| “ | Don't mock my World Turtle. | ” |
Zao Shen, or Zao Jun, was the Kitchen God of Chinese folk religion and mythology and is a very important domestic god. He meets with a number of other deities to discuss The Apocalypse.
Background[]
Season 5[]
Dean kills Zao Shen.
Zao Shen was one of the many deities who came to the Elysian Fields hotel to discuss the coming Apocalypse. He gets into a fight with Odin when Odin mocks his world (specifically the part about the world being carried on the back of a turtle). Later he helps Odin and Baron Samedi in killing one of their captives. He was the one who found Sam and Dean attempting to free the captured humans and grabbed Sam. He was killed by Dean using a stake of unknown wood. It is likely that Zao was the one who 'prepared' the humans for eating, as he was a Kitchen God.[1]
Powers and Abilities[]
- Immortality - As a deity, Zao Shen did not age and could have lived forever. He claimed to be older than Odin, though Odin claimed that this was never proven. He was at least around 2123 years old at the time of his death.
- Invulnerability - Zao Shen could not be permanently harmed by mortal weapons, only by special weaponized stakes such as the one wielded by Dean.
- Super Strength - Zao Shen overpowered a man for the deities to kill. He later lifted Sam off the ground by the throat with one hand and started to slowly choke him to death.
- Multilingualism - While Zao Shen was only shown to speak Cantonese, he had absolutely no problem understanding the other deities while they were speaking in English. Being a Chinese god, he would certainly know Ancient Chinese as well.
Weaknesses[]
- Stakes - He was killed by Dean using a stake of an unknown kind of wood.
Appearances[]
Trivia[]
- Zao Shen was known as a kitchen god and is the most important of a plethora of Chinese domestic gods that protect the hearth and family.
- As a kitchen deity, Zao might have been the responsible for cooking in the Elysian Fields Hotel acting as chef, although it is unconfirmed.
- Unlike the other deities, Zao Shen did not speak English, he spoke in Cantonese.
- It should be noted that he is frequently questioning Odin's age in comparison to him.
- In real world, stories on how Zao Shen became the Kitchen God dates back to around the 2nd century BC while Odin appears as a prominent god throughout the recorded history of Northern Europe, since c. 2 BCE, which could explain their rivalry about who would be older.
- He is the only pagan deity not to die by Lucifer's hand in the episode, but by Dean's.
- When Dean killed Zao Shen, he emitted a noise that sounded like an angel dying. Also, a cut on his face visibly burned for a second.
- Contrary to the show's depiction, Zao Shen wasn't worshiped with human sacrifice, but instead people made offerings of food and drink such as honey, candy, and wine.
- In real world, Chinese folk religion has a total of 578 million believers, but in Supernatural, Zao Shen was severely weakened like all deities, which implies his religion involves much less practitioners in this Universe.
- It is unknown where Dean got his weapon to use against Zao Shen, or even how he knew it would even be effective against him. This was never explained in the show.