–2.; Yong Chen,
Confucianism as Religion: Controversies and Consequences (Leiden: Brill,
2013), pp. 108–112.
CHAPTER 2
The Hermeneutic Challenge

of Ancestor-Related Practices
Introduction
Ancestor-related practices, the main concern of this study, have previously
attracted the academic interest of many scholars. Behind each contribution
lies the intention to sharpen and clarify the meanings and motivations behind
the praxes and manners by which people in given cultures interact with some
of their deceased relatives. Ancestor rites, a worldwide phenomenon,1 have
been referred to in a variety of ways: as ancestor rituals, worship, veneration,
remembrance and so forth. Wherever and whenever this phenomenon is
observed, it bears witness to the importance people around the world give
to the remembrance of their dead and the projection of their afterlife.
The extensive academic interest in studying praxes related to the
remembrance of ancestors has not only heightened knowledge of the field,
it has also increased awareness of the complexity of subject. This complex-
ity is made evident by the ambiguity of the common concepts used in this
field of inquiry. In fact, nearly every basic concept involved has more than
one ramification or nuance. For instance, while the term ancestor refers to
a deceased relative or kin, it cannot be freely applied to all. More clarifica-
tion is needed as to whom among the dead are considered to be such.
Likewise, the concept of rites as related to ancestors belongs to a wide
epistemic constellation comprising other concepts such as ritual, worship,
cult, veneration, remembrance and so on. In their usage throughout
history, each of these terms has evolved and been endowed with specific
© The Author(s) 2018 11

P. Batairwa Kubuya, Meaning and Controversy within
Chinese Ancestor Religion, Asian Christianity in the Diaspora,
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-70524-8_2
meanings and connotations, such that despite their proximity, occasions

where these concepts can be considered as interchangeable or synony-
mous are few. The nuances overtly stress the different meanings and con-
notations given to the praxes being interpreted. The complex and
ambiguous character of the concepts related to the interpretation of praxes
of ancestor rites calls for a preliminary mapping of the epistemic territory
to which these concepts refer.
The parameters of the field of investigation will be described in two
sections. First, the key concepts are discussed, pointing to the hermeneu-
tic tension inherent in their ambiguities. The concepts involved in this
preliminary task of mapping include hermeneutics, ancestor, rites and its
qualified synonyms. The second section elaborates on the methodological
insights that have inspired and are still guiding this study.
The working assumption of this research—my conviction that ancestor
rites are dealt with as a hermeneutic problem, historically speaking—
matured out of a reflection on Nicolas Standaert’s considerations of the
interpretation of cultural encounters.2 In deepening his considerations
regarding this specific field, I was led to conceive of ancestor rites as the
hermeneutic text or text analog at the core of a tradition and culture. The
understanding and interpretation of these specifics—especially in a cross-
cultural context—requires close attention and diligence.
Beside Standaert’s insight, the hermeneutic framework established by
ancestor rites, text and tradition has been further enriched by the work of
Michel Foucault, especially his consideration of power and its relationship
to knowledge. Power, according to Foucault, permeates and influences
every hermeneutical attempt. The interpretations of ancestor rites to be
addressed in the succeeding chapters are forms of knowledge which, based
on Foucault’s theories, have been obtained through and under the shadow
of named or unnamed power schemes, which I believe it is important to
unveil. Detecting the action of the power schemas will eventually shed
light on offset corners of observation and the possible distinct versions of
interpretation they enable. This will eventually enrich the history of inter-
pretation of ancestor rites.
Power controls the field of hermeneutic as, in different proportions and
for different reasons, concepts impact the process of understanding, inter-
pretation and explanation. Hence, the mission of the preliminary map-
ping, besides deciphering the power schemas that affect our understanding,
is to clarify the specific meaning attached to each of the concepts used.
The next step in this endeavor consists in clarifying the key concepts
involved in the project.
THE HERMENEUTIC CHALLENGE OF ANCESTOR-RELATED PRACTICES 13
Conceptual Issues
The title of the present project comprises three key words: hermeneutics,
ancestor and religion, hence Hermeneutics of Ancestor Religion, which
could also be reworded as “interpretations of ancestor rites.” In view of
the ambiguity inherent in the concepts involved, I consider it imperative
to elaborate on the meaning of each of these words. In this way, the spe-
cific connotations of our usage of this terminology will be clarified.
Hermeneutics
In the most basic way, hermeneutics refers to the act of “translating,”
“interpreting” and “making intelligible.” The Penguin Dictionary of
Philosophy offers a concise definition that emphasizes two meanings: the
first is “interpretation” and the second is “inquiry into, or theory of, the
nature or methods of interpretation.”3 Further explanations by different
authors depict hermeneutics as an art—the art of understanding, inter-
preting and explaining—stressing the importance of the objective quality
and clarity with which the understanding and interpreting process is to be
carried out. Friedrich Schleiermacher grasped that “understanding” and
“explanation” are the two tasks of hermeneutics. Other researchers in this
field made similar claims. Gustav Droysen repeated that “understanding is
the most perfect knowledge that is attainable for us humans.”4 And
Wilhelm Dilthey added: “understanding and interpretation constitutes the
method used throughout the human sciences. It unites all of their func-
tions and contains all of their truths. At each instance understanding dis-
closes a world.”5 Today, hermeneutics is still defined as “a theoretical
reflection on the principles and rules of interpretation and understand-
ing.”6 In other words, it is a philosophical inquiry into the human activity
of interpretation and understanding. As in the previous cases, understand-
ing and interpretation are consistently mentioned: they are inseparable
from hermeneutics. My attitude in handling the materials at hand will
strive to live up to the tasks of hermeneutics as efforts to foster under-
standing through interpretation, explanation and clarification.
Why Hermeneutics?
The above explanation confirms hermeneutics as an appropriate method-
ology for the scientific study of religion and religious phenomena.
Methodological insights from hermeneutics are emerging as capable of
offering a philosophical and methodological grounding for the study of
human sciences, including religion. This achievement offers a brighter

outlook after centuries of distrust, doubt and lack of consideration for the
scientific nature of knowledge emerging from the field of human sciences
and religion, to which ancestor religion—the topic of my investigation—
belongs. Ancestor rites have been and may still be addressed from dif-
ferent academic perspectives: liturgical, anthropological, ethnological,
sociological, archaeological and historical. Each of these approaches, how-
ever, can only lead to a univocal theory. While viewed through the lens of
a scientific and objective mind, these theories may represent nothing more
than the exteriorization of subjective perceptions. However, by viewing
these theories through the lens of hermeneutics, it becomes clear that they
work as distinct instruments interpreting the same melody.
All these conversations, which have lasted centuries and involved many
famous scholars such as Schleiermacher, Dilthey, Husserl, Heidegger,
Gadamer and Paul Ricoeur, have progressively created an environment
conducive to reflecting on the nature of religious truth, the human quest
for meaning and understanding. This scholarly conversation has also
established the places in which to search for that understanding: texts
(especially religious ones), phenomena, culture, existence itself, are all
imbued with meaning that needs to be understood. Discussions among
hermeneutic theoreticians correct and complement each other, pinpoint-
ing the gaps and distortions inherent in the analysis and interpretation
provided by each individual in a specific field.
This mutual and ongoing conversation has not only confirmed the
modern specification of hermeneutics as “a theoretical reflection on the
principles and rules of interpretation and understanding,”7 it has also
become a venue to check and countercheck its practical applications, as
well as the resulting interpretative theories which have been developed
over time. The presentation of several interpretative approaches to the
ancestor rites to be dealt with in this project is a contribution to that
ongoing discussion.
d hoc or Implicit Hermeneutics

