The Lahai Festival originated in ancient times at the end of the year the end of the sacrificial activities, and this ancient custom has been passed down with the Lahai Festival, then you know Lahai Festival is in honor of who? The following is a compilation of the Lahai Festival is in honor of who, welcome to read and share to learn.

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What is the Lahai Festival

On the Lahai Festival customs and symbols

Lahai Festival festival significance

Lahai Festival what are the traditional food

Lahai Festival in honor of whom

Lahai Festival and the Siddhartha Gautama related to the Siddhartha Gautama was originally Siddhartha Gautama was originally the son of King Jowan of Kaviravai in the northern part of India (now in Nepal). Seeing that all living beings suffered from the pains of old age, sickness and death, and dissatisfied with the theocratic rule of the Brahmins at that time, he gave up his throne and left his home to practise Buddhism. After six years of asceticism, he attained enlightenment and became a Buddha under the Bodhi tree on the eighth day of the waxing moon. During these six years of asceticism, he ate only one flax and one rice a day. The descendants did not forget his suffering and ate porridge on the eighth day of the Lunar New Year every year to commemorate him. "The eighth day of the eighth month of the lunar calendar has become the anniversary of the Buddha's death.

"Lapa" is a grand festival of Buddhism. In the past, Buddhist temples all over the world for bathing Buddha will be held, chanting, and follow the example of Sakyamuni before he became a Taoist, the shepherdess offer milk, the legendary story, with fragrant grain, fruits and other congee for the Buddha, called "Lahai congee". And Laha congee will be given to the disciples and the good men and women, and then in the folk custom. It is said that in some monasteries, before the eighth day of the eighth month of the Lunar New Year, the monks holding the bowl, along the streets, will collect rice, chestnuts, dates, nuts and other materials into Laha congee distributed to the poor. Legend has it that after eating it, they can get the blessing of Buddha, so the poor people call it "Buddha porridge". Lu You of the Southern Song Dynasty wrote a poem: "The Buddha congee is given to each other today, and the festival in the village of Jiangcun is new." It is said that the famous Hangzhou Tianning Temple has a storage of leftovers in the "stacks of rice building," usually the temple monks daily leftovers dried, the accumulation of a year's surplus food, to the eighth day of the eighth month of the lunar calendar into Laha congee to give to the believers, known as "Fukuda congee". The meaning of "Fudu Porridge" is that after eating it, one can increase one's happiness and longevity. Visible at that time the monks of the temple to cherish the virtues of food.

Laha congee in ancient times was made of red beans, glutinous rice, and then gradually increased the number of materials. The Southern Song Dynasty people Zhou Mi wrote "Wulin old story" said: "with walnuts, pine nuts, milk mushrooms, persimmon mushrooms, persimmon chestnut and so on to do the porridge, called 'Lahai congee'". To date, China's southern, northeastern, northwestern region people still retain the custom of eating congee on the eighth day of the month, Guangdong region has been rare. The materials used vary, mostly with glutinous rice, red beans, dates, chestnuts, peanuts, white fruit, lotus seeds, lilies and other sweet porridge. There are also added cinnamon, longan meat, candied fruit and other cooking. In winter, eat a bowl of steaming congee, both delicious and nutritious, can indeed increase the blessing of life.

The origin of Laha congee

Drinking Laha congee began in the Song Dynasty, the rise of the Ming and Qing dynasties. In the beginning, people did not pay much attention to the porridge, and the practice and ingredients were relatively simple. According to the "History of Song Dynasty", Fan Zhongyan lost his father when he was young and lived in poverty, and his mother remarried because she couldn't bear the pressure of life. Fan Zhongyan had to go to the temple to study. He used two liters of millet to make porridge every day, and after the porridge solidified overnight, he cut it into four pieces, and ate two pieces in the morning and two pieces in the evening with pickles, and studied hard to become a genius. Later, the idiom of "broken pieces of porridge" was derived. Used to living in poverty, so later became famous also did not change the habit of living a simple life. Every year on the eighth day of the month, he usually only let his subordinates buy the cheapest ingredients to cook porridge, such as jujube, sorghum, yellow rice, rarely add walnuts, grapes and other things. In his words, "hot belly only", as long as the porridge can drink the stomach warm on the line.

