The Reception and Reconstruction of Daoism in the Chinese Diaspora of Singapore (1880s–1930s)

Abstract

This article investigates how Daoism evolved into a source of moral order and cultural continuity in Singapore from the late nineteenth to the early twentieth century. Drawing on inscriptions, canonical texts, and Chinese-language newspapers, it traces the transformation of Daoism from an official cult into a social ethic amid the decline of the imperial ritual system and the emergence of new communal spaces among overseas Chinese. Confronted with the modern distinction between “civilization” and “superstition,” Chinese residents in Singapore reinterpreted Daoist teachings and reshaped ritual practices to meet changing social conditions. These reinterpretations found expression in education, philanthropy, and public ceremonies, linking religious practice with civic responsibility. Rather than fading under modern influences, Daoism acquired new forms of vitality through everyday practice and local cooperation. The Singapore case demonstrates that Southeast Asian Chinese communities were not peripheral to Daoism’s modern transformation but decisive arenas in which its discourse and ritual were recast into civic institutions of education, moral regulation, and communal order, thereby shaping one of the key trajectories through which Daoism entered modern public life.

1. Introduction

In the late nineteenth century, as the imperial system of state sacrifices collapsed and new definitions of “religion” emerged, Daoism gradually detached itself from a state ritual framework that had long incorporated Confucian, Daoist, and certain Buddhist elements, and ceased to function as an orthodox component of official worship. Yet, during this same period, Daoism experienced a striking revival in the British Straits Settlements—most notably in Singapore—where it became a vital moral and social resource within the Chinese community. This contrast suggests that the modern history of Daoism should not be reduced to a linear narrative of “decline.” Instead, it calls for a reexamination from the perspective of transregional Daoist practices that traversed imperial, colonial, and cultural boundaries.

Scholarly discussions of Daoism’s modern fate have long followed two parallel trajectories. The first, a China-centered narrative, revolves around the debate between “decline” and “revival.” Early interpretations—shaped by May Fourth intellectuals and Western missionary discourse—depicted Daoism as facing “spiritual extinction” after the loss of state support. More recent studies, however, have nuanced this view. The fieldwork of Anna Seidel and Kristofer Schipper revealed the continued adaptability and institutional vitality of Daoism amid political marginalization (Seidel 1989; Schipper 1993). Building on this foundation, Goossaert and Palmer, and X. Liu have highlighted Daoism’s “social regeneration” under modern pressures, showing how it embedded itself in local ritual, philanthropy, and community life (Goossaert and Palmer 2011; X. Liu 2009). Yet this body of research has remained largely confined to mainland China and seldom extends to Daoism’s transformation within transnational networks.

The second trajectory focuses on the study of Chinese religions in Southeast Asia. Anthropologists such as Kenneth Dean have conducted meticulous analyses of temple networks and epigraphic records, demonstrating how Chinese migrants employed religious ties to construct cross-regional communities (Dean 1998; Dean and Hue 2016). These studies have greatly enriched our understanding of the social functions of Chinese religion, though they often emphasize the institutional continuity of temples and ritual networks rather than examining how Daoist ideas and semantics were rewritten and reinterpreted under the conditions of colonial modernity. Moreover, most of this research concentrates on the postwar period, leaving the crucial transition from the late Qing to the early Republican era insufficiently explored. As a result, a clear gap remains between studies of Daoism’s “transformation” in China and those of its religious practice in the overseas Chinese world—a gap this paper seeks to bridge.

To address this gap, this study advances the following central argument: the modern trajectory of Daoism in Singapore was not a mere continuation of its decline in China, but a deliberate process of social reconstruction. In this transformation, Daoism was strategically reinterpreted by Chinese-educated elites—translated from a cosmological and ritual system into a public resource that could serve as a moral, cultural, and social instrument for community governance, ethical cultivation, and the defense of cultural legitimacy. It was no longer simply a “faith,” but a vital medium through which Chinese migrants negotiated selfhood and subjectivity within the conditions of colonial modernity.

To elucidate this process, the paper draws upon key theoretical approaches from religious studies and anthropology. Talal Asad’s genealogical framework reminds us that the very distinction between “religion” and “the secular” is itself a historical construct emerging from specific configurations of power (Asad 2003). This perspective provides a critical lens through which to understand how Daoism was redefined in the colonial and diasporic setting of Singapore. Thomas A. Tweed’s notion of “crossing and dwelling” (Tweed 2006) further illuminates how migrant communities employed religious practice to transform unfamiliar territories into morally meaningful “homes.” Building on these insights, this study argues that the Chinese community in Singapore materialized Daoist cosmology into a living social ethic through what may be described as “dwelling practices”—including ritual performance, epigraphic inscription, and public philanthropy.

Accordingly, the paper is organized into three main sections. Part I revisits the late nineteenth-century Chinese context, examining how Daoism, once expelled from state orthodoxy, underwent intellectual and social reconfiguration that laid the foundation for its transmission across the seas. Part II focuses on late-nineteenth-century Singapore, analyzing how Daoist conceptions of the cosmos, death, and merit were creatively transformed into temple-educational spaces, mortuary management, and association-based moral ethics, thereby generating a self-regulating communal order. Part III turns to the early twentieth century, exploring how Chinese elites—facing the twin pressures of colonial administration and Enlightenment discourse—appropriated modern vocabularies such as “civilization,” “public welfare,” and “science” to recast Daoism as a defensible cultural tradition, thereby asserting both communal legitimacy and cultural dignity.

Building on prior scholarship, this study makes two primary contributions. Empirically, it extends the temporal scope back to the mid-to-late nineteenth century—a period rarely examined in existing research—and employs “Daoism” as a precise analytical category to reveal the early institutionalization of its social functions. Theoretically, it shifts the focus from the operation of “religious networks” to the re-semanticization of religious discourse, highlighting how overseas Chinese communities, as active participants in global modernity, consciously mobilized traditional resources to shape their own forms of public life and civil identity. Ultimately, this paper argues that modern Southeast Asia was not the periphery of Chinese religious modernity, but one of its principal arenas of reinterpretation and renewal.

2. The Secular Turn of Modern Daoism and Its Transplantation in the Singapore Chinese Community

2.1. From Court Marginalization to Social Resilien

During the late Qing and early Republican periods, Daoism underwent a profound transformation—from an officially sanctioned ritual institution to a resilient network sustained by local society. The withdrawal of imperial patronage compelled the religion to shift its locus of vitality from the court to the grassroots. From the Qianlong reign onward, the Qing government gradually curtailed the Heavenly Master’s privileges, and in 1821, issued an edict ordering the fifty-ninth Celestial Master, Zhang Yu, to “cease his audiences at court and no longer come to the capital” 停其朝觐，着不准来京 (J. Liu 2000, vol. 4, p. 8494). This decree marked Daoism’s final removal from the imperial ritual system. While this edict concerned primarily the Zhengyi Heavenly Master system, it provides an early indication of the wider historical trajectory through which Daoist authority gradually shifted from court-centered ritual structures to networks rooted in local society. The Qing Dynasty did not intend to abolish Daoism, yet its policy of “neither abolishing its teaching nor employing its discourse, allowing it to live or perish between Heaven and Earth of itself” 不废其教，亦不用其言，听其自生自息于天地之间 (D. Huang 1962, p. 3999) effectively institutionalized Daoism’s marginalization and redirected its survival toward local society.

The Taiping Rebellion (太平天国暴乱1851–1864) further devastated Daoist institutions, destroying temples, images, and networks of believers. Yet even the Taiping forces, when struck by epidemics, invited Daoist priests to offer petitions and exorcisms—an ironic testament to Daoism’s deep-rooted influence in Chinese popular religion. By the early Republican period, the Enlightenment discourse of “promoting science and opposing superstition” deprived Daoism of its cultural legitimacy and accelerated its secular turn. Intellectual elites such as Chen Duxiu 陈独秀 and Qian Xuantong 钱玄同 denounced Daoist practices as deceptive superstition, forcing Daoism into a marginal and defensive position within modern intellectual life. These multiple pressures—from imperial withdrawal, revolutionary violence, and modernist critique—together shaped the secularization and popularization of Daoism and laid the foundation for its eventual transplantation overseas.

