Religions (May 2024)
From Myths, Ci and Fu Works to Temple Worship: A New Inquiry into the Evolution of Fu Fei 宓妃, the Goddess of the Luo River
Abstract
Luo Shen 洛神 (The Goddess of the Luo River), also known as Fu Fei 宓妃 (Consort Fu), governed the Luo River and was a deity with distinctive representativeness and influence in the Luoyang area of China. To date, research has been centered around literary works and paintings, particularly Luoshen Fu 洛神賦, with little exploration into the belief of the Goddess of the Luo River. In this paper, specific and detailed textual research is made on the origins and historical transformations, as well as functional shifts, of the Goddess of the Luo River from the perspective of belief in the deity. Based on extant ancient documents and stele inscriptions and combined with anthropological field research, five new ideas are described. First, rituals honoring the Luo River were present in ancient times, yet the deity of the Luo River was initially a male entity called Luo Bo 洛伯, not the goddess Consort Fu. Second, Consort Fu first appears in Li Sao 離騷 as a goddess from the Kunlun Mountains. Third, during the Eastern Han dynasty (25–220), driven by the political and cultural needs of rulers to maintain regime stability, the Goddess of Kunlun, Consort Fu, became the Goddess of the Luo River. Fourth, in the medieval period, the image of the Goddess of the Luo River underwent a historic transformation, evolving from a deity governing the Luo River to a beauty yearning for secular love, merging with the historical figure of Zhen Fei 甄妃 (Consort Zhen) from the Cao Wei dynasty (220–266), forming a unified literary and artistic figure that significantly broadened the social influence of the Goddess of the Luo River. Fifth, the state-sponsored worship of the Goddess of the Luo River reached its peak during the Tang (618–907) and Song (960–1279) dynasties, and afterward, it gradually declined to a local folk belief due to a shift in the political center. The transition of the belief in the Goddess of the Luo River from official to folk realms, deeply intertwining with people’s lives, is a historical reflection of the eastward shift in the imperial center after the Tang dynasty. It also signifies a transformation of the function of the belief in the Goddess of the Luo River, from a political guardian deity ensuring the nation’s peace and the government’s stability to a protective deity for ordinary people’s family stability and prosperity of descendants.
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