125
End of Mourning
Although many consider mourning lasts for five (or previously seven) tsats, namely 35 (or 49) days, a normally accepted figure is 100 days. Until this century laws laid down how long the five grades of relatives should mourn. If these rules were breached punishment was administered by the state. It is unlucky for mourning to end on the exact day.
43
A simple ceremony to mark the end of mourning, after 101 days in this study, was held by relatives in the home of the second daughter where a permanent shrine had been erected to the deceased. This faces the main entrance door but as the flat in question had not been ‘feng shui oriented’ its effects are likely to be negated. There were the customary three bows and burning of joss sticks. Everyone was in good spirits occasionally talking to the dead person's picture as if she was actually there. Of course there was food. This plays a major part in a culture of a country where famines were common. Dishes included chicken properly 'assembled', complete with head and tail (everything must have a beginning and an end), fish, and Chinese sweetmeats such as yam rolls. Oranges were placed on the shrine. On that day a box of home-cooked walnut cake was on the table. It was later found untied and everyone denied undoing it. Those present questioned whether the deceased had opened it.
There was also roast pork, believed by some to replace, ritualistically, the flesh lost in death. Pork is 'food fit for the gods'. Once placed on the altar before ancestors it takes on a sacred, magical quality which, some believe, can be likened to the host consecrated at the Eucharist. The Roman Catholic Church declares that, by transubstantiation (a custom continued since medieval times), bread and wine become the substance and form of the body and blood of Christ. Protestants believe the bread and wine do not take on physical affinity but convey a spiritual reality. By eating pork that has been offered up and 'ritually shared', ancestors and living descendants, so some Chinese claim, are not only able to fortify their chi ('cosmic breath' providing inner strength) but also capture special 'magical' powers. Even non-lineage members are sometimes offered some pork as a special gift. Babies barely able to masticate have pieces pressed into their tiny mouths. Afterwards, mothers swear they are better behaved and illnesses cured.
125
End of Mourning
Although many consider mourning lasts for five (or previously seven) tsats, namely 35 (or 49) days, a normally accepted figure is 100 days. Until this century laws laid down how long the five grades of relatives should mourn. If these rules were breached punishment was administered by the state. It is unlucky for mourning to end on the exact day.
43
A simple ceremony to mark the end of mourning, after 101 days in this study, was held by relatives in the home of the second daughter where a permanent shrine had been erected to the deceased. This faces the main entrance door but as the flat in question had not been ‘feng shui oriented its effects are likely to be negated." There were the customary three bows and burning of joss sticks. Everyone was in good spirits occasionally talking to the dead person's picture as if she was actually there. Of course there was food. This plays a major part in a culture of a country where famines were common. Dishes included chicken properly *assembled', complete with head and tail (everything must have a beginning and an end), fish, and Chinese sweetmeats such as yam rolls. Oranges were placed on the shrine. On that day a box of home-cooked walnut cake was on the table. It was later found untied and everyone denied undoing it. Those present questioned whether the deceased had opened it.
There was also roast pork, believed by some to replace, ritualistically, the flesh was losing in death. Pork is 'food fit for the gods'. Once placed on the altar before ancestors it takes on a sacred, magical quality which, some believe, can be likened to the host consecrated at the Eucharist. The Roman Catholic Church declares that, by transubstantiation (a custom continued since medieval times), bread and wine become the substance and form of the body and blood of Christ. Protestants believe the bread and wine do not take on physical affinity but convey a spiritual reality. By eating pork that has been offered up and 'ritually shared', ancestors and living descendants, so some Chinese claim, are not only able to fortify their chi (*cosmic breath' providing inner strength) but also capture special 'magical' powers." Even non-lineage members are sometimes offered some pork as a special gift. Babies barely able to masticate have pieces pressed into their tiny mouths. Afterwards, mothers swear they are better behaved and illnesses cured.
No comments yet.
Private notes are available after approval.