The introduction of the Western concept of “religion” redefined Daoism’s status through a newly imposed dichotomy of “religion” versus “superstition.” As Talal Asad notes, “ religion is essentially a matter of symbolic meanings linked to ideas of general order… that it must not be confused with any of its particular historical or cultural forms, is in fact a view that has a specific Christian history.” (Asad 1993, p. 42). The imported definition, emphasizing belief in a transcendent sovereign being (Zhu 1919, pp. 47–49)1, became the benchmark for determining whether a system qualified as a legitimate religion. When Chinese intellectuals adopted this monotheistic standard, Daoism inevitably appeared inadequate—a native tradition forced into a “Procrustean bed” of Western conceptual norms. Daoism posits an impersonal Dao as the ultimate principle of the cosmos. Its pantheon—such as the Three Pure Ones (三清) represents emanations of the Dao rather than autonomous deities, while its ritual practices, including talismanic rites (fulu) and jiao or zhai offerings, intertwine with popular worship of stellar gods, local spirits, and ghosts. Under the Western religious framework, Daoism’s philosophical thought was recast as “Chinese philosophy,” whereas its ritual dimensions were dismissed as “superstition.” This epistemological disjunction was institutionalized in Republican government policies, notably in the Standards for Preserving or Abolishing Shrines (Xin et al. 1991, p. 747).2 Seeking to regulate belief through the “religion/superstition” binary, the authorities produced contradictory results. The statute preserved temples dedicated to deities such as Fuxi, Shennong, the Yellow Emperor, Taishang Laojun, Yuanshi Tianzun, the Three Officials, and other figures associated with Daoism, yet simultaneously abolished those devoted to the Sun, Moon, Five Peaks, Four Streams, Dragon Kings, City Gods, Wenchang, the God of Wealth, and the Goddess of Childbearing. Daoist practices involving talismans and incantations were also banned as “unwholesome religion.” These inconsistencies revealed the policymakers’ limited understanding of lived religion and underscored the gap between ideological reform and social reality.

After the “Science versus Metaphysics” debate of the 1920s, the authority of science became further entrenched, making Daoism’s intellectual survival even more precarious. In response, some scholars attempted to reclaim Daoism’s legitimacy by tracing its origins to ancient Chinese traditions: “The remote sources of Daoism lie in the shamans, physicians, Yin-Yang masters, and Daoist philosophers of antiquity; today’s Daoism is nothing more than internal cultivation and mystical communication—cultivating qi pertains to medicine, communing with spirits pertains to shamanism” 道教之远源，古之巫、医、阴阳家、道家也。即今之道教，无过内修与冥通。内修养气，医也；冥通事神，巫也 (X. Liu 2010, p. 2). Within Daoist circles, reform-minded figures such as Chen Yingning 陈撄宁promoted xianxue 仙学 and sought to reconcile inner alchemy with Western physiology to dispel the stigma of superstition (Qing 1994, p. 403). Yet these efforts often produced a new fragmentation: the “philosophical” or “scientific” aspects of Daoism celebrated by intellectuals were deliberately separated from Daoism as a living, institutional religion.

Amid the collapse of traditional institutions and the transformation of epistemic paradigms, Daoism reconstituted its survival order through ritual practice and communal operation, eventually extending its presence overseas. As Vincent Goossaert and David A. Palmer demonstrate, from the late Qing dynasty, philanthropic societies integrating the tenets of Confucianism, Buddhism, and Daoism persisted under the guise of modern social service organizations—anti-opium campaigns, public hygiene initiatives, and charitable relief—thus acquiring a renewed space for survival within the framework of a modernizing state (Goossaert and Palmer 2011, p. 209). Kristofer Schipper further underscores that Daoism is still “part of the everyday life of the Chinese peopleand has no clearly defined profile… we must take into account all its components, those concerning the as well as those related to the social body… but also Taoist liturgy, mythology, and mysticism.” (Schipper 1993, p. xix)

Within this perspective, the modern “descent” of Daoism should be understood not as decline but as structural repositioning. The Chinese migrants who brought Daoist traditions to Singapore carried not only sacred icons and incense burners but also an entire repertoire of Daoist modes of living—a body of embodied, spatial, and organizational knowledge. Such knowledge was concretized in the acts of anshen (安神), establishing altar, and building temples, which inscribed Daoist cosmology into the moral and spatial order of migrant communities. Through these embodied and spatialized practices, Daoism did not merely survive abroad through doctrinal transmission but renewed itself through adaptive resilience, weaving ritual, morality, and social organization into the everyday fabric of diasporic life.

2.2. Localization of the Daoist Pantheon

The Daoist pantheon underwent a profound localizing turn amid the decline of imperial ritual institutions and the rise of popular belief. Since the Song dynasty, deities such as Guandi 关帝 (Lord Guan), Wenchang 文昌, Mazu 妈祖, and Baosheng Dadi 保生大帝 were incorporated into the state cult through official canonization. For instance, in the fifth year of the Jiaqing reign (1800), the Ministry of Rites conferred upon Guandi the title “Zhongyi Shenwu Lingyou Dadi” 忠义神武灵佑大帝, and ordered spring and autumn sacrifices throughout the empire. As state ritual declined, however, the social influence of these deities came to increasingly depend on the joint participation of local officials and common worshippers. Taking Mazu as an example (Daozang 1988, vol. 11, p. 408),3 through successive dynastic canonizations—from “Tianhou” 天后 (Empress of Heaven) and “Tianshang Shengmu” 天上圣母 (Heavenly Mother) in the Song dynasty and Yuan dynasty to “Huguo Bimin Miaoling Zhaoying Tianhou” (护国庇民妙灵昭应天后) in 1768—state recognition acquired new communal meanings, becoming a symbolic resource for protecting the homeland and praying for peace. When coastal migrants settled overseas, these deities—already localized in ritual and sentiment—naturally became spiritual bonds linking lineage and community.

Daoist belief was transmitted abroad primarily through the fenxiang 分香 (ritual branching) and temple reconstruction. Before leaving home, early migrants commonly carried with them incense ashes or effigies from ancestral temples to secure divine protection. This practice not only preserved personal devotion but also transplanted the sacred geography of the homeland into new environments. Meanwhile, the ancestral temple traditions of Fujian (福建) and Chaoshan (潮汕) provided direct institutional templates for Daoism’s reconstruction in Singapore. The most distinctive feature was the system of heci 合祀 (joint enshrinement)—“a single temple enshrines two or more principal deities, all receiving offerings equally, without hierarchy” (L. Huang 2005, p. 244). Its core principle lay not in sectarian affiliation but in merit and efficacy, “Since all three shared the same merit in pacifying the rebels, they are worshipped together” 三人俱有平寇功者，故并祀之 (Z. Huang 2006, p. 397). Thus, local heroes could be worshiped alongside gods. In the cultural sphere, the complementary values of civil and martial virtue produced arrangements such as “Wenchang and Zhu Xi venerated together” 文昌与朱子同祀or “Wenchang on the left, Guandi on the right” 左祀文昌，右祀关帝 (L. Huang 1967, p. 200). For worshippers, the primary criterion for reverence was lingyan 灵验; consequently, Buddhist, Daoist, and local worthies frequently shared a single temple space. For instance, the Buddha, Guanyin 观音 (the Bodhisattva Guanyin), and Wenqu 文曲 (Star Lord of Literary Attainment) were all enshrined together because of their perceived miraculous power. Temple layouts along the Fujian coast reflected both ritual logic and livelihood, merchants and fishermen in Quanzhou (泉州) and Pingtan (平潭) paired “For the safety of those who travel by road we rely on Bozhu; for the good fortune of those who sail, we depend upon Tianfei” 伯主保道路，天妃佑舟楫 (Zheng and Ding 2003, p. 376). Accordingly, temples often arranged “the Celestial Mother in the rear hall and Bozhu in the central hall.” (奉迎天上圣母进后殿，显祐伯主进中庙) On Pingtan Island, where people lived by fishing and salt, Mazu was jointly worshiped with the local Wulong Shunhua Wang 五龙顺化王 to secure protection from the perils of the sea.4

The ritual system centered on “Hesi–Peisi” 合祀—配祀5 enabled Daoism to reconstruct its liturgical order across the Nan Yang 南洋 (South Sea) through ritual replication. It was through this ritual logic of joint and paired veneration that Daoism acquired a trans-sectarian capacity for transmission. When Fujianese and Teochew migrants crossed the seas, they carried not an abstract theology but a mature repertoire of operative ritual practices already established in their home regions. Early temples in Singapore, such as Thian Hock Keng 天福宫 (Tianfu Temple) and Yueh Hai Ching Miao 粤海清庙 (Yuehai Qing Temple), faithfully continued this pattern of multi-deity enshrinement. Thus, the spread of Daoism in the Nanyang was not merely religious diffusion but the replication and reconfiguration of ancestral ritual order in a foreign land. Rooted in specific regional practices, these transplanted rites provided the institutional foundations for the localization of Daoism in Singapore and for the moral cohesion of the emerging Chinese diaspora.

