Cao Dai (religious movement)

Motto: From one, emanate many; from many, emanates one

Formation: 1926

Founder: Ngo Van Chieu

Cao Dai is a Vietnamese religious movement that combines elements of major Eastern and Western religious traditions. Its formal name is Dai Dao Tam Ky Pho Do. Because it combines beliefs and structures from a variety of sources with the intention of honoring all of them, Cao Dai is called a syncretist movement. (The noun form of this term, syncretism, means "a combination of different beliefs or practices.")

The tradition includes elements from a variety of sources. Among its sources are the theories of karma and the cycle of death and rebirth from Buddhism; the ethics and moral code of Confucianism; the spiritualism of Taoism; and the organizational structure of Roman Catholicism, including a pope, cardinals, and archbishops. Cao Dai has a pantheon of saints that includes such figures as Muhammad, Jesus Christ, Buddha, Confucius, Julius Caesar, Pericles, Joan of Arc, Sun Yat-sen, Victor Hugo, and Thomas Jefferson.

It is also highly nationalistic. After it was organized as a religion in 1926, Cao Dai became a political and military force when Japan invaded Indochina in 1940. Despite the nationalistic overtones, however, Cao Dai is open to all spiritual teachings and all people. Its stated goal is to bring harmony to the world through a common vision of the Supreme Being. Believers embrace the idea that true love and justice among individuals will lead to harmony on Earth, as well as individual spiritual liberation.

In 2024, official estimates were not readily available, but adherents are claimed to number between two and six million. The headquarters of Cao Dai are at Tay Ninh, which is near Ho Chi Minh City in southern Vietnam. The majority of Caodaists are located in the Mekong Delta in Vietnam, but followers are also located in Cambodia, Canada, the United States, Australia, and France. In 2015, a new Cao Dai temple built in Houston, Texas, became one of the largest to exist outside of Vietnam and represented Cao Dai's continued influence into the twenty-first century.

History

Ngo Van Chieu was a civil service administrator for the French colonial government in French Indochina, which eventually became Vietnam. During a table-moving séance in 1919, Chieu received a message from the Supreme Deity. This milestone event in his life led him to become the prophet of a new religion, which was formally established in 1926. Adherents say the following message was received in 1926:

Nhien Dang Co Phat (Dipankara, an old time Buddha) is Me,

Sakya Muni is Me,

Thai Thuong Nguon Thi (an old time Immortal) is Me,

Who is Cao Dai.

Caodaists believe the 1926 beginning of the religion marked the beginning of Tam Ky Pho Do, or the Third Period of Salvation. This period marks the third alliance between humanity and God. The first alliance occurred around the time that Judaism and Hinduism were founded. The second was at about the same time that Christianity, Buddhism, Confucianism, and Taoism began. Cao Dai is the final alliance, representing the religion that unifies the message of all previous religions, thus uniting humanity in harmony.

Nonetheless, although it has a universalist message, Cao Dai was a nationalistic movement in Vietnam. The movement raised an army to resist the Japanese during World War II. The army may have been as large as 25,000 men in the 1950s. Initially, the Cao Dai leaders sided with the anticolonial movements that helped to gain independence from the French. It supported but then opposed South Vietnam’s premier Ngo Dinh Diem. Its army was disbanded in the 1950s, and the group’s sole pope, Pham Cong Tac, was forced into exile.

Cao Dai priests did not support the Viet Cong during the Vietnam War, which pitted North Vietnam against the United States, and the movement was repressed after the country was reunified in 1975. But Cao Dai survived in exile communities, and the confiscated temple and lands in Tay Ninh were finally returned in 1985.

Beliefs and Practices

According to its website, two principles guide Cao Dai beliefs and rituals: "All religions have one same principle, and one same origin," and "the Universe and all things are bestowed with God’s Spirit." In practice, the movement combines the ethical concepts of Confucianism with ideas of karma and rebirth in Buddhism, as well as some influence from Christian Roman Catholicism. It also incorporates the yin-yang balance between good and bad forces in Taoism, as well as that system’s occult belief in communication with the dead.

Caodaists believe that humanity has suffered whenever societies have descended into chaos, and also each time a new religion is born. Cao Dai seeks to unite the new religion with the rest of humanity through a common vision of the Supreme Being. The hope is not for a single religion, but for a tolerant world in which all people recognize the Supreme Being within one another. Cao Dai means "High Tower," which is a Taoist name for the supreme god. The movement’s saints are diverse and honored in Cao Dai temples, as are adherents’ ancestors. Although the hierarchy of Cao Dai is modeled on the Roman Catholic Church, priests may be men or women. Group prayer in the temple as well as rituals and festivals are forms of worship. The goal is to divest oneself of the so-called interior self in search of oneness with the Supreme Being. Monks and priests focus on meditation, but laypeople practice the religion as well. All adherents are thus expected to:

adhere to the Confucian three duties and five virtues;

practice good while avoiding evil;

observe the Five Precepts (do not kill, do not steal, do not commit adultery, do not get drunk, do not sin by word);

purify the body and spirit at least ten days each month by practicing vegetarianism and avoiding killing living things;

worship the Supreme Being four times each day—every six hours beginning at 6 a.m. At least one daily ceremony is to be conducted at home.

Caodaist monks living in the Tay Ninh temple wear white robes. The temple features images of Jesus, Buddha, and Confucius, plus the all-seeing Divine Eye. This symbol of the Supreme Being is an eye within a triangle. The temple complex includes 188 acres with dormitories for priests, a hospital, a high school, and space for meditation as well as religious processions and ceremonies.

Bibliography

Beck, Ngasha, and H. D. Bui. CaoDai: Faith of Unity. Emerald Wave, 2000.

Blagov, Sergei. Caodaism: Vietnamese Traditionalism and Its Leap into Modernity. Nova Science Publishers, 2012.

"'Cao Dai Great Temple' by Mark Indig." Frames, 30 Apr. 2022, readframes.com/cao-dai-great-temple-by-mark-indig/. Accessed 28 Oct. 2024.

"Cao Dai Teachings."Dai Dao Tam Ky Pho Do, CaoDai.org, 2019, www.caodai.org/p107/caodai-teachings. Accessed 28 Oct. 2024.

Eller, Jack David. Introducing Anthropology of Religion. Routledge, 2007.

Gobron, Gabriel. History and Philosophy of Caodaism. Wildside Press, 2008.

Goossaert, Vincent, and David A. Palmer. The Religious Question in Modern China. U of Chicago P, 2011.

Hoskins, Janet Alison. "‘God’s Chosen People’: Race, Religion and Anti-Colonial Struggle in French Indochina." Asia Research Institute, Working Paper Series No. 189, Natl. U of Singapore, 2012.

Hoskins, Janet Alison. The Divine Eye and the Diaspora: Vietnamese Syncretism Becomes Transpacific Caodaism. U of Hawaii P, 2015.

Jammes, Jeremy. "Divination and Politics in Southern Vietnam: Roots of Caodaism." Social Compass, vol. 57, no.3, 2010, pp. 357–71.

Tolson, Mike. "'From Nothingness' to Largest of Its Kind in America." Houston Chronicle, 6 Sept. 2015, www.houstonchronicle.com/news/houston-texas/houston/article/From-nothingness-to-largest-of-its-kind-in-6488654.php. Accessed 28 Oct. 2024.