Welcome the God of Wealth on the fifth day of the first lunar month

 

Welcome the God of Wealth on the fifth day of the first lunar month

 

Some areas in the south welcome the God of Wealth on the fifth day of the first lunar month. According to folklore, the God of Wealth is the God of Five Ways. The so-called five roads refer to east, west, south, north, and middle, which means that you can get wealth in any of the five ways.

"Qing Jia Lu" written by Gu Lu in the Qing Dynasty said: "The fifth day of the first lunar month is the birthday of the Lutou God. Gold gongs and firecrackers are used, and the sacrifices are finished. In order to be the first to benefit the market, one must get up early to welcome it, which is called connecting the road." He also said: "The head of the road today is the walking god among the Five Sacrifice. The so-called five roads should be the east, west, south, north and middle ears." There was a custom of grabbing the head of the road in Shanghai in the old calendar years. According to folklore, the fifth day of the Lunar New Year is the birthday of the God of Wealth, and in order to compete for market profits, it is first received on the fourth day of the Lunar New Year, which is called "grabbing the road head", also known as "receiving the God of Wealth" and "sacrifice to the God of Wealth".

The five sacrifices include the household god, the kitchen god, the earth god, the door god, and the walking god. The so-called "Lutou" is the god among the five sacrifices. Whenever you receive the God of Wealth, you must offer a sheep head and a carp. Offering a sheep head means "auspiciousness", and offering a carp is a homophone of "fish" and "yu" in the picture. The poem is auspicious. People firmly believe that as long as they can get the God of Wealth to appear, they can get rich. Therefore, every Chinese New Year, people open their doors and windows at 50:00 on the first day of the first lunar month (after 24:00 on the fourth day of the first lunar month), burn incense, set off firecrackers, and light fireworks to welcome the God of Wealth. After receiving the God of Wealth, everyone also eats Lutou wine, often until dawn. Everyone is full of hopes of getting rich, hoping that the God of Wealth can bring gold and silver to their homes and make them rich in the new year.

Wulu God, also known as Lutou God, is a god of wealth believed in by Wu. It is customary to regard the fourth day as his birthday, and it is quite spectacular to offer sacrifices and greet him.

It is believed that the sooner you pick up the road head, the better. It is said that the earliest one to pick up the road head is the true god, which is particularly effective, so it is called "grabbing the road head". In some places, people really "rush to grab the road" on the fourth day of the first lunar month, and it has become a custom. As for people worshiping the Lutou God on the fifth day of the first lunar month and using this day as his birthday, this is because the "five" among the five Lutou gods is related to the "five" on the fifth day of the lunar month. To pick up the God of Wealth, the owner must bring incense and candles to the God of Wealth Hall in the five directions of east, west, south, north and center to pick him up. Every time a God of Wealth is picked up, a string of Baizi cannons will be set off in front of the door. After receiving everything, the host and the waiter bowed to the God of Wealth in turn, and then cremated the horse silk on the original offering table to express their respect to the God of Wealth. The ceremony is finally over.

It is an old custom that during the Spring Festival, large and small shops will be closed from the beginning of the new year and open on the fifth day of the first lunar month. It is customary to regard the fifth day of the first lunar month as the holy day of wealth. It is believed that choosing this day to open the market will definitely attract wealth.

Recently, China’s land worship activities have become “public sacrifices”. At the beginning of the reform and opening up, when many parts of the country were still silent on folk beliefs, Fujian Province took the lead in opening up the Mazu belief. Later, the Qingshui Patriarch, the Baosheng Emperor...all the gods "showed their magical powers" and took on the responsibility of maintaining the relationship between Fujian and Taiwan. It is an important task to promote the great cause of the reunification of the motherland, because Taiwan’s important folk beliefs are basically introduced from Fujian and other southeastern coastal areas of the mainland. The ancestors of the mainland who moved to Taiwan, in order to seek blessings from the gods and Buddhas, most of them carried "incense bags" from the gods in their hometown. As soon as they took root, they immediately built temples to worship the local gods of their place of origin and offered incense brought with great hardships from their hometown. The temples of local gods such as Mazu (Tianhou) in Taiwan are basically "fractionated incense" from ancestral temples and ancestral courts in mainland China, that is, the incense from ancestral temples in mainland China is introduced into newly built temples in Taiwan. Through "dividing fragrance", Fujian and Taiwan maintain a constant friendship.

The most important reason why Chinese people are Chinese is that they maintain the same cultural and psychological identity with each other, and the common belief in gods is an important factor for the Chinese nation to maintain lasting cohesion. The concept of "China" is, in a sense, a cultural construction. The auspicious cloud torch, the Bird's Nest, the Water Cube... the cultural construction of the concept of "China" is full of vitality and is constantly "opening up"; as a historical and cultural " Collective memory", we must also "carry on the past". Therefore, common belief in gods has become an indispensable part of Chinese identity.

