Khmer Temples in Southeast Vietnam

                                                           by Jim Goodman

the main assembly hall at Chùa Dơi, the Bat Temple

       The Mekong Delta was the last part of Vietnam settled by Vietnamese and incorporated into the country.  Before the 17^th century virtually no Vietnamese lived there.  Most of the Delta was uninhabited swamp, the main settled areas being the higher grounds near the mouth of the Mekong and the areas near the modern border with Cambodia.  The inhabitants were Khmer, with a few Chinese communities in the main river ports.  

       Vietnamese migration commenced in the late 17^th century, but the pioneers did not displace the local Khmer.  They simply cleared land next to them and founded villages.  By 1900 the Vietnamese had become the majority of the population in all of the Delta provinces, but a sizable percentage were and still are Khmer and Chinese.

monks drying grain at Chùa Dơi

       Both communities have clung to their traditional culture in spite of the strong Vietnamese presence all around them.  For the Khmer, this primarily means the practice of Buddhism different from the Mahayana branch to which the Vietnamese and Chinese adhere.  The Khmer follow the Theravada variant, like that prevailing in Cambodia, Laos, Thailand, Myanmar and Sri Lanka.

       Today, in a land where swamps are few and far between and practically everything between the rivers has been cleared for cultivation and settlement, 70% of Vietnam’s Khmer population still lives in Trà Vinh and Sóc Trăng provinces at the mouth of the Mekong River.   Their ancestors first settled here over a thousand years ago.  Culturally they were part of the Khmer model emanating from Angkor and later Phnom Penh.  But politically, so far from either Khmer capital and separated by swamps and wilderness, they were virtually autonomous.

kinnara roof strut,  Chùa Dơi

four-faced chedi at Chùa Khleang

       My first exposure to Khmer culture in Vietnam came with a trip to Trà Vinh.  Several Theravada Buddhist temples lie within the city and short distances beyond, with their typical angled roofs and monks in orange robes, very different from the usual Vietnamese or Chinese Mahayana Buddhist temples.  Angkor-style ruins still stood in one of the temples and religious services were well attended.

nagas on the roof of Chùa Khleang

       My curiosity aroused, I headed for Sõc Trăng next, though had to take a roundabout route via Cần Thơ, 60 km northwest of Sóc Trăng, which is about 240 km south of Hồ Chí Minh City.  In both provinces the Khmer constitute about 30% of the population, mainly in rural villages.  The city is about the same size as Trà Vinh but appeared to have less of a Khmer presence in the markets and urban neighborhoods.  It does, however, have two outstanding Khmer temples and a fine museum exhibiting Khmer arts and crafts.

       Arriving late afternoon, I headed for the first of these, Chùa Dơi, the Bat Temple, in the southern suburbs, which gets more visitors then than in the morning.  It is named after the bats that live in the grove of tall trees surrounding a pond in the compound.  A fire destroyed part of the grove several years ago, so the bats are not as numerous as before.  But over a couple hundred still emerge around dusk, some with wingspans of 1.5 meters, flying off to raid fruit orchards in the countryside.  Afternoon visitors congregate at the pond to observe them, feeding the fish in the meanwhile.  Early risers may also come to watch them return to the compound at dawn.

the abbot at Chùa Khleang

the interior of the assembly hall, Chùa Khleang

       In Vietnam, Khmer temple compounds grow their own rice and vegetables.  On my visit the monks were just gathering up the grain they had laid out in the compound to dry.  The main assembly hall, the largest in the compound, is a bright and beautiful building, with classic angled roofs supported by struts with carved kinnaras--half-bird, half-human.  The roof is covered with tiles in diamond patterns of yellow, red, blue-green and white.  The walls of the platforms, roof edges and nagas on the upturned corners are all painted golden yellow.  Other compound buildings feature guardian lions very much in the Khmer style—almost grinning.

ceiling painting, Chùa Khleang

       Sóc Trăng’s other Khmer temple, Chùa Khleang, is in the eastern quarter, across the small river running through the city.  Originally built in 1540, the modern version today is a compound of classic style buildings dominated by the colors gold, red, yellow and ochre-pink.  The main assembly hall sits on a double platform with gilded roosters and Hanuman-like figures in front of the entrance.  The interior features gilded standing and seated Buddhas, golden columns with black designs and paintings of celestial beings on the ceilings.

