The origins of Hungry Ghost Festival
The Afterlife in Chinese myth
The ancestors in Hungry Ghosts Festival
The Hungry Ghosts
 

The origins of Hungry Ghost Festival

The Chinese Ghost Festival falls on the 15th day of the seventh month of the Lunar calendar.  It is also the date for Zhong Yuan Festival, Yu Lan Pen festival and ShiHu. It used to be a religious ceremony in India.  The Buddhist would hold the Yu Lan Pen Festival in memory of their forefathers.  The Yu Lan Pen canon was compiled to encourage the Buddhists' piety, so it went with the Chinese custom of commemorating their ancestors and became popular in many Chinese regions.  China followed the custom since the Liang Dynasty (502-557 A.D.) and it was evolved into the present Zhong Yuan Festival.

No one can recall when the Hungry Ghost Festival actually started, but there are two theories about its origin.

The first theory is that the festival originated in Taoism.  The celebration marked the birthday of Di Guan, the god believed to have power over the land.   Sacrifices were offered on this day to thank Guan for his crop protection.

However, most people tend to associate the festival with the Buddhist story about Mu Lina, the eldest monk under the discipline of Buddha.  Legend has it that after committing many terrible crimes, including murder, Mu Lian's mother was sent to the 18th level the very bottom of Hell, where she became a hungry ghost.  Mu Lian learned of her suffering and went down to hell to help try and alleviate her pain with rice and water, but he failed, as the food quickly caught fire before it could reach his mother's lip. Mu Lian then asked Buddha for advice.  He was told to perform rituals with sincerity on the 15th day of the seventh month and prepare food for other ghosts as well.  The gods were so emotionally moved by his act that they finally let his mother go.

However, there are several versions of Mu Lian's story.  Here is a more detailed version.

Since then the date has been known as the Ghost Festival.  It is thought that the gates of Hell are opened on that day, releasing hungry ghosts into the world.
 

Tent is setup for doing street ritual.  Candles are used to mark the boundary of the cult on the lawn..

The Afterlife in Chinese myth

The seventh month festival serves two objects: ancestors and ghosts.  To understand the heart of the festival it is important to observe how ghosts and ancestors have come to be distinguished and accordingly treated.  The distinction has a Taoist influence.

During the Hungry Ghost Festival the living show their concern for the dead.  The Chinese concept of death and life makes participation mandatory for filial children.  This concept emerges from the Taoist philosophical development of yin and yang: two opposing forces of which everything is composed.  Yin is the force of death and yang of life, and these elements are at work within individual persons.  As a man ages, the yin increases at the expense of the yang, and death marks the total separation of the two.  The soul, however, also contains elements of both yin and yang.  The former is called Kui (demon) and the latter Shen (spirit).  At death the Kui should return to the earth and the Shen persist in the grave, family shrine and the other world.  If, however, one's soul is not properly cared for, it will persist as Kui and cause problems for the living.  In popular practice, the Kui are considered hungry ghosts thus, clearly, one's ancestor could only be Shen. Because both continue to exist and interfere, the living must respond accordingly.



The ancestors in Hungry Ghosts Festival

Because ancestors persist after death as Shen, the moral obligation to them never ceases.  As all subordinates owe their elder kinsmen worship, respect and honor, this duty is passed down throughout the generations, with descendents accumulating more and more ancestors to worship.  As the family line continues through the male, only-sons must maintain a strict worship lest the ancestors exist neglected.

Assisting the Ancestors

Neglecting the ancestors is a serious matter. Because the Chinese spirit world bears striking similarity to the physical world, spirits have the same basic needs: food, clothing and shelter.  As the spirit embarks from the grave he encounters two roads, one leads to the heavenly realms of the gods and the other to hell.  The very exceptional few may ascend to godhood straight away, but most take the lower road.  Soon they encounter a gate wherein several magistrates reside.  There they have recorded the deeds of those in their allotted districts.  This record is submitted to one of ten judges who determine guilt, punishment and reward.  For those of extraordinary merit, passage to heaven may be arranged.  Others who were good may be given positions in the infernal bureaucracy, or be permitted to reside in the judges' guesthouse, while others will be punished in various levels of hell.  The underworld is further organized into ten kingdoms, which replicate the same cities, towns and villages extant in the world of the living.  Souls go to the kingdom that corresponds to their sign of birth.

