Just calling them like I see them.

Mainstream Buddhist monks would probably not consider them to be proper clergy.

Here is a very good scholarly article regarding the Nine Emperor Gods and their festival, which is well worth reading.

https://nirc.nanzan-u.ac.jp/nfile/199

video of a lady medium trancing ji gong

While we are on the topic of the 9 emperor god's celebrations , let me share an event similar to this that is held in Taiwan.

https://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E6%9D%B1%E6%...%9A%86%E5%AE%AE

It is a 3 year once event where a wang ye will descend from heaven to perform his duties as an inspector with the imperial edict from the jade emperor himself.

What happens is , once ever 3 years , the town of 東港 in kaoshiung taiwan will perform a rite to invite the imperial censor wang ye to inspect the township as well as the world, the rite named 代天巡狩 （Inspecting on the behalf of the heavens ) will be very similar to what we have here in South east asia.

a band of higher temple committee members will go to the seaside with sedans and ritual items to offer prayers and chant invitational mantras to invoke the spirit of the imperial censor to arrive , thus , while it happens ,
mediums will hold onto wooden sticks tranced , will come upon the altar to write the secret passcode . Why I call it the secret pass code , it's only made known to only 1 or 2 temple high committee guys a day before the ritual , words are , the imperial censor's surname as well as his job title.



This is an example of what will happen.




A video of what is done during the festival

Who is Tin Fu Yun Sui ?

You are not typing words from any Chinese dialect that I understand.

How about giving me the name in Chinese characters?

I think he meant "天蓬元帥".

I understand. Curiosity kills the cat. Sometimes I also wish to validate what I know and this is one of the best place for it. However, over the years, I had learned that not everything is laid out in black and white or craved into stone (fixed teaching) and there is a lot of exception and reasoning behind. I listened to a lecture by some KL tibetan monk once which changes my outlook on certain teachings. He said two gurus can be both right even if they say different thing. An example is guru A (or sifu in sintua) might tell you to go to turn right and walk 10m and turn left and walk down the corridor 100m and turn left and walk 10m (destination) for a direct path. Guru B might ask you to turn left walk 10m, then turn right walk 200m and then then right and walk 10m and then turn right again walk 100m. If you draw out the path, you might each exactly the same point. so both are right. Just Guru B take a longer route while Guru A is a shorter route. But they lead you to the exact same point. Can you say A or B is right and one is wrong? Guru B might forsee you meet someone important at that route and that person can further help you gain more insight so he chose that longer route. Guru A might think you got everything you need so a more direct path is suitable. Or Guru B wants you to meet the person Guru A is telling but that person is 10 minutes late so Guru B tells you a 10 minutes longer route so both of you will meet at the point where both of you wanna go. Makes sense? That is why i say sometimes a sifu or guru might consider other stuff when telling you something and sometimes its not the "normal" way. And to be honest, nothing is really set in black and white or set in stone and says there is "no other" way to it. There are "acceptable" and "normal" way to do something, but its "not the only" way to do it. Hope you get what i try to say.

hmmm.. interesting. Its like a pot calling a kettle black. As a "mainstream buddist", what some of the stuff sintua did, as the example in the video of the female ji gong medium would probably not consider them to be "proper" as well. Anyway, what i trying to say is different "system/belief/culture/understanding/sects/organisation" or whatever you wanna call them might consider their own to be the right way and others as "moot/improper/wrong/illusion/confusion" as you wanna put it. Every of those "organisation" (i lazy type whole lot of it so i named it organisation for easier reading) have their own history and belief and ways to do certain thing. I would like to say that this case is the same. As i said above, there isnt really "one way" or "fixed" way of doing something. Some might point and say its "wrong" just because they do not understand it. I think its improper to judge and says "mine" is "better" than "yours" just because you practice it different from mine.