       The compound also holds several chedis—bell-shaped reliquary mounds—containing the ashes of famous monks.  Often they have four faces around the base of the pinnacle on top, a characteristic Khmer artistic embellishment.  A few very big trees shade the area, but there is no grove (or bats) as at Chùa Dơi.  One of the two long buildings in the compound houses more than a hundred resident monks and novices, while the other serves as their school.  Besides religious precepts, they also learn to read and write in the Khmer language alphabet.

Angkor era bronze sculpture

inside the Clay Pagoda

       Across the street from the temple is the Khmer Culture Museum.  Exhibits include two stage sets for performances of the Ramakien drama, a ceremonial boat, models of material culture from rice farming to the production of tools, baskets and clothing, ornate boat ‘eyes’, palm-leaf manuscripts and musical instruments.  The most interesting objects are the exquisite small bronze statues of dancing figures wearing elaborate headdresses, similar to those as stone carvings on the walls of Angkor temples.

cargo boat in Sóc Trăng

       Unfortunately, no information was posted on their age.  But they are obviously in the classic Angkor style, demonstrating that in spite of their distance from the heartland, the Khmer of ancient Soc Trăng were very much part of mainstream Angkor culture.  On the other hand, the other exhibits are displays of contemporary Khmer life that is mostly different from that of their Vietnamese neighbors and replicates Khmer life in Cambodia.  In spite of historical and political developments over the last few centuries, the cultural connection between separated Khmer communities has not diminished.

basket shop in Sóc Trăng

       Further down the road from Chùa Khleang is the city’s other main tourist attraction—Chùa Đất Sét.  A small, Chinese-style, family-managed temple over 200 years old, it is more commonly called the Clay Pagoda.  Except for its metal roof, nearly everything is made of clay—walls, columns, altars and many sculptures of animals and mythological creatures like an elephant with six tusks.  A single monk was responsible for all the hand-made sculptures, created during a monastic career of over 40 years until his death in 1970.

assembly hall at Chùa Salôn

       The city has few tall buildings and no shopping malls.  The river divides it into halves and boats carrying bamboo, construction materials, dirt for landfills and other goods occasionally glide by.  Small restaurants serve the local specialty—bún nước lea, a vermicelli soup with pork, shrimp and coconut milk.  On the northeast side of town lies An Bình, Sóc Trăng’s main recreational park.  It consists of a picaresque pond with an island pavilion and cavorting dragons in the water and a separate large rectangular reservoir with a tree-lined walkway.

       Outside Sóc Trăng the scenery is mostly flat farmland, but along the highway just 12 km south is another impressive Khmer temple—Chùa Salôn.  The main assembly hall was originally wooden when first built about two hundred years ago.  The present concrete structure slowly replaced it from 1969-1985 as donations accumulated to pay for it.  Large, on a raised platform and mostly silver gray in color, it features ceramic tile patterns on the roof and a tall chedi protruding from the center of the roof.

market scene at Chùa Salôn

       Other buildings in the compound—shrines, staircase sculptures, Sanskrit language school, monks’ quarters and tombs, are colored gold, orange and white.  What makes the compound unique is the daily food market that takes place within it.  From early morning until mid-afternoon Khmer and Vietnamese run stalls selling fruits, vegetables, spices and snacks.

       Southwest of Chùa Salôn the road goes to Bạc Liâu province, where the Khmer are much fewer in number.  Bạc Liêu city is smaller than Sóc Trăng and doesn’t look very prosperous.  The main tourist attraction, the Hồ Đàm Reservoir, is not as attractive as the one in An Bình and the city has no other parks or interesting buildings.  Unlike Trà Vinh and Sóc Trăng provinces, the soil in Bạc Liêu province is very saline and unsuitable for rice cultivation.  People generally make a living by fishing, shrimp farming or oyster collection. 

heron in Sân Chim sanctuary

       However, the province is not completely devoid of attractions.  A bird sanctuary, a temple honoring whales and one more wonderful Khmer temple compound made the excursion worthwhile.  The Bạc Liêu Bird Sanctuary lies about six km south of the city.  A turn off the main road runs about two km to a large swamp forest.  Visitors can take boats along the canals or walk along the fringes of land in between. 

