What are the traditional faith activities that people perform during Chinese New Year?

The traditional faith activity that people perform during the Spring Festival is to offer incense to their ancestors.

Worshipping the gods of heaven and earth and sacrificing to ancestors is the most sacred and grandest ritual at the arrival of the New Year, reflecting the traditional virtues of the Chinese people of honoring the gods and ancestors, and of loyalty and filial piety to the family. During the Spring Festival, people will carry out the traditional faith activities is to incense ancestor worship.

Worshipping the gods of heaven and earth is a kind of gratitude to nature, thanking nature for the gifts given in the past year and praying that nature will bless people with good weather and a good harvest in the new year. Sacrificing ancestors expresses the filial piety from the heart, praying for the spirits of the ancestors to bless the descendants with prosperity and prosperity.

Ancient Chinese society had great respect for the gods of heaven and earth and their ancestors, and built many ritual buildings, such as the Altar of Heaven, the Altar of Earth, the Altar of the Sun, the Altar of the Moon, the Temple of the God of the Winds, the Imperial Temple, the Family Temple, the Shrine of Famous Persons, etc. Even ordinary people's homes were dedicated to the "Heaven and Earth, the King, the Parent and the Teacher" tablets. Offering sacrifices to the gods and ancestors is the first thing to do in the New Year. Of course, the form of ancestor worship varies from place to place due to different rituals and customs.

Some people hold ancestor worship ceremonies at the ancestral hall, while others generally do so at home. Families make offerings to the gods of their ancestors in the center of the hall, display wine, food and sacrificial offerings on the tables, and under the leadership of the patriarchs, the worshippers burn incense and make offerings in the order of their elders and youngest children and perform the ritual of kowtowing to the gods.

Historical Development of the Spring Festival

The traditional Lunar New Year has a history of more than 4,000 years as China's number one festival, while the current Spring Festival is only 100 years old. The Lunar New Year has a long history, and in ancient times it was known as the first day of the year, New Year's Day, New Year's Day, Xinzheng, Xinchun, and so on.

Legend has it that it emerged from the Yu and Shun period at the end of the year, the gods and ancestors activities or "Waxing Sacrifice". But the first day of the first month of the year as the beginning of a new year, formalized in the Han Dynasty.

Before Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty, the exact date of the beginning of the new year was not standardized, with the Xia calendar of the Xia Dynasty taking January as the first day of the year, the Yin calendar of the Shang Dynasty taking the twelfth month of the summer calendar as the first day of the year, and the Zhou calendar of the Zhou Dynasty taking the eleventh month of the summer calendar as the first day of the year.

It was only in the first year of Emperor Wu's reign, 104 B.C., that the start of the new year was fixed at January 1 in the summer calendar, and this has been the practice for many generations since then. However, at this time, the Lunar New Year custom is still mainly to sacrifice to the gods and ancestors.

During the Tang and Song dynasties, the customs and functions of the Lunar New Year underwent significant changes. From this period onwards, the focus of the New Year began to be transformed from the mysterious rituals of the gods to the entertaining and secular entertainment of the people. In other words, until the Tang and Song dynasties, New Year's Eve has really become a universal celebration, all the people carnival "China's first festival".