Tongji (spirit medium)

Tongji (Chinese: 童乩; pinyin: tóngjī; Wade–Giles: t'ung-chi; lit.: 'youth diviner'; Tâi-lô: tâng-ki) or Jitong (Chinese: 乩童; pinyin: jītóng; Wade–Giles: chi-t'ung; lit.: 'divining youth') is a Chinese folk religious practitioner, usually translated as a "spirit medium", "oracle", or "shaman".

Chinese folk religion
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Concepts Tian—Shangdi Qi Shen Ling Xian ling Yinyang Hundun Mingyun Yuanfen Baoying Wu
Theory Chinese theology Chinese gods and immortals Chinese mythology Chinese creation myth Chinese spiritual world concepts Model humanity: Xian Zhenren Wen and wu
Practices Fenxiang Jingxiang Feng shui Miaohui Wu shamanism Jitong mediumship Precious scrolls
Institutions and temples Associations of good-doing Lineage associations or churches Chinese temple Ancestral shrine Chinese Folk Temples' Association
Festivals Qingming Zhongyuan Zhongqiu Jiuhuangye Qixi Duanwu Nian
Internal traditions Major cultural forms Chinese ancestral religion Chinese communal deity religion Chinese mother goddess worship Northeast China folk religion Main philosophical traditions: Confucianism (state rites) Taoism Other schools Ritual traditions: Folk ritual masters' orders Jitong mediumship Nuo folk religion Chinese shamanism Devotional traditions: Mazuism Wang Ye worship Zhenkong, "Void of Truth". Salvation churches and sects: De teaching Jiugongdao Luo teaching Maitreya teachings Tiandi teachings Tianxian miaodao Xia teaching Xiantiandao Zaili teaching Qigong Confucian churches and sects: Holy Confucian Church Indonesian Confucian Church Universal Church of the Way and its Virtue Phoenix churches Xuanyuanism Taigu school
Related religions Benzhuism Bimoism Bon Dongbaism Miao folk religion Vietnamese folk religion Qiang folk religion Yao folk religion Zhuang folk religion

Anthropology of religion
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Basic concepts Afterlife Animism Augur Augury Communitas Comparative religion Divination Greek divination Methods of divination Divine language Evolutionary origin of religions Fetishism Great Spirit Haruspex Henotheism Initiation Liminality Magic (supernatural) Apotropaic magic Mana Monotheism Necromancy Nympholepsy Oracle Ornithomancy Polytheism Pythia Rite of passage Ritual Revitalization movement Sacred dance Sacred language Sacred–profane dichotomy Shamanism Soul dualism Superstition Theories about religions Totem Transtheism Veneration of the dead
Case studies Magic Coral Gardens and Their Magic Treatise on the Apparitions of Spirits and on Vampires or Revenants Neo-Paganism Ritual Angakkuq Babaylan Bobohizan Bomoh Bora Dukun Miko Jhākri Pawang Slametan Wu Revitalization movement Cargo cult Ghost Dance Handsome Lake
Related articles The Elementary Forms of the Religious Life Purity and Danger Myth and ritual Archaeology of religion and ritual Poles in mythology
Major theorists Augustin Calmet Akbar S. Ahmed Talal Asad Joseph Campbell Mary Douglas Émile Durkheim Arnold van Gennep E. E. Evans-Pritchard James Frazer Clifford Geertz Robin Horton Claude Lévi-Strauss Robert Marett Roy Rappaport Saba Mahmood Marshall Sahlins Melford Spiro Stanley Tambiah Victor Turner Edward Burnett Tylor Daniel Martin Varisco Anthony F. C. Wallace
Journals Anthropological Perspectives on Religion Folklore The Hibbert Journal The Journal of Religion Oceania
Religions Ethnic and folk religions Afro-American religion Alaska Native religion Anito Atua Böö mörgöl Chinese folk religion Hanitu Hausa Kejawèn Native American religion Noaidi Shindo Shamanism in Siberia Shinto Traditional African religions Buddhism Mahayana Nichiren Pure Land Shingon Theravada Tiantai Tibetan Vajrayana Zen Christianity Adventism Anglicanism Armenian Apostolic Church Baptists Calvinism Catholic Church Coptic Orthodoxy Eastern Orthodoxy Ethiopian Orthodoxy Greek Orthodoxy Lutheranism Methodism Nestorianism Oriental Orthodoxy Pentecostalism Protestantism Quakers Russian Orthodoxy Hinduism Hindu denominations Shaivism Shaktism Smartism Vaishnavism Islam Ahmadiyya Ibadi Mahdavia Non-denominational Quranists Shia Sufism Sunni Yazdânism Judaism Conservative Hasidic Karaite Orthodox Reform Jainism Sikhism
Social and cultural anthropology

Chinese characters for tongji

This word compounds tong 童 "child; youth; boy servant" and ji 乩 "to divine" (cf. fuji 扶乩 "divination; planchette writing"). Regional variants include Hokkien tâng-ki 童乩 and Cantonese gei-tung 乩童 or san-daa 神打.

A tongji or jitong is a person believed to have been chosen by a particular shen 神 "god; spirit" as the earthly vehicle for divine expression. The Chinese differentiate a wu 巫 "shaman; healer; spirit medium" who gains control of forces in the spirit world versus a tongji who appears to be entirely under the control of forces in the spirit world.

External links and references

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Tongji.

Andersen, Poul. 2008. "Tâng-ki (or jitong) 童乩 (or 乩童) spirit-medium", in The Encyclopedia of Taoism, ed. by Fabrizio Pregadio, pp. 964-966. Routledge.
Elliott, Alan J. A. 1955. Chinese Spirit Medium Cults in Singapore. Monographs on Social Anthropology, No. 14. Department of Anthropology, London School of Economics and Political Science.
Groot, Jan Jakob Maria. 1892-1910. The Religious System of China: Its Ancient Forms, Evolution, History and Present Aspect, Manners, Customs and Social Institutions Connected Therewith. 6 volumes. Brill Publishers.
Jordan, David K. 1976. "A Medium's First Trance", Anthropology: Perspective on Humanity, ed. by Marc J. Swartz and David K. Jordan. John Wiley & Sons.
Jordan, David K. 1977. "How to Become a Chinese Spirit Medium".
Jordan, David K. 1999. Gods, Ghosts, & Ancestors: Folk Religion in a Taiwanese village. 3rd edition. Department of Anthropology, UCSD.
Myers, John T. 1974. A Chinese Spirit-medium Temple in Kwun Tong: A Preliminary Report. Social Research Centre, Chinese University of Hong Kong.
Myers, John T. 1975. "A Hong Kong Spirit-medium Temple", Journal of the Hong Kong Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society 15:16-27.

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