Mazu or Matsu is a Chinese sea goddess also known by several other names and titles. Mazu is the deified form of Lin Moniang, a shamaness from Fujian who is said to have lived in the late 10th century. After her death, she became revered as a tutelary deity of Chinese seafarers, including fishermen and sailors. Her worship spread throughout China's coastal regions and overseas Chinese communities throughout Southeast Asia, where some Mazuist temples are affiliated with famous Taiwanese temples. Mazu was traditionally thought to roam the seas, protecting her believers through miraculous interventions. She is now generally regarded by her believers as a powerful and benevolent Queen of Heaven.
Mazu worship is popular in Taiwan because many early Chinese settlers in Taiwan were Hoklo people from Fujian. Her temple festival is a major event in Taiwan, with the largest celebrations occurring in and around her temples at Dajia and Beigang. Under Xi Jinping, Mazu-related pilgrimages have become an avenue for Chinese Communist Party influence operations to promote Chinese unification.
Names and titles
In addition to Mazu or Ma-tsu, meaning "Maternal Ancestor" "Mother", "Granny", or "Grandmother", Lin Moniang is worshipped under various other names and titles:
Mazupo ("Granny Mazu") or Ma Cho Po in Hokkien, a popular name in Fujian
A-Ma, also spelled Ah-Ma ("Mother" or "Grandmother"), a popular name in Macau
Linghui Furen ("Lady of Numinous Grace"), an official title conferred in 1156. Linghui Fei ("Princess of Numinous Grace"), an official title conferred in 1192. Tianfei ("Princess of Heaven", Wu Chinese: Thi-fi), fully Huguo Mingzhu Tianfei ("Illuminating Princess of Heaven who Protects the Nation"), an official title conferred in 1281. Huguo Bimin Miaoling Zhaoying Hongren Puji Tianfei ("Heavenly Princess who Protects the Nation and Shelters the People, of Marvelous Numen, Brilliant Resonance, Magnanimous Kindness, and Universal Salvation"), an official title conferred in 1409. Tianhou or Tianhou Shengmu (title used mostly in Mainland China, Hong Kong, and Vietnam), also called Tin Hau in Cantonese, Thean Hou in Min Chinese and Thiên Hậu in Vietnamese (天后, literally meaning: "Queen/Empress of Heaven"), an official title conferred in 1683. Tianshang Shengmu ("Holy Heavenly Mother"; title used mostly in Taiwan) Tongxian Lingnü ("Worthy & Efficacious Lady") Shennü ("Divine Woman") Zhaoxiao Chunzheng Fuji Ganying Shengfei ("Holy Princess of Clear Piety, Pure Faith, and Helpful Response"), an official title conferred during the reign of the Hongwu Emperor of the Ming.
Although many of Mazu's temples honor her titles Tianhou and Tianfei, it became customary to never pray to her under those names during an emergency since it was believed that, hearing one of her formal titles, Mazu might feel obligated to groom and dress herself as properly befitting her station before receiving the petition. Prayers invoking her as Mazu were thought to be answered more quickly.
History
Very little is known of the historical Lin Moniang. She was apparently a shamaness from a small fishing village on Meizhou Island, part of Fujian's Putian County, in the late 10th century. She probably did not live there, however, but on the nearby mainland. During this era, Fujian was greatly sinicized by influxes of refugees fleeing invasions of northern China and it has been hypothesised that Mazu's cult represented a hybridization of Chinese and native indigenous culture. The earliest record of her cult is from two centuries later, an 1150 inscription that mentions "she could foretell a man's good and ill luck" and, "after her death, the people erected a temple for her on her home island".
Legend
The legends around Lin Moniang's life were broadly established by the 12th century.
She was said to have been born under the reign of the Quanzhounese warlord Liu Congxiao (.962), in the Min Kingdom, which eventually developed into the specific date of the 23rd day of the third month of the Chinese lunar calendar in AD960, the first year of the Song. The late Ming Great Collection of the Three Teachings' Origin and Development and Research into the Divine, however, placed her birth much earlier, in 742.