Folk custom:
On the twenty-third day of the lunar month, the king of the stove was sent to heaven
Zhang Yaoyu Wen
The twenty-third day of the lunar month, commonly known as "Xiao Nian", is spread in the northwest hometown that this day is the day to send the "stove prince" to heaven, so it is necessary to sacrifice to the god of the stove, also known as "the day of sending the stove". The Lord of the Stove went to heaven to report the good and evil of the family to the Jade Emperor, and let the Jade Emperor reward and punish.
Zheng Xuan's note "The Book of Rites and Notation" also said: "(The God of the Stove) lives in the world, and the inspector is small, and the one who reprimands is also." This is to say that the god of the stove is responsible for supervising the daily faults of people and reporting these faults to the Emperor. During the Eastern Jin Dynasty, the punishment reported by the god of the stove was very severe. Ge Hong of the Eastern Jin Dynasty recorded in "Hug Puzi Inner Chapter: Micro Purpose": "On the night of the moon, the god of the stove also went to the sky for white crimes. The big one seizes the discipline, and the one who takes the discipline is 300 days. The small one takes the count, and the one who counts it is three days." This means that after the god of the stove discovers a person's fault and reports it, he will live 300 days less for serious mistakes and three days less for minor mistakes.
Since then, there have been more and more legends about the god of the hearth. People worship the god of the stove on this night, hoping that the god of the stove will only say good things to the heavens, not bad words, and the couplets on both sides of the god case are usually pasted as follows: "God says good things, and the lower world keeps peace", and the horizontal criticism is "the head of the family". Sacrificial items such as wine and sugary foods are mandatory. The purpose of sugar is to make the mouth of the god of the stove sweet and not to speak ill of the family. The wine is to make the Lord of the Stove drunk, get carried away, and forget about those who want to say bad things.
I remember when I was a child, when I sent the stove, every household put 12 cooked stove dry food, a bowl of water, and a little grass on the table in front of the statue of the stove king in the kitchen or the main room. Listening to the elders in the village, the god of the stove on the twenty-third day of the lunar month went to heaven and reported to the Jade Emperor, who was in charge of the heavenly court and the world, the merits and deeds of each family in the past year, and the blessings and disasters of the coming year. The shrewd people put a sufficient amount of brown sugar and white sugar in the dry food of the stove when they burned the stove, so as to stuff it into the mouth of the stove god, hoping to be extra merciful and not talk about the sins of the world.
After the sacrifice is completed, the old paper horse of the stove monarch who has been enshrined for many years is removed from the stove, and the portrait of the prince riding the stove horse printed on the yellow paper table is incinerated together with the paper money, and a string of firecrackers is set off to show that the stove god is sent to heaven (one says that the stove lady returned to the heavenly court). In the seven days without the "head of the family", there are no taboos, and people begin to dust, steam steamed buns, braised pork, etc., to prepare for the New Year's meal.
Until Chinese New Year's Eve, when receiving the gods, the gift of receiving the god of the stove is performed again, and after worshipping the god Vesta, a new portrait and couplet of the king of the stove are pasted on the stove or on a special god case, and then incense is burned and sacrificed, and the horse of the stove horse hand-printed or painted on the paper money and yellow paper table as the mount of the king of the stove is lit, and the firecrackers are fired to take the king of the stove back to the house. The ritual of the sacrificial stove fully reflects the traditional culture of the Chinese people who revere the gods, and in a certain sense, the gods can not only communicate and control, but even be accommodating. In the hearts of the common people, the gods are no longer the supreme totems who do not eat the fireworks of the world, but the mortals who celebrate the festival with the people. In the subtle transformation of god-worshipping behavior, the sacrificial activities are aimed at strengthening the family concept and the national view, which is not exactly the secret of the Chinese nation's thousands of years, passing on the torch, uniting and enterprising, and endlessly.
When I was a child, when I arrived in the month of Layue, my friends were looking forward to the twenty-third day of the lunar calendar, because after sending the stove prince to heaven, they could share the enshrined stove dry food, and the family reunited to taste the sweet stove dry food, saying auspicious words, and looking forward to the Spring Festival seven days later.
"After the twenty-three, there are seven days left for the New Year" This sentence has been passed down to this day, folk culture is the soul of a nation, no matter how the times change, it must not be discarded. I hope that after reading this article, it is a good thing that people can pass on this folk custom. (The author is a member of the Chinese Prose Literature Association)
Editor in charge: Rong Feng
Information provided by: Peichang
Image source: Internet