A bowl of Laba porridge is not only a transfer of love and warmth, but also a kind of inheritance of Chinese excellent traditional culture. Every year, Lingyin Temple will distribute a large number of Laba porridge to give back to the society, so why is it so delicious? Let's get to know the inside story behind Laba porridge.
Why is Laba porridge so delicious in Lingyin Temple?
1. Rich ingredients
Lingyinsi Laba porridge is made of 12 kinds of ingredients: peanuts, red beans, lotus seeds, longan, red dates, honey dates, kidney beans, white fruits, glutinous rice, rice, osmanthus and white sugar.
2. Wash carefully
In addition to osmanthus and sugar, other ingredients need to be washed and dried. For example, white fruits are peeled and washed by hand, steamed and cooled, and then stored in refrigerator; lotus seeds are soaked for three hours, and water is changed every hour; longan meat also needs to be washed and dried quickly; red dates, kidney beans, peanuts, red beans, etc. need to be selected and washed.
3. Congeniality and harmony
During the production of Laba porridge in Lingyin Temple, hundreds of volunteers and Bodhisattvas participated in the selection and preparation of Laba porridge in shifts. They knocked white fruits, picked red dates, sifted rice and picked beans. The monks in the temple were busy cooking the scene to ensure that a bowl of Laba porridge was delicious. The silent efforts of the public have made a bowl of Laba porridge, which is popular and harmonious. The taste of it is just like the porridge of human character. Xiangnuo knows itself.
What is the biggest characteristic of Laba porridge in Lingyin Temple?
The most important feature is the four characters "achievement by all means". Lingyin Temple insists on giving more than 30 million Laba porridge to the public every year, which comes from the kindness and happiness of ten sides. Buddhism, based on the principle of coming from and applying to the ten directions, gives back to the public. In Lingyin Temple, the most important thing is to be grateful and pray for social harmony and stability.
Notes on eating Lingyin Laba porridge
1. Lingyin Laba porridge does not add any preservatives, and the shelf life at room temperature does not exceed 2 days. The porridge distributed every day is cooked in the early morning of that day. Please eat it in time to avoid deterioration.
2. The Laba porridge in Lingyin Temple is all packed in healthier aluminum foil bowls. Do not put it directly into the microwave oven for heating (in case of accidents). It is recommended to heat the porridge in a common cooker.
The origin of Laba porridge in Lingyin Temple, Hangzhou
Laba of Buddhism provides porridge for Buddha, which originates from the story of shepherdess offering soup and Buddha becoming Tao. The earliest record of Chinese Buddhist temple Laba porridge is in the Northern Song Dynasty's "Tokyo dreamland": 'on the eighth day of December & hellip; & hellip; the great temples make a bathing Buddha's meeting, and send seven treasures and five flavors porridge and disciples, which is called Laba porridge. '
Lu Hongnian, a professor of folklore at Zhejiang University, believes that Laba porridge took root in Hangzhou, mainly due to Lingyin Temple. As early as the Tang Dynasty, Lingyin Temple produced a kind of dim sum called "sweet osmanthus and fresh chestnut soup", which later developed into Laba porridge made of various raw materials. Every December, the monks of Lingyin Temple take out the beans and rice, boil them into porridge, give them to the benefactor, and help the poor through the new year.
During the Northern Song Dynasty (1071), Su Dongpo, who was a parent official in Hangzhou, went to Lingyin Temple to celebrate the Laba Festival. What he saw and heard made his poems flourish. He wrote the seven laws of the abbot of Lingyin Temple. "Chaobu" in the poem refers to "Laba porridge".
You can find it everywhere in the mountains and streams. You love it when you are alone.
The trees have a hundred Zhang long beard, disturbing the writing of willows and cattails.
The hall will eat Luo Qianfu, and the bells will beat the drums to make a sound in the North Dynasty.
Abbot Congxiang sleeps and sews the sea chart.
