Do you know what festival December 24 is? December 24 is commonly known as "Sweeping Day". It is the day when every household cleans their house before the Spring Festival, also known as "Spring Festival". What customs do people have on the 24th day of the twelfth lunar month?
What is the day of sweeping dust on the 24th day of the 12th month, that is, the so-called "sweeping dust" is the year-end sweeping. Every household cleans the spider web dust and cleans it. Although "24, sweeping Day", in fact, from before and after the sacrifice to the end of the year, it is the sweeping time. In some parts of China, from the small year (the 23rd of the 12th lunar month) to the new year's Eve, this period is called "dust sweeping Day", also known as "Spring Festival".
Sweeping the dust not only means to dispel disease and pray for new year's well-being, but also has the emotional desire to get rid of "Chen" (Chen) and cloth. This custom conveys the signal of busy atmosphere of the new year to people. This custom reflects the Chinese people's tradition of being clean and hygienic, and embodies people's good expectations. It still has strong vitality.
What are the Customs on the 24th day of the twelfth lunar month
People believe that the kitchen god is responsible for monitoring the good and evil behaviors of the family, so when delivering the kitchen stove, people will not only prepare Animal gifts and burn gold and silver paper, but also provide candy, maltose, sugar melon, honeydew melon and Tangyuan for the kitchen god; In a word, to make the offerings sticky and sweet is to hope that the kitchen god's mouth will be sticky and sweet. The motive is to seal the God's mouth and prevent the kitchen god from reporting back to heaven.
In addition, there are also some people who use the second tour of wine to paint the kitchen door or stick the kitchen door with sticky sugar. The goal is the same. It is also to make the kitchen King become a 'drunk or' sweet mouthed ', so that he can't speak ill when he arrives in the court.
Custom two
Some people think that the offerings to the kitchen can't be too rich. On this day, they should pay homage to the God and tell the kitchen king about their grievances. They hope that in order to have better offerings in the next year, they can report the good things of this family to the Jade Emperor and ask him to bless their family.
Custom three
To send God to heaven in the last month, in addition to burning money and silk, we also need to burn 'armour and horse' for the God. This is a yellow paper printed with horses, official hats, bows and arrows, swords and spears, and armour. Burning 'Jiama' means to pack some luggage for the gods in the heaven to strengthen their appearance.
Custom four
In the patriarchal society, there was a custom of "men don't worship the moon, women don't worship the kitchen". Every year, the man presided over the kitchen sacrifice. However, after the war of this century, the atmosphere changed even more dramatically. Because men were busy in their careers, the responsibility of sacrificing kitchen stoves often fell on women who were dealing with household chores.
Custom five
In feudal times, the government chose to take a "seal" vacation after sending the God back to heaven. Some temples will also "close the door" for rest on the ground that the gods return to the heaven and the people have no gods to worship.
From this day on, the government and even the temples are on vacation, not busy worshiping gods and doing business, but every family is busy to cope with the new year. Many people are busy with new year's products and making new year's cakes and cakes.
Custom six
From this day on, relatives and friends also treat each other, send each other New Year cakes and gift baskets and other gifts, known as' send the year '.
If there is a funeral at home, or if the funeral is less than one year old, they can't make rice cakes, but they can be presented by relatives and friends.
Custom seven
On the same day or later, people will hold a general cleaning. At the time of general cleaning, it is said that the bamboo leaves with the ability of exorcising evil spirits and clearing away the grey spider webs on the high place will be prepared.