Home » Feature » Art and Culture
Honoring ancestors, feeding ghosts
Print Edition
We are right in the middle of the Ghost Month, which reaches its peak on Wednesday with the Zhong Yuan (Mid-Year) Festival, better known as the Hungry Ghost Festival.
The 15th day of the seventh lunar month is when the ghosts and spirits roaming the mortal world are especially powerful. Ghosts are cold, dark yin energy.
On this day, ghosts — both benevolent ancestors and others — need to be appeased and calmed by special offerings of food and various rituals to ease their suffering and encourage them to return to the underworld. And not to bother humans. Hungry ghosts are especially dangerous, but many ghosts are ordinary and benign ancestors.
The gates of the underworld, which opened on the first of the month, close on the last day, when all non-mortals are supposed to return.
Hungry Ghost Festival is one of China’s three yuan festivals, celebrated on the 15th day of the first, seventh and 10th months on the traditional lunar calendar. Shang Yuan (Upper Year) is celebrated in the first month and Xia Yuan (Lower Year) is celebrated in the 10th month.
During the upcoming Zhong Yuan Festival, the most important task is making offerings of food and wine to ancestors. Other customs include burning incense, hanging paper flags, floating lanterns in a river and burning paper flowers. These practices aim to ease the suffering of the dead who roam the world during Ghost Month.
The three festivals originated in the celebration of the birthdays of the three Taoist gods of Heaven, Earth and Water who govern the world. The God of Heaven blesses, the God of Earth relieves the sins and pain of the dead and the God of Water dispels bad luck.
The God of Earth arrives on Zhong Yuan and passes judgment on people’s souls. Throughout the night, Taoists chant to relieve the suffering of ghosts.
Therefore, on Zhong Yuan, Chinese make offerings to the God of Earth and to their ancestors so they live better and more peacefully in the next world and bless their living descendants.
Paper money is often burned for use in the next life, as well as paper houses, luxuries and companions.
Buddhist festival
The Buddhist Ullambana Festival is celebrated on the same day as Zhong Yuan. It is widely accepted by Chinese since it reflects traditional of filial piety and respect for ancestors.
Ullambana is a food basin and it also means deliverance from suffering, referring to the salvation of anguished souls in hell — the hungry ghosts.
On this day Buddhists carry out ceremonies and make offerings in ullambanas to bless living parents with health and longevity and relieve the pain of those who have passed on.
It stems from the legend of Maudgalyayana, a follower of Buddha, who relieved his mother’s suffering for her sins. He had a vision of his greedy mother as a hungry ghost in hell. He magically sent food to her but she was so obsessed by greed that all the food in her mouth turned into hot coals.
Buddha told Maudgalyayana that he alone could not save his mother because she was so burdened by sin but on the 15th day of the seventh month all Buddhist monks would pray and make offerings of food. The merit of the collective act freed his mother and she was reborn a human.
Accepting both values in Taoism and Buddhism, many Chinese make offerings and carry out rituals.
Regional Zhong Yuan Festival traditions
• Floating lanterns
Paper lanterns in the Yellow River region are usually shaped like lotus and float on the water surface. The floating lanterns are supposed to ease the suffering of wandering ghosts and help send them to the other shore.
Lanterns in southern China are sometimes bigger and more delicate, shaped like palaces bearing flags, prayers and the names of the living, so the dead know who made the sacrifice.
The tradition is popular in regions with broad rivers with slow-moving currents.
• Boat sacrifice
In parts of Shandong Province, fishermen make small boats named for drowned villagers. The boats contain a memorial tablet, food, clothing, shoes and a lighted candle. The boats are launched into the sea by married men, sending the sacrifice to the dead.
• Burning flower plate
In parts of Sichuan Province, people make paper plates shaped like flowers. They put paper money and food offerings on the plate and walk around a room, inviting the dead onto the plate. After the ceremony, the plates are taken outside and burned.
• Hanging paper flags
Hanging paper flags on a doorway is a tradition in central China to protect families from attacks by hungry ghosts and malign spirits.
- About Us
- |
- Terms of Use
- |
-
RSS - |
- Privacy Policy
- |
- Contact Us
- |
- Shanghai Call Center: 962288
- |
- Tip-off hotline: 52920043
- 沪ICP证：沪ICP备05050403号-1
- |
- 互联网新闻信息服务许可证：31120180004
- |
- 网络视听许可证：0909346
- |
- 广播电视节目制作许可证：沪字第354号
- |
- 增值电信业务经营许可证：沪B2-20120012
Copyright © 1999- Shanghai Daily. All rights reserved.Preferably viewed with Internet Explorer 8 or newer browsers.
