Buddhist temples and associations in Penang
B. Liow Woon Khin’s 1989 article in the Journal of the Malaysian Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society surveys the institutional history of nine Buddhist temples and two associations in Penang between 1845 and 1948, arguing that these institutions were shaped less by doctrinal purity than by the demographic dominance of Chinese devotees over their originally Thai, Burmese, and Singhalese congregations. The study draws on temple inscriptions, land registry documents, court judgements, personal interviews with resident monks, and a small body of temple-published histories to reconstruct a period in which ethnic Buddhist communities negotiated identity, funding, and survival under British colonial rule and Japanese occupation.
Summary
Liow organises his material around the Theravada–Mahayana divide, examining four Thai temples (Wat Chaiyamangalaram, Wat Pin Bang Onn, Wat Candaram, Wat Buppharam), the Burmese Dhammikarama Temple, the Singhalese Mahindarama Temple, three Chinese Mahayana temples (Kek Lok Si, Ang Hock Si, Beow Hiang Lim Si), and two associations (the Penang Buddhist Association and the Phor Tay Institute). The central historical problem he identifies is the progressive absorption of non-Chinese Theravada temples into the orbit of Chinese Buddhist patronage. Originally established to serve the spiritual needs of small Thai, Burmese, and Singhalese communities, these temples found their congregations increasingly outnumbered by Chinese devotees by the early twentieth century. Chinese New Year replaced ethnic New Year festivals, Chinese inscriptions appeared on shrine halls, and in at least one case—Wat Sawan Arun, later renamed Ang Hock Si—the temple was formally transferred from Thai to Chinese Mahayana management after the Japanese occupation left it without resident monks.
The Mahayana institutions present a different but related set of tensions. Kek Lok Si, the largest Buddhist temple in South-east Asia, received an Imperial Sanction from Emperor Kuang Hsu in 1904, reflecting the Manchu court’s shifting policy toward overseas Chinese and its continued claim of influence over temple-building abroad. The Penang Buddhist Association, registered in 1925, attempted to present a “correct” Buddhism free from what its founders considered the superstitious malpractices of the older Pitt Street temples, yet it simultaneously operated a provident fund that attracted thousands of members more interested in financial benefit than doctrinal study. The Phor Tay Institute, founded by a Mahayana nun in 1936, extended Buddhist institutional life into education and orphan care, becoming the only Buddhist-run school and orphanage in Malaysia.
Throughout, Liow relies heavily on primary sources that survive in fragmentary form: marble slab inscriptions, land grant documents, a 1920 Supreme Court judgement over temple revenues, the text of the Imperial Sanction tablet, and—most significantly—oral histories gathered from resident monks and lay caretakers in 1980. The Japanese occupation emerges as a critical turning point: temples served as refuges for hundreds of Chinese civilians, the Japanese military administration generally respected Buddhist institutions (in some cases paying homage to Buddha images), and the PBA was compelled to pay $46,547.19 in “voluntary gifts” to the occupying forces. The war also accelerated the demographic and institutional shifts that Liow documents, as the absence of foreign monks during the occupation created openings for Chinese monks to assume permanent roles in previously non-Chinese temples.
Key Findings
- Wat Chaiyamangalaram’s five-acre site was formally granted on 22 July 1845 by Governor W. L. Butterworth to four trustees (two Burmese, two Thai); 48 Chinese-sounding names appear on gold tablets inscribed on the original mid-nineteenth-century Buddha image, evidencing early Chinese patronage (pp. 59–61).
- The Dhammikarama (Burmese) Temple’s marble slabs record a founding date of 1 August 1803, but Liow demonstrates from the land registry that this date corresponds to the original land grant by Lt. Governor Sir George Leith; the actual sale to Nonia Betong occurred on 29 November 1827 for 390 Spanish dollars, with registration as a Buddhist temple on 21 May 1828 (pp. 66–67).
- Kek Lok Si’s Pagoda of Ten Thousand Buddhas cost approximately $200,000 to complete (1915–1930), was funded primarily by Mdm Lim Leng Cheak, and was designed in three architectural sections—Chinese, Thai, and Burmese—reflecting inter-school cooperation; the temple also received 70,000 volumes of Buddhist scriptures from Emperor Kuang Hsu under the 1904 Imperial Sanction (pp. 71–72).
- The Penang Buddhist Association owned 49 terrace houses and three bungalows by 1939, rented exclusively to members; total membership grew from 540 in 1930 to 16,164 by 1936–1940, of whom 12,011 were Provident Fund subscribers (pp. 76–77).
- The Mahindarama Temple had collected only $3,500 over ten years by 1937 against a construction need of $43,500 for its shrine hall, kitchen, and monks’ quarters; Ven. Sumanasara subsequently raised $12,500 by travelling to Singapore and Burma (p. 69).
- During the Japanese occupation, the PBA was forced to pay $46,547.19 in “voluntary gifts” to the Japanese military administration, its share of the $50 million extracted from all Chinese communities in Malaya (p. 77).
Conclusion
Liow’s definitive takeaway is that Penang’s Buddhist institutions have always operated at two levels simultaneously—a popular, apotropaic level involving charms, divinations, and folk ceremonies, and an orthodox, intellectual level committed to doctrinal purity—and that the tension between these two modes is a permanent feature of Buddhist institutional life in the region, not a transitional phase to be outgrown. The demographic shift from ethnically specific congregations to Chinese-dominated ones did not eliminate this duality but redistributed it across the temple landscape.
Context
- Primary sources include temple marble inscriptions, the Penang Land Office Registry, the 1920 Supreme Court judgement (Suit No. 92), the text of the 1904 Imperial Sanction tablet, the “Documents on the Burmese Temple” file held by trustee Yeoh Phee Tin, and extensive personal interviews conducted in January–February 1980 with resident abbots and lay caretakers.
- The article contributes to the historiography of Malayan Buddhism by providing the first systematic institutional survey of Penang’s temples across both Theravada and Mahayana traditions, and by foregrounding the role of Chinese female philanthropists (Mdm Lim Leng Cheak, Mdm Lim Eow Thoon, Mdm Tan Say Siang, and others) as the principal financial patrons of non-Chinese temples—a pattern Liow notes repeatedly but does not develop into a separate analytical argument.