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Religious traditionProvenance · Religious tradition

Hungry Ghost Festival: China, Hong Kong, Taiwan

Whenfrom the Liang dynasty (502–557)
Regionmainland China, Hong Kong and TaiwanThe belief is spread across a whole region, so there's no pin.
DoorSomething Told
Whose this isReligious tradition
Origin
A seventh-lunar-month observance practised in mainland China (the Zhongyuan Festival), in Hong Kong (the Chiu Chow community's Yu Lan Festival) and in Taiwan (water-lantern rites). The written text at its root among these sources is the Ullambana Sutra, in which the Buddha tells Maudgalyayana to make offerings to the monastic community on the fifteenth of the seventh month for parents of seven generations past and for living parents in distress; these sources give no date for the sutra. China.org.cn dates the Chinese custom to the Liang dynasty (502 to 557).
How we treat it
The label covers the rites as their communities practise them: offerings to monks and ancestors, rites for wandering ghosts, paper offerings, Chiu Chow opera for the deities, burning the Ghost King effigy, and water lanterns set afloat after a rite by a Taoist priest or ritual master. It makes no claim that the dead return. Ghost Month habits such as putting off surgery belong to popular custom and fall outside the label.
Routes out
The sutra comes first, in a translation published by the Buddhist Text Translation Society of the City of Ten Thousand Buddhas. The heritage bodies that document living practice follow: Hong Kong's Intangible Cultural Heritage Office and Taiwan's Ministry of Culture encyclopedia. The Taipei Times report and China.org.cn background come last.

An observance held during the seventh lunar month, known as Zhongyuan in China and Yu Lan in Hong Kong, with offerings to ancestors and rites for wandering ghosts. It is practised in mainland China, Hong Kong and Taiwan.

Hungry Ghost Festival: China, Hong Kong, Taiwan
Chong Fat, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons

The Ullambana Sutra sets out the Buddhist offering. In the translation by the Buddhist Text Translation Society of the City of Ten Thousand Buddhas, the Buddha tells Maudgalyayana to make offerings on the fifteenth of the seventh month to the monastic community. Food, fruit, incense, lamps and bedding are given on behalf of parents, both living parents in distress and those of seven generations past. China.org.cn wrote in 2008 that China has followed the custom from the Liang dynasty (502 to 557) onward and that it grew into the Zhongyuan Festival, which adds sacrificial ceremonies to the meal offered to monks.

In Hong Kong, the government's Intangible Cultural Heritage Office describes the Yu Lan Festival that the Chiu Chow community holds throughout the seventh lunar month, a practice more than a century old. Its aims are ancestor worship and rites for wandering ghosts. Participants burn paper offerings in the street, stage Chiu Chow opera to thank the deities, burn Ghost King effigies, hand out rice for good fortune and auction lucky objects.

In Taiwan, the Ministry of Culture's Encyclopedia of Taiwan describes the release of water lanterns. Each participant carries a lantern to the water behind a lead vehicle and a band. A Taoist priest or ritual master performs a short rite to call the souls, then the candles are lit and the lanterns set afloat to guide lone souls in the water ashore to share in the offerings. People believe the farther a lantern drifts, the more good fortune its owner receives. Northern Taiwan gives the rite special weight, and the Keelung Zhongyuan festival draws huge crowds every year for its lantern parade.

The beliefs also shape everyday choices. The Taipei Times reported in 2006 that its survey of large hospitals found surgeries up between 10 and 30 percent in the weeks before Ghost Month, as patients avoided operations during that month. The paper explained the traditional belief that the gates of the underworld open that month so the dead can return and share in food their families prepare.

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