2.3. Sea Routes, Settlement, and the Singapore Hub

Singapore’s strategic position made it a pivotal maritime and religious hub for the southward dissemination of Daoism. Long before Stamford Raffles established the port in 1819, the island already functioned as an entrepôt within the maritime networks linking China and the Nanyang. Ancient records—including the “Pizong” 皮宗 mentioned in the Han shu · Dili zhi 《汉书·地理志》 (Geographical Treatise in the Book of Han), the “Pisong” 皮嵩 in the Tongdian 《通典》 (Comprehensive Statutes), the “Zhi” 质 in Guangzhou Tonghai Yidao 《广州通海夷道》, and the “Temasek” 淡马锡 in the Malay Annals 《马来纪年》, attest to long-standing sea routes between China’s southeastern coast and maritime Southeast Asia. Chinese settlers were already established on the island before Raffles’s arrival: “Before the British colony began its development, the Temenggong 天猛公 had already allocated land to Malays and Chinese, and about twenty plantation hills had been opened for cultivation.”(Cui 1994, p. 5) These routes facilitated not only the transport of goods but also the circulation of people, ideas, and ritual traditions, creating the historical conditions for the cross-sea transmission of Daoist scriptures, liturgies, and cosmological concepts. By 1819, Chinese temples such as Fude Ci 福德祠 (Temple of the Earth Deity) and Shuntian Gong 顺天宫 (Shuntian Temple) had already been established, providing tangible evidence of early religious life among the overseas Chinese. As Yan Ching-Hwang 颜清煌 notes, “Chinese migrants clearly realized that, in this entirely new land, they needed religious belief as a source of spiritual support” (Yan 1991, p. 10). Religion thus constituted a core component of the migrants’ moral and emotional world. The establishment of early temples and yizhong 义冢 (righteous cemeteries) exemplified how migrant communities, by sacralizing space, anchored moral order and social solidarity in unfamiliar territory.

As Chinese settlement stabilized, Daoist devotion shifted from portable domestic worship to temple-centered communal practice. Singapore’s status as a free port spurred rapid demographic expansion: “In 1824, the total Chinese population was 3317; by 1860 it had increased to 50,043, accounting for 61.3 percent of the total population” (Xu 2013, p. 34). This demographic concentration reflected not transient mobility but enduring economic settlement. Even in the early colonial period, Chinese settlers were already involved in land cultivation: “On the western slope of the hill there already existed a Chinese gambier plantation.” (Cui 1994, p. 5) Such evidence points to the emergence of a stable resident community. As livelihoods took root, religious life evolved from individually carried incense and icons to public temple institutions, marking the integration of Daoist ritual and organization into Singapore’s urban and social fabric. This process—“the southward journey of divine images, the establishment of joint worship, and the weaving of temple networks”—embodies what Thomas A. Tweed describes as the twin logic of crossing and dwelling: “Religion are confluences of organic-cultural flows that intensify joy and confront suffering by drawing on human and suprahuman forces to make homes and cross boundaries “(Tweed 2006, p. 54). Through such “confluences of flows,” migrant communities construct new moral and emotional homelands. Therefore, The Chinese diaspora thus transplanted not only deities but an entire institutional complex encompassing ancestral temples, cemeteries, merit steles. Through these institutionalized practices, religious belief was transformed into a structural foundation for community governance and moral cohesion, enabling Daoism to take root and flourish within the plural and colonial modernity of nineteenth-century Singapore.

3. Daoist Cosmology and the Formation of Overseas Chinese Social Order

3.1. Wen Yi Zai Dao (文以载道): The Sanctification of Textual Culture

The Daoist concept of wen yi zaidao—“using writing to carry and embody the Dao”—was reinterpreted by overseas Chinese as a moral and social framework for reconstructing cultural orthodoxy and ethical order in exile. Although the phrase wen yi zaidao is well known from its Confucian genealogy, nineteenth-century overseas Chinese employed it through a distinctly Daoist cosmological logic, in which wen—text, inscription, and cultural form—functions as an emanation of the Dao. This interpretive mode is clearly reflected in temple inscriptions produced in Singapore during this period. Rooted in Daoist ritual theology and interwoven with Confucian ideals of wenjiao (civil cultivation), this concept drew on the cosmological premise articulated in the Daodejing 《道德经》: “Humans follow the earth; the earth follows heaven; heaven follows the Dao; the Dao follows what is natural.”人法地，地法天，天法道，道法自然 (B. Wang 2008, p. 64) This passage establishes the correspondence between human and cosmic order—the idea that moral governance must model the celestial pattern. The Taiping jing 《太平经》 further elaborates this principle: “Extensively cultivate hidden virtue, and you will move the azure heavens. If one keeps a heart like mine, Heaven will surely bestow blessings upon you.”广行阴骘，上格苍穹。人能如我存心，天必赐汝以福。 (Zhang et al. 2007, p. 659) Here, yin zhi 阴骘 (hidden virtue) constitutes the moral cause; shang ge cang qiong 上格苍穹 (moving Heaven through virtuous conduct) signifies the medium of resonance; and tian bi ci ru yi fu 天必赐汝以福 (Heaven will surely bestow blessings upon you) denotes the reward—encompassing civil success, literary fortune, and prosperity. In this logic, wen—text—became the sacred conduit linking the human realm to the Dao.

By the mid-nineteenth century, Chinese settlers in Singapore had embedded this cosmology within temple-centered social institutions. Temples served not only as places of worship but also as loci of education and communal governance. The Thian Hock Keng, completed in 1842, was explicitly conceived as a temple that also functions as an association hall. In 1849, Singapore’s first Chinese school, Chong Wen Ge 崇文阁 (Chongwen Pavilion), was founded adjacent to the temple’s west wing. The Xingjian Chongweng Ge Beiji 《兴建崇文阁碑记》 (Stele Inscription for the Construction of Chongwen Pavilion) notes, “Now, the Great Origin of the Dao issues from Heaven; its substance is embodied in the sages, and its transmission depends upon writing.” 今夫道之大原出于天，其实体备于圣，而其流传则赖乎文 (Chen and Chen 1970, p. 283). It further declares, “Wherever writing exists, there too resides the Dao—there dwell both the Sage and Heaven.”文之所在即道之所在，亦即圣与天之所也。 (Chen and Chen 1970, p. 283).6 This inscription articulates wen as the manifest form of the Dao in the human world. The later Chongxiu Chongweng Ge Beiji 《重修崇文阁碑记》 (Stele Inscription for the Reconstruction of Chongwen Pavilion) expands this theology of text: “From the division of the Three Luminaries Heaven’s patterns were revealed; from the emergence of the Six Classics human culture was opened—thus, to carry the Dao is to make the Dao visible.”盖自三光分而天文启，六经出而人文开者，所以载道亦即道之显者也。 (Chen and Chen 1970, p. 288).

This understanding is unmistakably Daoist. The Yunji Qiqian 《云笈七签》 (Seven Tablets in a Cloudy Satchel) proclaims, “The scarlet script and jade characters, the eightfold dragon patterns, preserve the cosmic cycles and ensure Heaven’s eternal endurance.”赤书玉字，八威龙文，保制劫运，使天长存。 (J. Zhang 2003, vol. 37, p. 810). “The scarlet script and jade characters”, sacred writing born of the Dao, and its material form, the “cloud-patterned seal script” 云篆, embody divine order in visible signs. Thus, human wen—whether in moral cultivation or literary practice—became a ritual medium for communicating with the Dao, and writing itself was reimagined as a performative act of revelation. An 1887 inscription from the Yuhuangdian Beiji 《玉皇殿碑记》 (Stele Inscription of the Yuhuang Hall) explicitly connects divine order to human instruction: “The Heavenly Emperor—none can surpass Him; is this not the way of teaching through the divine Dao?” 天皇天帝，蔑以加矣……藉神道而教化者乎。 (Chen and Chen 1970, p. 141). Such statements illuminate the interpenetration of the sacred and the pedagogical. For overseas Chinese, the establishment of educational institutions signified the moral continuation of wende 文德 (civil virtue) in a foreign land. The Cui Ying Shu Yuan Bei Wen 《萃英书院碑文》 (inscription of Cuiying Shuyuan) proclaims, “Our nation’s governance has flourished since antiquity because it places moral instruction first, establishing schools and academies as its foundation.” 我国家治隆于古，以教化为先，设有庠序。 (Chen and Chen 1970, p. 291). Likewise, the inscription marking the reconstruction of Chong Wen Ge affirms, “Our successive enlightened emperors have ever placed literary virtue before martial achievement.” 我朝列圣相承，首重文德，次尚武功。 (Chen and Chen 1970, p. 288). Together, these inscriptions extend the cosmic moral hierarchy of the Dao into the colonial frontier, rendering education and inscription symbolic acts of governance through the sacred word. In this transoceanic context, Daoist cosmology and Confucian pedagogy converged to furnish Singapore’s Chinese diaspora with a sacralized framework of moral order—a textual theology through which Heaven’s pattern could be ritually and socially reenacted across the sea.