       The birds, mostly wild chickens, herons and other water birds, are visible behind a fence in front of a thick forest.  A natural lake lies next to it and large, open-air cages hold other swamp denizens like monkeys, crocodiles and pythons.  The sanctuary is one of the shrunken remnants of what, four centuries ago, was the landscape characteristic of most of today’s Mekong River provinces.

       South of the sanctuary a road runs about a few more km to the Khmer temple Chùa Xiêm Cán, near the sea.  But at the junction is a temple honoring whales.  It’s in a Chinese style, with portraits of whales on the exterior walls.  The cult of the whale was not a Khmer cultural trait, for they were never seafarers.  It came from the Chăm, who lived further north, for who maritime activity was an essential part of their culture, which was otherwise heavily Khmer-influenced.  When Vietnamese began migrating into former Chăm territory they assimilated some aspects of local culture and the Chăm custom of venerating whales was one of them.

Whale Temple in Bạc Liêu province

       The road continues a little ways past the temple to end at what is euphemistically called Bạc Liêu Beach.  It’s not a place to go swimming, though, for there’s no sand here, only slimy mud right to the water’s edge.  Local villagers come not for bathing, but to collect oysters in the tidal flats.

       Chùa Xiêm Cán is the largest Khmer temple compound in Bạc Liêu province and one of the biggest and most prestigious in southern Vietnam.  Constructed in 1887, it utilizes elements common to all Theravada temples, such as high, layered, sloping roofs supported by sculpted struts and the dominance of the colors yellow and orange.  It also incorporates architectural and sculptural motifs common to the classic buildings of Angkor, a feature that distinguishes Khmer temple compounds from those of other Theravada countries.

       This is evident right at the entrance gate, which is surmounted 

entrance gate of Chùa Xiêm Cán

by three Angkor-style prangs.  Covering the compound wall are low-relief sculptures of scenes from the Ramakien, warriors riding chariots, dancing girls copied from the walls of Angkor Wat and other Khmer scenes.  Within the compound other classic motifs are visible, like the four large faces, one in each direction, copied from Angkor Thom, the grinning guardian lions, the Hindu god Indra riding a three-headed elephant and the multi-headed nagas on the staircases.

       The main assembly hall has coral pink columns and walls, gray roof sand a chedi rising from its center.  The principal Buddha image inside sits on a tall throne, with lavish murals on the walls behind and the ceiling overhead.  The flanking walls are filled with paintings depicting scenes from the life of the Buddha or one of his previous incarnations.  The temple houses about 25 monks and novices.  In addition to their religious lessons, they study the Khmer language and Pali, the language used in the ancient Buddhist scriptures.

Angkor-style sculptures at Chùa Xiêm Cán

guardian lion, Chùa Xiêm Cán

       The best time to visit the Khmer-inhabited provinces in Vietnam is towards the end of the year, when the rainy season is over, the skies are clear, temperatures cooler and people busy with the rice harvest.  People are also in a celebratory mood then.  On the 15^th day of the 10^th lunar month (this year 11 November) they hold the Oóc Om Bóc festival.  Temples will sponsor elaborate rituals, but they do that every full moon day.  The festival predates Buddhism and honors the Moon Goddess, thanking her for a successful harvest and the return of fine weather.  The highlight of the program in Sóc Trăng will be teams of rowers, both male and female, racing long, narrow boats on the river.

       This is the greatest annual spectacle in the Khmer cultural calendar.  Ethnic pride is on display, the races are fun to watch and the cultural programs full of insight for outsiders.  Yet to appreciate the Khmer people, their culture, religion, art and architecture, one needn’t wait until a harvest festival.  Any time of year will do.

novice taking a break at Chùa Xiêm Cán 

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Sóc Trăng is one of the stops on Delta Tours Vietnam's cultural-historical journey through the country.  See the schedule at https://www.deltatoursvietnam.com/destinations 

Naxi Religion: a Mixture of Creeds

                                                  by Jim Goodman

Wufenglou, the former entrance gate to Fuguo lamasery

       Before the tragic earthquake of 1996 devastated Lijiang, the old Naxi town of Dayan offered travelers a wonderful experience of traditional urban life.  Concentrating my research on northwest Yunnan then, I explored the city on many excursions in those years, wandering down every street and lane in Dayan, at all times of day, but especially in the early morning, when activity commenced.

