~ November ~
Winter Solstice The Winter Solstice is the true solar New Year. In the northern hemisphere, it is the shortest day. The hours of light begin to lengthen and everybody knows that in time spring must come again from now on. Ancient civilizations marked this day with ritual of some kind. Under the monarchy in China, it's a day that the Emperor led the annual sacrifices at the Temple of Heaven in Peking. Very few Chinese and no foreigners were ever permitted to see this greatest of all Imperial ceremonies. The ordinary people were obliged to stay at home and hung the curtains across the entrances to the lanes where they lived. So that, the Emperor's procession could pass along the main roads without danger of his being seen. There are ceremonial offerings in the temples or ancestral halls, followed by a distribution of pork. The small shrines to T'o Tei kung are not forgotten. Also, people use this day of making offerings to spiritually powerful trees and rocks.
Ta Chiu The words Ta Chiu mean " arrange sacrifices" literally, but the Taoist festivals in the New Territories called Ta Chiu are much more than that. The objectives is the wiping away of evil, the restoration of peace, and the renewal of life for the entire population of a sizeable group of villages. Two kinds of spirits are invited to the festival together with the humans, gods and ghosts. FIrst in the minds of the villagers are the gods they know, all the deities whose images are in the temples or who are represented in pictures or writing on red paper on many local shrines in other words. People make offerings and give birthday parties, and who they believe can cure them, protect them and help them divine the future. The Taoists demand the exiistence of three far greater spirits - the Three Pure Ones, more accurately thought of as abstractions, pure spirit. They live in the stars, at the true source of life, beyond the reach of change or decay. The main aim of a Ta Chiu is to invite these greater spirits down that their superbounding power mauy be brought to bear upon the villagers in an attempt to renew their lives in every particular and reinstate them in the Way of cosmic harmony. Ordinary villagers are content to leave the rituals to the Taoist priests. For themselves, they make offerings to their own patron gods, renounce evil, do good deeds, and feed the hungry ghosts. The Ta Chiu's ceremonies go on at different levels. First, there are complex ceremony for the Three Pure Ones performed by the Taoist priests in the temple. Second, there is an continuous process of offering which the people perform before the patron deities whose images have been brought out of the temple and put in a temporary matshed shrine for the occasion, together with operas too. Third, there is a symbolic giving of life by liberating a large number of birds, a similar libertaion of fishes and recurrent invitations to the hungry ghosts. Fourth, there is purification. Cleansing of the altar was performed by the Taoists at the beginning of the festival. Before the festival opens, everyone has a bath and puts on clean clothes. From then till the end, there should be no sexual intercourse and no meat eaten in any of the participating villages. At last, there is a symbolic casting out of evil when the Taoist priests go from house to house collecting "dirty" things in a large paper boat. Later, it is taken outside the bounds of the village and burned with all its content. Finally, there are two spectacular closing ceremonies. The Taoists read out the names of all member villagers to the gods. After that, they send the huge list to heaven in flames on the back of a paper horse and then post a red paper duplicate list on the wall for all to see. At midnight on the last night, they Taoists preside over an enormous "clothes burning" at which the hungry ghosts are fed, clothed, given money, and sent away with the help of Taai Si Wong. Then, the vegetarian fast broken and together with all the villagers eat a communal meal at which the meat of the "golden pigs", offered to the gods previously, take pride of place.
On Lung, Pacifying the Dragon On Lung means "Pacifying the Dragon". It seems to be connected with the theories of Chinese geomancy and this set of ceremonies is performed within one month of a village first being established in the olden days. Fa si (magicians), the officiants, or Redheads since they wear red turbans, dance, posture, sing and blowing mournful blasts on a cow's horn. An odd feature of the ceremonies is one of the Fa Si dresses as a woman and dances with "her" partner. Many of the features of Ta chiu are present, such as fasting and releasing living creatures and a great "clothes burning" with Taai Si Wong in charge. Finally, several small pots of food are buried on the hillside where the Dragon is said to reside overlooking the village and now that he is pacified once more, hopefully protecting it. These ceremonies are rare and only few octogenarians still know how to perform them.
January May September February June October March July November April August December
Copyright© 1998-1999 Hong Kong Pearl of the Orient
