GHOST FESTIVAL                                      NYCHINATOWNcom

Gates of Hell
   The Ghost Festival, known in Chinese as Zhongyuan Jie or Yulan Jie, spans the entire seventh lunar month. It was originally a period for worshipping ancestors, but the God of Hell later decided the gates of hell should be opened during this period to let out the spirits. However, at the end of the month, the ghosts must return to hell.

    With the gates of hell wide open, the ghosts of dead ancestors can return to their families to receive offerings and joss money to be spent in the underworld. Therefore, this period is also known as the Ghost Festival. To appease the ghosts that are wandering among the mortal world, every household prepares a table of food, incense and joss paper in front of their houses.

    To avoid being disturbed by the wandering ghosts, households also post drawings of Zhong Kui, the ghost catcher. Not just a catcher of ghosts - Zhong devours spirits after he catches them.

    During the festival month, families worship their ancestors, visit the graves of their dearly departed and light lotus lanterns on rivers and seas so that the dead can find their way home. In Daoist (Taoist) temples, altars are be set up where prayers for good fortune and rituals to redeem the souls of the dead are performed.

    Among Buddhists, this day is known as the Yulan Jie, at time when the souls of the dead are redeemed. The word yulan means liberation from suffering in the original Sanskrit (ullambana), and Yulan Jie has its roots in the Buddhist story of Mu Lian, a disciple of Buddha, saving his mother.

Savior
   It is said that Mu Lian (Maudgalyayana in Sanskrit), who was endowed with magical powers, saw his mother starving in hell. His mother had been a miserly woman and had not done a single charitable deed in her lifetime. She was condemned as a hungry ghost in the lowest depths of hell. Mu immediately fed his mother some rice, but the rice was reduced to ashes when it touched her mouth.

    Mu begged Buddha for help, but Buddha said his mother had committed too many sins in her lifetime. The Buddha advised Mu to collect various types of fruit and vegetables in yulan basins as an offering to the Buddhist monks. Only by doing this could his mother's suffering be alleviated.

    Future generations continue to put fruit and vegetables in yulan basins as offerings to monks, as well as in remembrance of their ancestors.

Temple Opera
   Chinese communities everywhere take the Ghost Festival very seriously. Beside offerings to the dead, temple rituals and reciting the Buddhist scriptures, Chinese opera is performed to entertain the ghosts. Temple operas always take place in the evening when the local elite and members of the troupe burn incense and offer prayers before the show starts. Temple operas revolve around all kinds of themes. In the past, nobody viewed the opera because it was only performed for ghosts, not mortals. But nowadays, it entertains people as well as spirits.

Lotus Lanterns
   In villages and towns located on the banks of rivers, people make lotus-shaped lanterns from waterproof paper or rinds of fruit or gourds. The lotus is used because the flower a symbol of Buddhism meaning purity. They light a candle in each of these lanterns and then allow the lit lanterns to float down the river. They will try to follow the paths of their lanterns from the riverbank until they are out of sight. This is done to redeem the souls of those who had died by drowning.