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After living in China and then returning to the United States, people ask you a very wide variety of questions about China. One of the more common questions is about religion. My usual answer is that Chinese people as a whole are not very religious, and making up a statistic, say that only about 1% of the population is religious. Thanks to Shanghaiist I know that 31.4% of the Chinese population 16 or older are religious, meaning I was way off. And according to one researcher from a article in the Washington Post from February, Poll Finds Surge of Religion Among Chinese, many people feel purposeless in a cut-throat market economy. Perceiving this this lack of moral guidance, and trying to construct his “Harmonious Society” Hu Jintao proposed a moral law on the land, the 8 Virtues and 8 Vices.
1. The honor of loving the motherland ; the disgrace of endangering the motherland
2. The honor of serving the people; the disgrace of turning away from the people
3. The honor of upholding science; the disgrace of ignorance and illiteracy
4. The honor of industrious labor; the disgrace of indolence
5. The honor of togetherness and cooperation; the disgrace of profiting at the expense of others
6. The honor of honesty and keeping one’s word; the disgrace of abandoning morality for profit
7. The honor of discipline and obedience; the disgrace of lawlessness and disorder
8. The honor of striving arduously; the disgrace of wallowing in luxury
A numbered list of moral codes. That seems to remind me of something else. Perhaps the seven deadly sins of lust, gluttony, greed, sloth, anger, envy and pride. These go along with the 7 holy virtues of chastity, abstinence, temperance, diligence, patience, kindness and humility. By my estimate the list share sins of sloth, envy, greed and pride. Obviously, any sort of morality code is going to have some overlap, but instituting a numbered lists begs comparison to the famous Christian list (it doesn’t stack up as well against the ten commandments). And judging from my experiences, maybe they should add gluttony and anger to the 8 Virtues/Vices.
Popularity: 44% [?]
I would be interested how Shanghaiist came up with that statistic. Asking people whether or not they are religious isn’t exactly the most scientific kind of survey. It is like asking people if they are racist. Very few people would say “yes” whether they are racist or not. This is also true in regards to religion, however I would guess more people would be inclined to say “yes.” People’s perceptions of themselves is often quite different from reality. If somebody were to ask me, I’d probably say I was “religious” too, but I haven’t been to synagogue in years. Then determining whether or not I am religious becomes more of a judgment call than a science. Interesting points though Chris…my criticism is mainly directed toward Shanghaiist, not your post.
Comment by Ben — September 11, 2007 @ 1:46 am
Maybe I should have been a little more specific and stated that these figures came from a state sponsored survey. I think though Ben that your points are still valid ones.
Comment by Chris — September 12, 2007 @ 7:17 am
China Religion. China Money Making Opportunity.
Shanghaiist has a great post out (h/t to the Redkemp blog), entitled, “China home to the world’s largest Christian population?” The post is on an upsurge in Chinese religiosity and how “31.4 percent” of Chinese identify themselves as religious. Ru…
Trackback by China Law Blog — October 1, 2007 @ 1:49 pm