The concept of wen yi zaidao found its concrete expression in the spatial synthesis of temple and school 庙学合一. Through this integration of religion and education, the overseas Chinese community perpetuated its civilizing mission and moral tradition. The inscription of Chong Wen Ge vividly illustrates this sacred spatial order: “Its lofty upper hall is dedicated to the Wenchang Dijun文昌帝君 (Lord Wenchang), its spacious lower hall is for teachers and students to conduct their lessons.” 其巍然在上者，所以崇祀梓潼帝君；其翼然在下者，所以为师生讲授也. (Chen and Chen 1970, p. 288). This Shang Xi Xia Xue 上祀下学 (ritual above, learning below—a spatial arrangement integrating worship and learning) arrangement perpetuated the Daoist monastic practice of sacrificing to the deities and expounding the scriptures. As Lu Xiujing 陆修静 observed in the Daomen Kelüe 《道门科略》 (Essential Ritual Compendium of the Daoist Tradition), “For a household devoted to the Dao, a tranquil chamber is the place where sincerity is perfected. It must stand apart from other rooms and be connected to none.” 奉道之家，靖室是致诚之所。其外别绝，不连他屋。 (Lu 1988, p. 780). The jing shi 靖室 (Quiet Chamber) thus served as a prototype of the Daoist sanctuary—a sacred space separated from worldly concerns and aligned with the natural order of the Dao. The miao xue he yi model in Singapore reinterpreted this logic by situating the ritual pursuit of literary fortune and the educational transmission of moral virtue within the same architectural and symbolic frame. In this way, it reinforced the principle of “using the divine way to assist moral transformation” 以神道辅教化.

By the mid-to-late nineteenth century, with the advancement of printing technology and the growing sophistication of fundraising mechanisms, the local Chinese community in Singapore had developed a vibrant moral infrastructure in which xiu wen 修文 (cultivating writing) and xiu dao 修道 (cultivating the Dao) mutually affirmed one another. Together they sustained the continuity of Chinese cultural lineage and communal identity. Cui Ying Shu Yuan Bei Wen 《萃英书院碑文》 (the inscription of Cuiying Shuyuan) records, “Cherishing a heart that exalts the worthy and encourages learning, Chen Juchuan donated funds to purchase land as the foundation of the academy, wishing thereby to cultivate future talents.” 存兴贤劝学之盛心，捐金买地愿充为党序之基，欲以造就诸俊秀。 (Chen and Chen 1970, p. 291). Such acts of promoting virtue and encouraging study 兴贤劝学 were understood as social practices of moral cultivation 修德积功. Within this moral framework, Daoist cosmology was translated into a civic ethic whose ultimate goal was the realization of harmony between Heaven and humanity. As expressed in multiple temple inscriptions, this ideal was not abstract but materialized in prayers for prosperity and wellbeing.7 Through this interpretation of wen ji dao 文即道 (writing as the embodiment of the Dao), Chinese migrants reconstituted a moral and communal order in Singapore—an order capable of replacing the absent ancestral and kinship hierarchies of the homeland. As Tweed has observed, “Religions… are about dwelling” (Tweed 2006, p. 169). The creation of temple school spaces thus offered the Chinese diaspora a mode of dwelling that was both spiritual and ethical; by merging education, ritual, and virtue within a single sacred structure, they transformed an alien colonial landscape into a habitable moral cosmos grounded in the Daoist vision of order.

The ritual of fen zi song hui 焚字送灰 (burning written characters and sending the ashes away) rendered visible the Daoist cosmology that links wen 文, qi 气, and dao 道. Jointly organized by local gentry and temple authorities, the ceremony centered on the precept jing wen ru jing tian 敬文如敬天 (“to revere writing as one reveres Heaven”). As Lü Pengzhi explains, “Qi is the material foundation of the Dao’s operations within the world” (Lü 2023, p. 19). The burning of texts, in Kristofer Schipper’s interpretation, emphasizes “the essence of the sacrificed object to be distilled and refined; it is made divine, sacred, and powerful.” (Schipper 1993, p. 90). This understanding finds explicit confirmation in the Chongxiu Chong Wen Ge Beiji: “They extensively gathered discarded writings, transformed them into ashes, and reverently consigned them according to custom” 广收遗字以化灰，恭送率由乎旧。 (Chen and Chen 1970, p. 288). The inscription testifies to a ritual logic in which the wenqi 文气 was returned to Heaven and Earth. By consigning the ashes to rivers and seas, participants completed a cosmic circulation consonant with the Daoist principle of yi qi gui xu 以气归虚 (returning vital qi to primordial emptiness). This process functioned not merely as a form of moral discipline but as an embodied enactment of reverence. As Vásquez (2011, p. 107) reminds us, “religious experience may not be fully definable, fully reducible either to neural processes or sociohistorical practices”. Through ritualized gestures—kneeling, bowing, and the solemn dispatching of ashes—the participants transformed the abstract notion of wenqi gui tian 文气归天 (the return of literary qi to the celestial realm) into a tangible, affective experience of sacred awe. In this way, the Daoist cosmology of qi and wen became a lived practice that bound moral consciousness to the physical body and the social world.

3.2. Harmonizing Yin and Yang (调和阴阳): The Socialization of the Underworld Order

By the mid-nineteenth century, the Daoist cosmology of yin–yang hugan 阴阳互感 (mutual resonance between yin and yang) had been rearticulated as a principle of social governance, shaping how overseas Chinese communities regulated life and death and maintained collective order. The establishment of similar institutions in Singapore, such as the Yi an gong si yi zhong 义安公司义冢 (Yi’an Company Righteous Cemetery) and Bishan Ting 碧山亭, represented a direct transoceanic replication of these models. Managed jointly by clan associations and temples, these cemeteries served far more than a funerary function. They became ritualized moral spaces where the living were disciplined through commemorative practices for the dead—effectively realizing a mode of “governing through death.” Rooted in the Daoist ideas of yin–yang hugan and Ji De Zhuan Fu积德转福 (accumulating virtue to transform it into blessings), Chinese migrants redefined the commemoration of ancestors as an ethical obligation for the living. What had originally been a private cultivation of ji yinde 积阴德 (accumulating hidden virtue) evolved into a public moral code embedded within the social order.

This ethical transformation is vividly reflected in epigraphic sources. The 1896 inscription of Bishan Ting proclaims, “Heaven cherishes life and moves human hearts through benevolence. Whoever donates coffins or burial funds accumulates merit in the underworld and thus prays for Heaven’s protection.” 天道好生，感人以仁。凡施棺椁、施冥资者，皆积德于阴骘，以祈天佑。 (Chen and Chen 1970, p. 248). Here, the correlation between yinzhi and tianyou 天佑 (protection granted by Heaven) illustrates a logic of cosmic reciprocity grounded in Daoist metaphysics. Underlying this worldview is the teaching of the Daodejing: “Heaven’s Way has no favorites; it is always with the good” 天道无亲，常与善人。 (Editorial Committee of Xianzhuang Guoxueguan 2022, p. 287). To practice virtue, therefore, was not merely moral, it was an act of alignment with the Dao itself. A similar principle is articulated in the 1840 inscription Guangdong Sheng Yongdingxian Chongxiu Zhongshan Bei 《广东省永定县重修冢山碑》 (Stele for the Reconstruction of Zhongshan in Yongding County, Guangdong Province): “When the burial grounds are repaired, the wandering souls are grateful, and their descendants receive blessings for generations.” 幽魂戴德，奕世蒙庥。 (Chen and Chen 1970, p. 231). Through ritual practices such as providing coffins and restoring graves, overseas Chinese cultivated a virtuous circulation between the living and the dead: the living accumulated merit through benevolent acts, while the grateful spirits of the deceased, in turn, offered protection and prosperity to the community. In this reciprocal moral economy, the Daoist cosmology of yin and yang was transformed into a social mechanism of cohesion and moral governance—a form of yi si zhi sheng 以死治生. The management of the underworld thus became integral to sustaining the ethical order of the living, revealing how Daoist cosmology provided the moral architecture for overseas Chinese communal life.

