Hist 487_12 Summing up Gernet: Festivals and religious practice

For the emperor as the 'regulator of time', a annual calendar, or better an almanach, in which the days of festivals were fixed, was printed by the court. It also contained the dates for solstices and equinoxes and prescriptions for agriculture. It could be used for divinatory and geomantic purposes because it recorded the potential of the ruling element (of the five elements) for every day. [Marriages, funerals etc. were arranged according to this calendar; in addition, the almanach was also consulted for 'simple' tasks like getting a hair cut or moving to new premises.

Months were divided into units of ten days each, days consisted of 12 'double-hour' units represented by the twelve 'Earthly Branches' and 100 'quarter hours', in length almost equivalent to 15 minutes.

Night watches differed in length according to the season, they were slightly longer in the winter than in the summer.

The day began at dawn with signals of drums, gongs, or wooden clappers as indicators of time: morning audiences at court took place at 5 or 6 am, 'office hours' were completed by the afternoon which left the later afternoon and the evening free for officials.

Officials had one day of leave after a period of ten days of service, and a total of 54 days of vacation per year distributed over the annual calendaric festivals as well as special occasions such as the emperor's birthday or the memorial day of his ancestors' death. The death anniversary of parents gave the official a day off, and the officials were also allowed to return to their family for one day within three years.

Leisure time for non-officials was not structured by the state. The abolition of the nightly curfew in the Song allowed taverns and restaurants to be open until 2 am, during festival days even throughout the night. Complete days off were only available for mourning, marriage, New Year's eve and New Year, and the guild saints' [birth]day.

Festivals usually lasted several days (- different duration in different locations).
The most important festivals was the New Year's Festival. All activities like house cleaning and preparation of food had to be conducted with care in order to avoid inauspicious influences for the new year. The ancestors as well as the guardian spirits of the house (door gods, kitchen god, earth god etc.) received offerings.

A painting of Zhong Kui, the demon queller would be hung up to scare away any disturbing demon.

Zhong Kui, the 'ghost buster'

The Lantern Festival concluded the New Year celebrations and could last for up to 17 days and was the longest festival in China.
Temple festivals in honor of Daoist or Buddhist saints as well as the birthday of Buddha Sakyamuni also could last for several days.
On the Festival of the Dead, the only festival fixed according to the solar calendar, the tombs were swept and offerings in form of incense and food were made to the ancestors.
The double 5th (fifth day of the fifth month) was the day of warding off pestilence and malevolent animals: lucky charms were hung up to ward off evil influences;
the double 7th (seventh day of the seventh month), the day when the stars of Cowherd and Weaving Girl 'met' and their separation by the Milky Way was suspended, was celebrated among women who competed in games testing their skills in embroidery.
The Midautumn and double 9th festivals were celebrations of autumn, the hungry ghost festival in the 9th month a time to remember the souls that were roaming about because nobody cared for them ritually.

Religion
Religious concepts were designed to avert chaos and create or maintain order. Regulating space and time by making offerings at certain times or to deities of space were at the center of religious practices.

In the state cult which aimed at the preservation of order in the universe, the emperor as the mediator between Heaven and Earth was the most important figure. The rites he had to perform were fixed according to the solar calendar. The beginning of spring, prayers for rain at the winter solstice, and libations to Heaven and Earth, the mythical emperors, the planets and 360 stars were made.

The most important rites were performed during the tri-annual sacrifices to Heaven in the southern suburbs. The emperor had to fast and conduct rites of purification, and make offerings to his ancestors, and then perform libational sacrifices for Heaven, Earth, and the ancestors.

The sacrifices were structures hierarchically:

sacrifices to Heaven in the southern suburbs

sacrifices to the imperial ancestors

sacrifices to the deity of the soil

sacrifices to the Lord of the grain

sacrifices to regional deities (sacred montains, lakes etc.)

sarifices to ancient sages and deified heroes (poets, warrior heroes etc.)

Religions with a lay community of followers are characterised by tolerance, indifference to doctrine, and absorbing a multitude of heterogenous elements.

Family Cults / Ancestral Cult
- intends to create a link between the deceased parents and events as well as members of the family; ancestors are conceived of being able to determine one's fate; they can influence the life of individual family members

Popular Cults and Beliefs
- revered the ancients sages and deified heroes but also had methods to get rid of ghosts and demons and other fantastic creatures by exorcist rituals and magic charms, noise (drums, firecrackers), architectural tricks (the 'ghost wall') etc.

Buddhism and Daoism
- Buddhism although not an indigenous religion of China had won a more prominent place in the Chinese belief system than Daoism; favored and financially suported by the rulers since the Six Dynasties (3.-6. cent. C.E.) Buddhism had spread throughout the realm, covered the scenic places with monasteries which held vast amounts of ritual art objects, manuscripts, calligraphies, presents from the imperial palace etc. Buddhism offered a (mental) escape from the threats of life and with the concept of nirwana an escape from the prospect of a potentially dangerous neitherworld.
-Daoism was similarly organized like Buddhism; monks and nuns lived in monasteries and convents, a liturgy regulated the prayers, and a lay community supported the cleric. The Buddhist church was much wealthier than the Daoist organized religious community.

Borders between ethical contents of the religions diluted and during the Song first attempts were made to create a syncretistic religion that united all three important systems of thought, Confucianism, Daoism, and Buddhism in one.