Significantly, the distinct similarity between the world of the living and that of the dead requires that the dead also be provided with certain necessities.  For this reason the practice of the Feast of the Hungry Ghosts provides great benefit to the ancestor.  He is ensured of comfort with the bestowal of houses, cars and money, the latter being of great utility in bribing officials to escape punishment or to increase merit.  Thus it is important for a filial son to participate in the festival.

Appeasing the Ancestors

The dead are thought to have some effect upon the living, and this provides another reason to observe the festival.  Ancestors are primarily thought to bring aid and good fortune; however, should they be neglected, they may cause trouble.  Sociologist Arthur Wolf reports that most Chinese villagers he encountered would not readily admit that an ancestor would inflict punishment.  Yet should "they suffer a series of misfortunes, most people give serious consideration to the possibility that the ancestors are responsible."  For instance, consider a man abandoned ancestral practice.  Both he and his father died the following year.  "It's not a good thing to neglect the ancestors."   Furthermore, shamans often attribute tragedy to neglected ancestors.  Hence, some people perceive that no matter how benevolent the ancestors are in theory, the prime motive for worship is fear.  But, traditionally, if an ancestor acts aggressively, it is with good cause.  Neglect could mean increased suffering for them, should they consequently become hungry ghosts.

Honoring the Ancestors

Given the filial duty of honoring, assisting and appeasing the ancestors, the fifteenth day of the seventh month is of particular importance, having been apocryphally prescribed by Buddha as a day particularly honoring to one's ancestors.  Families offer fruit, cookies, cakes, candies, rice, sprouts, lotus, noodles and favored foods, placing them on the altar in the home, which serves as a shrine to the ancestors and gods.  On the evening of the fourteenth day, families worship the ancestors with specially prepared dishes of meat and vegetables, wine and incense.  They kowtow several times before the altar and present "hell money" (the Bank of Hell's currency), clothing, houses and other items of value in the underworld (all made of paper) by burning them in a large container placed outside the home.  For those who can afford it, priests may be hired to chant the sutras to petition the gods and by so doing further assist the ancestors.
 

Candles can be seen anywhere along the streets.

The Hungry Ghosts

While the needs of the ancestors are specifically addressed, the Chinese must remain conscious of the presence of the second object of the seventh month festival.

Who are the ghosts?

Several circumstances cause the Kui to become dominant in one's soul, rendering him a hungry ghost.  An improper burial, or none at all, is one factor.  The burial represents the first stage in sending the ancestor to the underworld.  If that task is left undone, the spirit is left homeless.  Typically, this occurs when people are killed en mass, or executed, or die away from home and subsequently have been forgotten.  Other spirits with descendents become ghosts because of anger.  Perhaps they were violently murdered or unjustly executed and now long for vengeance.

That some ghosts have descendants does create some problems: one's ancestor could be another's ghost.  Some research work indicates that although most people would not admit that their ancestor could be a ghost to another, when hard pressed with examples many will admit the fact.  Thus in some cases whether a spirit is a ghost or an ancestor depends very much upon one's perspective.

In other cases, the system of filial piety itself contributes to the creation of hungry ghosts.  Because worship is restricted to a junior paying homage to a senior, parents would abandon a child's soul rather than worship him.  Thus a child who dies has no one to assist him in the afterlife, leaving him homeless, hungry, a Kui.  To rationalize the child's birth, many believe that such children were strangers in the world of the living and therefore compelled to leave.  Likewise, a deceased unmarried daughter may never be worshipped, for only the husband's line and his wives may receive this honor.  A woman who dies before marriage is allocated the undignified position of a ghost.

