Traditional Culture Encyclopedia - Traditional customs - What are the cultural and spiritual connotations of traditional festivals and folk customs in China?

What are the cultural and spiritual connotations of traditional festivals and folk customs in China?

The Chinese nation has a long history. In the long historical development process, not only a profound national culture has been formed, but also various national festivals have been formed ―― Spring Festival, Lantern Festival, Tomb-Sweeping Day, Dragon Boat Festival, Chinese Valentine's Day, Mid-Autumn Festival, Double Ninth Festival and so on. These festivals have experienced vicissitudes, condensed the wisdom and feelings of the working people of past dynasties, and spread in the form that the masses loved. They intoxicated and yearned for generations of Chinese descendants with colorful folk culture, cultivated and tempered national character and personality with established folk etiquette, and carried forward national virtues and spirit with a happy and peaceful atmosphere. Its value of inheriting national blood, carrying forward national spirit, strengthening national cultural memory and psychological identity, maintaining national unity, social harmony and family harmony, stimulating and releasing emotions, and coordinating the relationship between man and nature is irreplaceable by any cultural form.

China traditional culture is the root of our nation's existence, the soul of the world and the foundation of inheritance. The traditional festival culture created and passed down by the working people in China is the most dynamic and influential culture with the most national characteristics and individuality, which embodies the core values of China traditional culture and vividly shows the spiritual world of the general public. "China traditional festivals condense the national spirit and feelings of the Chinese nation, bear the cultural blood and ideological essence of the Chinese nation, are an important spiritual bond for safeguarding national unity, national unity and social harmony, and are valuable resources for building advanced socialist culture." Today, we should use traditional festivals to promote the traditional culture of China. We should not only advocate the concept of civilized, harmonious, festive and thrifty festivals, but also enrich the contents and forms of traditional festivals. More importantly, we should dig deep into the cultural connotation of traditional festivals, let the general public know the origin of traditional festivals and the cultural spirit they contain, stimulate the enthusiasm of Chinese people to participate in festival activities, form the cultural consciousness of protecting spiritual homeland, and make China traditional festivals an important position to display and spread excellent national culture and carry forward and cultivate great nations.

The cultural connotation of traditional festivals in China is rich and colorful, which is mainly reflected in the following aspects:

1. The traditional festivals in China are the epitome of agricultural civilization and the product of ancestors' pursuit of harmony between man and nature.

The traditional festivals in China are rooted in the soil of agricultural society, and they are the companion of agricultural civilization, that is, the selection and setting of festival dates were established by the ancients according to the periodic transformation of weather, phenology and climate, all of which correspond to specific solar terms and farming seasons. China is one of the earliest ancient countries in the world to step into agricultural civilization. As early as the pre-Qin period, people already had the concept that "the great event of the country lies in agriculture". In the long-term farming life, they realized that if human beings want to survive and harvest crops, they must observe and master the astronomical phenomena (the changes of the sun, the moon and the stars), physical phenomena (the changes of animals and plants with the seasons) and meteorology (the changes of rain and snow in hot and cold weather) and their laws, conform to the rhythm of heaven and earth operation and the order of climate change, and rationally plan and arrange their agricultural production. In order to accurately reflect the changes of temperature, precipitation and phenology in four seasons and guide people's production and life, the ancients determined the "twenty-four solar terms" according to the different positions of the sun on the ecliptic. Once the new year season is established, some special dates will be highlighted. As joint points in the farming cycle, they are highly valued by ancestors. Whenever a specific solar term comes, ceremonies and celebrations corresponding to this solar term will be held. In this way, the farming cycle has also become a celebration cycle. "'Festival' is the segmentation of the year, dividing the gradual change of the year into sections like bamboo knots, and defining the day when two solar terms meet as a festival, thus turning it into a festival."

