2020/06/08 by Jérémy Jammes, Shao Zhu Shuai · 1 citation
Social Sciences · Arts and Humanities · #Vietnamese History and Culture Studies #Chinese history and philosophy #Historical Studies and Socio-cultural Analysis
paper · pdf · doi:10.3390/rel11060280
openalex publication_date 2020/06/08 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/30
This article sheds light on the sophisticated funeral process set up by the Cao Đài religion (or Caodaism), combining both a theological and an ethnographical analysis. After introducing how Cao Đài theology represents both the body and the spiritual components of each individual in the specific millenarian conception of existence that characterizes Cao Đài, we trace the ritual process of funerals from the altar and coffin preparation to the collection of prayers and talismanic rituals conveyed to save souls in a Cao Đài manner. Read together, these sources present a genuine project and spirit of reform in the ideas, imaginaries, and practices related to death in Vietnam from the 1920s onwards, crystallizing a specific Cao Đài identity in Vietnamese and also East Asian redemptive societies’ deathscapes.