A
A historical survey by Garrett Green lists the great names among the con-
tributors to the hermeneutic tradition starting from Schleiermacher down
to Ricoeur. In acknowledging the difficulties of presenting an exhaustive
and complete account of the development and diversification of herme-
neutics, he calls attention to what he calls “ad hoc hermeneutics” or
“implicit hermeneutics.”8 This interesting category encompasses the as yet
unaccounted for forms and methods that have been developed in order to
understand and interpret texts, religious phenomena, and encounters. As
the qualifications suggest, ad hoc and implicit hermeneutics are so named
because unlike with the main trends, the proponents of these new versions
are not yet internationally acknowledged. But they are still part of the
hermeneutic tradition in that they are oriented towards understanding
and interpreting. Nicolas Standaert’s theory of the interpretation of cul-
tural encounters, to which I devote ample space, can be discussed under
this classification. This extension is also made possible by expanding the
concept of text to text analog as the object of interpretation. In this larger
sense encounters of cultures, and in this particular case the study of ances-
tor rites, can be considered text analogs whose investigation and interpre-
tation is an inexhaustible source of meaning and understanding. This
wider scope enables us to look at the conflict emerging in the encounter
of cultures as worthy of the same consideration as the conflict of interpre-
tation Ricoeur finds at the core of hermeneutics.
icolas Standaert’s Hermeneutics of Cultural Encounters

N
The interpretation of cultural contacts between the East and West has
been a concern of many historians interested in China’s interactions with
other cultures. Speaking from a Christian perspective, Standaert can surely
be regarded as one of the most remarkable contributors to this field. His
early works offered an abundance of information with regard to this
exchange.9 But his greatest contribution consists in the spectrum of inter-
pretations he offers which become mandatory in analyzing and assessing
previous historical works about the cultural encounter between Christianity
and Chinese culture.10 Standaert’s contribution to this search for meaning
and interpretation can be seen from different angles. He discusses four
different interpretations of the single case of Matteo Ricci and his com-
panions, pointing at the strengths and limitations of each. Second, he
encourages initiatives to discover other implied interpretations. Third, his
interpretation challenges and positively answers the general assumption
that cultural encounters unavoidably generate tensions.11 Finally, the
“interactive and cooperative” framework that Standaert promotes does
not make an absolute claim to truth and thus can be neither confirmed nor
challenged. He wants it to inspire more reflection as it is applied to inves-
tigating more fields. “It is hoped,” he writes, “that this reflection on the
methodology involved in approaching this particular cultural contact may
enter into dialogue with the study of other types of cultural contact, in
other periods of Chinese history or indeed between other cultures.”12 In

this regard, Zhang Xiangqing makes the following assessment:
… a core value of Prof. Standaert’s paper is that it not only reminded us of

the complexity and multiple methods in which 17th century cultural
exchange between East and West can be studied, but also made us reevalu-
ate the depth and breath of this field. Having read this paper, we find our-
selves using his method to think further: What type of paradigm do our
studies in the past or in the present belong to? What is the value of our
academic studies?13
The triggering elements of Standaert’s thought and quest for an alter-

native interpretative framework were related to the ideas of Zürcher, who,
like many, reiterated the assessment of Buddhist expansion in China as
successful. In accord with the insight of Marcel Gernet,14 Standaert argues
that the model of Christianity Ricci introduced to China and its further
development by Chinese scholars, often referred to as Pillars of the Chinese
Church, cannot be said to be a failure. Standaert’s argument here is that
the historical event that Ricci and his Chinese partners and friends created
was a cultural contact between West and East that should be studied
through a more encompassing framework than the three which historiog-
raphers have applied, namely a transmitter, a receiver and an inventor
framework.15
Standaert makes the observation that the strength of previous consid-
erations consisted in their being inspirationally rooted in the mental
framework of communication.16 Moreover, he pinpoints the limitations
inherent in each of these hermeneutic frameworks.17 He further supports
his critical evaluation by arguing that none of the previous frameworks can
efficiently account for the effective Christian Chinese communities that
emerged from the sixteenth- and seventeenth-century encounter between
Ricci and China. Likewise, none can account for the specific theological
thought that the Christian Chinese did develop. In fact, the final product
of that interaction went beyond Ricci’s original plan and strategy, in the
same way that it was not a mere reiteration of Confucian or Buddhist
thought. It was a product of an interaction and cooperation between two
cultural worldviews.18
Unlike the criticized frameworks, Standaert’s proposed interactive
framework stresses reciprocity and sees understanding and transmission as
a mutual or two-way process wherein transmission achieves its goal through
the very act of reception. The two cannot be separated. Moreover, the
transmitter and the receiver are equally active in this process. They are
equally inventors, especially because the message transmitted can be
received in a creative way and hence produce new situations. This could
also validly be considered as the starting point of interpretation. He further
supports his views by critically referencing philosophers of alterity such as
Martin Buber, Levinas, Ricoeur, Taylor, Mikhail Bakhtin and Tzvetan
Todorov.19 Besides this solid backing, Standaert ponders some concepts
such as coherence, tension and negotiation.20 He further alludes to some
images which metaphorically represent the interaction between cultures
and consequently the way these phenomena should be interpreted. These
images include “organ transplant,” “implanting/grafting,” experiments in
chemistry, and threading or weaving a piece of clothing.21
In a recent publication, Standaert’s ad hoc hermeneutics focuses on the
“the image of a foreign missionary being present in the midst of a Chinese
funeral procession.”22 Based on several portraits of Christian funerary rites
in a Chinese environment, he ponders the role of ritual in the exchange
between cultures, namely China and Europe in the seventeenth century.
Here, Standaert’s aim is to emphasize the changes and progression in the
understanding and interpretation of funerary rites—Chinese and Christian
alike. The change in question enabled, and led to, the integration and
emergence of a reality that could be appropriately referred to as “interwo-
ven” Chinese-Christian funeral rituals.23
Initially, foreign missionaries upheld Christian regulations, excluding
and criticizing Chinese funeral practices; they especially denounced the
pomp of funeral processions and burial expenditures as unreasonably
immoderate.24 Christians were encouraged to break with these traditions.
But the sobriety and moderation that foreign missionaries preached were
understood as failures of filial piety, so much so that Christians were sus-
pected of not being filial and Chinese converts were accused of breaking
away from their own customs. Christianity in that case would not be
considered a good religion and would be taxed as a foreign and perverse
thought whose propagation would not be allowed on Chinese territory.
As a result, Christian Chinese funerary rites were developed as accom-
modations. On the one side, missionaries, realizing the shaky ground on
which their appraisal had placed them, began to realize that the rituals
contained some positive elements. They also recognized the missionary
opportunities that funeral processions offered. The processions were spe-
cific occasions for Christians to appear in public, to display their beliefs
and convictions.25 The clearest evidence of change in the understanding of
the pomp of funerary rites by the missionaries was their acceptance of and
cooperation with the efforts of the converts to acquire imperial sponsor-
ship for the funerals of some missionaries; they came to see the prestige
emanating from this imperial grant as a confirmation of the acceptance of
Christianity in China.26 But for this to happen, adaptations had to be
made: some points had to be dropped and others inserted. The final prod-
uct was an innovative new way of celebrating death that followed the
guidelines of the old Chinese customs of family rituals and at the same
time introduced Christian insights regarding death and eschatological
hope.27 Unlike Chinese funerary rites, which are exclusively a matter for
siblings, Christian death was lived as a community moment. But here
again, while in the West the priest served as the main official at funerals,
and the parish church was the locus of rituals, in China the priest’s role was
taken up by the leader of the local Christian community and the family
remained the central site of the rituals.28
Methodologically speaking, Standaert’s study of Chinese funeral rituals
attracts our attention for it spots the limits and consequences of the preva-
lent frameworks for understanding the rituals in question. He writes:
By explicitly using travel writings, reports, translated texts, decisions of

