Household Sovereignty and Religious Subjectification: China and the Christian West Compared

Abstract

This essay is an attempt to explore the cultural logics behind two very different orientations towards spirits (divinities), one Chinese and the other Christian, and the kinds of religious subjects that are produced by practices informed by these two differing orientations. Specifically, I examine the role the household plays in Chinese religious life as a site and structural unit to host different categories of spirits (gods, ghosts and ancestors), and contrast this with the Christian idiom of being hosted by God. In Christianity, God is the supreme host; humans (Christians) can only be guests at God’s banquet but they cannot host God in return. It is explicitly an unequal relationship. And even though they are unworthy of such generous treatment Christians must accept this divine grace and join the communion. The eucharist, the most important Christian ritual for almost all Christians, is a constant reminder to Christians that they are guests, and that when they go to heaven, they will be God’s guests eternally. In the Chinese case, on the other hand, the household hosts the spirits by providing offerings. Gods, ghosts and ancestors are invited to the bountiful banquet at fixed times of the year and then sent off when the banquets are over. The spirits can only be guests; they do not, and indeed cannot, host human guests. In Chinese religious culture there are no accounts of spirits, be they deities, ancestors or ghosts, hosting humans. In the Chinese hosting of spirits, the guest is accorded honour and respect, but it is the host who is the most active, potent and pre-eminent agent. In other words, agency rests with humans. And the social idiom of hosting enframes the entire cluster of ritual actions.