What is the custom of Zaosai

Zaosai Festival is a traditional Han Chinese festival, also known as Xiao Nian, Xie Festival, Zaowang Festival, Zaosai, commonly known in Chinese folk beliefs as Sending the God, and in Ryukyu language as Gouwangxie. The date varies in different places, but generally falls near the twenty-third or twenty-fourth day of the lunar month. Xiao Nian is regarded as the beginning of the New Year. It is said that at the end of each year, the god Zaojun, the god of the year, and the gods of folklore return to Heaven to report their duties to the Jade Emperor, and that Zaojun, in particular, reports to the Jade Emperor on the good and bad things on earth as the basis for rewarding and punishing human beings, so people mostly worship the gods of the family and Zaojun at this time.

Customs of Zaojiao

1, first of all, prepare the sacrificial fruits, wine and dishes, offerings of incense and candles. Specifically, they include New Year's Candies New Year's Cake: symbolizing a sweet life (supermarkets sell a big packet with all kinds of things in it); New Year's Cake: symbolizing a high yearly height; Water Chestnut: also known as Horseshoe, symbolizing richness; Sugar Cane: symbolizing days of successive heights. (It should have a head and tail of the whole root, the God of the kitchen uses the tail end of the sugar cane as a horse whip); spinach: it should have a root, the red root whiskers to symbolize the days of red-hot; garlic shoots: to symbolize the life of a very good calculator (careful calculations).

The above six are necessary, in addition, there are: wine: the twenty-third of the Lunar calendar to have wine, the twenty-fourth of the Lunar calendar to sacrifice the stove do not wine (yellow wine or old wine can be); tofu: the best printed on the top of the red "blessed" word; other: sweets, oranges and so on can be. General ten samples, or no less than ten samples. Ten, on behalf of ten perfect; to burn paper money to the god of the stove, usually burn gold.

2, time: the lunar calendar twenty-three all day, twenty-four nights before six o'clock to sacrifice stove can be. Lunar calendar twenty-three sacrificial stove to provide wine, twenty-four sacrificial stove do not provide wine, stove God is afraid to report full of wine. On the 23rd day of the lunar calendar, you can offer mainly fishy food, and on the 24th day of the lunar calendar, you can offer mainly vegetarian food. The dishes offered can be raw. If there are things that can not be bought, then there are a few is a few, the rest can add their own.

3, you can talk to the god of the stove, ask the god of the stove to go up for your family more good words and so on. If you are renting a house, there is no need to offer the god of the stove, because there is no god of the stove in a rented house. If you want to make offerings, it's better to let the people in your hometown make offerings. A special reminder is that if you worship Zaos on the 23rd day of the lunar calendar, don't tear down the old Zaos statue and wait until the 24th day of the lunar calendar or around the Chinese New Year before tearing it down and replacing it with a new Zaos statue because Zaos doesn't leave your house until around 6pm on the 24th day of the lunar calendar and rides up to the sky to report back to the Heavenly Court. If you tear down the old Vesta statue on the 23rd, the Vesta will have no place to stay. 24th offerings can take down the old Vesta statue and put on a new one. The old Vesta statue can be burned or disposed of as garbage.

Precautions for Zao Sacrifice in the Lunar New Year

1, when sending Zao, people offer candies, water, beans, and fodder on the table in front of Zao Wang's statue;

2, water, beans, and fodder are prepared for Zao Wang's ascension to the sky;

3, when sacrificing to the Zao, you also need to melt the Guandong candies in the fire and apply them on Zao Wang's mouth. Zao Wang's mouth. In this way, he can't speak bad words to the Jade Emperor.

4. There is a custom in Han Chinese folklore that "men don't worship the moon, and women don't worship the stove", so the worship of Zaoshengwang is limited to men only.