meetings, etc., written by European authors in European languages it has
shown how the transmitters’ – missionaries – vision of the other was based
on their own European culture. Europeans used their own categories to
interpret and reframe the Chinese notions of funeral: they classified them as
“superstitious,” “idolatrous,” “non-superstitious,” “civil,” “political,” etc.
Imposing categories on the native culture in this way helped them decide
which rituals could be used and which should be rejected. Though the
Chinese rites controversy, and the eighteenth century Enlightenment in
which its implications crystallized, have not been the object of this research,
it is not difficult to show that the early categorization determined, to a large
extent, European perceptions of China for a long time afterward.29
Moreover, funeral rituals, the textual analog of the hermeneutic

Standaert has launched in this study, are part of the broader phenomenon
of ancestral rites that, in our opinion, should be interpreted through ana-
logical ad hoc methods of hermeneutics. In making such a proposal, our
basic assumption is that ancestral rites are part of the domain of cultural
encounters. The otherness and strangeness of the phenomena observed
are posed as problems requiring understanding and interpretation. But the
solution to these problems should not be found in a monologue or using
an autocratic method. Related aspects of the hermeneutics conflicts

Standaert touches on have been partially addressed, for instance, by those
investigating the Rites controversies, by missionaries (Catholic and
Protestant alike), and by scientifically minded people (ethnologists and
anthropologists). Whereas each of these has the right to offer his or her
own explanation, I believe that the phenomenon needs an understanding
achieved not only as the result of an intellectual and autocratic mono-
logue, but as a consideration of a religious phenomenon.
Methodologically speaking, the example of interpretation Standaert has
provided regarding funeral rituals can also be applied to the phenomenon
of ancestral rites. Funeral rituals are part of the process of becoming an
ancestor; they are necessary steps that might jeopardize ancestral rites
themselves. In the same way as those rituals encountered a different under-
standing and interpretation, undergoing a process of cross-fertilization
that culminated in Chinese Christian funeral rituals, a revisiting of inter-
pretations of Chinese ancestral rites might generate different understand-
ings and appraisals of a phenomenon which in its nature appeals to the
religiosity of the Chinese people. I deem Standaert’s ad hoc hermeneutic
of cultural encounters helpful for the realization of this goal. His study of
the encounter of Christianity and Chinese culture has shed light on the
conflicts of interpretation involving foreign missionaries and local cultures.
He has also shown how through interaction both sides have enriched their
own understanding.
Ancestors
Generally speaking, the term ancestor is associated with deceased fore-
bears whose remembrance involves reverence, deep respect or veneration.
These inner attitudes are exteriorized through concrete gestures, whose
interpretation varies depending on the perspective of the interpreter.
Speaking of the meaning of the term in anthropology, Maurice Bloch and
Arthur Wolf specify that it refers to “forebears who are remembered” and
“the specific religious practices” related to them.30 The epistemic interest
in ancestors is not a mere curiosity about the mysterious realm of the dead,
but rather the dynamic interactions created by the recognition that,
though departed, they are remembered and addressed as if they were pres-
ent. This dynamic exists in many cultures, even though not all have an
identical notion of what it is to be an ancestor.
The closest depictions of the concept described here in the Judaic and
Christian biblical tradition are of course the words father,31 ancestor or
ancestry,32 patriarch33 and forefather,34 which are sometimes used synony-
mously. The descriptions are used at times as a eulogy to outstanding fig-
ures and exemplars who maintained and propagated the monotheistic
faith. These people are addressed as ancestors in faith. Among them,
Enoch, Noah, Abraham, Isaac, Joseph, Moses, Gideon, Samson and David
are all presented as ancestors in faith.35 An exemplary life is extolled as a
way of achieving parenthood, since those walking the trodden path
acknowledge the spiritual legacy of their forefathers. However, besides the
eulogy to outstanding models, there are also criticisms addressed to ances-
tors: fathers and forefathers as examples of disobedience, as lacking in per-
fection and so on. The overall picture is hence balanced, and in practice,
with the exception of the exhortation of Ecclesiastes36 regarding honoring
parents, little is said about the liturgical way of celebrating or commemo-
rating ancestors.
This ambivalent appraisal of ancestors passed into the Christian tradi-
tion. On the one side it extolled the good examples as representing spiri-
tual parenthood, but on the other side it took hold of the fear of idolatrous
deviation consisting in deifying a model and paving the path to idolatry.
The Catholic tradition of canonization avoids these incumbent risks,
stressing that a saint remains a human person—not a god or a divinity—
and portraying sainthood as a confirmation of divine merits working in a
person striving to embody Gospel values.
Still, in the Roman Catholic tradition, Eucharistic celebrations, requiem
masses, prayers, confraternities, church cemeteries, cults and devotions to
saints, and prayers for the beloved deceased are all external manifestations
of the desire to interact with the deceased. Additionally, the present litur-
gical calendar has two dates specially reserved for the remembrance of the
deceased: November 1 and November 2.. The first is dedicated to the
memory and celebration of all saints, that is, individuals who, though they
lived in a saintly way, upholding Gospel values, are not listed in the
hagiographic records of the Church. In fact, not all these saints could be
accommodated in the calendar. Still, there is an implied consensus that the
unnamed saints are partaking in the gratification that canonized saints
enjoy in God’s bosom. These are remembered as intercessors. November 2
is the other day consecrated to the interaction between the living and
their deceased family members. But unlike in the previous case, these
deceased are relatives still on their way to eternal rest. They have not
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streets and lanes and piazzas obstructed with broken furniture of every sort;
vilely smelling currents of black filth, and pools and lakelets of the same;
and—mercy on us!—corpses everywhere in the quieter squares—corpses of
wretches who had crawled there to die; corpses reeking in the sunlight;
corpses that even the clouds of horrid vultures refused to put a talon in.
“Such was Santiago. I had come for copy, and I soon had enough of it.
“ ‘Let’s get out of this, bo’s’n. Can’t we spend the night up yonder
among the hills and palm trees?’
“ ‘Yes,’ the good fellow answered, cheerily. ‘And luckily the wind’s
about a N.N.E.’
“We didn’t leave the city empty-handed, though. One hotel was doing a
roaring trade, and when we found ourselves, an hour before sunset, high up
among the woods, we had enough of the good things of this life to have
stood a five days’ siege.
“Perhaps we didn’t make a hearty supper! Oh no, sailor-men never eat
and drink!
“We had some wine anyhow, for our stomachs’ sake, let me say, and to
eliminate the perfume of sweet Santiago, which seemed still to hang around
us.
“The sunset was ineffably beautiful, the clouds and the bay were
streaked with the colours of tropical birds; of those very birds that sang
their evening songs above us, while the breeze sighed through the foliage.
“Twilight does not last long here, however, but a big round moon rose
slowly over the hills, and there would be neither darkness nor danger to-
night.
“ ‘I say, bo’s’n,’ I cried, ‘you were in the Merrimac with gallant Hobson.
Tell us your version. Have another cigar, and another glass of wine. Keeps
away infection, you know.’
“The bo’s’n needed no second bidding. He had a bo’s’n’s nip—four
fingers high—and the wine was brandy too.
“ ‘Ahem! Yes, I was in the Merrimac, and so was Jack Hardy, here.’
“ ‘Well,’ I cried, ‘I am in luck. Wait, bo’s’n, till I light up. Now, then,
heave round, my friend. Sure you’re not thirsty?’
“ ‘No, sirree. I feel that last little tot in my eye like. Ever seen Hobson?
Well, you’ll like ’im when you does. You’ve seen a yacht, spick and span,
new, that can rip through a stormy sea, hang or move like a Mother Carey’s
chicken, and do ’most anything. That’s him. That’s Hobson. Bless you, sir,
the old men didn’t like the youngster’s brave proposal at first. They pooh-
poohed it, as ye might say. Even Schley himself laughed a little, as, in his
fatherly way, he put a hand on young Hobson’s shoulder. I was as close to
