Chen Fu Zhen Ren (; Hokkien: Tan Hu Cin Jin) is an ancestral deity of the Indonesian Chinese people living throughout Banyuwangi Regency, Java, Bali, and Lombok. He is also worshipped by the indigenous population of Bali and Java (Kejawen).
The temples that worship Chen Fu Zhen Ren as their main deity are spread over East Java, Bali, and Lombok; but he is also known by the people of the West Java and other countries (i.e. Singapore, China, and Netherlands) because of trade and academic research.Salmon, Claudine and Sidharta, Myra. June 24, 2000. Kebudayaan Asia-Dari Kapten Hingga Nenek Moyang yang Didewakan: Pemujaan Terhadap Kongco di Jawa Timur dan Bali (Abad ke-18 dan 20).
Name Chen Fu Zhen Ren is a title which means Chen the Truly Man. The title Zhen Ren (or Cin Jin in Hokkien dialect) is translated as Truly Man, while Chen (Hokkien: Tan) is his family name.
Written history There are only two old scriptures which record the life of Chen Fu Zhen Ren, while the other sources have been handed down orally. The first source is a short biography written on a stele of Liong Coan Bio Temple in Probolinggo, East Java. The second is from the Malayan document that is kept at Royal Netherlands Institute of Southeast Asian and Caribbean Studies (KITLV), Leiden, Netherlands. The document had been copied by the grandson of the keeper of Ho Tong Bio Temple in Banyuwangi on June 2, 1880, at Buleleng, Bali. The name of the author cannot be identified.
The stele inscription of Liong Coan Bio Temple, Probolinggo, reads:
The Malayan script tells the life story of Chen Fu Zhen Ren when he was still a human and the legend after he left the world. A summary of the story follows.
Life as a human The script mentions Chen Fu Zhen Ren as Tan Tjien Djien (the Hokkien dialect for his name) the eldest of three brothers. Tan Cin Jin became a captain of a single-poled ship. One day the three of them traveled from Batavia to Bali, but their ship was wrecked at Bali Strait. He was cast ashore at Blambangan’s beach, his second brother was lost in the ocean, the third cast upon the shore of Bali. His worshipers believe that the second brother become a deity at Watu Dodol Beach as Ji Kongtjo (Second Great Grand Father) while the third become a tiger and is called Sa Kongtjo (Third Great Grand Father). That is why the local population, especially those of Fujian origin, believe that no tiger will devour them as the tigers consider them to be their grandchildren.Sa Kongco: Oleh karena itu, semua harimau tidak memakan orang China Hokkien yang mana mereka anggap sebagai cucu mereka (catatan penulis). "That is why, all of the tigers won't eat Fujian Chinese who are considered as their grandchildren". [writer's translation] After that, Tan Tjien Djien went to Kingdom of Blambangan. The script states that at the moment, the Chinese just came at Blambangan State. Salmon and Sidharta interpreted the words as at that time, Chinese people just started to live at the Kingdom of Blambangan; while The Chronicle of Blambangan which was written by Raden Haryo Notodiningrat and Ottolander (1915) states that the Chinese people lived at Blambangan in 1631 CE.Arifin, Winarsih Partaningrat. Babad Blambangan. Yogyakarta, Ecole francaise d'Extreme-Orient & Yayasan Benteng Budaya, 1995. Taken from: Salmon dan Sidharta, 2000. The script does not mention when this happened but it states that the Kingdom of Blambangan became a vassal of the Kingdom of Mengwi, Bali. That fact was used by Salmon and Sidharta to conclude that he had come into Blambangan after 1729 CE, the year when the Kingdom of Buleleng was defeated by the Kingdom of Mengwi and Blambangan became Mengwi's vassal.. Taken from: Salmon dan Sidharta, 2000.
He was accepted by the king of Blambangan and then was asked to build a palace at Macanputih, Banyuwangi (which is now a Probolinggo Sub-district). The palace was so beautiful that the king of Mengwi heard of Tan Cin Jin. At that time, the king of Mengwi had a plan to build a new palace; the king of Blambangan asked Tan Cin Jin to go to Mengwi for that reason. Tan Cin Jin had a precognition that he would be betrayed, so he tried to refuse, but the king insisted that he should go and assured him by swearing a vow: if any misfortune should befall him at Bali, the Kingdom of Blambangan would be far from blessed for many generations. So, reassured, Tan Cin Jin went to Bali and started to build the new palace.
After the palace was half finished, the ministries of Mengwi came to the king and said that actually the local craftsmen could build such a palace, thus the king could save his money as Tan's price was so high. The king felt confused because he had promised to pay, and Tan had come a great distance. The ministries concocted a plan to kill Tan because he had no relatives left to protect or avenge him. The king then sent two men from the Brahmin caste to do the job.
The two officers invited Tan Cin Jin to have a good time at the shore. He came although he knew their true objective. But the officers felt guilty and pitied him. After watching them silently for some time, Tan Cin Jin began the conversation and told them to carry out the king's command though, because he was innocent, his murder would be a sign of the fall of Blambangan and Mengwi. The two officers grew scared and asked for forgiveness. They asked to be allowed to follow him, because they were also afraid to return to their king. Tan Cin Jin took them along to Blambangan. It is said that Tan Cin Jin walked over the water across Bali Strait, while the two officers used his sandals as a boat. After that, they climbed Sembulungan Mountain at Blambangan and attained immortality.
