Legend 1 of Mid-Autumn Festival: In the Goddess Chang'e flying to the moon folklore, Chang 'e was originally the wife of Hou Yi. After Hou Yi shot nine suns, the Queen Mother of the West gave her the elixir of youth, but Hou Yi refused to eat it, so she gave it to Chang 'e for storage. Peng Meng, a disciple of Hou Yi, coveted the elixir and forced Chang 'e to take it out. Chang 'e had no choice but to swallow it and fly to the sky. On the 15th day of August, the moon was big and bright. Because of the reluctance of Hou Yi, Chang 'e stopped at the nearest moon on the earth and lived in Guanghan Palace for a long time. Hou Yi was heartbroken when he came home, so he put down a banquet on August 15th every year to reunite with Chang 'e and the moon.
Legend 2 of Mid-Autumn Festival: There was a plague in Xianning, Wugang, Guangxi, and people tried their best to cure it. WU GANG, a filial young man, went to the cliff of Guabang Mountain to collect herbs every day in order to cure his mother of the plague. This move moved the Bodhisattva, and the Bodhisattva instructed him to pick osmanthus in the Moon Palace, which can cure the plague. In order to help his mother and heal the people, the kind-hearted young man wanted to pick as many osmanthus as possible, so he shook the osmanthus tree and let it fall into a river at the foot of Guabang Mountain. However, this move violated the rules of heaven. Seeing that he was brave, filial and caring for the people, the Jade Emperor couldn't bear to punish him. He told him that if he could cut down the osmanthus tree, he could bring it to the world. In this way, WU GANG avoided punishment, but as a sacred tree of the Moon Palace, osmanthus trees could not be cut down. Therefore, WU GANG has been chopping down trees for thousands of years. When Wu Gang saw that chopping down trees failed, he was homesick, so he left a osmanthus flower on the hanging mountain every Mid-Autumn Festival night to express his homesickness. In the end, osmanthus trees spread all over Guabang Mountain, and the people used osmanthus to drive away the plague.
Legend 3 of Mid-Autumn Festival: Jade Rabbit Cures Diseases
Legend has it that in ancient times, there was a plague in old Beijing, and everyone was infected, so it didn't matter what medicine they took. Chang 'e was very sad to see people's suffering, so she sent a jade rabbit to the world to help people eliminate disasters and treat diseases. As a result, Yutu became a young girl, came to Beijing, walked around the streets and cured many patients. Yutu treated people for nothing, only borrowed other people's clothes to wear, and everywhere she went, she changed her costume, from a man to a woman, from a fortune teller to an oil seller, and finally traveled all over Beijing until the plague was eliminated. People cherish the kindness of Jade Rabbit. Every day on the 15th day of the eighth lunar month, every family will worship her and give her delicious melons, fruits and beans as a reward for her good fortune and happiness. They also affectionately call her "male prostitute" and "Grandma Rabbit".
Legend 4 of Mid-Autumn Festival: Mid-Autumn Uprising
At the end of the Yuan Dynasty, Zhu Yuanzhang joined forces with local resistance forces to prepare for an uprising. Liu Bowen, a military adviser, came up with a clever plan. He took advantage of the opportunity of giving each other wheat cakes during the Mid-Autumn Festival, and put a note in the wheat cakes to convey the information of the uprising. He agreed to hold an uprising at the same time on the evening of August 15th. Later, when the uprising was successful, Zhu Yuanzhang gave a message, and every year on the Mid-Autumn Festival, he gave the "moon cakes" that conveyed the information that year as holiday cakes to his ministers. Since then, the custom of eating moon cakes on Mid-Autumn Festival has been handed down.
Legend 5 of Mid-Autumn Festival: According to legend, Xuanzong of Tang Dynasty, Shen Tianshi and Taoist Hongdu all looked at the moon in the Mid-Autumn Festival. Suddenly Xuanzong raised the idea of visiting the moon palace, so Tianshi did it, and the three of them started to go to Qingyun and roam the moon palace. However, the palace is heavily guarded, so it is impossible to enter, and you can only overlook the imperial city of Chang 'an.
On this occasion, I suddenly heard the sound of fairy tales, beautiful and wonderful, and moving! Emperor Xuanzong of the Tang Dynasty was always familiar with melody, so he memorized it in his heart. This is precisely "this song should only be in the sky, and how many times can the world hear it!" In the future, Xuanzong recalled the music and singing of Xiane in the Moon Palace, and composed music and choreographed it himself. This is the famous "colorful plumage" in history.
Nowadays, the legend of the Goddess Chang'e flying to the moon has become a topic that will be talked about during the Mid-Autumn Festival. The story of the Goddess Chang'e flying to the moon was told to me by my grandmother when I was a child. Dear friends, apart from these five legends, what other legends and short stories do you know about the Mid-Autumn Festival? Tell me in the comments section.