’em, sir, as I am to Jack here. “Admiral Cervera,” he says, “is in yonder
right enough. Only wish the beggar would come out. He’s bottled.”
“ ‘“Ay, admiral,” says Hobbie, as we calls him for fond like, “and I want
to cork the bottle. Give me that old collier the Merrimac, and, with a few
volunteers, I’ll take her in and sink her right across the narrow neck, ’twixt
Canores and Estrella Points, and——”
“ ‘“And where will you and your men be then?” says Schley.
“ ‘“I’ll give you my word of honour, sir, I’ll go to heaven, almost
cheerfully, as soon’s we bottle up the dirty Don! Besides, sir,” he says,
“why smash that fine fleet up, when it would make so grand an addition to
the American Navy?”
“ ‘Yes; and it were that very argerment, I guess, that carried the pint, wi’
the captains in council assembled. Volunteers! Ay, in course; half the navy
would have volunteered to steam to certain death with young Hobson. It
was the forlornest o’ hopes ever led.
“ ‘Look you, see, sir.’ The bo’s’n paused a minute to draw with his knife
a rough sketch of Santiago bay and city on the ground.
“ ‘That’s my map, like, o’ the place lying down yonder beneath us in the
moonlight. Them things there at sea is the fleet—our fleet. You’ll have to
take Cervera’s for granted, but one of his ships lay here, you see, to guard
the entrance. The crosses is the batteries, and they did blaze and batter us
that awful night!’
“The bo’s’n paused a moment, and laid his hand affectionately on Jack
Hardy’s shoulder.
“ ‘Me and my young pal here,’ he continued, ‘had known one another
for months afore then. There was something about the lad that made me like
him. See’d him throw his extra garments one day and go like thunder for
big Nat Dowlais, ’cause he’d kicked the ship’s cat. Ay, and welted him well,
too. I took to talkin’ more to Jack after that. But I couldn’t get down deep
enough to the boy’s heart. There was something under the surface; I could
tell that. Jack was no ordinary bit o’ ship’s junk. Bless you, sir, there’s
hundreds o’ gentlemen’s sons before the mast—but they’re not all like Jack
Hardy. Jack was more like a stage sailor than anything else. Everything he
put on was so darned natty—his hands so white and soft, though his face
and neck was brown. Then he talked American like a book. Played the
piano, too, like a freak, and was often in the ward-room in consequence.
And blowed if I didn’t hear the master-at-arms—bloomin’ old brass-bound
Jimmy Legs—more’n once call him “sir.”
“ ‘Well, the Merrimac was ’long-side and ready. Incloodin’ Lieutenant
Hobson himself, eight of us were chosen for this deed o’ danger. Torpedoes
were arranged in the hold. Hobson would stand by the helmsman, Hobson
would touch the button and sink her, and, at a word, we should leap into the
sea and swim for the dinghy towin’ astern, for this was our only hope o’
salvation.
“ ‘Jack, here, had stood by my side among the volunteers, but the poor
lad was passed over. Don’t nudge me, Jackie lad; I’m goin’ to tell the truth,
the whole bloomin’ truth, and nothin’ but—so there! I’ll never forget, sir,
the look o’ disappointment on the lad’s face just then. Some time after, I
found him for’ard with his back to the ship and his face to the sea. He
looked smartly up, but I could see by the starlight there were tears on his
face.
“ ‘He said nothing, but walked away impatient like, and I saw him no
more for a time.’
“The bo’s’n leaned towards me now, and his eyes sparkled in the
moonlight. He touched my knee with his horny palm.
“ ‘We steamed away,’ he said, in a hoarse half-whisper—steamed into
the darkness and away from the flag-ship. Not a sound for a time save the
hollow dump o’ the screw and the swirl o’ the seethin’ seas!
“ ‘In silence we steamed—it might have been for half an hour, but it
seemed like an age—an age of blackness and terror. Nothing was nateral
like. The ship was a death-ship, the figures agin the bulwarks yonder were
spectres. I would have given worlds to have heard but a word, a laugh, a
cough even!
“ ‘I said there were eight of us! By the sky above us yonder, sir, there
were nine!
“ ‘I guessed at once who the ninth was, and I shuddered a bit when I
thought of brave, foolish Hardy here. For never a stroke could he swim, and
his coming with us to-night was sheer madness—nay, more, it looked like
suicide.
“ ‘Soon after Jack slid slowly up towards me, and his left arm clutched
my right as I clutch yours now. Every one of us, sir, was stripped to the
waist. Every one wore a lifebelt save Jack Hardy. He was a stowaway, and
not in it.
“ ‘“Oh, boy,” I said, speaking in a whisper, “why have you done this?”
“ ‘“Hush!” he answered. “My time is mebbe short, mate, and you’ve
always been my friend. So listen. Something tells me you’ll be saved, but I
am here to die. I want you to bear a message to my parents—to my mother
especially. Her address you’ll find in my ditty-box. But go to see her, Sam,
when the war is over. Far away west my people live in opulence, and I’m an
only son. Father taunted me with cowardice, and I ran away and came to
sea. Tell father I forgave him. Tell mother——” Ah, sir, just here the lad
broke down. He’s only a boy. “Tell mother,” he sobbed, “how her Jack died
for his country. Tell her I felt she’d forgiven me—that will please her—that
my every dream was of home and her, that——”
“ ‘“A boat on the weather-bow,” cried a man to Hobson. “Shall we fire?”
“ ‘“No,” cried Hobson; “never a shot.”
“ ‘It had been a picket. We heard her officer shout in Spanish to give
way with a will, and she disappeared up into the darkness of the channel we
were now entering.
“ ‘The end was coming; the end was very near, and we all knew it.’
* * * * *
“While the bo’s’n had been telling his story, young Hardy sat silent, but
he spoke now almost for the first time.
“ ‘A moment, sir. The bo’s’n won’t tell you, but I must. He tore off his
lifebelt, and fastened it around me. He swore I must wear it or he would
fling it into the sea. That’s all!’
“ ‘Well, sir,’ continued the bo’s’n, ‘the awful silence was speedily
broken. They had seen us only as a dark mass, black as the rocks that
towered above us. Then their fire opened. We’ll never be under such a fire
again as that, sir, and live. Shells burst above us, around us, shells riddled
our hull, and raked our spar-deck, and crushed into our deck-house.
Fragments and splinters flew about in all directions. I think most of us were
flat on our faces just then, and I lay beside Jackie here holding his hand. No
tremor there, though! No signs of fear! And the fire poured into us from
three sides, sir, from the batteries of Socappa on the left, from Morro on the
right, and from a warship ahead.
“ ‘Speak of thunder. Pah! thunder isn’t in it with such a devil’s din as
this, and lightning ’gainst those gun-gleams would have been like the glint
of a farthing candle!
“ ‘Then we saw brave Hobson’s figure—unearthly tall it looked. No
voice could be heard, only his arms waved us to the bulwarks.
“ ‘Next second it seemed we were all in the water, as a roar louder than
the artillery shook the sky, shook the hills, and silenced even the batteries.
“ ‘The ship was sinking beside us! We were all but drawn into the
whirlpool, but I held Jack’s hand and toughly towed him off.
“ ‘But the dinghy was gone, and the rudder too, and the Merrimac sank,
not across, but along the channel. So our forlorn hope had been led in vain.
The Spanish fleet was bottled still, but not corked, sir.’
“He paused for a moment.
“ ‘Ah, sir, no one there would ever forget that night, nor the hours we
passed under a tilted grating that God in His mercy had put it into some
one’s head to attach by a rope to the ship. We could just get under this
catamaran and hold on to the spars above.
“ ‘Hour after hour of darkness went by. Boats passed and repassed, and
we could hear the men talking. Had they known there were nine heads
under that grating, short would have been our shrift, sir.
“ ‘And all these hours we hardly spoke. We almost feared to breathe
aloud.
“ ‘More than once I thought that Jackie here was dead or dying, but I
whispered cheering words to him. More than once I trembled as my feet
were touched by slimy sharks. How they did not tear me down I cannot tell
you. Seems to me, sir, ’twere a ’tarposition o’ Providence like.
“ ‘But daylight came at last, and Cervera’s own boat and Cervera
himself.
“ ‘Hobson’s voice was feeble enough now, but he managed to hail her.
“ ‘“Por Dios!” we heard the white-haired admiral cry. “Do the dead talk
to us?”
“ ‘But we were saved, and taken to the Spanish ship. Yes, sir, treated
with every kindness, made prisoners, but released at long, long last, even
before sweet Santeehager fell.
“ ‘Well, that’s my yarn, sir, and it’s all as true as the stars above us.’
“ ‘And Jack Hardy here,’ I ventured to ask, ‘was he reprimanded?’
“ ‘Tried by drum-head he was, sir. Condemned to death for desertion,
and pardoned all in one sentence.’ ”
“ ‘Ah, sir,’ the brave bo’s’n added, ‘I’ll bet my boots that Jack Hardy is a
midshipman before this cruel war is over. Thank ye, sir, I don’t mind if I do;
and I’ll give ye a toast, too—
“ ‘“May the Stars and Stripes we love so well,