Traditional festivals in China, which are based on the changes of natural solar terms, fully embody the idea that people respect the natural rhythm, conform to the natural time sequence, realize the unity of heaven and earth, and pursue and sublimate "the unity of heaven and man". China's traditional festivals are like a "cultural chain" generated by natural solar terms and running through spring, summer, autumn and winter, with "four seasons coming and going". In spring, the earth warms up, everything recovers, and festivals such as Spring Festival, Lantern Festival, Zhonghe Festival and Tomb-Sweeping Day follow. On the occasion of the New Year, people celebrate the arrival of the New Year through family reunion, New Year celebrations, dragon dances and lanterns. We should also pay homage to our ancestors, do filial piety and seek roots, enjoy spring outing, enjoy entertainment and fitness, enjoy the New Year's blessing in the pursuit of the future, and prepare to devote ourselves to farming and sowing with full enthusiasm. In hot summer, Dragon Boat Festival comes as scheduled. People admire Ai for picking herbs, exorcising evil spirits and avoiding drugs, caring for Qu Yuan, making dumplings and racing, mowing grass and sending fans, and visiting relatives in the province, so as to eliminate summer heat and disasters. In autumn, the air is crisp and the sweet-scented osmanthus is fragrant. Tanabata, Mid-Autumn Festival, Mid-Autumn Festival and Double Ninth Festival follow one after another. People are immersed in the joy of harvest, begging for dexterity, setting off river lanterns, enjoying the moon, playing with autumn chrysanthemums, climbing high to bid farewell to youth, celebrating the harvest in various ways, paying homage to the dead and praying for happiness. Winter is coming, and it is snowing heavily. Laba Festival, off-year and New Year's Eve are the best welcome for it. People forget the cold, sweep away the epidemic situation, send stoves to worship their ancestors, have a social fire and roam the streets, happily reunite and spend their old age, savoring the joy of "increasing fields, increasing grain and increasing age", and the auspicious and festive seasons are harmonious and orderly, reflecting the harmonious interaction between man and nature.

The setting of traditional festivals in China also shows that there are other characteristics in the arrangement of slack farming and busy farming. From the distribution of festivals throughout the year, there are many festivals arranged in winter and spring during the slack season, which are rich in content and last for a relatively long time; In the busy summer and autumn season, there are relatively few festivals, and the content and time of the festivals are relatively short. For example, the Spring Festival, the largest traditional festival of the Chinese nation, has the largest scale, the longest duration and the richest activities in a year, which is arranged in the slack season in winter and spring. This arrangement is undoubtedly due to the agricultural society. Only when winter goes and spring comes can people who have worked hard for a year rest and have enough time to worship their ancestors and reunite with their families.

Entertainment celebrations and cooking and eating in the four seasons are also timely, timely and seasonal. For example, setting off firecrackers, dancing yangko, running on a dry boat, playing social fire, turning nine songs and visiting temple fairs during the Spring Festival can really add a lot of passion and joy to people in the cold winter; Tomb-Sweeping Day goes for an outing, swings and flies kites because spring returns to the earth, where everything is revived, lush and full of vitality, which is a good time for people to join in nature and enjoy beautiful spring scenery; Dragon boat race on the Dragon Boat Festival is just an auspicious moment when the flood season has not yet arrived and the temperature is already high, which is suitable for playing in the water. The Mid-Autumn Festival is a family reunion, and the moon is celebrated in Yue Bai. At this time, the moisture has gone, the dust has not yet risen, the air is fresh, the blue sky is washed, and the full moon is like a plate. It can be described as the best time to "spend a good month and reunite people"; On the Double Ninth Festival, people climb to the top of the mountain and enjoy the chrysanthemum feast, which is in late autumn. The autumn wind is getting thicker, the chill is getting thicker, the branches are covered with frost, and the clouds are pale and the mountains are green. Suitable for people to climb mountains, exercise muscles, cultivate temperament and enjoy autumn. In addition, the diversity of cooked food also reflects different characteristics such as spring, summer, autumn and winter, twilight and so on. Summer and autumn are the season when all kinds of fruits are ripe, so at this time, festivals such as Mid-Autumn Festival and Double Ninth Festival, peaches, apples, pomegranates, grapes and other fruits become the protagonists on people's dining tables; In winter and spring, pigs and sheep fatten chickens and ducks, so in the Spring Festival, Lantern Festival and other festivals, all kinds of fat meat have become people's favorite; During the Dragon Boat Festival, the leaves of zongzi are fragrant, and the natural fragrant and attractive zongzi has become the "master Hua Dan" on the dining table; Mid-Autumn Festival "autumn wind rings, crabs itch", so crabs have become the most popular Mid-Autumn Festival food. It can be seen that many festivals and folk customs, such as entertainment and diet in traditional festivals, are in harmony with nature.

