Snake Temple

About

The Snake Temple, known in Chinese as Shé Miào and bearing the loftier title Temple of the Azure Clouds, stands in Bayan Lepas on the Malaysian island of Penang. The sanctuary is best known across Southeast Asia for the snakes that have made their home in its smoky inner halls, regarded by devotees as the reincarnated disciples of the deified Buddhist monk Chor Soo Kong, to whom the Temple is consecrated.

Chor Soo Kong, also called Master Qingshui, was a monk of the Song dynasty in southern China revered for his works of healing and for the gentle care he extended to creatures, including the snakes who took refuge in his hermitage. The Temple was raised in 1805 by the Chinese community of Penang to honour his memory, and tradition relates that once the building was completed, pit vipers appeared of their own accord and have remained ever since.

Pilgrims travel from across the Straits, from Singapore, Taiwan and southern China, to offer prayers and incense here, especially on the sixth day of the first lunar month, the saint's birthday. The halls are filled with the perfume of joss sticks and the quiet presence of the resident vipers coiled upon the altars and tree boughs.

The snakes are believed by tradition to be rendered docile by the sacred smoke, although for visitor safety they have been devenomed while keeping their fangs intact. Within the precinct stand two ancient brick wells known as the Dragon Eye Wells and two brass bells, and a small breeding centre established in 2005 helps to sustain the community of serpents.

History

Official Penang state tourism records date the Temple's founding to 1850, though Wikipedia and most heritage accounts place it earlier, in 1805, when Penang's Hokkien community raised a shrine to Chor Soo Kong, a healer monk of Song dynasty Fujian venerated as Master Qingshui. Tradition holds that soon after the building was completed, Wagler's pit vipers appeared of their own accord and have remained ever since, coiled along its rafters and altar rails. The Temple, formally named Hock Hin Keong, stands in what was once the settlement of Sungai Keluang, still known to Penang's Hokkien speakers as Ban Kah Lan.

Significance

Devotees travel from Singapore, Taiwan and southern China to burn incense here on Chor Soo Kong's birthday, the sixth day of the first lunar month. A snake breeding centre established in 2005 sustains the resident vipers, whose fangs remain intact even though they have been devenomed for visitor safety, a practical accommodation to a tradition of shelter that devotees trace back to Chor Soo Kong himself.

Architecture

Traditional Hokkien Chinese Temple architecture, a tiered dragon-ridge roofline in polychrome ceramic over a masonry hall