Customs of Lahai Festival

Sacrifice

Ying Shao, "Customs" cloud: "Rites of Passage": waxing, hunting, said the field hunting for birds and animals, to sacrifice their ancestors. Or I said: wax, also, the new and the old, so the big sacrifice to report the success also." Its origin is very early, "Rituals - Suburban Special Adoption" records: "Ijian clan began for the wax. Wax is also known as "Suo" (索), which is the term for the twelfth month of the year, when all things are gathered together for the purpose of offering food and drinks." The Records of the Grand Historian (史记-补三皇本纪) also says, "The Shennong clan of the Yandi Emperor, with its first field affairs, made wax offerings in return for heaven and earth."

Summer dynasty called the wax festival as "Jia Ping", Yin said "clear sacrifice", Zhou said "big wax", Han dynasty changed to "wax". ". Sacrifice the object of all eight: the first stingy God Shen Nong, the Division stingy God Houji, the God of agriculture, the God of the field officials, the post table border God began to create the field hut, open the road, the delineation of boundaries of the people, cat and tiger God, the Square God embankment, the water in the God of the ditch, the insect God. Pre-qin wax festival day in the winter solstice after the third day of the eleventh day of the north and south dynasty after gradually fixed in the eighth day of the wax month. To the Tang and Song dynasties, this festival is covered with the color of God and Buddha. According to legend, before Shakyamuni became a Buddha, he was starving and fainted. A shepherd's daughter saved him by cooking porridge in a clear spring with a mixture of grain and wild fruits.

Shakyamuni was under the Bodhi tree, and finally attained Buddhahood on December 8th. From then on, the Buddhists set this day as the "Buddha became a day", reciting scriptures to commemorate the festival. In the Ming and Qing Dynasties, honoring the gods and Buddha was the main theme of the Lapa Festival instead of sacrificing to ancestral spirits, celebrating good harvests and driving away epidemics and avoiding disasters. The main custom of the festival is to boil, give and taste Lapa congee, and hold the celebration of abundant family realities. At the same time, many people since the beginning of the Spring Festival, busy killing the New Year's pig, playing bean curd, glue making wind fish and preserved meat, purchasing new year's goods, "New Year" atmosphere gradually thick.

Laha congee

Laha congee is also called "seven treasures and five flavors congee". The history of drinking Lapa congee in China has been more than a thousand years. The earliest started in the Song Dynasty. On every Laha day, whether it is the court, the government, the temple or the people's home to do Laha congee. In the Qing Dynasty, the custom of drinking Laha congee was even more prevalent. In the court, the emperor, the empress, the emperor's son and so on to the civil and military ministers, court ladies give Laha congee, and to the various monasteries to distribute rice, fruit and so on for the monks to eat. In the civil society, families also want to do Laha porridge, worship ancestors; at the same time, the family reunion together to eat, gifts to friends and relatives.

Laha Garlic

Laha Garlic is to soak garlic on the eighth day of the eighth month of the lunar calendar, is a custom in the north, especially in northern China. Its ingredients are vinegar and garlic cloves.

Eating Ice

The day before Lahai, people usually use steel pots to scoop up water to make ice, and then take off the pots and crack the ice into pieces when Lahai Day comes. It is said that the ice on this day is very magical, and that eating it will prevent you from getting a stomach ache in the following year.

Tofu on the 8th day of the 12th lunar month

"Tofu on the 8th day of the 12th lunar month" is a folk specialty of Qianxian County, Anhui Province, on the 8th day of the 8th lunar month before the Chinese New Year, families in Qianxian County have to make tofu in the sun, and the people will call this kind of naturally sun-dried tofu "Tofu on the 8th day of the 8th lunar month". The folk call this naturally sun-dried tofu "Laha tofu".