"If the holiday system of some ethnic groups is centered on religious memorial days, then our traditional ethnic festivals are very different from other ethnic groups. The important feature of our national traditional festivals is that these festivals are established with the core of coordinating our relationship with nature. " The traditional festivals in China express the natural life rhythm and unique aesthetic psychology of people of all ethnic groups in China. It reflects that since the pre-Qin period, people of all dynasties have been constantly understanding and transforming nature in social life practice and pursuing the ideal realm of "harmony between man and nature".

Second, the traditional festivals in China are important carriers of China culture, reflecting the richness and diversity of China culture.

The traditional festivals in China, coming from ancient times, are "formed by feeling the natural rhythm and full of humanistic spirit". With the passage of time and the development of Chinese civilization, traditional festivals are constantly infiltrated by various social and cultural factors, including the embedding of folk customs, the influence of religious activities, the accumulation of historical humanities, the integration of national wisdom, emotions and living habits, and the content of festivals is constantly enriched and enriched. For example, the legend of Jiezi's contribution to the Cold Food Festival, the legend of the Dragon Boat Festival by patriotic poet Qu Yuan, loyal minister Wu Zixu and dutiful daughter Cao E, and the love legend of the meeting of cowherd and weaver girl on the bridge to Qixi. Another example is that it originated from the Spring Festival in ancient La Worship. On the eighth day of the twelfth lunar month, whole grains were used to make Laba porridge for ancestor worship, which was the beginning of the ancient "La Worship". Later, Buddhism was introduced to China, and major temples made Laba porridge to commemorate Sakyamuni's Enlightenment Day, which combined with the ancient "La Worship" behavior and formed the folk custom of eating Laba porridge. Traditional festivals in China are widely inclusive, constantly integrated, accumulated, enriched and developed, and become rich and colorful cultural forms and the "prism" that best reflects national culture. It can reflect the unique customs, folk beliefs, ethics, humanistic demands, aesthetic taste, literature and art, food, clothing, housing and transportation of the Chinese nation. It can be seen that the traditional festivals in China originated from the common needs of people's lives and were formed through accumulation. Traditional etiquette, ceremony and entertainment are the important contents and methods, and the corresponding material carriers express thoughts, beliefs, morality and ideals in a specific space-time relationship.

There are various cultural and artistic forms of traditional festivals in China. According to the nature and content of traditional festivals, they can be divided into production festivals, sacrificial festivals, memorial festivals, celebration festivals, social entertainment festivals and exorcism festivals. Although all kinds of festivals revolve around unique themes, new contents and forms are constantly permeated in the process of inheritance and development, and a festival often contains various folk activities. Therefore, the traditional festivals in China, such as Spring Festival, Tomb-Sweeping Day, Dragon Boat Festival and Double Ninth Festival, are mostly comprehensive, and they are usually composed of many festival themes and many folk activities. Their rich content also makes these festivals bear richer cultural connotations.

China traditional festival culture is a rich and complete system, which mainly includes spiritual culture, behavioral culture and material culture. They interact and depend on each other, which constitutes the unique charm of China's profound festival culture.