In history, Lingyin Temple once stopped porridge in Laba until 1978, when it was reopened to the outside world. At that time, only glutinous rice, peanuts, red beans and white fruits were used by monks to cook Laba porridge, and the quantity was limited, which could only meet the needs of monks and some disciples at home. Later, the hall of pharmacists was rebuilt in Lingyin Temple. The monks gave Laba porridge to the experts and workers. They thanked them for their hard work and gave the rest to the visiting guests. As a result, Lingyin Temple gradually restored the tradition of gruel making in Laba. The source power of restoring Laba's porridge tradition comes from gratitude.
Nowadays, people's material living standard has improved, and the meaning of Laba porridge to help the poor has gradually faded, but its spiritual connotation of "being grateful and giving back to the society" has been further developed.
Under the influence of Lingyin Temple, the custom of "Celebrating Laba Festival and drinking Laba porridge" gradually popularized among the people, and its influence extended to Jiangsu and Zhejiang regions.
'Lingyin Laba Festival custom' application for World Heritage
Lingyin Temple has set up a "Zhejiang Lingyin intangible cultural heritage research and protection center", which packs the Laba Festival's offering ceremony, lecturing ceremony, Laba porridge, poetry, prose, folklore directly or indirectly related to the Lingyin Temple's Laba Festival custom, and even the formula and practice of Laba porridge, together to apply for the world heritage.
In 2016, 'Lingyin Laba Festival custom' was selected as the Sixth Batch of intangible cultural heritage in Hangzhou; in December 2017, it was selected as the fifth batch of intangible cultural heritage in Zhejiang Province. Master Guangquan, the abbot of Lingyin Temple, said that the way to apply for the world heritage is only half completed, and then to apply for the national intangible cultural heritage. The ultimate goal is to apply for the world intangible cultural heritage.
Lingyin Laba series of activities
On January 13, on the eighth day of the twelfth lunar month in 1898, it was the day when Sakyamuni Buddha became a Buddhist. According to the forest tradition, Lingyin Temple will hold a large-scale preaching and praying meeting. The Dharma society leads the public, does no evil, pursues all good, adheres to the spirit of Buddhist Compassion, tolerance and gratitude to serve the public, the society, and practices the Buddhist spirit of the world with practical actions to build a pure land of the world.
During the Laba Festival, Lingyin Temple will hold a cultural seminar.
Laba culture contains a compassionate sense of helping the world, an inclusive attitude of achievement, and a grateful spirit of giving back.
Significance of a series of activities of Laba in Lingyin
The series of activities of the Laba Festival in Lingyin Temple reflect the fine tradition of Buddhism to return to the society and form a wide range of good ties; guide the public to pay attention to traditional culture and participate in the inheritance and development of traditional culture, which plays a good role in promoting the protection of precious traditional Chinese cultural customs and cultural heritage. At the same time, it also proves that the cultural custom of Laba is the product of the integration of Buddhist culture and Chinese culture.
For more than two thousand years, Buddhism and Chinese culture have been in harmony. The custom of gruel making in Laba is a distinctive representative of this feature.
Master Guangquan, the abbot of Lingyin Temple, said: a bowl of Laba porridge is not only a transfer of love and warmth, but also a kind of inheritance of Chinese excellent traditional culture. Lingyin Temple has made a lot of efforts for the modern elaboration of traditional folk festivals, which has far-reaching influence. To explore the modern significance of traditional festivals is the basis of the development of traditional festivals. Lingyin Temple actively reshapes the Chinese traditional festival, Laba Festival, and constantly tries to innovate, striving to cultivate national cultural self-confidence with traditional Buddhist festivals. Culture is more and more regarded as the soft power of a country and a nation. It is very important for the development of a country to attach importance to and excavate our profound historical origin, extensive and profound cultural resources, and maintain cultural self-confidence and self-consciousness.
Buddhist culture has become an important part of Chinese traditional culture. Laba culture is the specific manifestation of the spirit of Thanksgiving in Chinese traditional culture, and the cultural representative of Chinese Thanksgiving spirit.