Chapter 39 Chapter Ten Sacrificial Rituals and Customs

Fengchan is a ceremony for ancient emperors to offer sacrifices to heaven and earth.Feng Chan originated from the worship of nature.According to "Historical Records Fengchan Book", the Wuhuai clan long before the Fuxi clan had granted Mount Tai and Zen Yunyun Mountain, and it is said that there were as many as "seventy-two families" who granted Zen in the pre-Qin Dynasty. The capital is in Mount Tai.This is because Mount Tai is the longest of the five mountains. It is high and close to the sky. The emperors of the world go to the top of Mount Tai to worship God, expressing that they are ordered by "heaven".Some also say that it is because Mount Tai is Dongyue, and the east is the place where all things start and where yin and yang alternate, so it has become a sacrificial place for the new dynasty and the newly enthroned emperor to report their achievements to the gods and earth in order to obtain legal dominance.Therefore, Zen is also held in Yunyun Mountain, Tingting Mountain, and Liangfu Mountain near Mount Tai.Because the sky is above and the earth is below, the ancients believed that the sky is Yang, the earth is Yin, and the sky is higher than the earth, so the ceremony of Feng is more important than the ceremony of Zen.The specific etiquette of enshrining Zen varies from dynasty to dynasty, but the etiquette of enshrining Zen established by Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty is more representative.Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty first went to Liangfu Mountain to worship the land, and then set up an altar to worship the sky at the foot of the mountain on the east side of Mount Tai.Then Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty climbed to the top of Mount Tai with a few ministers to worship the sky again.The next day, descend from the north slope, and sacrifice to the ground again at Suran Mountain under Mount Tai.When enshrining the Zen, the three-ridged grass produced in the Jianghuai River and the precious birds and animals from various places were used as sacrifices, and the altar was sealed with five-color soil.Amidst the solemn music, Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty, wearing a yellow robe, bowed down in person.After enshrining Zen, Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty also issued an imperial edict to change the Yuan Dynasty, and ordered that the mansion be "governed" under Mount Tai.Most of the Fengchan programs of later generations are similar to this.

The reason why ancient emperors were keen on enshrining the Zen ceremony was because it could take advantage of people's worship of heaven and use "the transfer of the destiny" to explain the rationality of seizing the world from others, so as to stabilize the hearts of the people and consolidate their ruling status.However, because it would cost a lot of money to enshrine Chan and mobilize the teachers, some knowledgeable officials (such as Wei Zheng in Tang Dynasty) raised objections.Therefore, since the Southern Song Dynasty, the form of the emperor going to Mount Tai to enshrine Zen was abolished, and the enshrinement and suburban sacrifices were combined into one.Suburb sacrifice is also a ritual of offering sacrifices to heaven and earth in ancient times. In the Zhou Dynasty, the heaven was worshiped in the southern suburbs on the winter solstice, and the earth was worshiped in the northern suburbs on the summer solstice.Later, there were often joint sacrifices of heaven and earth. In the Song Dynasty, heaven and earth were sacrificed together in the southern suburbs.In the 18th year of Yongle in the Ming Dynasty (1420 A.D.), the Great Sacrifice Hall was built in the southern suburbs of Beijing, and it was also used as a sacrifice to heaven and earth.Emperor Jiajing thought that offering sacrifices to heaven and earth together in the Great Sacrifice Hall did not conform to the ancient system, so he built a new Huanqiu (later renamed the Temple of Heaven) in the south of the Great Sacrifice Hall to worship the heavens; Come to worship.Since then, it has been a division of heaven and earth.