Tainan families have been coming here for generations on the 1st and 15th of every lunar month to pray to the supreme Taoist entity, the Jade Emperor. The temple has no statue of the god as the supreme deity is supposed to be shapeless and formless like the sky. There's a famous Yī (One) inscription over the altar. This single-stroke character embodies both the beginning and the end, signifying that all the world's truths are here and nothing goes unseen by heaven.
Altar of Heaven
Tainan
Lonely Planet's must-see attractions
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25.11 MILES
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Nearby Tainan attractions
1. National Museum of Taiwan Literature
0.13 MILES
This serious and excellent museum details the development of Taiwanese literature from the time of the pre-Han indigenous peoples to the modern era…
0.14 MILES
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0.19 MILES
Both buildings of the Tainan Art Museum are now open – this one (Building 1), the former Tainan City Police Station raised in the Japanese era; and the…
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Created by Japanese architect and Pritzker Prize–winner Ban Shigeru, Building 2 of the Tainan Art Museum has a dozen galleries spread over five floors…
0.2 MILES
This art deco department store from the 1930s has been so beautifully restored that it's worth going in just to ascend the sweeping staircase, peer…
0.22 MILES
Built in 1666 by the son of Ming loyalist Zheng Chenggong (Koxinga),Taiwan's first Confucian temple and official school is quiet, dignified and coloured…
8. Old Japanese Martial Arts Academy
0.23 MILES
This sleek and poised Japanese building next to the Confucius Temple was a butokuden, a place where the Japanese taught and promoted martial arts such as…
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- path: Destinations/POIs/superzone
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