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The Western Han Dynasty "Huainan Zi" said: "For example, if Ruoyi asks for the medicine of immortality to the Queen Mother of the West, she steals the moon, and there is a loss and there is no way to continue it." "姮娥" here refers to "Chang'e". The legend of Chang'e Running Moon enters the Mid-Autumn Festival, which is obviously closely related to Taoism in the Western Han Dynasty, and this relationship has become an important development direction and value orientation of the Mid-Autumn Festival.
Understand from a genealogical perspective
The traditional variations of the Mid-Autumn Festival
Text | Lin Jifu
The Mid-Autumn Festival on the fifteenth day of the eighth month of the lunar calendar is a poetic festival in the hearts of Chinese. "A good night in a year, when the light is seen." "The moon is born on the sea, and the end of the world is at this time." Every Mid-Autumn Festival night, a full moon hangs high in the blue sky, bright as a mirror, round like a jade plate, every household in the courtyard while admiring the moon while eating moon cakes, infinite affection, happy and harmonious.
The Mid-Autumn Festival is a whole, with vivid attributes of life and clear traditional levels. When explaining the Mid-Autumn Festival earlier, focusing on observing the Mid-Autumn Festival as a whole, focusing on the ins and outs of a traditional custom of the Mid-Autumn Festival, etc., is an important method that must be followed to reveal the traditional meaning of the Mid-Autumn Festival. However, the formation of the Mid-Autumn Festival has undergone a long and complex process, it is composed of many traditional elements, and the connections between each element and its source are real and concrete, which have become the key elements of the inheritance and development of the Mid-Autumn Festival. Therefore, understanding the traditional structure of the Mid-Autumn Festival from a genealogical perspective helps to deepen the understanding of the meaning of the Mid-Autumn Festival.
From the earliest folk motif "Moon Sacrifice", the development of today's Mid-Autumn Festival moon sacrifice custom has a history of thousands of years. In the process of historical development, the specific customs of the Mid-Autumn Festival to sacrifice the moon have also changed continuously. In order to better explain the Mid-Autumn Festival folklore, it is particularly important to discuss the formation and development of each traditional element in the Mid-Autumn Festival from a genealogical perspective, and it is particularly important to analyze the generation of the meaning of the Mid-Autumn Festival.
The moon festival is the foundation of the traditional origin of the Mid-Autumn Festival. As early as the pre-Qin era, the custom of offering the moon had been popular among the princes and nobles. Spring festival days and autumn moon festivals were important activities of the emperors at that time. Book 46 clouds of the Book of Rites and Justice: "Bury the young man in Taizhao, and also at the time of sacrifice." Similar to the kantan, the festival is also cold and hot. The royal palace, the day of the festival also. Night light, matsuri moon also. Youzong, matsuri star also. Yan Zong, sacrifice water drought also. Four altars, offerings to the four sides also. Mountains, forests, rivers and valleys can emerge from the clouds, for the wind and rain, see monsters, all know the gods. There are those who worship the hundred gods. "There are special idols of gods during the moon festival, and the image of the moon god in the Ming and Qing dynasties, dominated by Chang'e, evolved into a moonlight bodhisattva and a medicine jade rabbit. People burn incense to the moon on the night of the Mid-Autumn Festival. Today, Every August 15th in Xianning, Hubei Province, there is an activity of "keeping the moon", that is, whenever the moon rises, each family will put a basin of water in front of their own hall or patio, so that the shadow of the moon is poured into the basin, and the family sits around the basin to watch the moon, wait for guanghua, and celebrate the reunion together; the Orunchun people sacrifice the moon on August 15, put a basin of clear water in the open sky, put the sacrifice, and then kneel in front of the basin and bow to the moon; the northwest Turks use the basin to fill the water and receive the reflection of the moon into the basin. Then keep beating the moon in the basin with small stones, commonly known as "August fifteen hit the moon". The Zhuang people in western Guangxi are more typical of the "moon sacrifice and god" activity, every year in the middle of August of the summer calendar, some are on the night of the Mid-Autumn Festival, people set up an offering table in the open air at the end of the village, offering sacrifices and incense burners, and erect a branch or bamboo branch about one foot high on the right side of the table, symbolizing the social tree, also as a ladder under the moon god and the heavens, preserving the ancient moon mythical factors. From here, we can see that the sacrifice of the moon god actually includes two levels: the family-based "moon-keeping" activity, which should be the earlier form of the moon sacrifice; the family, nation or country-based activity of sacrificing the moon god, at this time the sacrifice has a clear and systematic sacrifice procedure and sacrifice ritual system.
