Introduction

Abstract

This study inquires into the historical question of how the politics surrounding death rituals contributed to the revival of Confucianism. It examines major changes in ritual performance both at the imperial court and in society at large during the reigns from Zhenzong to Shenzong. It investigates how polarizing debates about death rituals introduced new terrain for political power dynamics between monarchy and officialdom, and between groups of politically and intellectually divided court officials. In order to answer why death rituals in particular became focal points of contention, it delineates the social imaginaries implied in the distinct death rituals preferred by three powerful and competing social groups—emperors, scholar-officials, and rich merchants. It also aims to engage the theoretical question of how diverse social groups’ contentions over ritual were enmeshed in the struggle over social imaginaries between groups as they envisioned different construction of social reality.