ABSTRACT
The previous chapters of this book have considered judicial rituals from the broad perspective of the historical development of Chinese religions; here we adopt an interdisciplinary approach that explores the significance of these rites by means of a case study of the Dizang Abbey (Dizang An), a temple dedicated to the Bodhisattva Dizang and the Lord of the Hordes located in the former market town of Xinzhuang (now a city in Taibei County). This final chapter also marks our return to where we started: the links between the punitive underworld and the world of the living. The judicial rituals performed at the Dizang Abbey resemble those described in Chapter 7 in terms of addressing numerous problems that are unique to modern Taiwanese society, yet also display remarkable continuity. For example, the underworld petitions filed at this temple resemble the ritual indictments described in Chapter 4 in addressing a wide range of familial and commercial disputes, while the practice of offering items to meet the needs of one’s ancestors in the underworld may well derive from “the lists of [items] dispatched” (qiance 遣冊) described in Chapter 1. Moreover, like the late imperial and modern officials described in Chapters 2 and 7, police and prosecutors continue to worship the temple’s underworld deities in order to solve difficult criminal cases.