With Britain’s flag entwine,
And we’re goin’ to give the world—fits,
When the two brave fleets combine.“ ‘“
* * * * *
The Walrus sailed on and on around the great Antarctic continent, but
never saw her consort till once more the two ships met safe and sound at
Kerguelen Isle.
END OF BOOK II
BOOK III
ON THE GREAT ANTARCTIC

CONTINENT
CHAPTER I
A STRANGE DISCOVERY—SHEELAH AND TAFFY
“She is bound to be,” said Captain Mayne Brace, a day or two before the
good ship Walrus reached Kerguelen. “Bound to be, Mr. Armstrong. She is
the better craft of the two, you know.”
He was talking to Ingomar and Walter, one evening in October, while
they all sat together in the cosy saloon, not a mile away from the stove.
Ingomar and Brace were smoking the pipe of peace, and sipping their
coffee (which they placed, to keep warm, on top of the stove), between each
longdrawn sip. Walter was reading one of Scott’s novels, or trying to, for he
was listening to the conversation all the same. Charlie was missing to-night.
I rather think he would have been found, if any one had cared to look for
him, forward in the galley, listening to the men’s yarns, or playing a
hornpipe to please them.
“Well, yes, she is bound to be, in the natural course of events, because,
as you say, she has faster sailing qualities, and all that; but——”
“Ah!” interrupted Mayne Brace, with a smile, and another hearty pull at
his coffee; “we must not think of the ‘might be,’ or the ‘may be.’ Else we’d
go on thinking and get nervous, and end in believing, that because we did
not meet the Sea Elephant somewhere to the east of Dougherty Islands, she
has been taken aback in a squall, and gone down stern foremost, with all
hands. Or that she had, at the very least, broken her screw.”
“Steward!”
“Ay, ay, sir!”
“Put more coals on the fire.”
“Yes, sir.”
“And just replenish our cups of coffee. Fresh ground, isn’t it?”
“That it be, sir.
“Dumpty always roasts it himself, and I grinds it. A main good hand
Dumpty is, sir, at roasting coffee. A little morsel of lard in the bottom of the
pan to keep the beans from burning, a good clear fire, and keep them
moving and moving; and there you be, sir.”
“Steward!”
“Sir to you again, sir.”
“Ever anybody ask you for a recipe for roasting coffee?”
“Milk and sugar, sir?”
The milk was another invention of the steward. It was a fresh gull’s egg,
beaten and mixed with hot water, and sweetened with pure preserved milk.
On the whole, everybody did his best on board the old Walrus.
The men forward to-night were very jolly, for, being so near to the end
of their exceedingly long voyage, the captain had spliced the main brace,
that is, he had added one modest glass of rum to their nightly allowance. I
don’t believe in rum myself, but when one is writing a sea story, one must
adhere to the truth. The man who does not face realities and the naked truth,
is like the fabled ostrich that hid its head in the sand when danger
approached.
The men drank “sweethearts and wives,” or “wives and sweethearts,” in
the real good old British fashion. The married men, you know, drank “wives
and sweethearts.” The bachelors, and they were nearly all of that
persuasion, put the “sweethearts” to the front.
They had mixed the grog with a good deal of hot water and sugar to
make it last. But they toasted each other also; and it was, “Here’s to you,
Jack;” or, “Here’s to you, Bill,” or Tom or Joe, as the case might be. And
“We’ve been shipmates now more’n a year, and never a word atween us,
bar a sea-boot now and then.”
And they toasted “The Captain.” “And he is a good fellow,” was the
remark of one sailor, “though a stickler for duty.”
“Ah! Well, Sconce, dooty is dooty all the world. Stick by that, and we’ll
all do well.”
“Dooty,” said another, “is the needle wot points to the Pole, and the Pole
is Heaven itself.”
“Very good sentiment for you, Jack. Here’s to dooty!”
“Now, sir”—this to Charlie—“touch her up, sir. Give us ‘Homeward
Bound,’ and we’ll all chime in, from Dumpty downwards, to the nipper wot
tends the dogs.”
“Homeward Bound” was given with glee; but, of course, it was only a
make-believe, because there wasn’t much home life about Kerguelen.
They sighted the island after passing McDonald and Heard Isles.
Charlie again. He had been determined to be first to see land.
Before the entrance to the creek or natural harbour, where the men and
animals were, is a spit of rocky land, a rugged kind of breakwater, and had
the Sea Elephant been the first inside, her top-masts would have shown
over this.
But here was never a ship’s mast to be seen.
On the shore, high up on a braeside, was an outlook, and the Walrus’s
people saw both American and British ensigns dipped to welcome the
Walrus.
The Walrus returned the salute.
Then flags of all kinds were set in motion, and the signalmen on board
and on shore were very busy indeed, for a time.
“Yes, all was well, now,” said the signalman on shore, “but two dogs
dead, and one Innuit. Sea Elephant had never been seen.”
The anchor was hardly let go when the officer’s boat was alongside, and
he was heartily welcomed down below to exchange experiences.
He and his men had been very busy all the time, and they were ably
assisted and supported by the kindly Yak-Yaks. He spoke in the very
highest terms of Slap-dash, the chief. In the dreary days of winter, when the
island was deep in snow, snow-shoe expeditions were got up; but sleighing,
especially with the bears, who were better suited to the rough work, was
preferred. The Yak-Yak died of inflammation. One dog fell over a cliff and
was killed at once. The other was found dead. Both were buried side by
side, and cairns mark their resting-place. “There is a cairn also,” said Slator,
“on the poor Yak-Yak. I think we nearly all dropped some tears at his
grave.”
I suppose they did, reader, for in the loneliness of such a place as this the
heart is sometimes very near the throat. Sunshine brings mirth and
happiness, gloom depresses, and there is always a certain amount of sadness
in even the songs of northern nations, such as Iceland, Scotland, and
Norway.
Both Charlie and Walt had some doubt as to how the Yak-Yak dogs
would receive them again. But, accompanied by Ingomar, they boldly
marched some distance into the interior, to the kennels. It was the afternoon
of what had been a glorious day, and they had doffed their fur caps and
coats.
The bears were not at home just then. Both bears and dogs, indeed, had
gone away to roam the wilds nearly every day, but the Bruins, with the
dogs, always came shambling or trotting back at eventide, to sleep and to
eat.
They were away then at this moment, and Slap-dash proposed that, with
the Newfoundlands and pet collie, they should all march forth to meet them.
Strangely enough, they had a rendezvous on a hill-top, where most of
them met every night, and from this a beaten track to the camp.
To-day several of the dogs were already at the place of meeting, several
were straggling up from seawards, and in front (for no dog was permitted to
walk behind him) was Gruff, with his well-beloved wife Growley.
When within about seventy yards of the place, where Ingomar and the
boys were standing, both stopped short and sniffed the air. Then Growley
gave vent to a half-choked roar of rage, that shook the hills—well, if it
didn’t shake the hills, it shook the hearts of Charlie and Walt.
“Strangers!” Growley seemed to shout. “I’ll tear ’em limb from limb!”
Gruff rounded on her at once, and promptly knocked her down.
Then Gruff came trotting on, and Nora and Nick and the collie ran off to
meet them, our heroes following.
That was a pas de joie, a joy-dance, if ever there was a joy-dance in this
world; and those sceptical creatures, who would class dogs and our other
dumb friends as mere automata, would have been converted on the spot to
the dear old doctrine, that animals have souls, had they but seen that dance.
It was too absurdly intrinsically droll for description. The other two
bears, Grumpey and Meg, came up and joined, and presently all the rest of
the bonnie dogs.
They went round and round our heroes in a hairy hurricane; they
pretended to worry each other, they barked and roared, and grumbled and
growled, till the boys’ sides were sore with laughing.
Surely such a scene of merriment was never before witnessed, and when
all had quietened down somewhat, they went amicably back to the kennels.
This is not one of Grimms’ fairy tales, mind, rather is it a fairy tale of
science and natural history, and these, readers mine, are all true.
* * * * *
A whole week passed away, but still no Sea Elephant.
Captain Mayne Brace had taken in more coals, and his arrangements
were all complete, so he was becoming impatient; but at long last the ship
hove in sight over the horizon, and the union was complete.
On comparing logs, it was found that they must have passed each other
at night, and had been probably within ten nautical miles of each other.
The bigger ship had taken many observations, and done a much quicker
