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What are the customs on the 24th of the twelfth lunar month?
Custom 1
Folk believe that the chef has the responsibility to supervise the good and evil behavior of the family, so when sending the chef, the folk should not only prepare sacrifices and burn gold and silver paper, but also present candy, maltose, honeydew melon, honeydew melon and jiaozi to the chef. In a word, to make the offerings sticky and sweet is to hope that Kitchen God's mouth is sticky and sweet, and the motive is to seal the mouths of the gods and prevent Kitchen God from telling him at will.
In addition, it is also popular for someone to brush the kitchen door with a second round of wine or stick sugar on the kitchen door for the same purpose. This is also to make the chef a "drunkard's sake" or a "sweet-mouthed master", so that he can't speak ill of him in heaven.
Custom 2
Some people think that the offerings of kitchen stoves should not be too rich. On this day, when offering sacrifices to the gods, they will tell Mr. Zao Huo about the injustice of insufficient offerings. I hope he can tell the jade emperor the good news of this family in the coming year and ask the jade emperor to bless his family.
Custom 3
In the twelfth lunar month, besides sending money to heaven, we also burn "Ma Jia" to the gods, which is a kind of yellow paper with horses, official hats, bows and arrows, swords and guns, and armor on it. Burning "a horse" represents packing for the gods who show their strength in heaven.
Custom 4
In the patriarchal society, there used to be a custom that "men don't Yue Bai and women don't worship the kitchen", and the man presided over the kitchen festival every year. However, after the war in this century, the atmosphere has changed even more. Because men are busy with their careers, the responsibility of offering sacrifices to stoves often falls on women who do housework.
Custom five
In the feudal era, the government chose to "seal" the holiday after sending the immortal back to heaven. Some temples will also "close their doors" on this day, on the grounds that the gods return to heaven and the people have no gods to worship.
From this day on, the government and even temples have a holiday, and they are not busy worshipping God or doing business, but from this day on, every household is busy dealing with the Chinese New Year. Many families are busy making new year's goods, rice cakes and cakes.
Custom six
From this day on, relatives and friends also treat each other and give each other gifts such as rice cakes and gift baskets, which is called "sending new year's goods".
People who have a funeral at home, or who have been in mourning for less than a year, can't make rice cakes, but they can be sent by relatives and friends.
Custom seven
People will hold a general cleaning on the same day or later. At the time of cleaning, green bamboo leaves are usually prepared, which are said to have the ability to ward off evil spirits and filth, and the grey cobwebs at high places are removed.