Drawing upon the Daoist cosmology of yin–yang hugan, overseas Chinese communities transformed mortuary rituals such as yizhong and pudu 普度 (universal salvation ritual) into collective institutions of moral governance. Through these practices, Daoist metaphysics was translated into a social mechanism of belonging, allowing migrant societies to reconstruct order and ethical identity in a foreign land. The inscription of Hengshan Ting 恒山亭, erected in 1830, vividly expresses the existential unease of migrants who had lost their ancestral networks: “Those who left their homeland still grieve, for return cannot be expected. While living, they yearn to return in honor; when dead, they are buried abroad.” 昔人所悲，犹未旋返莫可以期。存则荣归，没则旅壅。 (Chen and Chen 1970, p. 221). The same stele voices a profound anxiety about ritual absence: “Each time the season of ancestral sacrifice arrives, to whom shall even a single drop of offering be entrusted?” 每值禁烟令节，一滴之到夫谁与主？ (Chen and Chen 1970, p. 221). The establishment of Hengshan Ting was thus a deliberate act of moral reconstruction, “to emulate the meritorious example of Lord Wen Zhenggong by building a pavilion at the foot of Mount Heng for annual sacrifices.” 会同人效文正公之妙举，建亭于恒山之麓，以备逐年祭祀。 (Chen and Chen 1970, p. 221).

When the pavilion was rebuilt in 1879, the community further sacralized the site: “They enshrined the Fude Zhengshen 福德正神 (the Earth Deity) within the pavilion and invited monks to maintain the incense offerings.” 祀福德正神于亭中，复募僧以奉香火。 (Chen and Chen 1970, p. 226). These developments were grounded in Daoist beliefs in the “land possesses spirit” 土地有灵 and “mutual bearing of virtue and retribution” 承负, which imagine the earth as a moral organism responsive to human conduct. As the Taiping jing proclaims, “Springs are the blood of the earth; stones are its bones; good soil is its flesh.”泉者，地之血；石者，地之骨也；良土，地之肉也。 (M. Wang 2014, p. 122). Within this cosmology, moral virtue shapes both human destiny and the vitality of the landscape itself. The worship of Fude Zhengshen thus functioned as a spiritual contract between migrants and the local terrain—an act through which settlers demonstrated moral worth and sought to secure both physical settlement and cosmic sanction, wherein acts of funerary philanthropy enabled Chinese communities in Singapore to attain symbolic legitimacy within their adopted environment. Through these ritualized forms of benevolence, Daoist metaphysics was socialized into a communal ethic, binding the living and the dead, humanity and the earth, within a shared moral ecology of resonance and reciprocity.

As Daoist compassion became socialized into communal governance, underworld rituals evolved from individual acts of salvation into collective practices of pacification. Within Chinese moral imagination, unattached or wandering Ghost were regarded as perilous precisely because they shared the same desires as the living. Their lingering attachment to the human world made them unpredictable and potentially disruptive. Thus, managing these dispersed and volatile entities became a public concern for overseas Chinese communities. Festivals such as the Zhongyuan jie 中元节 (Zhongyuan Festival) offered occasions for large-scale communal offerings that both appeased and reintegrated the dead. The 1887 stele titled Guang Huizhao Bishan Ting Jianshao Chaodu Youhun Wanyuan Shenghui Xu 广惠肇碧山亭建醮超度幽魂万缘胜会序 records that the event lasted “three days and four nights of Daoist ritual” and was held “To extend heartfelt reverence for the departed and compassion for those who perished tragically” 推慎终追远之诚，悯伤亡横死之苦。 (Chen and Chen 1970, p. 262). This form of collective jian jiao chaodu 建醮超度 (establishing a jiao offering and performing rites of salvation) integrated potentially restless spirits into an ordered and controllable framework of appeasement and transformation. Typically, such ceremonies took the form of “joint Buddhist-Daoist altars” 僧道共坛, where Daoist priests presided over the zhai jiao 斋醮 (fasting and jiao—ritual offerings) while Buddhist monks recited sutras for universal deliverance. This cooperation extended a late-Qing trend along the southeastern coast of China into the colonial Nanyang context, where it provided a hybrid model of religious governance for migrant society. The practice embodied the Daoist social ideal of “to extend equal compassion and make kin of those of different bones” 齐同慈爱，异骨成亲 (J. Zhang 2004, vol. 31, p. 449). Through such integration, Daoist rituals stabilized the underworld, while Buddhist chanting extended salvation to all souls, jointly serving the communal principle that “when the underworld is at peace, the living prosper” 阴安则阳乐. Compassion for the dead thus transcended sectarian boundaries and was transformed into a form of social cohesion among the living—a movement from the “merit of the dead” 阴功 to the “moral governance of the living” 阳治.

3.3. Yi Yi Jie Yuan 义以结缘 (Building Karmic Ties Through Moral Generosity): Merit, Memory, and Collective Identity

Within the overseas Chinese communities of the Nanyang, the Daoist cosmology of ganying 感应 (moral resonance) was transformed into a shared ethical language centered on merit功德 (merit). Through the intertwined practices of “temple building, soliciting donations, and inscribing steles” 修庙—劝捐—勒石, individual faith was rendered into a form of public expression and collective remembrance. By recording donor names and virtuous deeds on stone, merit became visible, transmissible, and durable—constituting a public archive of virtue that anchored communal memory and identity. The motivations behind temple reconstruction were clearly articulated in contemporary inscriptions. The first motivation was to secure divine protection. The Stele on the Reconstruction of Jinlan Temple 重建金兰庙碑记 asked pointedly, “It has often been said that there are blessings and misfortunes beyond human knowing, but there are no deities unworthy of reverence. The deities guard against calamity and bring fortune to the people. If their temples fall into ruin and none are willing to restore them, how can their spirits be properly enshrined?” 尝谓天下有不可知之祸福，断无不可敬之神明。神明者，所以御灾捍患，为万民造福者也。使其庙宇倾颓，漠然不愿，则妥神灵之谓何。 (Chen and Chen 1970, p. 55). Here, rebuilding temples is presented as a moral and practical necessity for preserving the gods’ role in averting calamities and bestowing blessings upon the people.

The second motivation reflects the Daoist concept of gǎnyìng—the moral resonance between human virtue and divine response. The Stele on the Reconstruction of the Dabo Gong Temple 重修大伯公庙碑记 explains that “humans rely on the gods to sow blessings, and the gods rely on humans to manifest their efficacy.” This moral symmetry accords with the teachings of the Taishang Ganying Pian 《太上感应篇》 (Treatise on the Exalted One’s Moral Resonance): “When the mind turns toward goodness, though the act has yet to be done, auspicious spirits already follow. …If one who has committed evil later repents, ceases from wrongdoing, and practices all good deeds, in time blessings will surely arrive—this is called transforming misfortune into fortune.” 夫心起于善，善虽未为，而吉神已随之……其有曾行恶事，后自改悔，诸恶莫作，众善奉行，久久必获吉庆，所谓转祸为福也。 (Daozang 1988, vol. 27, pp. 834–35). In this moral framework, benevolent intentions themselves invite divine protection. The inscription of merit in stone made this reciprocity permanent and publicly verifiable, transforming acts of faith into a system of recognized moral capital. The Stele on the Reconstruction of Shuntian Gong 重建顺天宫碑记 declares that the temple was rebuilt “to exalt virtue and repay merit” 崇德报功 The same inscription records that the donors’ names were “inscribed on the reverse of the stele to remain imperishable” 列于碑阴，以垂不朽 (Chen and Chen 1970, p. 123). Such public documentation of beneficence transformed individual generosity into collectively acknowledged honor. Temple reconstruction thereby transcended private devotion to become a mechanism of community organization and moral governance. This Daoist ethic of gōngdé—linking virtue, reciprocity, and divine resonance—provided the conceptual foundation for the overseas Chinese community’s systems of public order, philanthropy, and moral solidarity.

Clan associations emerged as the principal venues through which the Daoist ethic of merit was translated into enduring social institutions. Within these spaces, the Daoist injunction to “accumulate virtue and perform good deeds” 积德行善 was recast as rules of mutual assistance and self-governance. By the late nineteenth century, such associations had assumed increasingly public functions, secularizing and extending the Daoist logic of moral accumulation into an everyday ethic of solidarity among migrants. The Stele of the Reconstruction of the Yinghe Guan 重建应和馆碑 articulates this ethic with characteristic clarity: “When sojourning across the seas, mutual assistance comes first; when residing in distant lands, the guild hall is of greatest importance.” 盖闻客旅重洋，互助为先；远适异邦，馆舍为重。 (Chen and Chen 1970, p. 171). Although “mutual assistance comes first” 互助为先 is framed as a human sentiment, it resonates deeply with the Daoist logic that “merit is accumulated through human effort and blessings arise from collective moral resonance.” 功由人积、福由群感。 This moral reasoning recurs in the Stele of the Construction of the Panyu Hui Guan 新建番禺会馆碑记: “Mutual watching and mutual aid—this is the way of harmony among the people. Extending this principle, we seek friendship and mutual help, and thus we build the guild hall.” 守望相助，此百姓亲睦之道也。因推此义以期相友相助，而建会馆焉。 (Chen and Chen 1970, p. 673). Its ethical core echoes the Wenchang Dijun Yinzhi Wen 《文昌帝君阴骘文》 (Treatise on Hidden Virtue by the Lord Wenchang), which teaches, “Rescue those in urgent need as one would save fish in a drying rut; aid those in peril as one would free birds caught in a net.” 济急如济涸辙之鱼，救危如救密罗之雀。 (Zhang et al. 2007, p. 659).