voyage. But, knowing that he could be at Kerguelen much sooner than the
Walrus, a happy thought had occurred to Captain Bell. He would run up to
the Cape of Good Hope and endeavour to get a cargo of coals.
Although the war was raging, he succeeded, and now these were landed
in case of emergency, each ship just taking enough for the grand new cruise.
I need hardly say that the meeting between Curtis and Ingomar was most
cordial.
A grand ball was given on shore on the night of re-union.
Sailors are not sailors unless they can have a bit of fun.
It was a ball of a somewhat heterogeneous description, for men waltzed
with men, though Slap-dash did some really graceful movements with Gruff
and the other bears as partners. There were no ladies, you see, but all the
more freedom and merriment.
Yet, stay; I must qualify this statement. The Eskimos, Yaks, Innuits,
Teelies, or any other name you choose to give them, are droll creatures.
They all dress alike in skins, and their faces are all about the same shape.
Now the very day before the Walrus and Sea Elephant sailed, all being
then on board, except a change of men who were to remain at Kerguelen for
observation duty, Slap-dash came up and saluted Captain Bell.
“Four of my rascals,” he said, “want to speak to you directly.”
Then the four “rascals” were led up and threw themselves on their faces
before Captain Bell as if they had been worshipping the sun.
“Get up, get up,” said Bell, “and speak like men.”
They arose at once and stood before him, and two took a step in advance
of the other two.
“We not all men-people, sir,” said one.
“We not all men-people,” said the other.
Captain Bell began to frown.
“Dis ees my ole woman-people,” said the first speaker.
“Dis ees my ole mudder-people,” said the other.
“Slap-dash,” cried Bell, “did you know this?”
“Not befo’ dis morning, sah; no, no.”
Captain Bell was puzzled and silent. He addressed Ross, the officer who
had been left in charge at Kerguelen.
“No, sir,” said this gentleman; “I don’t see how we can send them on
shore. We can’t want the whole four. They will pine and die if separated.
That would be a dead certainty.”
“Very dead,” said Bell, smiling.
“Besides, though no one suspected their sex, that one called Sheelah is
an excellent cook, and both are capital nurses. We were sick sometimes. We
had green fever in winter, and certain I am that they nursed us back to life.”
The carpenter was next called for.
“Carpenter,” said Bell, “a small screen berth will be wanted below in
some corner, a kind of l-l-ladies’ cabin. Do ye hear?”
“Well, sir, I do hear, because I’m not deaf; but I don’t understand.”
“Then just do as you are told, Mr. Inglis.”
“Certainly, sir, certainly.”
So a little privacy was obtained for Sheelah and Taffy, and, as it turned
out afterwards, no one was the loser for the “women-people” being on
board.
Do coming events throw their shadows before?
Perhaps they do. Anyhow, when the two ships looked their last on
Kerguelen—the last for a long time, at all events—there was more silence
on board than is usual with sailors going off to sea.
They knew the dangers they were going to encounter, but they were all
quite acclimatized to the rigorous Antarctic climate by this time, and there
was not a man on board, British or American, who was not prepared to do
his best. Which of us can do more?
CHAPTER II
A FIGHT BETWEEN MEN AND ICE
The Sea Elephant’s cruise around the great Antarctic continent, and all her
captain and bold men did, and said and saw, would make a book in itself.
That may one day see the light, as well as the adventures of the men left
behind at Kerguelen.
We must now follow our heroes into a country as widely different in
every way as Scotland or England is from the moon.
Now, having been a boy myself, not so very long ago—apparently—and
being still a boy at heart, I know that boys do not as a rule care for
geography. That is because it is taught in a stupidly, awkward way at
schools, a method being adopted which is devoid of all interest. But never
mind, I do wish you for once in a way to take a look at the map here
presented to you. The ships were off south and east from Kerguelen Isle,
and the first port to be struck was Termination Land. It was not to be the
termination of their cruise, however, by a very long way.
Would you be surprised to learn that there are two poles in the south, and
two in the north, the magnetic and real poles.
The real axis, the hub of our “terral” wheel, is the one we have to deal
with.
Here all meridians may be supposed to meet at a point.
There would in reality be no more south for a man standing at this pole.
Let him look in which ever way he liked, to Africa, to South America, or
New Zealand; it would all be north, north, north. No east, no west, just
north.
The Sea Elephant and her sister, the Walrus, were not to be run into any
danger along the coast of Wilkes’ Land, which marvellous line of shore
may be said to stretch from Termination Land and Island, right away to
Ringgold’s Knoll, far, far east. It is, or is supposed to be, the longest stretch
of coast land in, or any way around, the Antarctic. There is no mistake
about this being land, nor that it is indented with bays and gulphs, just as
the west coast of Scotland or Norway is; and these indentations may really
divide the continent in places.
I only want to give you some rough idea of this land coast. Had you then
been able to sail along it many thousands of years ago—and you would
have had to be up very early indeed to do so—before there was any ice here
at all, when the shores were green and forest-clad, the sight you would have
witnessed would have been a very beautiful one indeed! Hills and vales and
mountain land, and probably in the farther interior, vast sierras, the woods
teeming with strange animals; and strange birds would have been there, too,
sailing over the forests, or floating on blue seas, alive with myriads of fish
of various species, many now lost and gone, others still extant because they
have migrated.
But now, though the same formation of surface and contour of hills may
remain, they are all, all snow-clad, and protected seawards by a barrier, or
barriers of ice, of every description, which few mariners would care to
negotiate.
* * * * *
The weather continued favourable, but there were many days of darkness
and gloom; and after Termination Land had been reached, it was not
considered advisable—strong and well fortified though the ships were—to
be among the ice when the shadows of great clouds enveloped the land, or
when storms were threatened. But when the sun shone, and the ice was
open, then they boldly ventured to push their way through, either under
steam, or under sail.
Ice like this closes very suddenly, and if the captain of an exploring ship
is not very clever, he may get caught, and a week’s imprisonment counts
against a ship when making a voyage.
Sailing in a pack like this, a vessel to a landsman would seem to be in a
very dangerous position.
She may be, though no one on board appears to think so. The ice is here,
the ice is there, the ice is all around; flat bergs, like what you meet in the
north; pancake ice, lakes of slush, and those terrible masses, or square
mountains of land-ice—a characteristic feature of this country—with caved
perpendicular sides, striated on the horizontal, or, if they have been melted
by the sun at one side, oblique, and glittering gorgeously blue, green, or
paley white, in the sun’s rays.
But all, big or small, covered with snow, so that their very whiteness
dazzles the eyes. But at this season there were birds everywhere, and seals
of many species. The penguins, I need hardly add, were a very curious
sight, as they stood or staggered about on the low flat bergs. Our heroes saw
some sea-elephants, though I believe these, as a rule, are far more common
to the south of Tierra Del Fuego.
One day, when the ships were pretty close together, and well in through
the ice, the sky cleared far too quickly to please Captain Mayne Brace. He
knew at once that John Frost would have them in his clutches, if they did
not soon beat a retreat.
So he signalled to his consort, and both vessels quickly had their heads
turned to the north.
They might have found themselves clear in a few hours had it not
suddenly come on to blow from the cold and icy south.
The ice began to pack.
Steam was got up with the greatest despatch, and nearly all sail taken in.
Luckily there was no swell, else there would have been pressure enough to
have thrown both vessels on their beam-ends on a floe.
The Sea Elephant was leading, and by-and-by the Walrus managed to
creep right into her wake. This was an advantage for a time. A south wind,
even with a clear sky, would naturally open the ice, but there was some
demon current working underneath that they could not account for; and
while they were still two miles from clear and open water, they found
themselves rapidly becoming part and parcel of the pack.
Break the ice, did you say? I should smile. You may get steam
