From my YouTube channel.

Hear for yourselves the unearthly voice of a Chinese Hell deity.

People must understand that one cannot volunteer to be a medium.

One is chosen to be a medium by the gods themselves, on the basis of karmic debts that must be repaid or erased via divine service.

In a nutshell, mediumship is a form of penance for sins past and present.

The job holds numerous hazards - the act of channeling a deity puts tremendous strain upon the mind and body, for one.

Many mediums are consequently ruined in physical and mental health; a good number die young.

It is not a responsibility to be taken lightly.

Buddhists do not 开光 or consecrate statues or ritual items the way sintua/Chinese folk religion practitioners do.

They merely bless the items by chanting sutras.

In sintua, a statue or ritual item can only be consecrated by a medium who is channeling the relevant deity, and the medium usually does this by anointing the statue with blessed ink, incense ash or his/her blood.

Taoists do not have mediums; they have their own means of consecration that their priests perform.

And Taoists do not worship Guan Yin; she is revered only by Buddhists and by sintua practitioners.

Within the sintua context, Guan Yin CAN be channeled by mediums and she can therefore consecrate ritual items pertaining to her by possessing a medium

Otherwise, she can authorise a lower-ranking deity to perform the consecration on her behalf.

Hardcore orthodox Buddhists will condemn this as being blasphemous and false.

But thankfully there are wiser, more open-minded heads.

I'd like to stress once more that this thread is NOT about Taoism.

Sintua and Taoism are two different beasts.

The Black and White Brothers are 'generals' in the sense that they are senior soldiers in Hell ('general' in the Chinese folk religion context is a term used to describe a senior spirit soldier who serves as an assistant to a major deity).

But I would not classify them as commanders, no.

There are other higher ranking deities whom they answer to.

The lower ranking Hell beings, the soldiers, including the Black and White Brothers, are ghostly creatures.

The higher ranking ones, the officials, can be considered gods.

Who do you approach when your house has been burgled - the local constables, or the Inspector General of Police?

Your analogy would apply if we were discussing the fact that different deities have different roles and specialties.

But we are discussing rank, and why lower ranking deities are approached more than higher ranking ones.

So my analogy stands.

I have never heard of a 'Long Shen Da Di' - are you sure the name you have is correct?

Hello and welcome, Mars. Do stick around; I promise to keep this thread entertaining and informative.

On to your questions:

1. Sintua is a mostly oral tradition, as previously mentioned. You are not going to find very much in the way of holy texts or scriptures, if at all. Nor is most sintua-related information stuff you can read about in books or on the Internet. The lion's share of ritual techniques and so on are imparted by the deities through their mediums during trance sessions, yes.

2. Good fakers can be quite convincing, unfortunately. But as a rule of thumb, a genuine medium will not make inappropriate statements (e.g. using vulgar language or requesting sexual favours) during trance, nor will they demand payment. Genuine mediums are capable of very astounding feats, as well, including volunteering information without being told and withstanding inordinate degrees of pain. The hard-and-fast gold standard, however, is results. A fake medium will not be able to solve your problems, the same way a fake doctor cannot really heal the sick.

3. Sintua deities are 'lawful good' in alignment, and will not tolerate acts that are illegal according to spiritual law. Black magic is therefore strictly taboo in sintua, especially for mediums; any medium who performs acts of black magic risks severe punishment from their divine patrons. In any case, serious spells require WAY more than just time and date of birth to perform - stuff like the target's hair, fingernails or personal effects (e.g. clothing) are vital. The most you will be able to do with just time and date of birth is give your target a bout of, say, itchy rashes. Or a mild migraine. Or an upset tummy.

4. As I've said earlier, one cannot volunteer to become a medium. You are chosen based on your karmic debts. Mediumship is a form of penance for sins past or present. Unless one is expressly picked for the purpose, it is impossible for one to channel a deity, period.

Hope this helps,

Nachty

No problem, Mars.

There is this one temple known as the Hall of Sevenfold Jade/七玉殿. It is one of the few temples in my hometown of Klang dedicated exclusively to the Hell deities, boasting the all-merciful Ksitigarbha Bodhisattva in the main hall, and a special air-conditioned, cave-like basement room where the Black and White Brothers and other lesser but more fearsome Hell beings reside.

You can visit them at 4, Jalan Cox, 41300 Klang; they hold consults on Saturday nights at 9:30 p.m or thereabouts. The temple is admittedly somewhat difficult to find, being off the beaten track; it is located down by the river bank near the Fairy Park funeral parlour, close to Wisma TLT and the old Pawagam Sri Intan.

You're too kind, my friend; I'm just doing my humble part to ensure that my faith and its rich tradition gains more exposure.

The credit really should go to people like you for making this thread a success; without a supportive audience, it would not have gotten off the ground.

Stay tuned; I'm immeasurably grateful for the viewership.

What is the 'Sheng Guan Fa Cai' ritual?

The phrase 'sheng guan fa cai'/升官发财 means 'to attain promotion/officialdom and reap wealth' - in other words, to succeed in life.

The Chinese word for 'coffin', 'guan cai'/棺材, is a homonym with the 'promotion/officialdom' and 'wealth' words of the above phrase ('guan cai'/官财).

It is in this pun that the 'Sheng Guan Fa Cai' ritual, associated with and performed exclusively by Chinese Hell deities, was born.

This ritual involves a down-on-their-luck supplicant lying inside a special coffin that has previously been occupied by a Hell deity and imbued with his spiritual energy, in order for the supplicant to absorb this and be rid of negative influences, so that his or her lot in life may improve.

