Wu Tai Shan
From Adventures in Mongolia by James Gilmour, 1886
From: 1886 C.E. To: 1886 C.E.
Location: Wutai Mountain
Note: This article has been excerpted from a larger work in the public domain and shared here due to its historical value. It may contain outdated ideas and language that do not reflect TOTA’s opinions and beliefs.
From Adventures in Mongolia by James Gilmour, 1886.
As Jerusalem to the Jews, as Mecca to the Mahometans, so is Wu Tai Shan to the Mongols. All over Mongolia, and wherever Mongols are met with in North China, one is constantly reminded of this place. It is true that the mania which possesses the Mongols for making pilgrimages carries them to many other shrines, some of which are both celebrated and much frequented, but none of them can be compared to Wu T'ai. At all seasons of the year—in the dead of winter, in the heat of summer—pilgrims, priests, and laymen, male and female, old and young, rich and poor, solitary and in bands, on foot and mounted, from places far and near, may be seen going to and returning from this, the most sacred spot on earth to the Mongol Buddhist, the object of his devout aspirations during life, the place where he desires his bones to be thrown at death.
The Mongols speak of it as one of the blessed spots of the earth, holy purified, everlasting, indestructible, and destined to survive the otherwise universal ruin that is to ensue at the close of the present stage of the world's existence. They say that any beast which eats the grass and drinks the water of the place is sure to be born hereafter into a higher state. One visit made to it by a pilgrim is said to ensure him happiness for the period of one of his future lives, two visits for two lives, three visits for three lives, and so on. In this way every devout Mongol endeavours to make at least one pilgrimage to this mountain during his lifetime, a number of them go frequently, and there are some who endeavour to visit it every year.
In addition to this promise of happiness after death, a journey to Wu T'ai is frequently prescribed as a cure for disease; and the merit of making these journeys is supposed to be transferable, so that it is no uncommon thing to meet Mongols going to Wu T'ai, not on their own account, but for the benefit of others.
This mountain is situated, not in Mongolia, but in China, in the province of Shansi, and having heard a great deal about it, I, in company with two other missionaries, set out to visit it. On the afternoon of the eleventh day after leaving Peking, we found ourselves going up a valley, which became narrower and narrower as we went on. Temples began to be numerous, and just as the sun set we came upon an image cut out in the solid rock and painted with bright colours. On the same rock also were cut Tibetan characters, and from these and other signs we knew that we were coming near the famous Wu T'ai.
Darkness gradually settled down upon us, and the few people we met kept telling us that we were still a mile or two from the end of our journey. We would ask a man, 'How far?' he would say, ‘A mile or two.' We would go on, and still the next man would say as before, ‘A mile or two.' At last we saw, a little ahead, the lights of the small Chinese village where we were to put up—’The hamlet in the bosom of the mountains.'
Next morning we found that the name described the place very well. All round were hills, some of them so high that the morning light shone clear on their tops, while in the village below all was shade and gloom, and it was not till late in the forenoon that the sun was able to climb the east hill and look over the ridge down into the court of our inn.
Close to the village a hill rose steeply up, like a cone of loaf-sugar, and, seeing a temple on the top, we found it to be a shrine to which Chinese resort to pray for children. It seemed to be quite a famous temple, and was hung almost full of its own praises, written on red cloth and silk, the grateful offerings of votaries, who in this way returned thanks for having their prayers answered. In the temple we found only one priest, a Chinaman. He was old, deaf, could not read, and spoke a dialect so different from that of Peking that we could not talk much with him.
From the hill-top we counted about thirty temples. We could see almost no level land but all up the hillsides, nearly to the very summit, the Chinese had made terraces and sown them with oats.
The month was October, and the oats had been reaped, carried down, and piled up around the threshing-floors where men were busy with flails threshing out the grain. There seemed scarcely enough level land to make threshing-floors, yet from the hill-sides good crops had been gathered, and there was abundance of food all along the valley.
While the brawling of the torrent rose mingled with the sound of the flail, it was a striking view to behold the encircling belt of mountains, the valleys with their streams, the forest on the south, the snow on the north, the temples flashing back the sunlight from their golden towers, the trains of camels winding slowly along, and the groups of worshipping pilgrims, sacred staff in hand, going the round of the temples.
One of the first temples we visited was a curious little upper chamber over the gate of the village. In the shrine, among the other images, was pointed out to us one, which, said the priests, had wonderful virtue. From a little mark on its brow could be drawn out a hair a thousand miles long, and from the body of the image a blaze of light shone out regularly three nights every month. So said the lamas. On the altars before the images were numerous little lamps trimmed and burning. The butter for the lights is supplied from the gifts of devout pilgrims. To give butter for the lamps is a common way of making an offering to the gods.
The priests lived in a little court below, and we had tea offered us in a very neat quiet room. The lamas of this temple were educated men, and we found them engaged in copying a large sacred book, in letters of gold, on blue cardboard. The Mongols believe that to write out a sacred book in black ink brings much merit, to write it in red ink brings more merit, but to write it in gold brings most merit.
Among the other temples which we visited was one with a large tope or mound. At the base of the tope were mounted more than three hundred praying-wheels, which the worshippers set in motion one after the other as they passed round. Inside a building of the same temple, we came upon an immense praying-wheel, about sixty feet high, containing shrines, images, books, and prayers. To the devout Mongol, such a wheel is a most useful invention. It is filled with books and prayers which would take him a life-time to read and repeat. Most likely he cannot read, or if he can read, he cannot find time to read so much, so he comes to the temple; two or three together go down to the cellar, lay hold on the hand-spokes, and with a long pull, a strong pull, and a pull all together, round goes the wheel, and each one of them believes he gains just as much merit as if he had read the books, repeated the prayers, and knocked his head to all the gods that grin from the shelves and shrines of the wheel. No wonder that the Mongols travel hundreds of miles to reach so quick a method of making merit!
But the temple of all the temples at Wu T'ai is P’u Sa T'iug. It stands central among the others, and in it lives the Zassak lama, who rules all other lamas. The Fu Sa T'ing is built along the ridge of a hill, and is reached by a very steep path, at the top of which rises a flight of over one hundred steps. We climbed up and entered. We found a street lined on both sides with houses built in the Tibetan style, and evidently crowded with lamas and pilgrims. The houses and the people did not look clean, and the street looked worse than either, being partly blocked up with piles of wood and argol, to be used as fuel. We were taken to the room of the attendant of the great lama, and a snug room it was, being clean, comfortable, and kept warm by a charcoal fire in a well-polished brass brasier. Near the ceiling, just above the charcoal fire, hung a paper cylinder, like an inverted wheel of life, which kept constantly turning. This also was a praying-wheel, and was kept in motion by the hot air ascending from the fire. In this way, whether the lama slept or ate, was at home or abroad, entertained his friends or attended to his superior, the wheel kept continually turning, and merit was always coming to his abode. Such was his idea.
We sent in a present of a new Testament and some tracts in Mongolian to the Zassak lama, and said we would call on him if he wished to see us. He sent back a polite message, asking for our welfare and comfort on the journey, begging us to accept a small present in return, and saying he was sorry he could not see us, as he was engaged in preparing for a great festival called the Ch'am Haren, or Sacred Dance.
Gilmour, James. Adventures in Mongolia. Religious Tract Society, 1886.
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