Both texts advocate “to aid others and benefit the world” 济人利物 as a central moral imperative linking individual virtue to collective welfare. Through their regulations and commemorative steles, these associations institutionalized moral exhortation as social procedure. The Stele of the Ning Yang Hui Guan 宁阳会馆碑记, records, “It is joyful to open the regulation encouraging donations and to rebuild the Ningyang Guild Hall.” 乐开劝捐之规，重建宁阳会馆。 (Chen and Chen 1970, p. 287).8 This statement signals the transformation of moral persuasion into a codified and repeatable civic mechanism. The same stele further notes that through collective banquets and ritual gatherings, “All matters were managed publicly through the guild hall, thereby rectifying moral relations and quelling resentment.” 众从公馆理处，以正纲常，以息怨怒。 (Chen and Chen 1970, p. 287). In this way, the Hui Guan functioned as a secular ritual arena where social relations were mediated and moral order maintained. The yi 义 cultivated within Hui Guan thus complemented the de 德 (virtue) nurtured in Daoist temples, embedding moral governance into the structural fabric of the overseas Chinese community.

Merit and benevolence steles endowed religious virtue with a visible commemorative form, transforming belief and morality into public memory and collective history. The Stele on the Renovation of the Changtai Temple 重修长泰庙碑记, records that local worthies “donated generously and undertook the temple’s repair. Upon its completion, both gods and people rejoiced, and it was fitting to engrave a stele to commemorate their virtue for posterity” 慷慨乐输，重为修理。兹当落成之日，神人共庆，合应勒碑铭功，以垂不朽焉。 (Chen and Chen 1970, p. 144). Through the act of public inscription, the Daoist belief in “accumulating good deeds brings reward” 积善得报 was reconstituted as a shared moral narrative, capable of being transmitted across generations. The meaning of merit itself expanded in scope; even acts of mundane construction—such as building the perimeter wall of the Fude Temple—were invested with enduring, symbolic significance. The inscription “a work to endure for a thousand autumns without end” 永千秋勿替之业 (Chen and Chen 1970, p. 85) suggests that meritorious practice had evolved beyond individual piety into a collective pursuit sustaining communal prosperity and moral order. This moral grammar centered on merit gradually penetrated clan institutions as well. The Preface to the Renovation of the Jiangxia Hall 《重修江夏堂小引》 declared, “Specially printing the names of all donors on the record, we leave this written account to enlighten those who come after.” 特刊诸赞助人芳名于版，留爰志其事以昭后者。 (Chen and Chen 1970, p. 279) Here, moral achievement within the lineage was rendered permanent through inscription, turning virtue into textual continuity. By 1935, the Preface to the Donation Register of the Qiongya Chen Clan Association 《琼崖陈氏公会发起人乐捐筹备费芳名表弁言》 expressed this communal ideal in explicitly social terms: “There is no virtue greater than that which arises from the collective; through unity comes communication, through communication comes wisdom, and through wisdom comes strength.”德莫善于群，群故通，通故智，智故强。”(Chen and Chen 1970, p. 281). By this stage, the orientation of merit had shifted decisively—from divine resonance to collective self-realization. Merit no longer functioned solely as a religious transaction between human and deity; it became the ethical foundation upon which social cohesion, historical consciousness, and communal identity were built. In this transformation, merit completed its evolution from cosmic reciprocity to social ethics, and finally to historical memory, serving as a symbolic resource through which the Chinese diaspora continually reaffirmed its moral unity and transgenerational continuity.

4. The Modern Reinterpretation and Cultural Regeneration of Daoism

4.1. From “Superstition” to “Civilized Morality”

In early twentieth-century Singapore, Daoist belief was redefined within the emerging discourse of “civilization versus superstition” as a cultural object that could be governed, classified, and improved. As Talal Asad has observed, religion is not a universal, transhistorical category but a domain produced and regulated within particular political and epistemic formations (Asad 1993). The Singapore case during the late Qing and early Republican periods vividly demonstrates how this process of classification was not simply imported but was actively embraced, reinterpreted, and implemented by overseas Chinese communities themselves. With the spread of modern education and the proliferation of enlightenment discourse through Chinese-language newspapers, traditional Daoist rituals in Singapore were increasingly labeled as cultural remnants requiring reform. Within this new intellectual framework, key Daoist concepts such as deity, Ghost, blessing, and misfortune were reassessed through the binary of civilization and superstition. Leading Chinese newspapers such as Lepo 《叻报》 and Nanyang Siang Pau 《南洋商报》 frequently published essays advocating for the eradication of vulgar customs and the enlightenment of the people’s mind, linking Daoist practices with the depraved habit of fawning upon gods and flattering ghosts while declaring that “the world advances daily in civilization.” This shift reveals how local Chinese elites adopted the language of enlightenment and rationality to redefine religious value. The criterion of legitimacy moved from “lingyan” 灵验 (numinous efficacy) to “social usefulness.” Given that professional Daoist priests began to establish altars and participate more fully in temple affairs in Singapore only from the 1920s, and that documentation on ordinary practitioners before this period is scarce, the surviving sources inevitably foreground elite voices in shaping these reinterpretations.

Yet this transformation did not seek to abolish religion outright; rather, it aimed to achieve “civilized governance” through administrative differentiation and control. A revealing example appeared in Nanyang Siang Pau, which reprinted the Nationalist Government’s “Standards for the Preservation or Abolition of Temples” 神祠存废标准.9 The document began with an explicit call for moral purification. This administrative framework effectively divided Daoism into two categories: a “cultural–ethical” component (such as the veneration of historical figures) deemed worthy of preservation, and a “superstitious–ritual” component (such as talismanic magic and exorcistic rites) targeted for prohibition. In response, temple boards pragmatically adjusted their pantheons and rituals to minimize the risk of official censure. This process offers concrete historical validation of Asad’s claim that “there cannot be a universal definition of religion, not only because its constituent elements and relationships are historically specific, but because that definition is itself the historical product of discursive processes” (Asad 1993, p. 15). In early twentieth-century Singapore, what counted as Daoism was not determined by intrinsic theology or doctrine, but by the hegemonic discursive order that defined civilization and superstition as instruments of modern governance.

The turn toward “civilized governance” in Singapore’s Chinese public sphere soon evolved into a turn toward scientific rationality, extending the critique of Daoism from political rhetoric to epistemic practice. Influenced by both China’s May Fourth Movement and British colonial education, scientific reason became a dominant mode of public discourse in early-twentieth-century Singapore. Chinese-language newspapers began to invoke natural science to demystify the supernatural. An essay in Lat Pau explained, “Ghost fires are merely a manifestation of phosphorus light… How could there truly be ghosts presiding over them?” 鬼火，乃燐光之现象也……岂真有鬼以司之欸。 (Lat Pau, September 1922).10 Another article urged readers to adopt a scientific spirit in scholarship: “The most important thing is the scientific spirit… One would rather err in explanation than allow anything to remain mysterious or unknowable” 最重要者，是科学精神……宁可解释错误，绝不容他为神秘而不可测的。 (Lat Pau, November 1922).11

Such writings show how scientific discourse gradually displaced religious vocabulary in the public sphere, filtering into moral philosophy and economic ethics alike. Critiques of Daoist ritual were often articulated in tandem with emerging ideas of economic rationality. Commentators meticulously enumerated temple incense fees and festival expenditures, ridiculing devotees who “spend useful money to purchase meaningless vanity—a folly indeed worthy of lament.” 以有用之金钱博此无谓之虚名，其愚诚堪慨叹。 (Nanyang Siang Pau, September 1925).12 They further condemned the enormous costs involved, noting that “each temple festival causes losses of tens of thousands of dollars to society.”一次赛会，社会上的损失，总要有数万元。 (Lat Pau, June 1922).13 Within this moral economy, belief was expected to serve public welfare, and ritual to embody thrift and utility. Xianghuo 香火 (incense offerings) and saihui 赛会 (ritual festivals) were recast as “wasteful consumption”, and reformist writers urged that religious spending should be redirected toward legitimate public causes. Under the gaze of modernity—and particularly under what might be termed fiscal rationality—the social role and epistemic authority of religion were fundamentally restructured. From a sociology-of-knowledge perspective, this amounted to a redistribution of epistemic authority: science, economics, and education supplanted traditional religion as the new “secular faiths,” while Daoism and other popular traditions were relegated to the realm of the “backward” or “superstitious.” As Peter van der Veer reminds us, the modernization of Asia was not a unidirectional process of secularization but a reciprocal negotiation between the religious and the secular (Peter van der Veer 2016). The efforts of Singapore’s Chinese intellectuals to articulate a rationalized understanding of faith through the press exemplify precisely this form of negotiation—an attempt to secure legitimacy for Daoism within the moral and epistemic order of modern public life.