Life as a god Forty or fifty years later, when "a lot of Chinese already lived at Blambangan" and '"four Chinatowns were already built at Banyualit (now Blimbingsari), Kedaleman, Lateng and Kesatrian", the story continued. Salmon and Sidharta believed that this story had happened less than fifty years after the former, by the fact that the year of the coming of Tan Cin Jin at Blambangan was after 1729 and the fall of the Kingdom of Blambangan (by this script) was in 1765. During the seventeenth century CE, there was an important slave trade route between Bali and Batavia, one of the most important slave trade routes in Asia.A. Van der Kraan. Bali; Slavery and Slave Trade, the edition of A. J. S. Reid, Slavery, Bondage and Dependency in Southease Asia, St. Lucia, Publisher University of Queensland, 1983, pp. 315–340; Schulte Nordholt, 1980, Matht, mensen en middelen; Patronen en dynamiek in de Balische politik ca. 1700–1840, Doctoraalscriptie Vrijie Universiteit Amsterdam, pp. 32–54. Taken from: Salmon dan Sidharta, 2000.
One day, a large slaving vessel sailed from Badung to Batavia, carrying about 60–70 slaves "males and females, old and young, simple and lowly". When the sailboat came near the Sembulungan Mountain, "it seemed the sailboat had left the area for one day and one night, and had a favorable wind and strength, but suddenly in the morning the sailboat returned in the same place". That recurred for almost a month, exhausting their provisions and making the passengers fear imminent death. Some of the slaves were Kshatriyas "who had been sold, and their hands and feet and their neck had been chained with iron". Suddenly one of them was free "although the chain was still locked". He fell into a trace, danced and spoke to the captain in Chinese:
The man jumped into the ocean and walked carefully over the waves, while the captain followed him by boat. After the Kshatriyan came to the peak of Sembulungan, he regained his senses and found three statues: one big and two small. Both of them took the statues into Banyualit Port.
At Banyualit, the captain gathered the Chinese citizens, and the Kshatriya fell into a trance once again. He spoke in Chinese about his life on Macanputih and Mengwi, and how his two former murderers now became his two bodyguards forever:
The Chinese people embraced him with joy and built a Chinese temple at Lateng, Banyuwangi Regency. But after Blambangan was attacked by the Dutch in 1765, the center of Blambangan had been removed to Banyuwangi City. The Chinese people also migrated and they moved the old temple to what now is Hu Tang Miao Temple.
The anonymous manuscript author also added that in 1880 only three temples of Chen Fu Zhen Ren had been built on Java, i.e. at Banyuwangi City, Besuki, and Probolinggo; while Bali had two temples, i.e. at Buleleng and Badung. And the Chinese at Tabanan, Mengwi, Bangli, Gianyar, Klungkung, Karangasem, and Sasak set home altars for Chen Fu Zhen Ren. Every year, the keepers of Banyuwangi temple would travel Bali to arranged Zhong Yuan Festival. The writer stated:
The unidentified word before wangi is generally considered to mean "at Banyuwangi".
Oral sources and legends These stories below are the histories and legends of Chen Fu Zhen Ren that spread amongst the Chinese, Javanese, and Balinese.
The story from Mengwi The Java village ("Banjar Jawa") on the northern Mengwi states that their ancestors came from Java and had taken to Bali to build a palace under the command of a Chinese architect. In the early 1980s, a Dutchman named Henk Schulte Nordholt heard stories from one Gusti Agung Gede Rai (from Kleran Palace) and Ida Bagus Ketut Sindu (from Mengwi), that the king of Mengwi had set a contest to make the best blueprint for his new palace.
A priest from Sibang and the Chinese architect from Blambangan entered. That architect brought the Javanese peoples to help him, but until the third day before the deadline, they had only built the outer wall of the palace. Magically, the palace was finished on time. Mengwi's citizens were afraid of the wonder and asked the king to kill him. The architect ran to Java and disappear at Watu Dodol along with his two followers, reputedly named I Gusti Ngurah Subuh dan Ida Bagus Den Kayu.
Salmon and Sidharta, in 1999, also got information from Anak Agung Gede Ajeng Tisna Mangun (from Gede Mengwi Palace) that the king of Mengwi was not asking the architect to make the blueprint of a palace, but for Pura Taman Ayun garden. The architect made the framework by digging the ditches surrounding it and then gave instruction about which plants and trees should be planted. He went to the shore with two guards that were assigned to accompanied him and never came back. This story is illustrated on the front wall of Gong Zu Miao Temple at Tabanan, Bali. Problematically, Pura Taman Ayun Garden was finished in 1634, while the Malayan script records that Chen Fu Zhen Ren lived much later.
Henk Schulte Nordholt noted in his book Negara Mengwi that Taman Ayun was renovated in 1750. The architect's name is given as Hobin Ho.Indrana Tjahjono and Mas Soepranoto. 2010. Kongco Tan Hu Cin Jin. Banyuwangi, pp. 12.
The stories from the temples of Banyuwangi and Tabanan The worshippers of Chen Fu Zhen Ren at Banyuwangi and Tabanan, both Chinese and Balinese, know well the story of their patron. He is called Kongco (Hokkien dialect for gongzu; lit. grand ancestor), although this title is also used by other temples for their own patrons. The people of Hu Tang Miao Temple, Banyuwangi, also call him Wainanmeng Gongzu (lit. ancestor of Blambangan); Blambangan was the ancient name for Banyuwangi.
Hu Tang Miao Temple is the oldest Taoist temple in East Java, Bali, and Lombok. Franz Epp, the German doctor, said that:Franz Epp, Banjoewangi", Tijdschrift voor Nederlandsch-Indie, 1849, II, 2, pp. 249. Taken from= Salmon and Sidharta, 2000.
Actually the oldest Taoist temple in Java is at Jakarta, West Java. Doctor Epp was clearly amazed by Hu Tang Miao Temple.