Ancestor worship is a grand traditional folk activity, carrying profound humanistic connotation and spiritual value.
Zhongyun in the "Analects": "Be cautious and chase the distance, and the people's morality will be restored." "Emphasizing the careful handling of the deceased and the remembrance of ancestors, it can make social customs more pure. Ancestor worship is the embodiment of this spirit of "chasing the distance with caution". It reminds us of the hard work and great achievements of our ancestors, and we are grateful.
In ancient poems, traces of ancestor worship can also be found. For example, "there are many cemeteries on the north and south hills, and the Qingming Festival sweeps each other." It depicts the scene of people worshipping their ancestors during the Qingming Festival, reflecting the memory and respect for the ancestors.
Ancestor worship is the continuation of filial piety. "The Book of Filial Piety" says: "Husband filial piety, the scriptures of heaven, and the righteousness of the earth." "Filial piety is a matter of course, and ancestor worship is an important way to practice filial piety. By worshipping our ancestors, we express our respect and filial piety to our ancestors, so that this virtue can be passed on in the family.
At the same time, ancestor worship can enhance the cohesion and sense of identity of the family. Clansmen of the same bloodline gather at the graves of their ancestors to mourn together, a ritual that brings family members closer together and strengthens family bonds.
In addition, ancestor worship is also the inheritance of family culture. The family's history, family rules, family mottos and other valuable assets can be passed down from generation to generation through ancestor worship, so that future generations can know where their roots are and understand the family's responsibilities and missions.
In short, ancestor worship is not only the nostalgia and gratitude of ancestors, but also an important way to inherit filial piety, unite the family, and continue the culture, which carries the traditional virtues and spiritual pursuit of the Chinese nation, and should be cherished and inherited.
So let's take a look at specific examples of passing on family mottos and values when worshipping ancestors:
● Pei family worships ancestors: Pei Bai Village in Wenxi County, Yuncheng City, Shanxi Province is known as the "Chinese Prime Minister's Village". On April 11 (the third day of the third lunar month), more than 500 descendants of the Pei family from Guangdong, Guangxi, Fujian, Inner Mongolia and Vietnam, gathered in Pei Bai Village to hold an ancestor worship ceremony. At the event site, through activities such as worshipping ancestors, reciting sacrificial texts, and reviewing family mottos, the Pei family style was inherited. The Pei family has always paid attention to the revision of the family rules, and the core content of its 12 family mottos is "emphasizing filial piety and discipline, advocating literature and martial arts, promoting both morality and industry, and being honest and self-disciplined". The Pei family has produced many talents in history, including 59 prime ministers, 59 generals, and more than 600 people who have established and listed the official history.
● Zhang family ancestor worship: On March 22, in the Zhang family ancestral hall in Datong Village, Hong'an Town, Longquanyi District, more than 100 Zhang family members from all over the country held an ancestor worship ceremony. Zhang's ancestor worship ceremony has 13 ceremonies, such as announcing the beginning of the ceremony, opening the household, offering cloth offerings, offering flower baskets, purifying hands and incense, offering knights and toasting, bowing, reading sacrifices, inviting the divine bow, opening the divine bow, sending the divine bow, music and dancing worship, and singing carols. When they worship their ancestors, they review the family customs and family rules, and combine national policies and regulations and ancestral teachings to admonish their descendants. The Zhangjia ancestral hall has a history of nearly 300 years, and since its construction, the activities of worshipping ancestors on the ninth and tenth days of the second lunar month have not been interrupted every year. The family spirit includes the courage to forge ahead, helping the weak, neighborly harmony, and forbearance.
●Yimen Chen's descendants worship their ancestors: Jiangzhou Yimen Chen, De'an County, Jiujiang City, Jiangxi Province, created a world family history wonder of more than 3,900 people, 15 generations, and more than 330 years of gathering and living in the Tang and Song dynasties. Every year around the Qingming Festival, the descendants of Yimen Chen from all over the country will return to the Chen Wanggong Cemetery and the Five Ancestors Temple to worship their ancestors in various ways. They held chrysanthemums, burned incense and lit cannons, bowed in silence, etc., to express their sorrow to their ancestors. In the first year of Tang Dashun (890), the Yimen Chen family established the "Thirty-three Articles of Family Law", "Sixteen Family Rules" and "Twelve Family Rules", which became the earliest family motto and family rules fixed in written form. Its content embodies the Confucian concept of loyalty, filial piety, benevolence and righteousness, such as "filial piety is based on human ethics, harmony with the township party is used to settle disputes, reading poetry and books is clear about righteousness, relatives and teachers and friends are to become virtuous, the Lord is faithful to the roots, and humility is beneficial to good fortune", etc., many of which are still relevant today, and the family motto tradition was included in the fifth batch of national intangible cultural heritage list in June 2021.
● Lin family ancestor worship: On April 4, more than 300 representatives of the descendants of the Lin family from more than 10 villages in Luohe held a ceremony to worship ancestors on the Qingming Festival and the four narratives of the "Lin Family Tree" in Linzhuang Village, Zhaoling Town, Zhaoling District. On the same day, the representatives of the descendants of the Lin family presented flower baskets, fruits, and wine in the sound of drums, and at the same time announced the establishment of the Lin Surname Committee of the Luohe Surname Culture Research Association. They researched the origin, development, evolution and migration history of the Lin surname in the Luohe area, and extensively collected and sorted out genealogies and related materials to inherit the excellent family style and enhance the cohesion of the clan. "Lin Family Tree" shows that the Luohe Lin family originated in Weihui, Henan Province, grew up in Fujian, and its descendants are of the same origin as the national hero Lin Zexu.
● Zhang family (descendants of Zhang Jiuling) ancestor worship: Zhang Shiji, a descendant of Zhang Jiuling, a famous minister of the Tang Dynasty, was ordered to bring his family from Qujiang in Guangdong to Sichuan in the first month of the year of Kangxi Gengyin in the Qing Dynasty (1709), and settled in the West Chamber, Dazhu County, Sichuan. In the forty-ninth year of Kangxi, according to the essence of his ancestor's family style of "loving the country and loving the family, being trustworthy and courteous", he formulated the "Ten Family Rules of the Zhang Family", which was passed down from generation to generation as the moral code and method of life of the Zhang clan. Its content covers "filial piety to parents", "harmony in the township", "compassion for orphans and widows", "determination to succeed", etc., the central idea is to start from "governing the family", cultivate pillars, and practice "the will to serve the country". Today, the Zhang clan still inherits the ancestral motto of "governing the family and serving the country", the family elders will tell the story of the family style and family motto to the younger generations, and in some family gatherings, activities will be held to inherit the family cultural skills, such as teaching woodcarving and calligraphy.