At Stone Pavilion Dam in Kuaiji there stands a great maple tree.
The trunk has rotted and is hollow; so whenever it rains, a hole in the tree becomes filled with water. A merchant passing here with a load of eels put one eel in the rotten tree for fun.
Since eels do not grow on trees, when the villagers saw it they were sure it must be holy.
They built a temple by the tree, slaughtered cattle to sacrifice every day, and called the place The Temple of Father Eel. They believed that those who prayed at the shrine would immediately have good fortune, while those who offended the god would be overtaken by calamity.
When the merchant came back this way and saw what had happened, he took the eel to make eel broth. And so it ceased being holy.
Allegorical Meaning
This story serves as a sharp critique of blind superstition, the human tendency to deify the unexplained, and how easily collective delusion can be manufactured and dismantled.
The Manufacture of Divinity
The hollow tree becomes sacred not through inherent power, but through human projection. The villagers’ assumption that “fish don’t belong in trees” (a flawed premise, as some fish like mudskippers do climb) demonstrates how superstition transforms mundane accidents into divine signs.
The Economics of Belief
The merchant’s joke exposes religion as a transactional system:
- Supply: The accidental “miracle” (a fish in a tree)
- Demand: Villagers’ need for supernatural explanations
- Infrastructure: Temple construction and ritual sacrifices
The immediate “cause-effect” relationship between prayers/mockery and “blessings/curses” mirrors how confirmation bias sustains faith.
The Fragility of Illusions
The abrupt end when the merchant reclaims his fish parallels how:
- Religious systems collapse when their material origins are exposed
- Social constructs depend on collective suspension of disbelief
- Power resides not in the sacred object but in believers’ perception
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