What day is the Lunar New Year?

Lunar New Year (also known as: Zao Festival, Zao Wang Festival) is one of the traditional Chinese festivals for the worship of Zaojun. The date is set between the 23rd and 25th day of the Lunar New Year in the lunar calendar every year. Xiao Nian also means that people should start to prepare for the New Year's goods, ready to clean a good year, said that the New Year should have a new atmosphere, expressed the Chinese working people a kind of resignation of the old and welcome the new, welcome the auspicious and blessed good wishes.

In accordance with the traditional customs of the Han Chinese people, the twenty-third day of the lunar month, called the "small year". I'm afraid that this is because in a few days, the Spring Festival, which is the "big year", will be coming. Therefore, it can also be said that the "little year" is the prelude or overture to the "big year"!

Small year sacrificial stove is the same custom in the north and south of the Yangtze River ****. In the past, on this day, people have to make offerings to Zao Wang, Zao Wang grandmother on the wall near the pot table in the stove house (kitchen). Both sides of the shrine should also be affixed with a couplet, the upper line reads "good things to play in heaven", the lower line reads "to keep peace in the world" or "back to the Palace of descending good luck", the banner is The banner reads, "The head of the family". As the old saying goes: "Food is the God of the people", so it is totally understandable that people respectfully worship Zaowangmaster as the head of the family.

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The custom of sacrificing to Zao has a long history. Zaojun, in the Xia Dynasty, had already become a great god revered by the people. In the Analects of Confucius, which describes the words and deeds of Confucius during the Spring and Autumn Period, there is the saying, "It is better to be with Zao than to be with the public opinion". During the pre-Qin period, sacrificing to the stove was one of the "Five Sacrifices" (Five Sacrifices for the five gods of the stove, the door, the line, the household, and the middle thunder. In Lei is the earth god. Another said that the door, well, household, stove, in the Lei; or said that the line, well, household, stove, in the Lei). When offering sacrifices to the stove, the god-master should be set up, and abundant wine and food should be used as offerings. The tripod and chopping block should be displayed, fruits and beans should be set up, and corpses should be welcomed, and so on. With very obvious traces of primitive worship

Small New Year is a traditional Han Chinese festival, also known as Xiezao, Zao Festival, Zao Wang Festival, Zao Festival. In different places the date is different, in the lunar calendar on the twenty-third or twenty-fourth or twenty-fifth lunar month (folklore experts say that in ancient times, the small new year has "official three people four boat five" tradition, that is to say, the official family of the small new year is the twenty-third of the lunar month, the people's family is the twenty-fourth of the lunar month, and the people on the water is the twenty-fifth of the lunar month. Like the north, which was the political center before the Southern Song Dynasty, was heavily influenced by the official atmosphere, so the Lunar New Year was mostly on the 23rd day of the Lunar New Year; on the contrary, the south was far away from the political center, so the Lunar New Year was on the 24th day of the Lunar New Year; while the residents along the lakes, such as the Poyang Lake, retained the tradition of the boat family, and the Lunar New Year was set on the 25th day of the Lunar New Year, "No matter which day the Lunar New Year was celebrated on, the people's desire of celebrating the old year and welcoming the new year was unanimous! ".) (In some areas such as Sichuan and Guizhou, the 30th day of the Lunar New Year is the Small New Year, and the 15th day of the first month is the Big New Year.) In some areas of Shandong, the Small New Year is the 22nd day of the Lunar New Year. Xiao Nian is regarded as the beginning of the New Year.

The emperor of the Qing dynasty from the Yongzheng years, every year on the 23rd day of the lunar month in the Kunning Palace worship God, in order to save money, the emperor by the way, the Zao Wang Wang also worshipped. Later, the royal family, Baylor followed suit, in the waxing moon on the 23rd sacrificial stove, since then began to have the people and the government in different days of the small New Year's division.

Small year is the day of the folk sacrifice stove. It is said that on this day, the Zaos have to go up to heaven to report to the Jade Emperor on the good and bad deeds of the family, so that the Jade Emperor can reward and punish them. During the zaos offering, Guandong sugar is also melted with fire and smeared on the mouth of the Zaosheng, so that he cannot say bad words in front of the Jade Emperor. The custom of "men don't worship the moon, women don't worship Zao" means that the worship of Zao Wang Wang is restricted to men only. Since the Chinese basically eat rice, cooked food is generally not easy to preserve and must be cooked at any time. Unlike bread in the West, which can be baked and preserved for consumption, cooked food is not easy to preserve. Therefore, for the Chinese, "Chai" (fuel) is the first and most important of the seven things in life (Chai, Rice, Oil, Salt, Sauce, Vinegar, and Tea), and without fuel, even if there is basic food, there is no way to eat it. In the West, one bread oven is enough for a village, but in China, every family must have a stove. Since every family has a stove, a legend has arisen, that is, the Jade Emperor has stationed a supervisor - Zao Shen (Zaojun, Zaojun, Zao Wangjun, Zao Wang) - in each family to supervise and examine the family's behavior for a year, and on the 23rd day of the Lunar New Year, the Zao Shen will go up to heaven to report to the Jade Emperor, who will decide whether the family should be rewarded or punished in the following year based on the report, and then return to supervise the family's behavior in the following New Year. The next New Year, the Zaoshen will come back and continue to supervise the behavior of this family. The day of the Zaosai Festival is actually a festival for each family to send the Zaosai God to heaven.

Specific operation: Since each family usually has a Zaoshen portrait affixed near the stove, sometimes accompanied by the Zaowang granny portrait, after a year of smoke and fire, the portrait has been old, dark face. To uncover the old like, with straw for the God of the stove tie a straw horse, in order to let him "say good things in heaven, back to the Palace of descending auspicious", but also to bribe him, with a piece of sticky sugar melon or cake stuck in his mouth to make its "sweet mouth" can only say good things, and then and the straw horse with the burnt! This process is known as quitting the stove. This process is known as the "resignation of the stove". On the 30th day of the New Year, a new picture of the god of the stove is brought back and put up. In the middle of these days, because there is no Zaoshen supervision, the average person indulge in overeating and drinking, gathering people to gamble, and indulging themselves to do some of their own usually also think that should not be guilty of small faults.

Making sugar melons and offering sacrifices to Zao is the main activity on this day, and from then on it is the stage of preparing for the New Year, when people start to relax mentally.