Chapter 44 The Sixth Stove Sacrifice

Sacrificing stoves is a custom with a long history.Kitchen God is also known as "Kitchen Lord", "Kitchen King" and "Kitchen Lord" among the people, and is one of the oldest gods believed by people.The early Kitchen God originated from people's natural worship of fire.In the life of primitive clans living in groups, the pile of unquenchable fire is their stove, so the god of fire and the god of stove are the same.In the Xia and Shang Dynasties, the Kitchen God gradually separated from the Vulcan God and became a great god enshrined by the people alone.According to the "Book of Rites·Qu Lixia", the "sacrifice to the five sacrifices" in the Zhou Dynasty included sacrifices to the Kitchen God.The so-called "five sacrifices" are household sacrifices in spring, stoves in summer, Zhongliu (Zhongtang) in the center (at the turn of summer and autumn), gate sacrifices in autumn, and line sacrifices in winter.The sacrifice to the stove here is mainly based on the fact that the stove has practical value to people like doors and households.But after the Han Dynasty, the kitchen god was transformed into a god who inspected human faults and made small reports to the emperor of heaven.

Ge Hong in the Jin Dynasty "Baopuzi Weizhi" contains: "On the dark night of the moon, the kitchen god also goes to the sky to accuse the white people. The big one takes the discipline. The discipline takes three hundred days. The small one takes the calculation. The calculation is one hundred Days.” From this, it can be seen that at first people thought that the Kitchen God would go to heaven to sue on the last day of each month, and those who committed serious crimes would lose 300 days of life, and those who committed minor crimes would lose 100 days of life.Later, it gradually evolved, and the kitchen god went to heaven once a month instead of once a year, and the time for offering sacrifices to the kitchen was fixed on the 23rd or 24th of the twelfth lunar month.

Every household has the Kitchen God, and it is a god that people can't get rid of or get rid of. "People are not sages and sages, and no one has faults." There is a guardian god guarding at home, and he must be afraid of suing the gods, so the kitchen god is the most taboo.According to the "Jingzao Quanshu", it is not allowed to use the stove to burn incense; not to hit the stove; not to put knives and axes on the stove; Spit; not be naked in front of the stove; women who have not yet finished their menstruation are not allowed to pass by the stove;Many of these taboos have no reason, except that urinating and spitting in front of the stove are harmful to hygiene.But from this we can see how respectful the ancients were to the Kitchen God.

There are so many taboos against the Kitchen God, and three meals a day cannot be separated from the kitchen.People accidentally broke a taboo in front of the stove and offended the Lord of the Stove. Once the report was made on the 23rd of the twelfth lunar month, no one knew what disaster would happen.Therefore, before the Stove Lord goes to heaven, people must solemnly offer sacrifices. On the day of sacrificial stoves, no matter big or small, rich or poor, every family has to clean up the stove, tables, pots and pans, and prepare to set up a sacrificial stove.At this time, the same new couplets should be pasted on both sides of the kitchen god enshrined in the kitchen shrine: "God says good things, and the lower realm will keep you safe (or 'return to the palace to bring auspiciousness')." This is people's prayer to the Kitchen God.After the offerings are made, the whole family participates in the ceremony.Then the eldest son withdraws incense, delivers wine, and sprinkles beans, grass festivals and other horse feed for the Stove God's mount, from the stove to the path in front of the kitchen.Finally, the original kitchen god statue is removed and incinerated, which is called "sending the stove", that is, sending the kitchen god to heaven.A few days later, usually on New Year's Eve, the parents will light candles, burn incense, kowtow, clean hands and paste the new kitchen god statue on the shrine, and then place it in front of the statue for sacrifice. Take back to the world from the sky.Usually, the kitchen is delivered on the 23rd day of the twelfth lunar month, and the kitchen is welcomed on New Year's Eve, a total of seven days.Zhang Chaoyong, a native of the Qing Dynasty, wrote a poem titled "Miscellaneous Songs at the Years of Yanjing": "The horse with the paper banner and armor arrived at the kitchen, and the commanding officer [chuan boat] was drunk. It only took seven days to go up and down from the sky, and mortals do not have such great supernatural powers." This poem The poem reflects some situations of offering sacrifices to stoves from one aspect.

Regarding the offerings for the stove, yellow sheep was popular in the Han and Jin Dynasties, and "pork wine" was used in the Southern and Northern Dynasties.In the Song Dynasty, according to Fan Chengda's "Poems on the Stove", "the pig's head is overcooked, the double fish is fresh, and the bean paste, sweet pine powder and bait are round", and the food is more abundant.These offerings are nothing more than to stop the mouth of the kitchen god, so that he can be full of wine and food, and be satisfied.During the Ming and Qing Dynasties, the food for offering sacrifices to stoves changed from meat to vegetables, and persimmons and dried fruits were added.One of the most interesting is the addition of kitchen sugar, that is, maltose.Maltose is sweet and sticky, paste it on the Kitchen God's mouth. First, the Kitchen God's mouth is sweet, so he can't speak bad words anymore, he can only speak good things; mouth.As for the poor people who can't even afford sweets, they have no choice but to make a wish to the Kitchen God.There is a folk song like this: "The Stove King's surname is Zhang, and there are three incense sticks in a bowl of cold water. This year's life is hard, and I will treat you to candy next year."

The activity of offering sacrifices to stoves is a kind of superstition, which reflects the ignorance of ancient people about their own destiny. They can only attribute all kinds of good and bad fortunes they encountered to gods.Mistakes are unavoidable in the world, and they are afraid of being punished, so they have to sacrifice to the stove sincerely in order to eliminate disasters and avoid disasters.With the improvement of people's civilization, the activity of offering sacrifices to kitchen stoves has gradually declined in modern times.