Connecting the dots: Jiang Ziya

This story was originally scheduled to appear on this blog on 20 June 2017 but somehow, I decided to save it for a later day. As things went, I totally forgot about it until today when I went through all my drafts that did not see the light of day. Well, this one will see the light of day: today, (four years later 😉)! So read on....

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20 June 2017

It was actually quite accidental that I came across the film, Xuan Zang (大唐玄奘), which I wrote about a few days ago. It was days after I had returned from Sitiawan in Perak that I had wanted to know more about the Tua Pek Kong temple there. Remember too that I had written very briefly about the statue of Jiang Ziya (姜子牙) in the pond behind the temple building.

I had long been intrigued by Jiang Ziya and seeing that statue at the temple simply increased my curiosity about one of ancient China's military strategists. Jiang Ziya was also known by several other names: Jiang Shang (姜尚), Lü Shang (呂尚) and Jiang Taigong (姜太公), among others more. He was a Chinese noble who was hired by King Wen (周文王) and later helped his son, King Wu (周武王), of the Zhou Dynasty (周朝) overthrow the Shang Dynasty (商朝) in the 11th Century BC. 

In popular culture, Jiang Ziya is portrayed as an old man sitting by a riverside and patiently fishing with a baitless or hookless fishing rod. His contention was that when the fish was ready, it would swim to meet him. One day, King Wen saw him fishing thus and began engaging him in conversation. King Wen was convinced that he was a military strategist and made him his Prime Minister. Jiang's treatise on military strategy, Six Secret Teachings (太公六韜), is considered one of the Seven Military Classics of Ancient China.

I did a search on for the Internet for Jiang Ziya and among many things, learnt that in 2016, someone had made a film where Jiang Ziya was one of the main characters. The blockbuster show was called League of Gods (封神榜) and starring heavyweight actors like Jet Li. A name among the other cast members stood out: that of Huang Xiaoming.

Huang Xiaoming. At first, the name had sounded vaguely familiar to me. Then I remembered that he had starred opposite Donnie Yen in Ip Man 2. So naturally, I did a search on his name as well and Huang Xiaoming's name appeared as the main actor in the film, Xuan Zang (大唐玄奘). Now, I did know that Hsuan Tsang (玄奘) was the real-life pilgrim monk who went to India in search of Buddhist scriptures. He underwent lots of personal perils but none of which were even distantly close to those depicted in the various fantasy film versions of Journey to the West.

In those fantasy film versions, Hsuan Tsang would be protected by the divine powers of Sun Wukong (孫悟空), Zhu Bajie (豬八戒) and Sha Wujing (沙悟淨), which brings me full circle back to the Tua Pek Kong temple in Sitiawan where these four stone statues were located. Fascinating connections, aren't they?

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As an afterword, I must add that there are currently some flicks about Jiang Ziya in the past few years. Other than League of Gods in 2016, there are now New Seal God Jiang Ziya in 2019 while the fully animated Jiang Ziya: Legend of Deitification came out in 2020. As I've yet to watch them, I can't comment anything on these three films. But for sure, they'll be on my list to watch. [UPDATE (22 May 2021): I laboured to watch New Seal God Jiang Ziya and can summarise my review in six words: "Don't waste your time on it."] [UPDATE (4 June 2021): For a Jet Li film, the action scenes in League of Gods lacked excitement, perhaps too much CGI, that couldn't make me grip my seat. Nevertheless, a film that can be enjoyed once and never again.] 

I must also mention something else. In 2013, I wrote in this blog that according to a newspaper story in The Straits Times of Singapore in the 1990s, some of Jiang Ziya's descendants had adopted Ke (柯) as their surname. It's difficult to prove or disprove this sort of claim.