But to be fair, I will say you are partly right and partly wrong. In thai there is a mainstream monks/buddism and there is a small small small group which practices are not the "mainstream" buddism (i will not say they are monk but rather as "guru/practitioner/cultist". But i will not group them as one. Just in like malaysia there is sintua and there are some conman/bomoh. I will not call everybody as one. Each are responsible for their own doing/teachings. And the ones you seems to "dislike" and call them "non mainstream" are actually not part of the monk if you look properly. All MONKS have precepts and rules to abide. It goes to every country and every belief and every sects, be it tibettan, vietnam, thai, china, hk, japan, Myanmar, Australia, US and everywhere else on earth. there might be some variation but all have 200 plus precepts or rules to abide to. But each country do have their own bomoh/cult/funny practitioner that seems to "mimic" them and gives the wrong understanding. I am just saying this coz i do not wish you to "misunderstand" certain stuff which i think you did.

hmmm... i never really watch a full video of these sorts of things to be honest.. but the amulet she is wearing is kinda funny and hence i try to have a better look and hope all through the video i might have a proper look. lol.. too bad i can only make a guess and i cannot really pinpoint with 100% accuracy..

It's in Cantonese..sorry..I don't know Chinese characters..so can't write in Chinese.

I went to Ampang jiuhuangye and that night they are welcoming this particular deity. So I'm curious.

Marshal Tian Peng is a fearsome stellar warlord, a protector of religion and state.

He has his origins in Tantric Buddhism; the multi-armed, multi-headed look that he sports belies his Indian antecedents.

Please note that Marshal Tian Peng and Piggy from Journey to the West are NOT the same individual, despite what Journey to the West might claim.

Beg your pardon; I'm Hokkien and don't understand a word of Cantonese.

If your mystery deity is, indeed, Marshal Tian Peng, him being invoked during the Nine Emperor Gods festival would not be unusual, as he, like them, is a deity of the stars and could be considered a colleague of theirs.

to the canto dude , i think you meant tian fu yuan shuai ?

Have you guys done any studies in metaphysics, feng shui or fortune telling such as 稱骨? Yes, our fate is controlled by ourselves but there should be some truth in those?

They should not be regarded as anything more than a general guideline.

As I've mentioned earlier, fortune telling merely predicts a probable outcome based on the choices a person has made up to that point in time, plus the decisions they are contemplating at that point in time. If you start contemplating different decisions while your fortune is being read, a whole new set of equations can be produced, and hence a different reading.

The future is completely malleable. The only thing that cannot be altered is past events.

You are writing the story of your life as you go along, not acting according to a pre-written script.

u are wasting ur breath

if these ppl can really accept or understand what u are saying, the discussion won't started at all.

it's practically like telling smoker smoking is bad, and tell him bla bla bla story.

I've got time to kill.

my current take/point of view on this issue is everything is interconnected. first the "topic" of karma and "self" and reincarnation. How does one come into the "current self"? at this point at this time at this exact second. And where will it lead us to? So depending on how you look at "self" and "where" it began or end, you will see that it does make certain sense. Of coz there is no black and white and there are lots of questions and so on. So, to start off, first we must answer the question of, is there only ONE lifetime? or is there "multiple" lifetimes? and how do "one" determines how one is "borned" if its only ONE lifetime and is that fair? How was it determined? what happens when one lifetime has ended? and so on and so forth.

of coz i going to fast forward it to "i think there is multiple lifetime", ie, reincarnation theory. And following that "theory" the path of suffering and the 6 path of reincarnation as explained by some old text. And if you reach there you will see that some of the "path" (non human path), they have longer lifespan. From there you will reach that there "are others in this world, not only us". And learning to "co-exist"/asking help/requesting help/asking direction/asking protection/bla bla bla will come into place and walla~... we are here in this thread wuahahaha.. of coz there are a lot of specifics which i skipped. If not all will doze off as you can see my post are usually long. So i cut corners.

Being able to keep company with my divine patrons and be privy to their knowledge and wisdom is reward enough for me (that's me in the photo below, having a nice little chat with one of them over a drink or two).

Epiphanies that common folk will be unable to achieve? I think the facts that I'm sharing here count in that regard.

wah... boss... i dint know you so handsome wor... anyway, what did you talk about? I dont have to know the content but sort of topics coz i am curious as they will "chit chat" rubbish or its a "you ask me i answer you" session about something that normal human will not know? hehehe.. like future kah.. if you are on the right path kah.. what you need to do kah? and do they actually give "stuff" for "ong"? and i curious oooo... can you communicate with them directly without a medium? hehehehe... and ah and ah.. can they "leak" info about your future?

Nope, your time is not wasted. I followed this thread from 1st page for quite some time and I liked your way of explaining things. I'm considered one of your fan.

Hopefully my questions in the future (if any) will not waste your breath as mentioned by kravo. As I find all these stuff intriguing but I have very little knowledge of it.