Deferential interactions are predicated upon asymmetrical status relations (Goffman 1956, 1961; Scott 1990). For Chinese Buddhist apologetics, deference controversies and the reconciliation of the tensions between the monastic persona and authoritative figures in political and domestic ritual orders have been prominent themes. On the fringes of Buddhist monasticism, however, a critically overlooked aspect of the deference conundrum has been the dynamics of status asymmetries among loosely affiliated lay individuals and between monastics and ordinary temple-goers. The paper examines the discursive conventions of deference within the context of addressing elderly strangers in publicly accessible Buddhist temples in reformed China. It specifically analyzes the use of three common address terms (Ju-shi, Shi-xiong, and Lao-Pusa) and other phrasings (including honorific and diminutive forms) as found in fieldwork in Buddhist temples in East China in the 2010s. The paper contextualizes their occurrences in a historical genealogy of the tension between monastic and lay statuses in a state-centric, Han-majority society. The paper argues that each term highlights a specific aspect of the tension, tied to historic conditions. In the context of late socialist China, the paper offers anthropological insights into the limits and potentialities of Buddhist resources in contributing to contemporary Chinese sociality.
