Vietnamese popular religion

Vietnamese popular religion (tín ngưỡng dân gian Việt Nam) is the most popular faith system in Vietnam although many official religions have been existing. Confucianism was mainly adopted by the royal court and elites, while the folks localized and transformed it into "mass Confucianism" (see Nguyen 2016, 2020). Although Buddhism was promoted to state religion between the 11th and 14th centuries, at the grassroots level, folk Buddhism with a folk religious flavor still dominates (see Duong 2004; McHale 2004). There are four main reasons for the formation and development of Vietnamese folk religion, including (1) The limited knowledge of nature and life made ancient Vietnamese revere, worship, and seek shelter from "superpowers"; (2) Rice-growing traditions made pre-modern Vietnamese people largely dependent on nature and superpower forces; (3) Local wisdom has been often absorbed and ritualized into popular religions; and (4) The folk culture stream based on folk beliefs coexists with the official culture stream dominated by the royal family, and there is an interactive relationship of opposition and complementarity between the two. Vietnamese folk religion is divided into three categories, namely family, community, and nation-state worship. Among families, the most prominent are the customs of ancestor worship and the veneration of Ngũ tự gia đường (Door Gods, Kitchen God, Guardian God, Well God, and Main Hall god (now replaced by God of Wealth), all following the standardized policy of the pre-modern monarch monarchies. Additionally, some families enshrine Saint Trần Hưng Đạo (see Phạm 2009), Quan Đế/Guandi and/or Quan Âm/the Bodhisattva of Compassion (Southern Vietnam) in their homes. At the community level, Vietnamese people practice animism and worship nature and human spirits, including those they believe control weather phenomena (Tứ pháp: Four goddesses who control clouds, rain, thunder, and lightning), space gods (including Tứ bất tử/the Four Immortals (Tản Viên, Chử Đồng Tử, Thánh Gióng, and Liễu Hạnh), Tam Phủ-Tứ phủ (see Nguyen 2002; Nguyen & Fjelstad 2018), Ngũ hổ tướng/the Five Tigers, etc.), sun god, moon goddess, star gods, mountain gods, water gods (such as Bà Thủy, Bà Cậu, Hà Bá), sea gods (General Đại Càn Nam Hải /Whales), God of Agriculture (Thần Nông), goddess of treasury (see Le 2007), snake gods (ông Lốt, Thanh xà – Bạch xà), classic imaginary figures (dragon, kirin, phoenix, etc.), tree gods, linga and yoni symbols, and others (see Trần 2001; Ngô 2018). When the Vietnamese migrated to the central and southern regions, they adopted and localized some of the beliefs of other ethnic groups to a certain extent, such as Goddess Po Nagar and Whale gods from the Chăm, Goddess Bà Đen, Bà Chúa Xứ/Goddess of Realm in Mekong Delta (see Taylor 2004), and Ông Tà/Neak Ta from the Khmer, Quan Đế/Guandi, Thiên Hậu/Tianhou, God of Wealth, and others from the Chinese. In pre-colonial periods, every village had to worship thần Thành hoàng (Village Guardian God - a miniature symbol of the king in every village's communal house (đình làng) (see Ngo & Nguyen 2020). There are many customs of hero worship in Vietnamese folk religious system, such as the cults of Thánh Gióng, An Dương Vương, Hai Bà Trưng, Bà Triệu, Trần Hưng Đạo (northern region), Quang Trung (central region), Trương Định, Thủ Khoa Huân, Lê Tấn Kiều, Trần Văn Thành, Nguyễn Huỳnh Đức, Võ Thị Sáu, etc. (southern region). From the late 19th century to the early 20th century, under French rule, the religious salvation movements became active in the southern region, and folk religions (especially ancestor worship and hero worship) actively joined Buddhism, Taoism, and others to form various sects and new religions such as Bửu Sơn Kỳ Hương, Tứ Ân Hiếu Nghĩa, Phật giáo Hòa Hảo, Tứ Ân Đạo Phật, Minh Đức Nho giáo đại đạo, Caodaism, Minh Sư Đạo, and so on (see Ho Tai 1983; Do 2003; Truong 2016; Nguyen 2020; Nguyen et al. 2024). Vietnam's 53 ethnic minorities still retain their traditions of folk beliefs, increasing the diversity of Vietnam's religious culture. At the state level, the custom of offering sacrifices to heaven and earth has a long history during the pre-modern periods. At the end of the 19th century, the Vietnamese people formed the national cult of Hùng Kings and designated the tenth day of the third lunar month as the anniversary of those national founders. Lạc Long Quân and Âu Cơ (the legendary parents of the first Hùng King, recorded by Vietnamese historians during the 13-15 periods) were officialized as the Founding Father and Mother. At the end of the 20th century, the worship of Ho Chi Minh was formed nationwide while the Ho Chi Minh Mausoleum was built in Hanoi (see Nguyễn 2017). In addition, the Vietnamese people also worship meritorious kings such as Đinh Tiên Hoàng, Lê Hoàn, Lý Thái Tổ, Trần Thái Tông, Quang Trung, meritorious generals such as Lý Thường Kiệt, Trần Hưng Đạo, Võ Nguyên Giáp, etc. as well as meritorious cultural experts such as Chu Văn An, Nguyễn Trãi, Nguyễn Bỉnh Khiêm, Nguyễn Du, Nguyễn Đình Chiểu, and so on.