The eighth day of the twelfth lunar month is the traditional Laba Festival of Han nationality in China. On this day, most parts of China have the custom of eating Laba porridge. Laba porridge is made of eight kinds of fresh grains and fruits harvested in the same year, usually sweet porridge. However, many farmers in the Central Plains like to eat Laba porridge. In addition to rice, millet, mung bean, cowpea, peanut, jujube and other raw materials, porridge also contains radish, cabbage, vermicelli, kelp, tofu and so on. Laba Festival, also known as Lari Festival, Bala Festival, Maharaja or Buddha's Enlightenment Day, was originally a sacrificial ceremony to celebrate the harvest and thank ancestors and gods (including door gods, household gods, house gods, kitchen gods and well gods) in ancient times. In addition to offering sacrifices to ancestors and gods, people must also drive away epidemics. This activity originated from Nuo in ancient times (the ritual of exorcising ghosts and avoiding epidemics in ancient times). One of the prehistoric medical methods was to exorcise ghosts and treat diseases. As a witchcraft activity, Xinhua and other places in Hunan still retain the custom of beating drums to drive away epidemics in the twelfth lunar month. Later it evolved into a religious festival to commemorate the enlightenment of Buddha Sakyamuni. The Xia dynasty called Lari "Jiaping", the Shang dynasty called it "moss" and the Zhou dynasty called it "big wax". Because it is held in December, it is called the twelfth lunar month, and La Worship is called the twelfth lunar month. The twelfth lunar month in the pre-Qin period was the third day after the establishment of the winter solstice, and it was fixed on the eighth day of the twelfth lunar month in the Southern and Northern Dynasties. "Shuowen" contains: "Three days after the winter, La Worship will be guarded by 100 gods." It can be seen that the third garrison day after the winter solstice is the twelfth month. Later, due to the intervention of Buddhism, the twelfth lunar month was changed to the eighth day of December, and it has since become a custom. Why is it called "La" at the end of the year has three meanings: First, "La" means the alternation of old and new (recorded in Sui Shu etiquette); The second is "wax hunters hunt together", which means that hunting in the wild can make animals sacrifice their ancestors and gods. "wax" comes from "meat", which means meat for "winter sacrifice"; Three yue "wax, chasing the epidemic to welcome the spring", ("Jingchu Sui"). Laba Festival is also called "Buddhist Enlightenment Festival" and "Enlightenment Meeting". In fact, it can be said that the eighth day of December is the origin of Laba Festival. According to legend, Sakyamuni, the founder of Buddhism, practiced in the mountains and sat quietly for six years. He was so hungry that he wanted to give up the pain. He happened to meet a shepherdess and gave him chyle. After eating, he sat cross-legged under the bodhi tree, became a Buddha in early December, and held a "Buddhist Festival" to commemorate it. Believers in China are very devout, so they merged with "La Ri" to form the "Laba Festival" and held a grand ceremony. On Laba Festival, most people drink Laba porridge. There are many stories about the origin of drinking Laba porridge. On the one hand, Laba porridge comes from India. The founder of Buddhism, Sakyamuni, was originally the son of Sudoku king in northern India (now Nepal). He saw that all beings were suffering physically and mentally, dissatisfied with the theocratic rule of Brahmins at that time, and gave up the throne and became a monk. After six years of asceticism, he became a Buddha under the bodhi tree on the eighth day of the twelfth lunar month. In the past six years, I have only eaten one hemp and one meter a day. Later generations did not forget his sufferings and ate porridge as a souvenir on the eighth day of the twelfth lunar month every year. "Laba" became "Buddha Inauguration Day". Laba is a grand festival of Buddhism. Before liberation, Buddhist temples all over the country held Buddhist baths and chanted scriptures, and imitated the legend that a herder offered chyle before Sakyamuni became a monk, and cooked fragrant cereal porridge to offer sacrifices to the Buddha, which was called "Laba porridge". Laba porridge was presented to disciples and kind men and women, and later became a folk custom. It is said that in some monasteries, before the eighth day of the twelfth lunar month, monks would hold alms bowls along the street and cook the