Today is the twenty-fourth day of the twelfth month of the lunar calendar, and this day has a custom in Chaoshan "God on Heaven" (also called "Gong Shang Tian"). This is a big thing for the Chaoshan people to do before the New Year, and almost every household has to hold the ceremony of "sending the gods to heaven".
Chaoshan folk festival custom "God on heaven" on the 24th day of the twelfth month of the lunar calendar, on this day, to spare the stickiest glutinous rice made of kway teows with peanuts, sesame seeds and sugar, or pancake roll brown sugar as an offering to the Emperor Of Siming, that is, the god of Vesta. Legend has it that vesta is most closely related to each family, and everyone has done something good or bad in a year, and on the day of "God in Heaven", he will go to heaven to report to the Jade Emperor; there is nothing to hide. There is a saying in Chaozhou called "Si Ming Gong Straight Play", which means truth. Some people did something wrong, afraid that Si Minggong would play the Jade Emperor directly and blame him for not being able to bear it, so they wanted to stick his mouth before the God of Vesta went to heaven, so that he could not say bad things in heaven.
God wants to go to heaven, and the family will burn a square piece of paper printed with a red horse and a crane in front of the stove and give it to God as a mount. The housewives also took the incense bones, golden flowers, red silk, etc. from the incense burner to the stream and burned them, and washed the incense burner. Because after sending the god to heaven, god went to heaven to earn money and came back to use it with his family, so it was inconvenient to take old things to god again.
On the 24th day of the 12th month of the lunar calendar, it is commonly known as the day when the gods are sent to heaven, and their custom is to worship the god Vesta. In the Chaoshan region, this vesta god was called "Shen Mian Gong", and the correct name of the god was Si Ming Emperor Jun, referred to as Si Ming Gong for short.
The "Customs and Customs" records that the little god worshiped had this emperor, who was in charge of full-time affairs related to life. The Guan Zi Shu Shu says: "Grain eats rice, and the people's si zhi is also ordered." Qu Yuan's "Chu Ci" said that the Si Ming Emperor was responsible for the disaster and the main life.
The legendary Si Ming Gong in the Chaoshan folk area was originally a poor man, and in ancient times, the young daughter of the Jade Emperor took a fancy to him and secretly married him. This matter was known to the Jade Emperor, and his heart was angry. According to the heavenly rules, the Jade Emperor beat his own daughter down to mortal dust and was not allowed to return to the Heavenly Palace.
The Queen Mother, who loved her younger daughter, interceded, and the Jade Emperor promised her daughter to marry her husband, and allowed her to return to the Heavenly Palace once a year on the twenty-fourth day of the first lunar month, and to return to the human world on the fourth day of the first lunar month. At the same time, he made his son-in-law the Emperor of Siming. Emperor Si ming was well aware of the sufferings of the people, and every year the heavens interceded with the Jade Emperor to give food to the world. But the land god also told the Jade Emperor that ordinary people trampled on grain. When the Jade Emperor heard this, he ordered Emperor Si to examine the good and evil of the people, the rise and fall of livestock, and the return to the Heavenly Palace must first explain these matters. Emperor Si ming returned to the human world and told his neighbors and relatives and friends about the incident. Neighbors and relatives and friends then used half-cut tile tubes on their stoves to paste them next to the chimney, pasted them with red paper with the title of Emperor Siming and emperor, and worshipped on the 24th day of the waxing moon.
The people knew about this matter, and once they passed it on to a hundred, a hundred to a thousand, four townships and six miles, they all installed their superiors and ordered the emperor to take the throne, and sincerely worshiped. On the morning of the fourth day of the first lunar month, he reverently received God from heaven to earth. At dawn on the 24th day of the waxing moon, women must get up and first take the pot to the alley outside the house to remove the smoke stains, commonly known as "rake ding". From this day on, it is necessary to wait until the gods have fallen to the heavens before they can "rake", which means not to alarm si minggong. At dawn, people put a bowl of sugar porridge, a plate of brown sugar, a bowl of water, a plate of rice, and four paper horses that had been cooked and worshipped. The coastal areas of Shenquan, Aojiao, and Qianzhan also make red peach kway, fat kway, oil cone kway teow, and three animals to worship the Emperor Of Si, that is, to worship the Duke of Zhao.
When worshipping, first burn three incense sticks, then kneel down, recite words in your mouth, and pray that the priest will say more good things about the family door, and more blessings will be sent to the door of the house, so that he can raise big pigs in the new year. After burning the incense, he asked Si Minggong to carry these gifts to heaven. In order to ensure that Si Minggong arrived safely as soon as possible, two paper horses were burned after the worship, so that the husband and wife of the stove could take the heavenly horse and go straight to the Heavenly Palace to reduce fatigue.
After sending Si Minggong to the heavens, each family cleaned up the indoor hygiene, tore off the various old man runes posted by the elderly, took off the incense sticks, and respectfully served them and piled them together next to the village, which means that if the Jade Emperor did not believe in Si Minggong, when he sent people to inspect, he saw that the people of the world really cleaned the village community home, and prayerfully prayed to the Jade Emperor for blessings and longevity, and there would be no more lies. From then on, the Jade Emperor trusted Si Ming Gong even more, and entrusted the affairs of eliminating disasters for the people, adding blessings to life, increasing grain, and feeding big pigs to The Si Ming Company. The people also worshipped him even more.
On the morning of the fourth day of the first lunar month, the people still followed the practice of honoring the priest and ordering the public to burn two paper horses to welcome the fall of the gods, and the same folk custom has been followed until dawn to "rake ding". Note: The above graphics and text come from the network!