Pre axial ancient indigenous chinese religion slide 1

Pre-Axial Ancient Indigenous Chinese Religion
Slide 1 Welcome to the AVP on pre-Axial Ancient Indigenous Chinese Religion Slide 2 Slide title: The
Axial Age
Slide content:
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Image: the earth surrounded by numerous religious symbols
Narrator: Scholars call the period when the world religions were taking shape the “Axial Age,” which
lasted roughly from 600 BC to AD 200. In the early Axial Age, the major religions of China took shape,
including Confucianism and Daoism. Later in the Axial Age, Buddhism came to China. In this presentation
we explore some aspects of pre-Axial Age Chinese religion that influenced all the later major religious
traditions.
Slide 3 Slide title: Pre-literate Tribal Religion
Slide content: Text: “Religion changed in significant ways with the move from pre-literate tribal societies
to the civilizations in the ancient world.”
Image: cross section of a buried skeleton
Narrator: Tribal hunter-gatherer societies existed before civilization. Tribal religions shared common
features. There was no sharp distinction between the natural and the supernatural. There were no sharp

World Religions Notes
boundaries between humanity and nature. All of nature—living and non-living—was seen as an organic
whole, and as sacred. Ultimate reality was everything. There was no “creator” outside of nature.
When civilizations appeared in India and Greece, a dualism between the physical and the spiritual
emerged. The goodness of nature and the unity of the natural and spiritual, however, endured in
Chinese thought after the dawn of civilization. In fact, these Chinese beliefs were obstacles for the first
Buddhist missionaries to China. The Chinese could not view all life as suffering.
Slide 4 Slide title: Animism and Shamans
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Image: cave paintings of people throwing spears at each other
Narrator: Tribal religion was also characterized by animism, the belief in spirits everywhere to explain the
unexplainable. Not understanding the workings of nature, people attributed things like storms and fruit
on trees to spirits.
The religious leader was the shaman. The word “shaman” comes from his role in ancient China. Shamans
deal with the spirits. In China, shamans were mediums for the manifestation and communication of
spirits. Shamans practiced primitive medicine also. Because people did not understand its natural causes,
illness was also attributed to spirits. Shamans performed exorcisms to cast out evil spirits in attempts to
heal the sick.
Slide 5 Slide title: Ancestor Worship
Slide content: No text
Image: tribal Asian family in traditional costumes
Narrator: Tribal cultures also saw communities as more real and important than the individual. The dead
were still a part of society, either reincarnated or inhabiting a spiritual world that the living could access.