       Dayan’s Naxi rose later than those in rural areas.  The first establishments to open were the noodle-makers and those preparing black bean pudding.  People began setting up market stalls and opening shops around 9 a.m.  Women came to the streams to wash vegetables, men led pony-carts of charcoal and firewood and shoppers started appearing shortly after. 

White Horse Pond, Dayan

       The one activity missing was anything religious.  No shrines or statues stood anywhere on the streets.  The only religious building was the temple next to White Horse Pond in the southern quarter.  It marks the spot where the Tang Dynasty Buddhist scholar Xuan Zang, on his way to India to procure religious manuscripts, supposedly stopped to give his horse a drink.  The modest temple, built in the 18^th century, did attract occasional devotees who bought fish to set free in the pond.

       Still influenced by the Confucian tradition, the Naxi maintained their ancestral altars and made offerings to them at festivals.  But even the surviving village temples, those that hadn’t been converted to schools, were hardly active and the big monasteries barely maintained.  In general, the Naxi, in contrast to the Tibetans, Bai, Hui, Dai and Bulang, were not very religious-minded.

pictographs of a dongba manuscript

       Long before exposure to Buddhism or Taoism, the Naxi had established their own belief system, built on the propitiation of natural elements and the presumed existence of myriad unseen forces.  Everything in the world was endowed with a soul and life-force of its own, including inanimate objects such as mountains, streams, fires, cliffs and stones.  Ancient Naxi believed something or other controlled the weather, the rain, the wind, etc., and so deified and gave names to these assumed agents, while lesser deities and spirits were associated with other natural phenomena.  And to account for all that could go wrong in the course of a life the Naxi identified over 500 demons.

wooden swords for funerals and the propitiation of nagas

       To deal with these pernicious spirits, and to properly honor or beseech the gods, a class of specialists arose within Naxi ranks.  Known as a dongba, this specialist performed a wide array of numerous complicated rituals.  To prompt his memory he used manuscripts in coded pictographs and performed rituals both privately for patrons and publicly for the welfare of the realm.  He was so much at the core of traditional religious practice that even today the original Naxi belief-system is known as "Dongba Religion" or "Dongba Tradition."

       A few rituals lasted several days and required recitations from over a hundred books.  Among the most frequent were:  propitiation of the nagas—the huge, dragon-like serpent spirits believed to be the invisible owners of the land; the expulsion of demons, with rituals varying according to the type of demon and sometimes involving dancing while wielding swords; rites for suicides, who were nearly always young couples whose parents had forbidden their marriage; and funerals, the most spectacular being that of a dongba.  The highlight of the latter was the display of a painted scroll twenty meters long and a recitation of a text explaining the illustrations.

dongba performing a ritual at Dazui, Lugu Lake

dongba funeral painting

       In the old days, village dongbas customarily wore large-brimmed felted wool or bamboo hats.  Otherwise they did not stand out among the villagers.  They lived in the same kind of house and while the ceremony patrons fed them for the occasion, they did not receive a salary.  The only social advantage a dongba had was the prestige accorded by being one.

mural inside Dabaoji, Baisha village

       For rituals they generally donned a five-lobed crown, called kho, with deities painted on each lobe.  They employed thick, oblong cards with figures painted on them, called dzu, which they stuck upright in groups of 7, 9 or 11, in bowls of rice in the middle of the altar.  They also used wooden swords, called khobya, painted with pictographs, which they thrust into the ground next to streams (to propitiate the nagas) or on a hill away from a funeral site.  For some rites the dongbas also made small figurines of deities and demons out of corn flour.

mural at Suhe Dajue Temple, Xiawu village

       The venues for these rituals could be anywhere within the village or outside by a stream or on a mountain.  There was no dongba temple of any kind, though.  The first temple in Naxi territory was to their own war god Sanduo, but it was built in 784 under orders of King Yimoxun of Nanzhao, the state that ruled over Yunnan at the same time as the Tang Dynasty in China.     