1, spiritual and cultural level

The traditional festivals in China have condensed the rich connotation of China's thousands of years of civilization, embodied the excellent spiritual outlook of the Chinese nation, entrusted the ideal feelings of the people of China in past dynasties, and contained people's unremitting pursuit of a better life, gratitude and awe for nature, and eternal expectation for family reunion and harmony. Every traditional festival has its specific cultural connotation and value: the Spring Festival evolved from the "La Worship" in primitive agricultural society, which celebrated harvest, offered sacrifices to gods and ancestors and expressed gratitude to nature and ancestors; Saying goodbye to the old and welcoming the new, family reunion is the theme of the Spring Festival every year. A series of ceremonies and ceremonies during the Spring Festival not only enrich people's lives, but also show people-oriented and harmonious coexistence between man and nature, embody the precious national spirit of self-esteem, self-love, self-confidence and self-improvement, and highlight the spiritual pursuit of reunion, harmony, peace and joy. In Tomb-Sweeping Day, people pay homage to their ancestors by paying homage to their ancestors and remembering their heroes and sages, which embodies the moral feelings of China people, such as being cautious in pursuing the future, respecting their ancestors, and family friendship, including gratitude to their ancestors and recognition of their blood responsibilities; The outing embodies the open-minded attitude of China people who are sad but not hurt, and the ideal life realm of returning to nature, loving life and pursuing harmony between man and nature. On the Dragon Boat Festival, people commemorate Qu Yuan, which embodies the pursuit of ideal personality in traditional values, such as patriotism, love for the people, high self-control and Excellence. Hanging Artemisia argyi leaves and Acorus calamus, collecting herbs and making medicines, realizing the life wisdom of our ancestors in coping with disasters and epidemics in accordance with natural laws in the process of exorcising evil spirits and avoiding drugs, and conveying people's desire for life health, family happiness and national prosperity; Dragon boat race embodies the spirit of unity, cooperation and courage. Mid-Autumn Festival, family reunion, * * eating moon cakes, * * enjoying the moon, * * enjoying family life, reflects the China people's pursuit of family reunion, peaceful life and a happy future.

2. Behavior culture.

The traditional festivals in China are platforms for all kinds of folk activities and concentrated display of folk arts. This platform is a collection of colorful behavior cultures such as memorial service, etiquette, performance, skills, art, sports and games, which constitutes a beautiful landscape. As the first festival of the Chinese nation, the Spring Festival is the epitome of various folk activities. Sacrifice and celebration ceremonies have been very rich since ancient times. As far as sacrifice is concerned, the Spring Festival sacrifice activities have long formed two cultural traditions of sacrifice: one is to thank nature for its gifts, such as offering sacrifices to the kitchen god, which is a feeling of the merits of cooking with kitchen fire; Sacrificing to the earth god is the reward for Mother Earth's reproduction of everything. Sacrificing well gods and river gods is gratitude to the water of life; Treating and offering sacrifices to cattle, horses, chickens and other domestic animals is a reward for animals that help human beings survive and develop, and so on. These sacrifices are the ways and channels of China people's annual communication and dialogue with nature, and they are the portrayal of pious pursuit of harmony and unity with nature. The second is to offer sacrifices to ancient sages and clan ancestors. Respecting the feelings of ancestors is an important source of Chinese civilization. On the Spring Festival, which is celebrated all over the world, every household holds a grand ancestor worship activity. Clan parents lead their children and grandchildren to worship their ancestors, feel the kindness of their ancestors, pray that they "bless their children and grandchildren in the spirit of heaven", and pour out their promises and comfort. This fully embodies the traditional spirit of the Chinese nation of thinking about the source of drinking water and not forgetting the roots. During the Spring Festival, social entertainment activities are colorful, such as reunion, Spring Festival, posting Spring Festival couplets, cutting window grilles, hanging New Year pictures, setting off firecrackers, worshiping elders, visiting relatives and friends, visiting temple fairs, watching lanterns and celebrating the Lantern Festival. People release their inner feelings, satisfy their psychological demands, appreciate the warmth of the world and enjoy the joy of the New Year. At the same time, they interpret, inherit and create the festival culture of the Chinese nation, and purify and enhance family ties and friendship. The Spring Festival is also a great display of folk arts and skills. In the long festival history of the Chinese nation, thousands of forms and varieties of games, arts and sports have been invented and created by our ancestors, including speeches, singing and performances, as well as games, competitions and juggling. During the Spring Festival, there are many common activities, such as social fire, drama, dance, yangko, stilts, dry boat, dragon dance, lion dance, monkey playing, acrobatics, martial arts, skipping rope, swinging, fireworks, light array, story telling and story telling. These colorful activities not only greatly enriched the cultural connotation and taste of the Spring Festival, but also brought the festive atmosphere of the Spring Festival to a climax. As some scholars have said: "The Spring Festival celebrated all over the world is indeed beyond ordinary daily life, the birthday of the Chinese nation and the most oriental carnival." In addition, the myths and legends and folk stories surrounding the festival culture, the poems and sentences created by literati in past dynasties, and the folk songs and sayings about festivals also contain profound cultural connotations and rich national spirit.