4.2. Rationalization and the Re-Interpretation of Knowledge

From the late nineteenth to the early twentieth century, Chinese communities in colonial Singapore redefined Daoism from a religion centered on divine manifestation and spirit mediation into one grounded in rational interpretation—the principle of nature. Chinese elites within the diaspora consciously adopted a strategy of selective rationalization, seeking to detach Daoism from popular practices of spirit summoning 求仙问鬼 and to highlight its philosophical lineage in the Tao Te Ching and the Zhuangzi 《庄子》. Through this re-emphasis on textual and conceptual foundations, they sought to reposition Daoism as a system of moral philosophy compatible with modern reason. This approach resonated with the “philosophization of Daoism” championed in late-Qing China by reformers such as Liang Qichao 梁启超 and Zhang Taiyan 章太炎. Yet in Singapore’s colonial setting, the movement acquired an additional political dimension: it enabled the overseas Chinese intelligentsia to reclaim discursive agency within a rational order defined by colonial epistemology. By presenting Daoism as an intellectual tradition rather than a set of “superstitious” rites, they asserted that Chinese civilization possessed its own mode of reason.

A representative example appeared in Lat Pau, in an article titled “San Jiao Yuanliu Shuo” 《三教源流说》. The text argues that “Laozi composed the more than five thousand characters of the Daodejing with xu 虚 (emptiness) and wu 无 (nonbeing) as its core principles… Daoism takes Laozi as its founder, and Laozi, in turn, takes wu 无 (nonbeing) as his fundamental tenet; thus wu is the true orthodox principle (zhengzong 正宗) of the Dao.” 老子着《道德经》五千余言，以虚无为宗……道教以老子为宗，而老以无为宗，无乃道之正宗也。 (Lat Pau, May 1893).14 He continued emphasizing a historiographical mode of reasoning: “To determine origins and authenticity, one must rely upon historical transmission; other popular accounts are filled with falsehoods.” 欲正定本末，当以史传为据，其他俗说文多虚妄。 (Lat Pau, May 1893).15 The article further dismissed much of the Daozang 道藏 as “spurious writings falsely attributed to Zhang Daoling and others” and “Ling Fu Xian Lu” as “heterodox arts.” 张道龄等私撰伪托之文，灵符仙箓为旁门左道。 (Lat Pau, 19 May 1893).16 By distinguishing between orthodox philosophy and heterodox magic, such writings actively distanced Daoism from ritual practices vulnerable to scientific criticism while preserving its philosophical system centered on natural principle. This mode of discourse—defining cultural legitimacy through epistemic differentiation—reveals the agency of diasporic elites navigating multiple regimes of knowledge. Rather than passively absorbing the shocks of modernity, they rewrote the meaning of the Dao itself to reconstruct a civilizational narrative on their own terms. This intellectual shift also marked a semantic transformation of Daoism within the overseas Chinese context. No longer validated through miracles or divine efficacy, Daoism entered the modern knowledge system through philosophical exegesis and textual criticism. In this new framework, Daoism in Singapore emerged as a “rationally interpretable religion”—a tradition capable of moral reasoning and intellectual dialog—allowing Chinese elites to reaffirm both the dignity of Chinese thought and the subjectivity of Chinese culture within the epistemic order of colonial modernity.

Within this rationalizing context, overseas Chinese intellectuals in Singapore reinterpreted Daoism through philosophical and historiographical approaches, transforming it into an intellectual tradition compatible with modern academic discourse. The first shift was a philosophical reorientation of Daoist thought. In the Lat Pau literary columns, writers began to articulate Daoist cosmology in the language of natural philosophy. One article stated, “From the wuji (无极) arises the taiji 太极, which generates Heaven, Earth, and humankind.”本无极而太极，生天生地生人。 (Lat Pau, 17 October 1892)17. Here, the traditional doctrine of tian ren gan ying 天人感应 was absorbed into a rational cosmological framework. Likewise, the notion of xiudao 修道 was redefined as a pursuit of intellectual and moral inquiry rather than divine intervention: “To cultivate the Great Dao 大道, to manifest the subtle efficacy of wuwei, and to probe the ultimate principles that reveal the secret mechanisms of creation.”修大道发无为之妙用，穷至理泄造化之秘机。 (Lat Pau, January 1895).18

Such reformulations reveal a transformation from religious devotion to philosophical reflection, recasting Daoism as a moral and cosmological philosophy rather than a ritual practice of spiritual mediation. Singaporean Chinese intellectuals further legitimized Daoist thought by drawing on contemporary scholarship that emphasized philological and historical critique. The Nanyang Siang Pau published an essay on 20 January 1928, citing the scholar Liu Rendao 刘仁道, who argued that “The teachings of the Huainanzi cannot serve as authoritative instruction, for Daoism and Confucianism are not divided by refinement or crudity.” 故《淮南》之说不能为训，道儒本无精粗之分焉。 (Nanyang Siang Pau, January 1928).19 Liu contended that the Huainanzi’s critique of Confucianism oversimplified its doctrine, for Han dynasty Confucians had “lost the spirit of Confucius himself.” The Huainanzi, he maintained, targeted the bureaucratized Confucianism of the Han, not the ethical core of the sage’s teaching. By invoking such modern scholarship, the overseas Chinese intelligentsia advanced a view that the distinction between Daoism and Confucianism as “refined” versus “coarse” was both epistemically flawed and historically contingent. The two shared a common intellectual foundation, differing only in emphasis and historical development. This interpretive stance freed Daoism from its long-standing opposition to Confucianism and reframed both as complementary traditions of knowledge. As a result, Daoist thought could now be positioned as a philosophical resource of plural epistemic value, resonating with modern academic tendencies to read classical traditions as dialogical and mutually illuminating rather than oppositional.

An even deeper transformation occurred with the rise in philological scholarship and historical verification. The 1892 article “Shu Jia Shen Sha Bian” 《术家神煞辩》 exemplified this intellectualization of Daoist knowledge: “Fuxi 伏羲 obtained the Hetu 河图 and observed the generative sequence of the Five Phases, from which he composed the Ba gua八卦 (the Eight Trigrams) … King Wen rearranged the trigrams according to the post-celestial order, aligning the pre-celestial with the River Chart and the post-celestial with the Luoshu (洛书). … Nowhere did the sages speak of ‘astrological spirits.’” 伏羲得河图，观五行相生之序，以合生成作八卦……文王更易先天方位演后天八卦，先天合河图，后天合洛书……未尝有言及神煞者。 (Lat Pau, 1892). The mysterious “shushu” 术数 were rationalized into a system of shuli 数理 grounded in empirical observation. Such reinterpretations exemplified the transformation of Daoism into an object of rational hermeneutics, suitable for discussion within modern scholarly frameworks. Through these dual paths of philosophical abstraction and philological scholarship, the Chinese community in Singapore accomplished a modern reconstruction of Daoism. Daoism was reconstituted as a body of knowledge that could be analyzed, interpreted, and defended—no longer merely believed or performed. This “knowledge turn” not only aligned Daoism with modern scientific and historical reasoning but also allowed it to persist as a living intellectual tradition. This process was not unique to Singapore. As Di (2023, p. 118) observes, since the late nineteenth century Daoist ideas—particularly those of Laozi and Zhuangzi—have been reinterpreted across China, Japan, and Europe as a source of modern philosophical vitality, regarded as “an advanced and revolutionary school” that gained new life through literary and artistic reinvention. This transcultural revival demonstrates that Daoist philosophy continues to adapt and regenerate across social and epistemic boundaries. Its modernization, therefore, does not represent the decline of religion but the ongoing transformation and renewal of intellectual life.