       Lying at the foot of Jade Dragon Mountain, just below present-day Yufeng Temple, Sanduo's temple is called Beiyuemiao—Temple of the North Sacred Mountain.  A statue of the god, in white armor and helmet, brandishing a white spear, astride a white horse, stands outside the temple entrance.  A manuscript inside contains prayers to the god, as well as the legends and exploits associated with him.

Tibetan deity in Yufeng Temple

Naxi fresco at Suhe Dajue Temple, Xiawu

       The most famous legend is of Sanduo’s aid to Azong, the last Naxi ruler prior to the Mongol conquest of Yunnan in 1253.  The god appeared to Azong in a dream, complimented him as an "upright" magistrate and promised to help him on the battlefield.  From then on the god appeared whenever Azong went to war, “rushed furiously in the front line of battle," and disappeared in a storm afterwards.

Wenfeng Monastery

       After the Mongol conquest Mahayana Buddhism gained a foothold in Lijiang with the construction of Jinshan Temple and Donglin Temple.  Dabaoji in Baisha village is its finest Ming Dynasty expression.  Daoism found a place as well in Dayan and adherents built the Jade Emperor Tower Temple and the Royal Heaven Temple.  Its philosophy was popular among the literati and its Dongjing music became part of Naxi tradition.

       The introduction of Buddhism and Daoism influenced Naxi painting, which rapidly evolved from the simple, almost crude pictographs of the dongba manuscripts to the sophisticated wall murals that graced thirteen temples in the Dayan area.  The overall balance of the murals, the orderly disposition of the figures, reflected the Han tradition.  Subject matter could be Mahayana Buddhist or Daoist themes.  The vivid coloring, emphasizing red, gold, black and silver, and the decorative aspects, reflected the Tibetan influence.

monk in his quarters at Wenfeng Monastery

Wenfeng Temple lama

       Sadly, most are gone, for nine of the temples fell to ruins and the other four were completely destroyed or badly vandalized during the Cultural Revolution.  The outstanding extant example is at Dabaoji in Baisha village.  The main fresco depicts the Buddha achieving enlightenment, surrounded by haloed holy men and bodhisattvas that appear to be floating in the clouds.  Other murals feature Tibetan lamas, dakinis, fierce deities and magistrates in hats and robes conversing, while elsewhere the Day of Judgment takes place.  Vignettes of contemporary life, such as plowing or weaving, are sometimes in the margins.

thangkas at Puji Monastery

       Nearby Dading Tower also has some Qing Dynasty frescoes, mostly restored, except for the gouged-out eyes. The only other testimony to the expertise of classical Naxi painters is the smaller set of murals at Xiawu village, west of Baisha, in the Suhe Dajue Temple.  Against a black background, the figures are skillfully painted, emphasizing gold, red, black, white and yellow, with fine details on the faces and in the jewelry.

       Lijiang’s lamaseries date from the end of the 16^th century, with the introduction of the Karmapa (Red Hat) sect of Tibetan Buddhism.  The earliest was Yufeng Temple, built between 1579 and 1619 at the edge of the forest on Jade Dragon Mountain, a kilometer up the hill from Beiyuemiao.  The great camellia tree, which attracts so many to the Sanduo Festival, was planted a century earlier, so one of Yufeng's courtyards was constructed around this tree.  Carved doors and windows, a pebbled courtyard floor in geometric designs and the remains of the original interior frescoes are the other attractions of this temple.

Puji Monastery

       More dramatically sited is Wenfeng Monastery, high up on Wenbishan, nine km southwest of Dayan.  Completed in 1733, it is isolated far above the nearest village, lying beside a forest and spring.  Until 1949 monks came here to perform an unusual ascetic rite.  Digging holes near the spring, they climbed into them and made them their residences for the next three years, three months, three days and three hours.  During this period they never left their holes and spent the time meditating, chanting and otherwise purifying themselves.  When they finally emerged, they were supposed to be endowed with supernatural powers, such as the ability to fly.