The legend of the motif of Chang'e Running Moon shrouds the Mid-Autumn Festival with a charming and magnificent aura, adding a rich poetic meaning and also strongly promoting the development of the Mid-Autumn Festival. The Western Han Dynasty "Huainan Zi" said: "For example, if Ruoyi asks for the medicine of immortality to the Queen Mother of the West, she steals the moon, and there is a loss and there is no way to continue it." "姮娥" here refers to "Chang'e". The legend of Chang'e Running Moon enters the Mid-Autumn Festival, which is obviously closely related to Taoism in the Western Han Dynasty, and this relationship has become an important development direction and value orientation of the Mid-Autumn Festival.
Different versions of "Chang'e Running Moon"
On the basis of the motif of Chang'e running to the moon, Chang'e incarnated as a toad, and then evolved the belief that the moon palace was a toad palace. In the Eastern Han Dynasty Zhang Heng's famous article "Lingxian", this myth is recorded more specifically: "Yi please the medicine of immortality in the West Queen Mother, Concubine E steals to run to the moon, will go, There is Huang Zhi Huang, there is Huang Zhan Zhi Ji, Fei Fei Gui Sister, the only will go west, every day obscure, no fear, and then Dachang." She was entrusted to the moon for the toad. "This myth was obviously influenced by the prevalence of immortal alchemy in the Han Dynasty. At this time, the myth of Chang'e Running Moon has a strong immortal color.
The ancients believed that "the sun, the sect of yang essence, accumulates into a bird, like a black and has three toes, yang and the like, its number is strange." The Moon, the Sect of Yin Essence, accumulates into beasts, like rabbit clams, yin and the like, and its number is even. This is the earliest origin of the motif of "Jade Rabbit in the Moon". In the Tang Dynasty, the myth about the moon deduced the plot of jade rabbit pounding medicine and Wu Gang cutting laurel trees. The Tang Dynasty Duan Chengshi "Youyang Miscellaneous Tricks" says: "The old saying that there is a laurel in the moon and a toad, so the different book says: The laurel is five hundred zhang high, and there is a person under it who often cuts it, and the tree is created and joined." People surnamed Wu Minggang, Xihe people, Xuexian has been, who ordered the tree to be cut down. ”
The custom of appreciating the moon was very popular in the Tang Dynasty, and in the Song Dynasty, the Mid-Autumn Festival custom centered on moon appreciation was formed, and it has been popular ever since. The Southern Song Dynasty Wu Zimu's "Record of Dreams" records: "On August 15, the Mid-Autumn Festival, the third autumn of this day is exactly half, so it is called the Mid-Autumn Festival. This night the moon is brighter than the usual time, also known as the moon and night. At this time, the golden wind is recommended. Gyokuro is cold. The fragrance of dangui is wafting. Silver toad full of light. Prince Wang. Rich family room. Don't climb the dangerous building. Linxuan play month. Or open the canton. Tortoiseshell feast listed. The piano is sonorous. Drink wine and sing. The joy of the night. "The scene of the Song people celebrating the Mid-Autumn Festival can be seen. On the night of the Mid-Autumn Festival in the Song Dynasty, everyone in the city should worship the moon, the boy hoped that the moon god would bless him to become famous as soon as possible, and the girl "wished to look like Chang'e, round as a clean moon". After the Ming and Qing dynasties, the moon god gradually became a special object of female worship, with the so-called "men do not worship the moon, women do not sacrifice stoves" common saying. The custom of praying for heirs in the ancient Autumn Festival was gradually transferred and merged into the Mid-Autumn Festival. On the night of the Mid-Autumn Festival, people go to the field to "steal" melons, and then blow and beat and lively give winter melons or pumpkins depicted as babies to couples who have been sterile for several years after marriage, in order to make the melons last.
The custom of using mooncakes as a special food for the Mid-Autumn Festival and offerings for the moon festival began around the Time of the Ming Dynasty. In the Qing Dynasty, in addition to the moon cakes that were generally fed to each other, there were also special moon cakes for sacrifice, which were rounder and larger than the daily moon cakes. Mooncakes are usually shared by the family after the moon festival.
After modern times, with the dilution of the belief in the moon in the Mid-Autumn Festival, the traditional moon worship activities have disappeared, and tasting moon cakes, appreciating the Mid-Autumn Moon, and relatives and friends coming and going to celebrate the festival have become the customs of most people.
From the above analysis, it is not difficult to see that the formation of the Mid-Autumn Festival tradition is the result of long-term accumulation, in which each traditional element is the presentation of the people's life at that time, including emotional. These elements are created and integrated around the moon, and the genealogy of their traditional knowledge is both living and emotional. Each traditional element in the Mid-Autumn Festival has meaning, and more importantly, each traditional element is combined with the life of the times to form a complete Mid-Autumn Festival.
Author | Lin Jifu is a professor at the Minzu University of China and the deputy secretary-general of the Chinese Folklore Society
Source | "People's Political Consultative Conference Daily" 2019-09-09 Issue 10 edition
Edit | Wang Yaxin