3. Material and cultural aspects

In the traditional festival culture system, the explicit and tangible material culture is also very rich, including seasonal delicacies, various decorations and mascots, plants and flowers endowed by nature. These material carriers usually have multiple functions, which can not only meet people's physiological needs, social needs, aesthetic needs, decorative needs and so on. During the festival, it also satisfies people's need to avoid the plague with its unique symbolic significance and rich cultural connotation.

Many foods in traditional festivals have certain symbolic meanings: eating jiaozi at midnight on New Year's Eve and New Year's Day, also known as "making friends", and jiaozi takes the homonym of "making friends", which means "saying goodbye to the old and welcoming the new" and "celebrating reunion"; Jiaozi is also shaped like an ingot, so it means "getting rich". Eating rice cakes in the Spring Festival is homophonic with "high year", meaning "smooth and high all the year round". There are also many exquisite foods on the dinner table of the New Year's Festival. Cooking is a must-have dish for every family, which means "kissing is hot"; Eat bean sprouts, because bean sprouts are similar to "ruyi", which means "ruyi auspicious"; There must be fish on the table, but don't eat it all at once, which means "more than wealth", and so on. In addition, eating Yuanxiao and Tangyuan on the Lantern Festival symbolizes family reunion, harmony and happiness. Eating zongzi on Dragon Boat Festival in memory of the patriotic poet Qu Yuan; Enjoy the moon and eat moon cakes in the Mid-Autumn Festival, which means "the moon is full in the sky, and the world is reunited", and * * * enjoys family happiness; Eating Chongyang cake on the Double Ninth Festival means that everything is high. Delicious holiday food is full of beautiful meanings and embodies the simple and noble spiritual pursuit of Chinese descendants.

In traditional holiday products, such as calligraphy and painting ornaments, plants and flowers, most of them are also associated with feelings. People express their feelings with things, skillfully use various material symbols, and convey rich cultural information and complex psychological feelings. For example, during the Spring Festival, people have the custom of pasting the word "Fu" on doors and windows. The word "fu" contains the meanings of "happiness", "auspiciousness" and "auspiciousness", which embodies people's yearning for a happy life and their pursuit of a better future. In order to fully reflect this yearning and pursuit, many people simply put the word "Fu" upside down and use the homonym of the word "Fu" to express the meaning of "Fu is here". The Spring Festival couplets developed from Fu Tao are concise, profound, neat and even. With the perfect combination of Chinese characters and China's calligraphy, they express everyone's praise and wishes for life. The New Year pictures evolved from the door-god pictures, including historical stories, fairy tales, folk stories, folk life and other themes. It can be said that "there is a scene in the painting, and I can't get tired of it." There are all kinds of beautiful hopes for life in the New Year pictures such as Longmen Yue Carp, Liuhe Tongchun, five blessings and Wugu Fengdeng. Even some plants and flowers in nature have inexhaustible spiritual connotation and cultural charm under the specific situation of traditional festivals. During the Spring Festival, people use noble and refined daffodils to symbolize the good luck of the new year. Plum blossoms in full bloom in the wind symbolize the auspiciousness of the Spring Festival. In the old days, there were Spring Festival couplets with "plum blossoms in Five Blessingg, bamboo sounds reporting more than three". In Tomb-Sweeping Day, people insert willows and put them on. On the Dragon Boat Festival, people hang mugwort leaves and calamus. These specific plants have become messengers for people to avoid evil and protect peace. On the Double Ninth Festival, the blooming chrysanthemums are intoxicating, and they express their wishes with Ao Shuang's cold-resistant character.