Chapter 12 of "The Analects of Confucius·Bayi": "Sacrifices are as if they are present, and sacrifices to gods are as if gods are present. Confucius said: 'I don't offer sacrifices, it's as if I don't offer sacrifices.'"

According to the current saying: offering sacrifices to ancestors is as if the ancestors are really there, and offering sacrifices to gods is as if gods are really there. Confucius said: "If I do not personally participate in the sacrifice, (having someone else sacrifice on my behalf), it will be the same as not sacrificing. Confucius said, "Sacrifice is as if the gods are present, sacrifice to the gods as if the gods are present." This sentence is often regarded as Confucian atheism The most powerful evidence, but those experts and scholars may have forgotten that Confucius always prayed before eating.

The worship of local gods and sages is a precious culture left to us by history and an important cultural and psychological foundation for the Chinese to be Chinese. However, these "gods" must be continuously sacrificed by people in order to maintain their (culture) ) the continuation of life and continue to exert its beneficial social functions; if they do not worship and commemorate for a long time, people will forget these "gods", and the precious common spiritual heritage of the Chinese nation represented and condensed behind these "gods" will also be lost as a result.

According to existing texts, Chinese sacrificial activities originated from the patriarchal society in the late primitive society. The types are roughly divided into worshiping heaven and earth, society, ancestors and stove. Before the emergence of wine, worship mainly used water, which was called Xuanjiu. Later, it developed to use five Qi, namely: Fan Qi, Li Qi, Ang Qi, Ti Qi, and Shen Qi.

The ancients often referred to Huangtian and Houtu together: Huangtian refers to the god of heaven, and Houtu refers to the god of society (the god of the earth). Among the gods of society, Sheji is the first, which includes “sheji, the five sacrifices, the five mountains, the gods of mountains, forests, rivers, and all things in the four directions. She represents the god of the earth, and Ji represents the god of grain.

From the pottery and bronzes unearthed in the Shang Dynasty, we found that most of the unearthed cultural relics were wine vessels. In the "Book of Rites and Ritual Utensils", during the ancestral temple sacrifices, the venerable ones raised their goblets and the humble ones raised their horns, indicating that the Shang Dynasty had a strict hierarchy in the etiquette of ancestral temple sacrificial activities.

The Zhou Dynasty was a period when ancient Chinese sacrifices were standardized, institutionalized, and matured. The practice of drinking alcohol during sacrificial activities reached its peak in the Shang Dynasty, which was one of the reasons that contributed to the rapid demise of the Shang Dynasty.

Sacrifice is not only a unique activity of the Han people, but many ethnic minorities in my country also maintain various sacrificial activities. For example, the Lisu people worship the mountain god, and the Bulang people worship the thunder god.

Primitive religion originated from witchcraft. In ancient China, shamans used so-called "supernatural power" to perform various activities and used wine. There was no difference between witches and doctors in ancient times. As medicine, wine was one of the common medicines of witch doctors. In ancient times, rulers believed that "the great things of the country are to be enshrined in the army." In sacrificial activities, wine, as a beautiful thing, must first be dedicated to heaven, gods and ancestors for enjoyment. War determines the life and death of a tribe or country. Warriors who go on a war journey must use wine to boost their fighting spirit before setting off. The relationship between wine and national events can be seen from this. The "Rites of Zhou", which reflects the system of the Zhou Dynasty and the Warring States Period, has clear regulations on the use of wine for sacrifices. For example, when offering sacrifices, a total of eight kinds of wine are used, namely "Wu Qi" and "Three Wines". The person who presided over the sacrificial activities was very powerful in ancient times. In primitive society, he was a wizard. The main responsibility of the wizard was to worship the emperor, ghosts and gods, and to pray for blessings and prevent disasters. Later, there was a "jiujiu" to preside over the wine-sacrifice activities during the banquet.

The famous piece "Nine Songs" in "Chu Ci" was originally the name of a legendary ancient song. "Nine Songs" was adapted or processed by Qu Yuan, a native of Chu during the Warring States Period, based on folk songs for worshiping gods. There are eleven chapters in total: "Donghuang Taiyi", "Yunzhongjun", "Xiangjun", "Mrs. Xiang", "Da Siming", "Shao Siming", "Dongjun", "He Bo", " "Mountain Ghost", "National Memorial", and "Soul of Ceremony". One chapter, "National Memorial", mourns and praises the soldiers who died fighting for the Chu Kingdom; most of the chapters describe the attachment between the gods, showing deep longing or sadness of failed wishes. Wang Yi said that it was composed by Qu Yuan when he was exiled to the south of the Yangtze River. At that time, Qu Yuan was "sorrowful and full of sorrow and thoughts", so he composed music and songs to worship gods to express his thoughts and feelings. However, modern researchers mostly believe that it was made before the exile and was only used for sacrifice. But we can think that "Nine Songs" is actually a song to worship gods.