The Mid-Autumn Festival is an important traditional festival in China. However, Mid-Autumn Festival is the name of Taoism in China. On July 15th in the summer calendar, Buddhism called it "Kasahara Festival" and folks called it "Ghost Festival". Of course, the Taoist Mid-Autumn Festival, the Buddhist Bonner Festival and the folk Ghost Festival have different forms of expression, but these three festivals also have the same cultural connotation of offering sacrifices to ancestors and advocating loyalty.
1, Taoist Mid-Autumn Festival
According to the cultural logic of Taoism, the time and space of a year should be divided into two parts: upper and lower yin and yang. Moreover, according to Taoism in China, the three basic elements for nurturing everything in the world are heaven, earth and water. Therefore, Taoism regards the first half of the year as a celestial official and the second half as a local official. What needs to be explained here is that the "official" mentioned here does not refer to the "official" of human officials, but refers to the fragments in the process of time and space flow, similar to the "official" in China Weiqi game.
Taoism in China is mainly produced in the developed areas of agricultural civilization in China. Therefore, Taoism in China has always believed that heaven and earth are mysterious, everything is born on the earth, water is the foundation of life, and the earth contains water. That is to say, because China's agricultural civilization pays attention to the important role of soil and water in human beings, China's Taoist cultural concept has always contained the "ontology", "epistemology" and "methodology" of observing the world with the earth as the center. According to the Taoist worldview, Taoism is used to calling the fifteenth day of the first month of the year "Tianguan" (the first half of the year) and "Shangyuan Festival"; In the second half of the year, July 15th, the local official festival, was called "Mid-Autumn Festival". Because the earth contains water, water acts on the earth, so1October 15 in the second half of each year is "Xiayuan Festival". These three elements, namely, upper, middle and lower elements, constitute a systematic understanding of the trinity world of Taoism.
Taoism in China is different from many religions in the world. Many religions in the world are the unity of god and man, or just like Christianity, they pay attention to the trinity of "Tao into flesh", which makes religious communicators often highly deified. The purpose of China's Taoist missionary work is very clear. Taoist communicators are not gods, but people. So Taoism teaches students in accordance with their aptitude. For people with high wisdom, the truth in Tao Te Ching is very clear; For those who lack wisdom or have little time to deeply reflect on their own moral and ethical construction, writing stories is to explain the truth. "Education through fun" is a missionary method originated from Taoism in China.
The Mid-Autumn Festival of Taoism in China is actually a festival to spread morality and ethics, that is, to advocate people to pay attention to Xiu De on this day. On the Mid-Autumn Festival, people with thoughts and time will get together to study Laozi's Tao Te Ching, communicate with each other and reflect on themselves. For the general congregation, Taoism has created some stories of "entertaining through education". For example, in the invention of Taoism, a man named Chen Ziqi married the daughter of the Dragon King and gave birth to three children, namely, the "celestial officer, local officer and water officer" on the 15th of the first month, the 15th of July and the 15th of October. These "three officials" are in charge of the three tasks of human blessing, sin forgiveness and salvation respectively. They have infinite magic power, and they want to tour the world in these three days to check whether people's moral quality is good or bad. However, Taoism in China is a very tolerant religion, giving people the opportunity to change and renew themselves at any time. Therefore, the Mid-Autumn Festival is not only a festival of rewarding good and punishing evil, but also a festival of atonement. Therefore, the Mid-Autumn Festival is also a confession festival and atonement festival in China. People who have committed crimes for one year can have various ceremonies on the Mid-Autumn Festival.
2. Buddhist "Kasahara Festival"
Legend has it that there was a man named Mulian who dreamed that his dead mother was reduced to the ranks of hungry ghosts, so he sent food to his mother, but failed repeatedly. Manglietia told the Buddha about it, and the Buddha advised him to support the monks to do more good deeds in order to free his mother from the sins of the underworld. Manglietia made a basin on July 15 (Brahman means "saving upside down"), so Buddhist monks collectively recited scriptures for Manglietia's mother and freed her from her suffering. It can be seen that Buddhists' Boni Festival on July 15 has two meanings, one is to educate people to support religious monks, and the other is to educate people to do more good deeds to transcend the sins of their ancestors and advocate filial piety.
3. Folk "Ghost Festival"
July 15 is a "ghost festival", probably because people burn paper money to worship their ancestors from the first half of July to 15. This atmosphere of dialogue between man and soul leads people to say "Ghost Festival".
In the China Folk Ghost Festival, the first day of July is the opening of the gate of hell, and the dead ancestors will return to the world to see if their descendants are good or evil, and future generations will also take the opportunity to sacrifice; July 15 is Ghost Festival. After July 15, the gate of hell is closed. Before July 30th, if someone has not offered sacrifices to his ancestors, his ancestors will wander around the world for a year. ……
It should be said that China's ghost culture is quite developed, and it can't be simply called feudal superstition, which can be brought down by one hand. It contains profound moral concepts, which once played a very important role in the moral and ethical construction in China, and also played a very important role in stimulating a person's economy and employment. For example, the paper and incense industry, which was common in the past, solved the employment problem of a group of people. Like Du Feng ghost town, it has been a tourist attraction since ancient times, which has brought great economic development opportunities to Fengdu area.
Ghost Festival, from the beginning of July to the 30th of the lunar calendar, opens the gate of hell on the first day of July and closes it on the 15th of July.