Thirdly, the traditional festivals in China are a portrayal of the national spirit and contain traditional Chinese virtues.

With the emergence and evolution of agricultural civilization, traditional festivals in China have fully embodied the cultural spirit of "harmony between man and nature". At the same time, in the long-term popularity and development, traditional festivals have absorbed and integrated many beneficial cultural elements, such as Confucianism, Buddhism and Taoism, because they contain the same ideals and spiritual pursuits of people throughout the ages. Therefore, in the traditional festivals in China, the national spirit and ideological essence of the Chinese nation are condensed, and the traditional Chinese virtues worth promoting mainly include:

1, the humanistic spirit of loving life and pursuing health

Between heaven and earth, man is precious, man is the center, man is the dominant, and man pursues harmony with everything. This is the people-oriented spirit and keynote of China traditional culture. In the traditional festivals handed down from generation to generation year after year, people are always the main body of the festival. The content of festival activities is mainly to meet people's needs, coordinate the relationship between man and nature, show people's talents and conduct interpersonal communication. During the festival, people may have family reunion, celebrate exchanges, visit relatives and friends, meet men and women, sacrifice ancestors, cherish the memory of sages, travel together, enjoy the moon, respect the old and love the young, and help the poor ... In the joy of celebrating harmony all over the world, they pursue harmony between man and nature and between people. Life is the most precious thing for people. Every traditional festival in China embodies the love of life and the pursuit of health. Almost every festival has mass cultural and sports activities: Spring Festival, dragon and lion dances, walking on stilts and yangko dances; Tomb-Sweeping Day, enjoy a spring outing, swing and fly kites; Dragon boat festival, dragon boat race, outdoor autumn outing; Double Ninth Festival, chanting, riding and shooting, and so on. Many festivals also have the contents of avoiding evil spirits, expelling plagues and pursuing health, such as dust removal and sending stoves before New Year's Eve, inserting willows in Tomb-Sweeping Day, hanging Aipu in Dragon Boat Festival, drinking realgar wine, inserting dogwood in Double Ninth Festival and drinking chrysanthemum wine. People are enjoying the joy of festivals and writing a song of life in the best wishes of "peace and good luck" and "health and happiness".

2. The traditional virtue of respecting the old and loving the young.

The Chinese nation has always had an unusually strong feeling for its ancestors. "Book of Rites" says: "Pro-ancestors, respect ancestors, respect ancestors." "Benevolence" and "filial piety" are the core of China's traditional morality, and the basic content of filial piety is filial piety and respecting the old and loving the young. Pursuing the feeling of distance has become an important root of Chinese civilization. Every festival, we should worship our ancestors devoutly to express our filial piety and nostalgia. Spring Festival, Tomb-Sweeping Day, Mid-Autumn Festival, etc. There are ceremonies and contents of ancestor worship, which breeds the gratitude and sense of responsibility of future generations. Festival activities also show respect for the elderly and care for children everywhere. Give a warm-hearted gift to the elderly during the Spring Festival, give priority to the seats of the elderly at the festival banquet, and propose a toast to the elderly. The Double Ninth Festival, which takes praying for longevity as an important content, has become the national legal "Festival for the Elderly" since 1989, and respecting and loving the elderly has become a new theme of the festival. Children and teenagers are the darlings of festivals. Chinese New Year elders should give "lucky money" and Tu Su wine should be drunk from childhood; During the Dragon Boat Festival, children should be painted with realgar, sachet and Ai Hu. There are children's favorite "male prostitutes" and "meteor balls" in the Mid-Autumn Festival, and these customs place people's blessings and expectations on future generations.