machinery to smash bay-ice, or splinter pancake, but not your solid, heavy
pieces. Oh no! So men who have inventions of this sort should sell them to
farmers at home to break up their mill dams in winter.
Then came a battle ’twixt men and ice. Men with their cunning, ice with
its force of movement, slow but sure.
Both ships got closer together, the Sea Elephant leading, all hands that
could be spared from both ships, over the side in front of the foremost.
Armed with great poles, they moved the bergs on every side.
It was bitterly cold work, and the pieces moved but slowly.
Under all the pressure of steam she could produce without risk, aided by
the men over the side, the Sea Elephant forged her way slowly, fathom by
fathom, indeed, but after a time that to our heroes seemed interminable, her
jib-boom hung over the black water.[D]
Then came the scramble to get inboard, and though their fingers were
about as hard as boards, and some had frozen faces, in less than ten minutes
all hands were once more on their respective decks.
Sail was once more set, fires were banked—save the coals they must—
and away they went, right merrily, to the east again, the wind well on the
starboard beam.
Although the men had raised a cheer when the ships were quite out of
that ugly pack, there was no fear in any breast.
“Would there have been much danger if we had been beset in there,
uncle?” Charlie ventured to ask the captain, at supper.
“A fig for the danger, boy. We’ll never be out of that, but we came to
find the South Pole, or get somewhere near it.”
Ingomar smiled.
“Well, then, Hans, we have come to make a big record.”
“That will beat all creation, captain.”
“Yes, beat all creation, and it would have been misfortune, to say the
least of it, to have got beset. That’s all. Yes, thanks, steward, I’ll have
another slice.”
* * * * *
The two ships stood steadily onwards now, day after day, sailing
whenever they could, steaming only when obliged to, for the economy of
coal had to be studied, and that, too, most carefully.
Captain Bell, of the Sea Elephant, came now to be recognized as head of
the expedition, though on every occasion that was deemed important a
council was called and the opinions of all officers taken.
He was now always called The Admiral, but not to his face. He was
none too fond of fine titles.
And the Sea Elephant was called the Flag Ship, for short.
One day, when in the neighbourhood of the Knoll, the Admiral signalled
to the Walrus, that as they would soon round Wilkes’ Land and stand down
south, it would be best for all hands to bend their cold-weather gear.
In shore English that would signify, give out the supplies of winter
clothing.
As it turned out, this was very excellent advice indeed.
The Eskimos had their supply first and foremost, and this they had made
themselves, under the supervision of Slap-dash, and from seal-skins with
the hair on.
Slap-dash assured Captain Bell that there was nothing so good for
keeping out the cold, and his words turned out to be true. Most, however, of
the sailors and their officers still stuck to flannel and fur.
Both Charlie and Walter had a very great desire to see the inside of a real
ice-cave. These caves look like archways, or the openings into tunnels, and
are formed by the dash of the waves on huge bergs of land-ice, or even in
the sides of the ice-barrier itself.
They had their desire fulfilled one day, while the ships lay almost
motionless on the dark water.
There wasn’t a breath of wind, nor was there any fog. And the surveyors
were engaged very busily indeed, in taking soundings, and bringing up
specimens of the mud or clay at the bottom for examination.
Fires were banked, but the ships were at no great distance from a lofty
ice-wall, at the foot of which were several caves.
They rowed on shore at sunset.
And the appearance of that sunset was in itself a sight to behold!
The sun was sinking slowly down to the north of west, and in a cloudless
sky. It seemed a larger sun than our young heroes had ever yet beheld, and
cast its reflection on the heaving waves ’twixt boat and horizon, in a very
remarkable way; for although the sheen was bright, it was not dazzling. Nor
was the sun itself. But nearer to the spot where our heroes stood, on the
field of level ice betwixt them and the ice-caves, were many shades of opal
and pearl.
“We must be moving,” said Ingomar, “at last, boys, or we will not get
home to-night.”
“Oh!” cried Walter, “I wouldn’t mind staying here all night to look at the
sky.”
“Nor I,” said Charlie. “I’d like to sleep in the snow. Nothing could harm
us except the frost, and we should be in our sleeping-bags, so that couldn’t
hurt much.”
“There are no snakes here, anyhow.” This from “wise Walter,” as Charlie
sometimes called him chaffingly.
“No, Walt; and no burglars, either.”
There was one thing to be said for the dogs, Nick and Nora and Wallace.
They had long ago fully made up their minds to enjoy themselves to the
fullest extent, whenever they had the chance.
They were tearing round and round on the ice-floe at this moment,
wriggling and jumping and playing at leap-frog, while Nick would pause
every moment to fill his mouth with snow and fling it over his neighbour’s
shoulders.
The boys must have just one more look at that sky before they entered
the ice-cave.
Lo! what a change. The sun was all but down, and sea and sky had
changed to orange, deep and charming. The very snow was orange.
But judge of their disappointment when they entered the first cave and
found that all was pitch dark.
CHAPTER III
THE BEAUTY AND MARVELS OF AN ICE-CAVE
“Oh, what a shame!” cried Walt, impatiently. “We did expect to see
something real splendid.”
Ingomar laughed.
“You are snow-blind, boys, just for the moment. If you’d come when I
told you, when the sun was still above the horizon, you would have had a
daylight view.
“The sun can’t be expected to stay for you. He has to rise and shine on
other seas, if not on other lands.”
But when their eyes became more accustomed to the twilight, they could
see that they were in a vast vaulted cave, solid ice and snow beneath them,
and strange uncanny shapes sparkling in the semi-darkness beyond.
Three men had accompanied Ingomar and the boys, and one was
carrying a bag.
“Be cautious how you move, lads, else one of you may go through into
the sea, and never be seen again.”
“But the ice feels very strong.”
“Yes; it is perhaps a foot thick, and that is strong enough for anything.
But there are ‘pussy-holes’ here and there, up through which seals crawl to
sleep, and on these the ice is very thin.”
Just as he spoke, there was a sudden and angry roar heard ahead of them,
where something black and big reared itself, and two fierce eyes glared at
the intruders.
The boys clutched each other in superstitious fear, and stepped quickly
back.
It was only a large seal, however, but so quickly did it retreat that
Ingomar had not the slightest idea what species it was.
I may say for the seals here in the Antarctic, which number four or five
species, that though in the breeding season they have certain habitats, after
that happy time is over they are free to wander where they please, and often
turn up in strange places. It is the same with Arctic seals.
An eared seal, whose fur has been much sought after, is now, I think,
almost extinct, owing to the murderous greed of the sealer. I think it would
be well if there were a close season for all species. But this is a digression.
Let us return to the cave.
The somewhat mysterious bag carried into the cave was now opened,
and Ingomar, bending down, extracted some of what he termed theatrical
properties therefrom.
Next moment, on the touch of a button, the whole of this cave was filled
with dazzling light.
What a sight!
“Oh—h—h!”
That was all our boys could say for a moment or two.
No stalactite cave probably ever rivalled the beauty of this.
And here were stalactites, too, in the form of depending icicles, dozens,
scores, hundreds of them, and, seen by the electric light, they emitted all the
colours of the rainbow.
They walked cautiously on and on a long way into the bowels of this
mighty cavern, watching the floor for pussy-holes.
No one could even guess where the seal had gone.
“Well,” said Charlie, as they came at last to the end of the ocean-
hollowed cave, “I should really have expected to find mermaids here.”
“Now,” said Ingomar, “one more transformation scene, or perhaps two,
and then the pantomime is over.”
As he spoke he touched a spring, and, wonderful to say, the cave was
illuminated with brightest crimson, then with orange and red again. So on to
the pure white light, and in this they found their way to the mouth of the
cave, and made their exit and presently their way to the boats.
“We’ve seen a sight,” said Ingomar, “that is surely worth coming to the
Antarctic to look upon.”
“Yes,” said Charlie, thoughtfully.
“Oh,” cried Walt, “will you do it again some time?”
Ingomar laughed.
“It all depends,” he said.

