Mid-Autumn Festival, that is, ancestor worship festival in July and a half, also known as shi gu Festival, Ghost Festival, Solitary Festival and Local Official Festival, is a traditional festival of main sacrifice in China. Together with the Cold Food Festival and Tomb-Sweeping Day, it is called the three major ghost festivals in ancient China. The festival customs mainly include ancestor worship, setting off river lanterns, worshiping the dead and burning paper ingots. The Mid-Autumn Festival evolved from "July and a half" in ancient times, when crops were harvested in autumn and ancestors were sacrificed. July and a half is a festival to celebrate the harvest and reward the earth in the early autumn, and some crops are ripe. According to the law, people should worship their ancestors and report Qiu Cheng to their ancestors with new rice. It is a traditional cultural festival to remember their ancestors, and its cultural core is to respect their ancestors and be filial.

the origin of the Mid-Autumn Festival

The festival originated from the early "July and a half" harvest in autumn to worship ancestors, and the emergence of "July and a half" can be traced back to the ancestor worship and the harvest festival in ancient times. In ancient times, people often relied on the blessing of the gods for the harvest of farming. Ancestors are worshipped in spring, summer, autumn and winter, but the "autumn taste" in early autumn is very important. Autumn is the harvest season. People hold ceremonies to offer sacrifices to the ancestors' souls, offer the best seasonal products to the gods first, and then taste the fruits of these labors themselves, and pray for a good harvest in the coming year.

"July 3" was originally a folk ancestor worship festival in ancient times, but it was called "Zhongyuan Festival", which originated from Taoism after the Eastern Han Dynasty. Taoism has a "three-yuan theory", and the name "Zhong Yuan" comes from the fact that "Heaven officials bless the Yuan Dynasty, local officials forgive sins in the Yuan Dynasty, and water officials relieve Eritrea in the Yuan Dynasty. Buddhism calls July and a half the "Bonin Festival". In the Tang Dynasty, when the rulers praised Taoism, the Taoist Mid-Yuan Festival began to flourish, and gradually fixed "Zhong Yuan" as the name of the festival, which was set on July 15 and has been going on ever since.

On the Mid-Autumn Festival, many people will hold sacrificial activities with wine, meat, sugar cakes, fruits and other sacrifices on the first day of July to the 3th day of July in the old calendar, so as to comfort many ghosts who are playing in the world and pray for their own peace and success throughout the year. Those who are more solemn even invite monks and Taoists to recite the scriptures. During this period, some people will invite Buddha statues such as Ksitigarbha Bodhisattva and Mu Lian Zun to place high platforms, or invite artists to play Zhong Kui, the exorcist (some of them invite artists to manipulate Zhong Kui's puppet), so as to eliminate the rage of the dead.