Yicheng Guandi Temple, Kaohsiung高雄意诚堂关帝庙
- Type
- Temples and Abbeys (Gongguan)
- Location
- Taiwan, China · Taiwan · Lingya District, Kaohsiung · No. 66, Sanduo 4th Road
- Coordinates
- 22.613, 120.3011 Map ↗
- School
- Daoism in Taiwan
- First built
- 1899 (Jihai year): thatched-hut shrine; rebuilt in 1908 and named "Yicheng Tang" · Some tourist materials give the founding date as 1901, which does not match the temple's official website, which gives 1899; this entry follows the official website
Overview
The Yicheng Tang Guandi Temple principally enshrines Guandi (Emperor Guan); at its founding it venerated the Three Sage Benefactor Lords, and it belongs to the Rujiao Shenjiao (Confucian Spirit-Writing) luantang (spirit-writing hall) tradition. Tradition holds that it originated with an old vegetable farmer known as 'Yi-a,' who built a thatched shed to venerate the Three Sage Benefactor Lords; an altar was established in 1899 and rebuilt in 1908, and it was named Yicheng Tang ('Hall of Yi's Sincerity') in gratitude for 'the sincerity of Old Yi.' In 1926, the Kaohsiung gentry figure Chen Zhonghe set up a spirit-writing platform there and organized the Tongshanshe (Society of Fellow Goodness), completed in 1930 under the full name 'Yicheng Tang Tongshanshe.' The building has passed through three generations of change: a two-courtyard brick temple in the southern Fujian style was built in 1966, rebuilt in northern Chinese palace style in 1996, and the Lingxiao Precious Hall was added in 2003. To this day, spirit-writing sessions to aid the world are still held every Friday evening, and it is among the better-preserved examples of the luantang tradition in the Kaohsiung area. The competent authority registers its religious affiliation as Daoism, but in terms of the nature of its congregation it should properly be classified as a luantang / Enzhugong (Benefactor Lord) cult, not a Zhengyi or Quanzhen Daoist school in the strict sense. The temple building itself is not registered as a cultural heritage item.
Highlights
- Spirit-writing sessions to aid the world (every Friday)
- Chen Zhonghe's establishment of the spirit-writing platform and the Tongshanshe (1926)
- The Lingxiao Precious Hall (2003)