3. Self-improvement spirit of diligence, courage, vigor and vitality.

The Chinese nation is a hardworking and brave nation, with a vigorous and enterprising spirit of self-improvement. This kind of national characteristics and national spirit has always been the driving force for the Chinese nation to make progress and flourish. It is reflected in all aspects of people's lives and is also prominent in festival culture. Traditional festivals in China are the best time for people to show their diligence, wisdom and cleverness. "The Lantern Festival shows all kinds of whimsy and exquisite craftsmanship. There are hundreds of scenes in the temple fair, and all kinds of arts win, which makes people dizzying. Scholars can sing poems together, and village girls can sing live. Liu Sanjie didn't lose to a sharp scholar. Guessing riddles makes people rack their brains. Paper-cut window grilles are lifelike, lifelike. The youngest daughter mows grass, which is better than plant knowledge. Swing ups and downs, kites into the clouds, Kongming lanterns into the sky, lotus lanterns into the water, each has its own chance of winning. The ingenuity of Tanabata and being a skilled girl are even more beautiful. " These colorful festivals and folk customs fully reflect the enterprising spirit of Chinese descendants, making the Chinese nation indomitable, pioneering and fearless.

4. Carry forward the patriotic feelings of putting righteousness above family members and worrying about the country and the people.

The Chinese nation is a nation that attaches importance to rationality. In the long historical development, it has formed a national integrity of upholding justice and a broad feeling of caring for the country and the people. Among the traditional festivals in China, many festivals are related to national integrity and patriotic traditions, especially Tomb-Sweeping Day and Dragon Boat Festival. The origin of Tomb-Sweeping Day Cold Food Festival is to commemorate the legendary Jin loyal minister Jie Zitui. Jiezi pushed for success and lived in seclusion in Mianshan, preferring to be burned to death. At the cost of his own life, he pleaded for the people, advised you to reflect on yourself and be diligent and honest. People regard the days when mesons are in trouble as the Cold Food Festival. It is forbidden to set off fireworks on this day every year, and only eat cold food to commemorate it. At the same time of the Cold Food Festival, people also praised and publicized the integrity of meson push from generation to generation. Dragon Boat Festival is to commemorate the great patriotic poet Qu Yuan. In order to serve the country faithfully, he searched everywhere. He was repeatedly framed and died with a grudge. In order to show respect to Qu Yuan, people formed the custom of dragon boat race and eating zongzi on the Dragon Boat Festival. Qu Yuan's patriotic spirit of caring for the country and the people is constantly carried forward in the festival activities year after year through the Dragon Boat Festival.

5. The psychological pursuit of beauty, unity and harmony, peace and auspiciousness.

"Harmony" means harmony and unity, and "beauty" means happy reunion. Noble, beautiful, united and harmonious is one of the basic spirits of China traditional culture. Traditional festivals in China contain rich harmonious thoughts. The origin of festivals is the product of ancestors' organic combination of natural time process and social life rhythm, which embodies the concept of "harmony between man and nature". All kinds of entertainment activities, interpersonal communication and diet arrangements in the festival reflect the harmony between man and nature, man and society, and man and man. On New Year's Eve, the whole family gets together and eats bread and jiaozi. The harmony of dough is homophonic, and the round dumpling skin symbolizes reunion. During the Spring Festival, the "Happy New Year" activities have eliminated the gap between relatives and neighbors and enhanced unity, which can be described as "Congratulations on getting rich and forgiving each other". On the Lantern Festival, the family sat together to eat glutinous rice balls, which also expressed people's desire for a round, harmonious and happy life. The tragic legend of Valentine's Day in China, Cowherd and Weaver Girl, make the eternal love of China people so beautiful and romantic. Mid-Autumn Festival, family and country reunion and harmony, is the eternal yearning and pursuit of the Chinese nation. Double Ninth Festival, climbing high to eat cakes, has placed people's good wishes for a healthy and long life and a better life.

Fourthly, Chinese traditional festivals are the condensation of national feelings and an important spiritual bond to enhance national cultural identity and safeguard national unity, national unity and social harmony.