Some very impressive results have been obtained via this delightfully morbid ritual, although given that a Hell deity's spiritual energy is not something everyone can withstand, it is not for everyone.

The amount is entirely up to you.

Traditionally, you offer an amount that is commensurate with the seriousness of the problem you are seeking a solution for.

Let me know how things go; I'm always interested to hear other people's perspectives of what goes on during consultation sessions, especially the perspectives of laypeople.

I recall that episode very well.

The hostess was not truly brought down to Hell.

Rather, she was merely made to think that she was there.

It was an attempt to teach the nosy girl and 'Master' Szetoh a lesson: be careful what you wish for, and do not regard Hell as a frivolous place that you can take trips to and from like Disneyland.

The Black and White Brothers will never bring a living person down to Hell without good reason to do so, as doing so is extremely dangerous and can result in serious physical or mental injury.

The chap in gold is known as Uncle Bullion or Jin Qian Bo/金钱伯.

He is Hell's paymaster, a ghostly being who receives and stores all the burned offerings (especially money) that people offer their departed loved ones.

He will only distribute them to their intended recipients if they are deserving of such.

If these individuals have not behaved in a manner deserving of receiving their offerings (if they were particularly wicked in life, or if they remain unrepentant in death), the offerings will be either confiscated indefinitely, or re-distributed to more deserving souls.

Keyword: 'saw'.

To see something doesn't mean you are actually where that thing is.

When you watch a movie or a TV show in which you can see some scenery in South America, does that mean that you are actually in South America?

Most of the Hell deities are ghosts, strictly speaking.

You seek different spiritual beings for different things.

If your car has broken down, do you go and look for a dentist?

She was unfortunate enough to meet the fake ones rather than the real thing.

They are celestial beings, not monstrous creatures of darkness and shadow like the Hell deities.

They have attained divinity via a different route.

A good number of them never actually physically died, in that they attained immortality and ascended straight to paradise.

Others who did, died natural deaths rather than violent ones, and had already cultivated themselves to high levels of spiritual enlightenment prior.

Lord Guan is an exception, but as the story goes, his ghost embraced the Dharma after death and became godly after loyally serving as a Dharma protector for untold centuries.

The Hell deities, on the other hand, were mostly victims of violent or gruesome deaths who were appointed their roles after descending to the Netherworld like any other deceased soul.

While largely upright men in life, they were not saints.

In death, they remain rough-and-ready dudes not beyond baser conduct, such as telling raucous jokes, smoking, partaking of opium and liquor, et cetera.

And a lot of them have never seen Heaven, let alone ventured there.

They are quite content to stay where they are and continue working their roles indefinitely.

They take a certain pride in their grotesqueness, in being the 'angels with dirty faces'.

Someone has to do these jobs.

1. The Jade Emperor is traditionally depicted as an aloof, distant monarch, disinterested in mortal affairs. I think it's safe to say you won't get much luck with him.

Generally speaking, the higher up the food chain you go, the less involved with us humans the deities get. Oftentimes, higher ranking deities are merely present in a temple or shrine in order to supervise the lower ranking ones who possess mediums during trances, and provide them with the necessary authority to solve devotees' problems.



2. The Monkey King is very widely worshiped. He is a warrior and Dharma protector who can be called on to dispel evil spirits. Also, he is a master of guan xi - the art of interpersonal relationships and diplomacy, as evidenced by his always knowing whom to approach whenever he required help with solving a problem that was beyond his scope or ability. It would not be unreasonable to approach him if you are having trouble with workplace politics.

Regarding him being powerful, most of the difficulties that the Heavenly armies encountered when they battled him back in the day stemmed from the fact that they had absolutely no idea what they were dealing with - at the time, they had yet to battle an foe of his type. He is tough, but not unbeatable. For instance, Lord Er Lang adapted very quickly to the Monkey King's tactics and was able to fight him to a draw. A rematch between the two of them might very well result in a tipped scale.





3. Piggy's job scope as Cleanser of the Altar is to clean up after major ceremonies to the gods - he's a glorified janitor, essentially. We commonly see him being worshiped OUTSIDE of this job scope, however, in that he is most widely prayed to by bar-girls, prostitutes, strippers and other women of easy virtue, for protection while performing their jobs (against disagreeable clients, violent pimps, diseases, etc). Although he took his Buddhist vows, that doesn't stop him from looking after the class of girl he is so fond of.

1. In Chinese folk religion, the context of an action is ALWAYS taken into consideration when judgement is passed in the next world. This includes suicide, which, in itself, is not necessarily regarded as sinful, unlike in Abrahamic religions. For example, a terminally ill man who commits suicide because he does not wish to burden his children with medical bills will be viewed sympathetically, while the serial killer who commits suicide rather than be caught by the police who are banging on his door is going to get it nicely.

2. Most sintua deities are deified human beings who achieved divine status after accumulating merits as mortals. The take home message is that anybody can become a god if he or she is virtuous enough. So don't stop believing.

3. One example of a (relatively) modern deity is the German girl whose spirit is worshiped at a shrine on Singaore's Pulau Ubin called the Berlin Heiligtum. As the legend goes, she was the teenage daughter of a German plantation owner who lived on Pulau Ubin, and died from a fall off a cliff in 1914 while attempting to escape the British authorities, who were detaining all German nationals within British territory following the outbreak of the First World War. Her soul subsequently made its presence felt to Ubin residents, performing several minor miracles; she was subsequently enshrined and revered ever since, represented by a meticulously made-up doll on the shrine's altar and provided with offerings of cosmetics and other feminine items.