My Near Encounter with Ancestor Worship

This is a blog post I wrote during a trip to Hawaii way back in January 2007. Since I'm in Hawaii now, I decided this would be a good time to post it on this blog - especially since I had a similar experience this past Friday.

My Near Encounter with Ancestor Worship

Every year since 1957 the United Chinese Society of Hawaii has bestowed “Model Parent” awards to a Chinese father and mother. This year the USC wished to honor the 100 model parents of the last fifty years. In addition, the UCS wanted to recognize the great-grandchildren of these model parents - "the future of the worldwide Chinese community.” 

My great-grandfather, Koon Keong Kam (1897-1984), was chosen as the Model Father of 1966. My grandmother was asked to receive the honor on his behalf. My brother and I, the great-grandchildren of K.K. Kam, were also invited to be recognized at the gala event. We had no desire to attend, but we knew it would make our grandmother happy. Plus, we would get to hear a concert by the Royal Hawaiian Band and see a traditional Chinese lion dance. 

After about 45 minutes of introductions and greetings, swimming through the chaotic sea of 1,100 Chinese honorees and their descendants, the preparations for the lion dance commenced. The bright colors, the exotic percussion instruments, and the elaborate costumes piqued my excitement, and I was looking forward to seeing a real Chinese lion dance. But as the lion dance was about to begin I noticed something curious: the lion-dancers were burning sticks of incense and arranging a platter of fruit in the middle of the stage. At that moment, the question hit me like a sack of won ton: Is the lion dance a form of entertainment or a religious ceremony?

I turned around and asked one UCS officials, “Excuse me, but is the lion dance a religious ceremony?” “Well,” she said, “in a sense ... yes.” I tried to be more direct, “I was wondering why they are burning incense.” She responded and gestured toward the seated living honorees and the representatives of the deceased, “Well, they are making offerings to the revered ancestors.” In other words, they weren't merely honoring my great-grandfather – they were worshipping him! Just to double-check, my brother asked one of the lion dancers if this was a religious ceremony, and he responded, “Of course!” [1]

That did it. We immediately escaped so as not to violate the prohibition of deriving benefit from the idolatrous ceremony and offerings. Later in the evening we had to make yet another escape when they had a ceremony to "re-summon" the “lion spirit” to come and bestow "blessings of fortune" on the honorees.

The events of last night made me think about the prohibition to derive benefit from objects of avodah zarah (idolatry). This prohibition comes from the underlined part of the following pesukim: 

"The carved images of their gods you shall burn in the fire; you shall not covet and take for yourself the silver and gold that is on them, lest you be ensnared by it, for it is an abomination of Hashem, your God. And you shall not bring an abomination into your house, and become banned like it; you shall surely loathe it and you shall surely abominate it, for it is banned" (Devarim 7:25-26). 

The verse implies that by bringing avodah zarah into our homes, or by deriving benefit from it, we will somehow become corrupted by it. 

On the surface, this seems to be a far-fetched concern, especially in this day and age. Does the Torah really mean to say that if I purchase a small statue of a Chinese lion because I like the way it looks, without any idolatrous intentions, I will somehow come to worship avodah zarah?

Sforno [2] provides an answer to this question. He explains:

lest you be ensnared by it - for sometimes it will happen that this gold and silver will bring you success, and you will think that it is because of the power of the avodah zarah that it was on.

In other words, let's say I buy the Chinese ritual lion statue and keep it in my living room. A few days later, I get a raise in salary. Whether consciously or unconsciously, there is a danger that I will attribute my good fortune to the "power" of my recently acquired avodah zarah, thereby bolstering a belief in supernatural powers - a notion that the entire Torah seeks to uproot. The Torah protects us from this danger by prohibiting us to derive any benefit from avodah zarah.

The experience I had at my great-grandfather's award ceremony and the insight that followed gave me new appreciation of Torah's prohibitions against avodah zarah and helped me realize their relevance even in this generation. 

[1] In case you are interested, according to Wikipedia there are two types of lion dance: the northern style and the southern style. The southern style is a religious ceremony, whereas the northern style (pictured above) is purely a form of entertainment. You can tell the difference by the number of performers and the style of lion: the northern style uses two performers and a Pekinese-like lion, whereas the Southern style typically uses seven or more performers and looks more like a lion or a dragon.

[2] Rabbeinu Ovadiah Sforno, Commentary on Sefer Devarim 7:25