Abstract
This paper is intended to study Taiwan's temple steles to observe political manipulation of Taiwan's village society. By interpreting contents of various steles, the author indicates managerial structure of temples which covers the management of temples, the involvement of members of the board of trustees. Traditionally, village dwellers have a consensus seeing temples a social and historical sphere characterized with public affairs. Consequently, there is a collective confining power between temples and village dwellers, and thus temples have become an appropriate place for steles. From this framework, the author points out that the contents of steles and inscribed donating names both carry some moral education purposes. This indoctrination has been influenced by traditional Chinese belief of deifying deities through strong moral actualization. The inscriptions on steles of describing deities as well as of naming donators from the gentry and the populace have also created an atmosphere with educational purposes. In addition, temples steles have been used to promulgate sanctions and have become one of the important interior arrangements for the village.
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