Corpse Driving
Corpse Driving. Among the three great ancient mysteries of Xiangxi, corpse driving is the most mysterious. In the late 1940s, on Guniu Bei Mountain opposite Dongting Creek, a man who carried kiln wares died of a sudden illness in Mushan Village of present-day Yuanguping Town, Yongding District. With no hands at home to carry the body back, a clansman went to the Jin family altar and asked the presiding wizard, Old Jin Jiu, to help drive the corpse...
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Driving Corpses
Among the three great ancient mysteries of Xiangxi, corpse driving is the most mysterious.
In the late 1940s, on Guniu Bei Mountain opposite Dongting Creek, there was a man who carried kiln wares. He died of a sudden illness in Mushan Village, Yuanguping Town, present-day Yongding District. The family lacked manpower and could not carry the corpse back. A clansman came to the Jin Family Thunder Altar and asked the presiding wizard, Jin Jiugong, to help drive the corpse back. Before setting out, Jin Jiugong first divined in the main hall and invoked the masters; only after the masters responded did he set off. After arriving at Mushan, Jin Jiugong washed his face and hands, took out talismans and a command tablet, and set up a temporary thunder altar beside the corpse—without beating gongs and drums, and without performing a full ritual. After circling the corpse once, he drew several characters, turned the deceased over, then took a rooster that had just begun to crow, bit open its comb, and dripped the blood into a bowl of water. Chanting incantations and forming hand gestures, he held the ritual water, then used the command tablet to draw several characters above the water bowl. His eyes flew open, his right foot stamped, the command tablet struck the altar table with a bang, and he sprayed three mouthfuls of ritual water at the corpse, shouting: "Beast, arise!" The so-called "beast"—it is said that after death, the corpse has already become a beast, or that after death, some have already been reborn as animals, hence the term "beast." As soon as Jin Jiugong's voice fell, the corpse began to tremble slowly. Jin Jiugong stepped forward and lifted the deceased's head, covering the face with a piece of black cloth, saying that ghosts fear the sun, and also to prevent people on the road from being frightened. Jin Jiugong then placed a broken bamboo hat on the corpse's head and a pair of old straw sandals on its feet. After the corpse sat up, Jin Jiugong drew several more characters on its head, sprayed another mouthful of water, stamped his foot again and shouted: "Beast, stand up!" In the blink of an eye, Jin Jiugong struck the corpse's back with the command tablet in his right hand, and the corpse stood up as if electrified, frightening the onlookers into scattering in all directions, afraid the dead ghost would seize their souls. At this point, Jin Jiugong trod the dipper steps, formed hand gestures, circled the corpse three more times, drew several characters on the corpse's feet, sprayed a few mouthfuls of water toward the deceased's face, then took leave of the local earth god and called on the road gods along the way to clear the path. Next, with a peach branch he had prepared in advance, he lashed the deceased's back with a "crack," shouting three times: "Beast, on the road!" The deceased was seen stiffly hopping forward step by step out of the drying yard where it had lain. Jin Jiugong clasped his fists in farewell to the audience whose souls had just settled, and waving the peach branch, drove the corpse onto the road. His son and the deceased's brother followed behind Jiugong, walking in trepidation.
The corpse did not walk like a living person stepping, but hopped forward step by step. When encountering steps or going up or down slopes, Jiugong would call "Beast, halt!" and the corpse would stand still. At this point, Jiugong would have the brother carry the corpse back-to-back up or down the slope. If they came to a fork in the road, and the route was to the left, Jiugong would pat the corpse's right side with the peach branch and say to go right, and the corpse would hop to the right; vice versa. The corpse was very obedient, truly like a living person. Because the mountain road was rugged, the corpse walked very slowly, and it took three full days to reach Wujiawan Village in Qijiaping Township. That day, hundreds of people gathered by the Jin clan ancestral hall and along both sides of the road to watch, blocking the way out. Jiugong clasped his hands to the villagers and said: "The beast has come, please make way!" The terrified crowd immediately parted with a swish, and the corpse hopped through the opening. On the road, if Jin Jiugong was tired or wanted to smoke a pipe, he would have the corpse lean against a dirt bank or rock ledge by the roadside; if lodging for the night, he would lean the corpse against the wooden wall under someone's eaves. Originally less than two days' journey from Mushan to Guniu Bei, Jiugong drove the corpse for seven days before arriving at Guniu Bei. This corpse-driving episode opened the eyes of thousands of people, and so the story still circulates endlessly in this area to this day.
Regarding the story of corpse driving, Shen Congwen said in his essay "The People of Yuanling": "The place of Chenzhou is famous for the Chenzhou Talisman, and among the legendary miracles of the Chenzhou Talisman, corpse driving is the most renowned." "As for the legend of corpse driving, it is truly moving." And the "magic power" of corpse driving, as Shen Congwen wrote in his book: "The movement of a corpse also requires water sprinkled facing it." But what exactly the Chenzhou Talisman is, and why it can drive corpses to walk, has always been an unbreakable heavenly secret. Because it cannot be explained by scientific methods, the eternal mystery of corpse driving, which has fascinated scholars at home and abroad, was lost amid the campaign to "eliminate superstition."