       Puji Temple, all but hidden in a forest five km northwest of Dayan, was the third Karmapa lamasery, originally built in 1771.  Two great crab-apple trees with twisted trunks stand in the main courtyard.  Time, the weather, and neglect have reduced most of the exterior wall murals to mere traces and outlines.  But the interior furnishings are in better shape, featuring painted religious scrolls (thangkas), bright silk suspended banners and various images of the Buddha and venerated Tibetan lamas.

special lantern hung for the Mid-Autumn Festival

       The other two Karmapa temples were Zhiyunsi, on the shores of Lashi Lake, and Fuguosi, above Nguluko, the northernmost village on the Lijiang Plain.  Zhiyun Temple has been turned into a school and the buildings of Fuguo Temple were removed to Black Dragon Pool Park in Lijiang.  The very ornate entrance gate, Five Phoenix Tower (Wufenglou), graces the southern end of the park.

       After 1949 the lamasery residents were reduced to a bare minimum.  Proscribing their dongba ceremonies, the government co-opted the dongbas by making them village chieftains.  Beyond the Lijiang Plain, though, the dongba tradition survived, even if not so openly, especially Baishuitai, its birthplace in southern Shangrila County.   After the reforms of the 70s and 80s it became more public. 

       Around Lijiang, hardly any former dongbas were still alive.  The rituals did not revive, but the local government set up the Dongba Research Institute near Black Dragon Pool Park and hired them to translate the pictograph manuscripts that had survived.  A museum next door exhibited some of these books, plus the hats and robes, wooden swords, funeral paintings, drums, figurines and other items associated with dongba rituals.

Sanduo--the ancient Naxi war god

floating a lamp in Dayan at the Mid-Autumn Festival

       Like other minority nationalities in Yunnan, the Naxi were reviving their traditions, but that didn't necessarily include whatever religious piety they once had.  While in areas far from Lijiang, like Baishuitai, or Dazui, the Naxi village on the northern shores of Lugu Lake, the dongba tradition continued, not many young men were taking up the role.  No new dongbas appeared in villages on the Lijiang Plain.  The mind-sets of the Naxi people had moved beyond the animism and nature-worship that essentially characterized the dongba tradition.

       None of Lijiang’s lamaseries regained their former popularity.  In the 90s Zhiyun Temple was still used as a school.  Lay caretakers looked after Pujisi and two septuagenarian monks lived at Wenfengsi.  Only Yufengsi had been able to recruit any new novices.  About twenty were living there by mid-decade, compared to the hundreds resident before 1949.  The new mood of official tolerance meant monks could preach again and a Tibetan huofu (reincarnated lama) of the Gelugpa (Yellow Hat) order set up in Dayan to instruct Naxi in Tibetan-style Buddhism.  But after two years of scant success he departed.

the old camellia tree at Yufeng Temple

       Traditional festivals, however, came back into vogue.  The Naxi celebrate the major Han festivals, but sometimes with special features.  Their New Year rites include an outdoor Sacrifice to Heaven and at the Mid-Autumn Festival for venerating ancestors, they hang fancy big lanterns at their doorways.  On the first day, with firecrackers and hot-air balloons, the Naxi salute their ancestors and invite them to their homes.  On the second night they place small paper lanterns, usually lotus-shaped with a candle in the center, into the streams.  And on the third night they inscribe their clan names on paper and make sacrifices of fruits and grains to their ancestors.

       The biggest traditional event, 8^th day of the 2^nd moon, is the Sanduo Festival, honoring their chief indigenous deity.  In the morning they hike up to Beiyuemiao, kowtow to Sanduo’s statue and leave offerings.  Afterwards they ascend to Yufengsi, where the old camellia is in full bloom, to pose for photographs.  Then they may make a stop in the compound where the lama is performing his rituals for the occasion.  Upon departure they will head for a spot in the woods or on a nearby hill and have a leisurely picnic.

       Back in Lijiang in the afternoon, they may form up for ring dances in one of the squares. Sometimes traditional orchestras are contracted to play for the day and much feasting ensues from dark.  Ostensibly a religious festival, but one totally identified with the Naxi identity, people relish this as a time of socializing and public entertainment.

Naxi devotees passing a reliquary mound en route to Yufeng Temple

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For more on the dongba and the Naxi, see my e-book Children of the Jade Dragon.

Lijiang and Baishuitai are both stops on Delta Tours Vietnam’s route through northwest Yunnan.  See the details at https://www.deltatoursvietnam.com/northwest-yunnan