Chinese folk religion is not organized around a single, universally binding scripture; rather, it is a web of practices that draw upon many different textual traditions. Its authority rests primarily in custom, lineage, and local ritual, while texts function as reservoirs of imagery, cosmology, and ritual technique. Classical Confucian, Daoist, and Buddhist writings provide important conceptual and ritual frameworks, but they are not treated as a unified canon. Confucian ritual texts such as the Book of Rites helped shape ancestral ceremonies and ideas of proper conduct, while Daoist works like the Daodejing and Zhuangzi contributed notions of cosmology, qi, and the interplay of yin and yang. Buddhist sutras, including those that describe the afterlife and karmic consequences, have been woven into popular understandings of merit-making, hells, and salvation. These “borrowed” scriptural elements are selectively appropriated rather than adopted wholesale, reflecting a fundamentally syncretic religious landscape.

Alongside these classical sources, there exists a rich corpus of ritual and liturgical writings used by local specialists. Ritual manuals transmitted within lineages of priests, “yin–yang masters,” and spirit-mediums prescribe procedures for offerings, funerals, exorcisms, and communal renewal rites. Texts for major communal rituals, such as offering and fasting ceremonies, may be hand-copied or locally printed, often varying from place to place. Divination texts, including the Book of Changes, as well as almanacs and calendars indicating auspicious times, guide everyday decisions and ritual timing. Temple oracles and other divinatory materials further mediate communication with deities and spirits. These writings do not form a standardized scripture, yet they quietly structure much of the religious life of villages, clans, and neighborhoods.

Equally significant are the textual forms that sustain memory, identity, and moral imagination. Clan genealogies (jiapu or zupu) and ancestral records preserve lineages, biographies, and ritual instructions, anchoring ancestor veneration in written form. Ancestral tablets and inscriptions in lineage halls condense these traditions into concise texts that both commemorate and prescribe. Popular religious literature—morality books, precious scrolls, and spirit-written revelations—circulates ethical teachings, miracle stories, and visions of cosmic order. Hagiographies and legends of deities such as Mazu or Guandi, as well as mythological narratives found in works like Journey to the West or Investiture of the Gods, shape how communities imagine the pantheon and its relationship to the human world. Local temple records, gazetteers, and deity biographies further root these stories in specific landscapes and histories.

Finally, various sectarian and redemptive movements within the broader folk milieu have produced their own scriptures and doctrinal compilations. These texts blend elements from Confucian, Daoist, Buddhist, and popular traditions into distinctive systems of belief and practice, yet their authority is usually confined to particular groups rather than the populace at large. Taken together, all these materials illustrate that textuality in Chinese folk religion is plural, fluid, and deeply contextual. Rather than a single book laying down the law, there is a shifting constellation of writings that illuminate, support, and sometimes reshape practices whose deepest foundations remain in lived custom, communal memory, and the rhythms of ritual life.