What are the traditional cultural characteristics of temple fairs?

The local temple fair in China is a folk activity of multi-ethnic culture, with various forms and rich contents, which has played a positive role in the inheritance of traditional culture in China. In many places, nothing is more lively than visiting temple fairs during the Spring Festival. Let's take a look at the characteristic cultures of temple fairs around the country.

temple fair

There are many folk activities at the temple fair, such as touching stone monkeys, making money at Wofeng Bridge and so on. Below the arc-shaped stone carving of Baiyun Temple, there is a stone monkey relief. People think that touching stone monkeys can eliminate diseases and prolong life, so they compete to touch them.

There is a big copper coin hanging in the bridge opening under the phoenix bridge. There is a small copper bell in the hole of the copper coin, which reads "The bell rings auspicious". If you can hit the bronze bell with a coin in your hand, you will get what you want. These two events are the most lively activities at the temple fair.

With the changes of the times, many new contents have been added to ancient temple fairs, such as business negotiations during the temple fairs, but showing folk customs has always been the main feature of temple fairs. The contents include lion dance, traditional national flower performance, modern dance, Beijing folk figure modeling, traditional commercial "cover" exhibition, old Beijing photo exhibition, folk arts and crafts exhibition, special book exhibition, Beijing opera, martial arts and acrobatics. Temple fair integrates tourism, leisure and entertainment, shopping and catering, and has distinctive traditional ethnic characteristics.

Sacrificial ceremony

The custom of temple fairs is closely related to the religious activities of Buddhist temples and Taoist temples, and it is often necessary to hold ceremonies to worship the gods. Such as the "line image" activity. "Walking like an elephant" is a religious ceremony in which statues of gods and buddhas are mounted on floats and paraded in urban and rural areas, so it is also called "walking around the city" and "patrolling the city".

After Emperor Xiaowen of the Northern Wei Dynasty moved to Luoyang in the ninth year (AD 485), Buddhism was promoted, and a Buddha statue travel conference was held every year on Sakyamuni's birthday. The day before the Buddha's trip, all the temples in Luoyang sent the Buddha to Jingming Temple. For a long time, there were more than 1000 Buddha statues.

When traveling, the team is led by lions to ward off evil spirits, and the buildings are covered with banners. Then, there are all kinds of music, juggling and excitement. Most of the temple fairs after Tang and Song Dynasties are the inheritance and development of the image activities in this period. And gradually extended to Sichuan, Huguang and Xixia. Only after the Yuan and Ming Dynasties, the trend of the image declined, and few people recorded it.

Prayer activity

As soon as the temple fair opened, people from all directions came to worship, offering sacrifices to the gods and burning incense, and praying to return home. This is the activity of gods around "temple" and "society", and it is the theme of traditional temple fairs. Among them, praying for children with witchcraft can best reflect the core of China traditional culture, which is determined by the nature of China agricultural society.

Thousands of years of feudal society, people's living environment has basically not changed, and the reproduction of future generations has become a top priority for thousands of years. Therefore, praying for the son, an ancient form of witchcraft, will be attached to various forms of gatherings and displayed. Typical temple fairs are Renzu Temple Fair in Huaiyang, Henan, Mazu Tempel Temple Fair in Tianjin, Shuanglin Temple Fair in Pingyao, Shanxi, Miaofeng Mountain and Baiyunguan Pedestrian Street in Beijing.