Traditional festivals in China not only contain excellent national spirit, but also condense rich national feelings, which is an important way to entrust people's spiritual feelings. The broad masses of the people have the common ideal and desire to pursue bumper harvest, prosperity, peace and harmony, happy life, happiness and good luck, health and longevity. These psychological demands are constantly expressed and released through the way of celebrating traditional festivals and the etiquette and customs of festivals. The people's best yearning is the closeness and harmony between people, and what they want to enjoy most is the warmth of harmonious family ties. As the node of cultural life, traditional festivals are the best opportunity for people to express and express their inner feelings. Festivals are rich in emotions, including gratitude to all things in nature and gratitude to ancestors. There is not only the memory of the martyrs and sages, but also the nostalgia for the hometown; Not only the love for parents and elders, but also the participation of brothers and sisters; There is not only the mutual help of neighbors, but also the care of friends and colleagues. Through various festival ceremonies, such as ancestor worship, New Year greetings, family visits and reunion, these beautiful human feelings are conveyed, so that traditional festivals transcend the boundaries of time and space and always play the functions of rallying national feelings, harmonizing interpersonal relationships and promoting social harmony. Because traditional festivals have the characteristics of periodicity, nationality, mass and comprehensiveness, this function has been continuously strengthened.

The traditional festivals in China are a kind of national strengthening of national culture and national memory, and a chain to continue national character and enhance national identity. The customs of traditional festivals have been inherited, developed and integrated in the long history of thousands of years, forming unique national characteristics. These festivals transcend the boundaries of regions, classes, races and even times. Whether it is official or folk, whether it is dignitaries or ordinary people, they all celebrate and enjoy on the same day. As the saying goes, "Go home for the New Year if you have money". Before the Spring Festival, the scene of China people going home is like migratory birds coming back. No matter where they are, most people will embark on the road to their hometown, go home for reunion and spend New Year's Eve. Even overseas Chinese consider themselves descendants of the Yellow Emperor in traditional festivals and yearn for the motherland when celebrating festivals. Tens of millions of China people on five continents, as well as more and more industrialists and overseas students who have gone abroad, all carry the custom of "celebrating the New Year" wherever they live, expressing their feelings of homesickness, longing for reunion and goodwill among people and countries to the extreme. In the rich atmosphere of traditional festival culture, national identity will come unexpectedly and happen to coincide. Overseas Chinese also attach great importance to Tomb-Sweeping Day's sacrifice. Every time I go to Tomb-Sweeping Day, a large number of overseas Chinese will return to their hometowns to worship their ancestors. Every year, thousands of overseas Chinese come to the Huangdi Mausoleum and Xuanyuan Temple in Qiao Shan, Shaanxi Province, to pay homage to China's ancestor Xuanyuan Huangdi. In a solemn atmosphere, in the ceremony of remembering their ancestors, they were influenced by national culture and humanistic spirit, maintaining the blood ties and spiritual connection between the descendants of the Chinese people. Traditional festivals make the elements of national traditional culture penetrate into everyone's mind and appear in all fields of social life. In the repeated baptism of Chinese festival culture, the whole nation condenses and maintains national feelings, temper and solidify national individuality, cultivate and carry forward national spirit, and expand and publicize national image.

Chinese traditional festivals are an important spiritual link to safeguard national unity, consolidate national unity and promote cultural exchanges and integration among all ethnic groups. China is a country composed of 56 ethnic groups, each of which has its own traditional festivals, but some of the larger traditional festivals of the Han nationality are also shared by many ethnic minorities. Ethnic minorities such as Manchu, Korean, Li, Naxi, Dong, Maonan, Er, Lahu, Xibe and Bai, like Han, mostly regard Spring Festival, Dragon Boat Festival, Mid-Autumn Festival and Double Ninth Festival as their national festivals. Especially the Spring Festival, has now become almost the same festival for all ethnic groups in China. All ethnic minorities celebrate traditional festivals in their own way, which just reflects the fine tradition of "harmony without difference" in China culture. People of all ethnic groups have effectively promoted the exchange and integration of national cultures in traditional festivals, consolidated national unity and enhanced the centripetal force and cohesion of the Chinese nation.