collected rice, chestnuts, dates, nuts and other materials into Laba porridge and distribute it to the poor. Legend has it that eating it can get the blessing of Buddha, so the poor call it "Buddha porridge". The poem of Lu You in the Southern Song Dynasty said: "Today, Buddha porridge is more mutually beneficial, and the opposite is Jiangcun Village. "It is said that Tianning Temple, a famous temple in Hangzhou, has a rice stack building for storing leftovers. Usually, monks in the temple dry leftovers every day, accumulate a year's surplus grain, and cook laba porridge for believers on the eighth day of the twelfth lunar month. It is called "Fushou porridge" and "Fude porridge", which means that they can increase their happiness and longevity after eating them. It can be seen that the monks at that time cherished the virtue of food. It is said that Laba Festival comes from the custom of "dressing up as a ghost with red beans". Legend has it that Zhuan Xu, one of the five emperors in ancient times, turned his three sons into evil spirits after his death and came out to scare children. In ancient times, people generally believed in superstition and were afraid of ghosts and gods. They believe that adults and children suffer from strokes and poor health because of the spectre of epidemics. These evil spirits are fearless, only afraid of red (red) beans, so there is a saying that "red beans play ghosts." "So on the eighth day of the twelfth lunar month, we cook porridge with adzuki beans and adzuki beans to get rid of the epidemic. It is said that when Qin Shihuang built the Great Wall, migrant workers from all over the country were ordered to come, and they could not go home for many years, so they relied on their families to deliver meals to them. Some migrant workers whose homes are separated by water in Qian Shan are unable to deliver meals, resulting in many migrant workers starving to death at the site of the Great Wall. One year, on the eighth day of the twelfth lunar month, migrant workers who had no food jointly accumulated a few handfuls of coarse grains, put them in a pot and cooked them into porridge. Everyone drank a bowl and finally starved to death under the Great Wall. In order to mourn the migrant workers who starved to death at the Great Wall site, people eat Laba porridge every year on the eighth day of the twelfth lunar month as a memorial. On the other hand, in the Western Jin Dynasty, there was a very lazy young man. He always idled around and ate nothing. His bride repeatedly advised him to be ineffective. However, by the eighth day of December at the end of the year, his family had stopped cooking and the young man was hungry. He searched the rice jars, flour bags, pots and pans at home, washed the leftover powder and edible leftovers into the pot and cooked a bowl of mushy porridge to drink. After that, he drank it. The local people take this opportunity to educate their children to cook porridge every Laba, which not only means that they will not forget the virtues of their ancestors' diligence and thrift on Laba, but also hopes that the gods will bring a good year of plenty of food and clothing. On the one hand, Laba Festival originated from people's commemoration of loyal minister Yue Fei. At that time, Yue Fei led troops to resist gold in Zhuxian town, which was in the severe winter of September. Yue Jiajun had no food and clothing, was hungry and cold, and the people sent porridge one after another. Yue Jiajun had a hearty meal of "thousand porridge" sent by the people, and the result was a great victory. It was the eighth day of December. After Yue Fei's death, in order to commemorate him, people cooked porridge with miscellaneous grains and beans on the eighth day of the twelfth lunar month, which finally became a custom. It is also said that Laba Festival originated in the late Yuan Dynasty and early Ming Dynasty. It is said that when Zhu Yuanzhang was in trouble and suffering in prison, he was cold and hungry. Zhu Yuanzhang actually found some seven or eight kinds of whole grains such as red beans, rice and red dates from the rat hole in prison. Zhu Yuanzhang cooked these things into porridge. Because it was the eighth day of the twelfth lunar month, Zhu Yuanzhang called this pot of miscellaneous grains porridge Laba porridge. I enjoyed a delicious meal. Later, Zhu Yuanzhang pacified the world and became the emperor facing south. In order to commemorate that special day in prison, he designated it as Laba Festival and officially named the miscellaneous grains porridge he ate that day Laba porridge.