What are the names of these two gods?

[SimL]

Hi niuc,

Thanks for all the great information on 大伯公 and 灶君公. I don't know tau-mi, but will ask my father.

In Penang (AFAIK), both the Kitchen God and ThiN-Kong don't have images. Both have just a simple altar, though I've no idea what text is written on the "tablet" to represent them (this was in the days when my mind just clamped shut when confronted with Chinese characters) - "天官賜福" seems vaguely familiar for ThiN-Kong. AFAIK, the Kitchen God only went up to heaven once a year in Penang. Once every 3 days would really drive a family crazy "being good" - I think I would have far too much a feeling of "big brother is watching you" in a once-every-3-day tradition !

[Mark Yong]

SimL wrote:
Both have just a simple altar, though I've no idea what text is written on the "tablet" to represent them...

天官賜福 for Thĭⁿ-KŌng is correct. As for the Kitchen God, if I recall correctly from visiting the Chan House in Malacca, the characters on the tablet read 司命灶君. To note that even back then, the use of the simplified character 灶 instead of the full version 竈 was in common use (ugh! ).

[niuc]

To note that even back then, the use of the simplified character 灶 instead of the full version 竈 was in common use (ugh! ).

Wow, Mark! I didn't even know that 灶 is a simplified character, much less about 竈!

[Mark Yong]

Hi, niuc,

My knowing that character was a fluke. It was one of those random characters that I picked up from my grandfather's old copy of Mathews' Chinese-English Dictionary.

Actually, I should correct my statement. It is technically not a part of the character simplification process that took place in China across the 20th century, but rather was a commonly-used 俗字, hence its appearance on the altar tablet at the Malacca Baba-Nyonya Heritage Museum (a.k.a. "Chan House").

From 康熙字典:《五音集韻》則到切，音躁。俗竈字。

Cheers,
Mark