Propitiating the Ghosts

As indicated above, in the Chinese spirit world there exists a large group of homeless and hungry souls, motivated by jealousy of the living, possibly of their own descendents or offspring who have homes, wealth and families, and therefore are the cause of most misfortunes.  For that reason they are popularly perceived as spiritual beggars.  The beggar is not conceived as lethargic and idle.  Rather he represents a vagrant who, because of intense jealousy, attempts to take what belongs to others and willingly threatens and performs ill against his victims to satisfy his own desires.  But by giving him something, he should leave one alone.  Thus the intent of the Festival of Hungry Ghosts is not to honor but to propitiate the ghosts, lest they prey on the living and obstruct the peace of the ancestors.  It is necessary to avoid offending the Kui, hence ghosts are referred to as "the good brothers because they would be offended if you called them ghosts."  A northern Taiwanese tradition epitomizes the connection.  There, on the fifteenth day, the community prepares a huge feast.  First the spirits are given opportunity to spiritually partake and then the meal is opened to the earthly beggars to physically eat the food.

As the ghosts could interfere with the ancestor festival, food must be prepared for them.  But as it would be dangerous to allow a beggar into one's home, the same holds true for ghosts.  So offerings are made on tables outside the home.  Offerings usually consist of whole cooked fowl and large pieces of meat and delicacies.  Other attractive items such as beer, cigarettes and washing implements are left out for the homeless ghosts to use.

The Hungry Ghost Festival is observed throughout the seventh lunar month by both serious adherents and nominal believers of traditional religion.  In modern Asia, youths may regard festivals, ancestors and ghosts as a tradition, perhaps not entirely realistic.  Yet, as is similar to Halloween in North America, few have completely abandoned the practice, which their elders maintain.  But to the sincere adherent, one must question whether their observance is consistent with the festival's theoretical intent.

While the festival emerged as an inclusive institution, incorporating Buddhism with Chinese religious traditions, ancestors and ghosts, at its core lay an expression of filial piety, and an opportunity to address the needs of the spirit world.  But, the attempt to keep both ancestors and ghosts reasonably content serves to protect the adherent from the unknown will of the spirits.  Thus one must question whether practitioners of the Festival of the Hungry Ghosts have abandoned a noble expression of filial piety and love for an act of fear.
 

Abundant food of different varities are offered at the door step from home.
 

Photos and information credits

By courtesy of the following sources, this article was made possible:

Ahern, Emily M. The Cult of the Dead in a Chinese Village. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1973.
Bong Rin Ro (ed.) Christian Alternatives to Ancestor Practices. Taiwan: Asia Theological Association, 1985.
Chappell, David and Saso, Michael (eds.) Buddhist and Taoist Studies 1. Hawaii: University Press of Hawaii, 1971.
Ch'en, Kenneth, K.S. The Chinese Transformation of Buddhism. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1973.
Hurvitz, Leon. "The Mind of the Early Chinese Buddhist" in Developments in Buddhist Thought: Canadian Contributions to Buddhist Studies. Amore, Roy C. (ed.). Waterloo: Laurier University Press, 1979.
Hashimoto, Tatsumi. Ancestor Worship. Japan, 1962.
Hsu, Francis, L.K.. Under the Ancestors' Shadow: Kinship, Personality, and Social Mobility in China. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1971.
Saso, Michael R.. Taoism and the Rite of Cosmic Renewal. Washington: Washington State University Press, 1972.
Sng, Bobby,E.K. & Choong Chee Pang. Church and Culture: Singapore Context. Singapore: Graduates' Christian Fellowship, 1991.
Tan, Lucy. The Christian Answer to Chinese Ancestral Worship. Singapore.
Wolf, Arthur P. Religion and Ritual in Chinese Society. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1974.


Main Menu
Table of Content
<< Previous  1 2 3 4 5 6 7  Next >>