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Meaning and Controversy within

Chinese Ancestor Religion 1st Edition

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Loving St Nix A Forever Safe Christmas Story 1st

PAULIN BATAIRWA KUBUYA

More information about this series at

Asian Christianity in the Diaspora

Library of Congress Control Number: 2017959109

© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s) 2018

Cover image © Sean Pavone / Alamy Stock Photo

Printed on acid-free paper

This Palgrave Macmillan imprint is published by Springer Nature

This work focuses on ancestor-related praxes, specifically their riddles in

There are no pure and completely disinterested explanations. Moreover,

Taipei, Taiwan Paulin Batairwa Kubuya

I express my deep appreciation to everyone whose friendship has been

1 Introduction: Are Ancestors a Problem? 1

2 The Hermeneutic Challenge of Ancestor-Related Practices 11

3 The Conflict of Interpretation of Chinese Ancestor Rites 55

4 “Our” Perspective: The Indigenous Explanation

5 Existential Practical Hermeneutics of Ancestor Religion 167

Introduction: Are Ancestors a Problem?

While worship of ancestors constitutes 60 % of religious practices and

© The Author(s) 2018 1

many foreign interpreters who found in them a hermeneutic problem. It

ancestors in Chinese customs has led some interpreters to theorize it as

interactions and Foucault’s warning about the implications of power at play in

7. This hypothesis can also be sustained in the light of a Chinese Confucian

The Hermeneutic Challenge

© The Author(s) 2018 11

meanings and connotations, such that despite their proximity, occasions

human sciences, including religion. This achievement offers a brighter

 d hoc or Implicit Hermeneutics

 icolas Standaert’s Hermeneutics of Cultural Encounters

other periods of Chinese history or indeed between other cultures.”12 In

… a core value of Prof. Standaert’s paper is that it not only reminded us of

The triggering elements of Standaert’s thought and quest for an alter-

By explicitly using travel writings, reports, translated texts, decisions of

Moreover, funeral rituals, the textual analog of the hermeneutic

an autocratic method. Related aspects of the hermeneutics conflicts

“ ‘“May the Stars and Stripes we love so well,

ON THE GREAT ANTARCTIC

A STRANGE DISCOVERY—SHEELAH AND TAFFY

A FIGHT BETWEEN MEN AND ICE

THE BEAUTY AND MARVELS OF AN ICE-CAVE

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Taipei, Taiwan Paulin Batairwa Kubuya

1 Introduction: Are Ancestors a Problem? 1

2 The Hermeneutic Challenge of Ancestor-Related Practices 11

3 The Conflict of Interpretation of Chinese Ancestor Rites 55

4 “Our” Perspective: The Indigenous Explanation

5 Existential Practical Hermeneutics of Ancestor Religion 167

d hoc or Implicit Hermeneutics

icolas Standaert’s Hermeneutics of Cultural Encounters