The cultural connotation and significance of the Lantern Festival

Mondo Culture Updated on 2024-02-20

With the passage of time, there are more and more activities in the Lantern Festival, and many local festivals have added traditional folk performances such as dragon lanterns, lion playing, stilt walking, rowing boats and twisting Yangge, and playing Taiping drums. The following is a collection of the cultural connotation and significance of the Lantern Festival, welcome to read and share, I hope you can like it.

1.Connotation: The Lantern Festival symbolizes family reunion, happiness and reunion. At the same time, it also has the meaning of praying for a smooth and prosperous New Year. The Lantern Festival is regarded as the last climax of the Spring Festival, because after this day, people will really enter the production and life of the new year, so people celebrate in the Lantern Festival to pray for the blessing of God in the coming year.

The meaning of the Lantern Festival is auspiciousness, family reunion, and people's good wishes for future life.

The Lantern Festival is held on the 15th day of the first lunar month every year and is one of the traditional festivals in China. The Lantern Festival is also known as the Little New Year, the Lantern Festival or the Shangyuan Festival. The Lantern Festival existed as early as the Qin Dynasty more than 2,000 years ago, but it was not until the Western Han Dynasty that Emperor Wen of Han was taken seriously.

The main customs of the Lantern Festival include viewing lanterns, setting off fireworks, guessing lantern riddles and eating Lantern Festival. In June 2008, the Lantern Festival was selected into the second batch of national intangible cultural heritage.

2.Significance: The Lantern Festival is the first full moon night of every year, so its significance is that the full moon represents reunion, there is an expectation, and the beautiful meaning of family reunion is in it;

And the Lantern Festival is the end of a reunion life during the Spring Festival of the family, is a beautiful beginning, the Lantern Festival Chinese tradition has the custom of admiring the moon and eating the Lantern Festival and watching the lanterns, which entrusts the Chinese people to a pursuit and yearning for a better life.

The Lantern Festival is also called the Shangyuan Festival, and there are also other names such as the Little New Year, the New Year's Eve, or the Lantern Festival. On this day, it is a very romantic festival when people set off fireworks and reflect each other with the bright moon in the sky.

Lanterns: Various regions will hold lively lantern festivals on the fifteenth day of the first lunar month, which is a variety of lanterns about to appear, there are various animal appearances, and there are also lanterns with added scientific and technological elements, which are beautiful and make you forget to return.

Sending lanterns: On this day, grandmothers often send lanterns to their nephews or nieces to bless them with the meaning of healthy growth, and for newlywed families seeking children, the mother's family will also send lanterns to the past, in order to add good luck to Ding, because Ding and lamps are pronounced similarly, symbolizing the meaning of prosperity.

Walk a hundred diseases: in fact, it is to encounter a bridge, walk from above, in the night of the fifteenth, with a family, have passed by the bridge, also called to travel a hundred diseases, scatter a hundred diseases, roast a hundred diseases, is a kind of disaster elimination and health activities, the purpose of this is to drive away the epidemic, wish the whole family health and auspiciousness in the coming year.

There is also a beautiful legend in the approach: according to legend, when Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty, there was a person named Dongfang Shuo, who was witty and resourceful, and often offered advice and amusement to Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty, and was loved by Emperor Wu. There is a year of heavy snow in the moon, Dongfang Shuo saw that Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty was bored, so he went to the imperial flower garden to fold plum to Emperor Wu, saw a palace maid with tears in his eyes, extremely sad, asked the reason, learned that the palace maid is called Lantern Festival, the family lives outside Chang'an City, the family is rich and elderly parents, since being elected to the palace, every New Year, thinking about relatives and not seeing, the heart is like a knife. Dongfang Shuo comforted her and allowed her to try to reunite with her family. After Dongfang Shuo left the palace, he went to the Lantern Festival house to make a place. Then he returned to Chang'an and pretended to be a wizard to sell hexagrams. Dongfang Shuo told people: "On the thirteenth day of the first lunar month, the Fire God King will transform into a girl wearing a big red jacket, riding a red donkey to Chang'an City to inspect the terrain, you can go to the north of the city to block the road to cry, the whole city may be rescued." After listening to Dongfang Shuo's words, the people were convinced, told each other, and waited on the street on the thirteenth day of the first lunar month, and Dongfang Shuo invited a folk girl, disguised as a girl in red, and rode a donkey into the city.

The meaning of family reunion.

When boiling the rice balls, because it floats on the water after boiling, it is very beautiful, reminiscent of a bright moon hanging in the clouds. The bright moon in the sky, the rice balls in the bowl, and the reunion of every household, symbolizing the auspiciousness of reunion. Therefore, eating glutinous rice balls expresses people's love for family reunion.

Hope for harmony and happiness.

In addition, the name of the glutinous rice balls is similar to the word "reunion", taking the meaning of reunion, symbolizing the reunion of the whole family, harmony and happiness, and people also miss the parting relatives and place their good wishes for the future life.

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