4.3. The Scholarly Turn: Textual Verification and Rational Hermeneutics

In the early twentieth century, overseas Chinese elites sought to align Daoist ritual life with the emerging language of philanthropy and civic responsibility, thereby reasserting its legitimacy in a modernizing world. A 1922 commentary in Lat Pau urged that expenditures for deity festivals should be redirected toward socially beneficial causes: “If the expenses for offerings to the gods were allocated to the following purposes, both the nation and society would benefit: (1) reserved as tuition for one’s children; (2) used to subsidize schools; (3) invested in the Jiaozhou–Jinan Railway; (4) donated to charitable funds.”移作下列各项之用度，则国家社会交受其惠矣，一留为子女将来之学费；二资助学校；三投资胶济铁路；四移作慈善费。 (Lat Pau, 1922)20. This reinterpretation reframed the traditional Daoist notion of merit in modern terms such as “charity,” “education,” and “public service,” granting ritual expenditure a new moral and civic justification. Even under the pressures of modernization, large communal ceremonies retained remarkable mobilizing power. In 1933, Nanyang Siang Pau reported on a grand jiao 醮 festival in Melaka that successfully solicited donations from the entire town, “Donations were solicited from all residents to raise a great fund for the enterprise; the ten-yearly jiao festival, deeply rooted in the Chinese community’s devotional habits, attracted hundreds of worshippers each day.” 向合埠居民劝捐，以集巨资而成斯举……十年一度之閤埠建醮，善男信进香日有数百。 (Nanyang Siang Pau, May 1933).21 Such restrictions reveal the ritual’s temporary yet potent authority over social and economic life.22

As modern civic discourse expanded, adaptations of this kind became increasingly subtle. In the same year, the board of Bishan Ting rejected a proposal to hold a “wanrenyuan jian jiao” 万人缘建醮 (mass jiao-offering for public participation) to raise funds for road repair, dismissing it as “superstitious.” Instead, the board approved an alternative plan—a “Bishan Ting Fund-Raising and Road-Repair Fair”—that achieved the same ends under the guise of modern civic entertainment. The minutes recorded, “The Bishan Ting assembly discussed the proposal for a ten-thousand-person jiào to raise funds for road repair. The proposal, deemed superstitious, could not be passed; however, approval was granted to organize a ‘Bishan Ting Fund-Raising and Road-Repair Fair,’ and the board of directors was authorized to carry it out.” 碧山亭同人大会讨论万人缘建醮筹款修路事，事属迷信不能通过，但通过组织碧山亭筹款修路游艺会，授权董事部办理。 (Nanyang Siang Pau, April 1933).23 This case exemplifies how local organizations repackaged ritual in modern idioms to preserve its collective efficacy while satisfying the new moral expectations of a secular, bureaucratic order. By framing the “recreational fair” 游艺会, Daoist practice acquired a secular façade that allowed it to persist within the language of “progress” and “public welfare.” The result was not the disappearance of ritual but its rearticulation—a transformation that maintained its social vitality while embedding it within the moral economy of civic modernity.

Within the intersecting discourses of colonial governance and Enlightenment rationality, Daoism was gradually reconstituted as a moral and cultural symbol of collective order and Chinese identity. An illustrative example appears in Lat Pau in 1909, in the article “Reflections on the Seventh-Month Ghost Festival in Singapore” 《观叻地七月祀鬼事感言》. On the one hand, it criticized what it described as the deep-rooted superstitious customs of Chinese society: “For generations, our people have maintained the vulgar habit of believing in divine authority. All mysterious and unfounded tales are accepted without question… Even those who have long resided overseas and claim to have breathed the air of civilization behave no differently. The belief in divine power has permeated the very bones and marrow of the Chinese people for more than two thousand years.” 向有迷信神权陋习，凡属幽眇无稽之说，咸皆坚信而不疑……即羁旅外洋，所谓饱吸文明之空气者，亦皆如是。盖神权之说，深中于中国人之脑筋骨髓者，已两千年矣。 (Lat Pau, September 1909).24

Yet, the same text also urged that certain ritual practices should be retained to “compensate for what politics cannot reach” 留之以补政治所不能及者, proposing that religious functions supplement the moral and administrative limits of state power. This notion was not mere rhetoric but reflected the lived realities of community organization. When a plague struck Singapore in 1911, the rickshaw-puller communities of Fuqing and Xinghua responded through collective ritual action:

“Believing that the epidemic was caused by malevolent spirits, they organized a procession to expel the ghosts… More than ten thousand people eagerly contributed, quickly raising between twenty and thirty thousand dollars. For two consecutive nights, the deities were carried in procession through the small and large Chinese quarters of Singapore.” 怀疑瘟疫流行乃鬼怪作崇之故，遂组织巡游以驱厉鬼……约万余人踊跃投资，很快便筹集到两三万元，并连续两夜在新加坡的小坡和大坡奉神出游。 (Lat Pau, 25 November 1911).25 This episode substantiates Mayfair Yang’s insight that “religious revival and ritual expenditure provide the basis for the reconstruction of an indigenous form of ‘civil society’” (Yang 2020, p. 314). In the absence of official intervention, the rickshaw-puller associations—among the most marginalized labor groups in colonial society—utilized Daoist ritual as a mechanism of social coordination, independently managing fundraising, organization, and public engagement. Through ritual, they achieved what may be termed grassroots governance, providing an alternative framework of community regulation and mutual aid beyond the formal state apparatus.

Such cases illustrate how elements once condemned as superstition were redefined as instruments of social ethics and moral governance. Moreover, Lat Pau and other Chinese newspapers strategically engaged in cross-cultural comparisons to challenge Western cultural hegemony, asserting that “superstition is no less prevalent in the West, and in fact is often deeper and more absurd than among the Chinese” and “Even in Western societies, superstition persists, and the depth and eccentricity of such beliefs are often greater than among the Chinese.” 迷信之深且僻，实尤甚于华人。 (Lat Pau, September 1909). Through such rhetorical negotiation and public discourse, Singapore’s Chinese intelligentsia recast Daoism not merely as a religious belief but as a moral and cultural resource integral to collective identity. In this sense, Daoist ritual practices became intertwined with the modern colonial project of “civilized governance,” suggesting that, as Chee-Kiong Tong pointed out, “The structural and social transformations in Singapore society has resulted in modifications and adaptations of beliefs and ritual performance, but not in the decline of the importance of religion.” (Tong 2007, p. 266). The Singapore case vividly exemplifies this paradoxical dynamic, where Daoism’s domestication under modern rationality also provided the very conditions for its cultural regeneration as a moral community.

5. Conclusions

From the late Qing to the early Republican era, the reception and regeneration of Daoism within Singapore’s Chinese diaspora were not merely an extension of inherited belief but a renewal of Daoist knowledge and practice. Following the disintegration of the Qing state’s ritual system, Daoism shifted from an orthodox sacrificial order (正祀体系) to a constellation of localized and communal practices. Within this process, temples, yi zhong, and merit inscriptions became new mediums through which Daoism was reinterpreted as a moral and administrative language that structured social order in the diasporic community. Colonial administrative frameworks and Chinese-language enlightenment discourses jointly redefined “religion” within a binary of “civilization versus superstition.” Daoism, as a result, was recategorized as an object of governance and moral instruction. Yet, the overseas Chinese were not passive subjects of this epistemic reordering. They actively negotiated between the demands of rationalization and the realities of social life, reshaping Daoism through both intellectual reinterpretation and ritual adaptation. On one level, the intellectual elite rearticulated Dao through the methods of philosophy and philology, transforming it into a cosmological principle compatible with modern systems of thought. On another, Daoist ritual practices—integrated into festivals, education, and philanthropy—assumed new social and ethical functions, becoming the moral foundation of communal life.

This trajectory reveals that the modernization of Daoism was not a one-way process of disenchantment, but rather a re-enchantment achieved through cross-cultural negotiation. Here, “re-enchantment” does not suggest the revival of supernatural miracles; it refers to the institutional and epistemic regeneration of Daoist symbols within new social frameworks. Recast in the idioms of education, charity, and civic ethics, Daoism continued to infuse everyday moral life, providing an implicit logic for maintaining community cohesion and cultural identity. The Singapore experience demonstrates that the modernization of Daoism did not signify the decline of religious vitality. Instead, it marked a process of re-semanticization and re-socialization, through which Daoism adapted to modern colonial and intellectual contexts. In this regard, the overseas regeneration of Daoism not only extends Talal Asad’s analytical vision of religious discourse but also substantiates Peter van der Veer’s concept of multiple religious modernities. It shows how Daoism, through localized intellectual practices and social mechanisms, continued to generate new meanings and vitality within modernity. Ultimately, this history reminds us that Southeast Asian Chinese communities were not peripheral to modernity, but central arenas where religious modernity was renegotiated and rewritten.