Tu Er Shen (兔兒神 or 兔神) is a Chinese deity who manages the love and sex between homosexual men. His name literally means "rabbit deity".
According to Zi Bu Yu (子不語), a book written by Yuan Mei (袁枚, a Qing dynasty writer), Tu Er Shen was a man called Hu Tianbao (胡天保). Hu Tianbao was originally a man who fell in love with a very handsome imperial inspector of Fujian Province. One day Hu Tianbao was caught peeping on the inspector through a bathroom wall, at which point he confessed his reluctant affections for the other man. The imperial inspector had Hu Tianbao sentenced to death by beating. One month after Hu Tianbao's death, he is said to have appeared to a man from his hometown in a dream, claiming that since his crime was one of love, the underworld officials decided to right the injustice by appointing him the god and safeguarder of homosexual affections. After his dream the man erected a shrine to Hu Tianbao, which became very popular in Fujian province, so much so that in late Qing times, the cult of Hu Tianbao was targeted for extermination by the Qing government.
A slang term for homosexuals in late imperial China was tuzi (rabbits)[1] which is why Hu Tianbao is referred to as the rabbit deity, though in fact he has nothing to do with rabbits and should not be confused with tuer ye (兔兒爺）the rabbit on the moon.
Images of Hu Tianbao show him in an embrace with another man. According to Zhu Gui (朱珪, 1731–1807) a grain tax circuit intendant of Fujian in 1765, images of Hu Tianbao show "two men embracing one another; the face of one is somewhat hoary with age, the other tender and pale".[2] Zhu declared his intention to improve the moral shortcomings of the people under his jurisdiction. Zhu Gui promulgated a "Prohibition of Licentious Cults," criticizing the respect the people of Fujian paid to such cults, yinci (隂祠). One of two cults in the provincial capital of Fuzhou which particularly aroused his ire was the cult of Hu Tianbao. Zhu Gui reports "All those debauched and shameless rascals who on seeing youths or young men desire to have illicit intercourse with them pray for assistance from the plaster idol (the image of Hu Tianbao). Then they make plans to entice and obtain the objects of their desire. This is known as the secret assistance of Hu Tianbao."[3]
Keith Stevens reports seeing images like these in Fujian speaking communities in Malaysia, Taiwan, Thailand and Singapore.[4] Stevens refers to these images as 'brothers' or 'princes' and calls them Taibao (太保), which is probably a perversion of Tianbao. Stevens was usually told that the two figures in an embrace were brothers, and only in one temple in Fujian was he told that they were homosexuals. A photo of an image from a temple in Kaohsiung is provided by Stevens on p. 434 of his article.
Sadly, the history Hu Tianbao has been largely forgotten even by the temple keepers. However, there is a temple in Yonghe city (永和市）in Taiwan that venerates Hu Tianbao. The temple is known as the Rabbit Temple (兔兒廟). The address is Taipei, Yonghe City, Yonghe Road Section 1, Alley 37, No 12.