Mid-Autumn Festival中秋节
Today is the Mid Autumn Festival in Chinese it is called “zhong qiu jie” 中秋节. (It is a legal Holiday here in China) The Mid-Autumn Festival is celebrated on the 15th day of the 8th month in the Chinese Lunar Calendar. It is the day of the autumnal equinox and it is said that on that day the moon is at its fullest and brightest. It is also known as the Moon Festival. It is a popular harvest Festival celebrated in South-Eastern Asia. The origins of this Festival date back to 2000-3000 years, the earliest records go back to the Zhou-Dynasty, in these records it is said that : “in mid-spring, beating earthen drums and playing Bin Shi are aimed at welcoming the approaching of the summer, and it is also true of Mid-autumn to await the coming of autumn”.[1]
The Mid-Autumn Festival is also a time of family reunion, traditionally people will gather with their family and friends on this day to eat Moon cakes and Pomelos, and admire the bright moon together.
In the past married daughters who went home to visit their parents were expected to go back home to their mothers in law’s home that night. Also on this night people living in a foreign land would go outside and watch the moon and think of their home country and their family. In some northern Chinese regions moon cakes are also called “reunion cakes”.
There are many story’s around the Mid-Autumn Festival and I will try to present a few of them here.
Emperor Ming visits the Moon Palace :
This legend goes that on the day of the Mid-Autumn Festival Emperor Ming went to the Imperial Garden to admire the moon in company of a Taoist priest named Luo Gongyuan. When the Emperor wished he could fly to the Moon Palace, Luo Gongyuan told him that it was no problem, he threw his walking stick in the air and it flew straight to the Moon Palace, leaving a large silvery bridge behind it. The emperor and the priest stepped on the bridge and walked until in front of them appeared a beautiful palace. At the gate stood a large osmanthus tree, underneath sat a white rabbit pounding herbs. On the gatehouse there was a big sign reading “The Cold Palace”. When they entered the palace they found that there were exotic flowers and rare herbs everywhere. When they got into the palatial hall they saw hundreds of fairy maidens dressed in fine white transparent jade gauze, they were dancing on crystal like floor to a melodic music. As the emperor was proficient in music he learned the tune by heart. After they visited the whole Palace they went back to earth. When they arrived at the earth the emperor felt a tremor which woke him up. Realizing he only had a dream he wrote down the tune he had heard in the Moon Palace. The song would be “Music of colourful Feathered Fashion Dance”.
Another story is the one of “Chang E ascends to the Moon” first recorded in Huainanzi.
In ancient legendary times there used to be 10 suns (which where suns on the Jade Emperor) on the sky, which made that the life on earth was very hard, because fires broke out everywhere and the rivers dried up. The Jade Emperor sent his bravest god to Earth to end this catastrophe : Hou Yi. Hou Yi tried to convince them to take turns in their journey through the sky so that each day there would only be one of them crossing the sky. But they did not listen to him but instead amplified their intensity.
Hou Yi then took his magic bow and his arrows and shot down 9 of the 10 suns. The last one begged for his life and promised to divide the day in two parts, night and day as we know it today.
The killing of his sons made the Jade Emperor furious and he didn’t let Hou Yi and his Wife Change E back into Heaven. As Hou Yi felt pity for the people living on earth (filled with fierce animals) he decided to stay on earth and help the people to get rid of them. His wife didn’t like to stay on earth and often fought with him that he should not have shot down the nine sons of the Jade Emperor. Hou Yi did many good deeds for the people on earth and killed a lot of fierce animals. He even offered one of them to the Jade Emperor so that he and his wife could go back to Heaven, but the Jade Emperor still refused to let them back in.
One day Hou Yi was told of an elixir, if one would take the elixir he would ascend to Heaven but if two persons would share it both would become immortal. He got hold of the elixir and took it back home and gave it to his wife Change E who kept it beside her bed. During this time there were floods everywhere on earth and people didn’t have many places to live and no food to eat. At the beginning Hou Yi was able to hunt for some food but it became harder and harder. Chang E could not stand this anymore and thinking about the good life in Heaven she decided to betray her husband and consume the elixir. She then ascended to Heaven, when she arrived at the gates to Heaven all the gods and goddesses were standing there, but instead of welcoming her return they were gossiping about her, some even insulted her. When she saw that they all thought very low of what she did, she felt very ashamed and changed her direction and went to the Cold Palace on the moon.
Hou Yi was thinking about shooting his wife down from the moon, but he could not do it, so he finally decided that as he did not have any use for his bow anymore he would destroyed it. After having destroyed his weapons everyone sympathized with him except his disciple Peng Meng who thought that if he would kill Hou Yi he would be the best archer. So one day when Hou Yi was senselessly drunk he killed him. This angered the Thunder God so much that he struck Peng Meng with a thunderbolt and killed him.
Chang E stayed lonely and cold on the moon with only a rabbit and a toad as company.
[1]Gai Guoliang Traditional Chinese Festivals in China, Shanghai Chinese Classics Publishing House
