Vu Lan Festival - a holiday to honor filial piety
(Baonghean) -The Vietnamese Full Moon Festival (lunar calendar) is a special occasion for descendants to show their gratitude to their ancestors and deceased parents. Buddhist monks call it the Great Vu Lan Festival. Folk beliefs consider the Full Moon Festival of the Seventh Lunar Month as the day to pardon the dead. "There are stories and plays", this coincides with the concept of "results arising from causes" in dialectical materialism.
* Dictionary of Traditional Vietnamese Culture edited by Huu Ngoc, from Vu Lan: Ceremony (Buddhism). The word Vu Lan is translated as: bon - a basin containing fruits and offerings. Vu Lan Ceremony is held on the 15th day of the 7th lunar month every year, is a ceremony to offer offerings to monks in a Vu Lan pot, praying for the souls of loved ones to escape from hell. The 15th day of the 7th lunar month is called the day of forgiveness of sins, meaning that on that day in the underworld, the souls of the dead are forgiven.
* Ancient story: After Maudgalyayana attained the fruit of Arhat, he remembered his mother and wanted to know how she was now, so he used his wisdom eye to find her. Seeing that his mother had committed many evil deeds and had fallen into Avici hell as a ghost, suffering from hunger and thirst, he brought rice down to the ghost realm to offer her. However, due to hunger for a long time, when his mother ate, she used one hand to cover her rice bowl to prevent other ghosts from coming to steal it, so when she brought the food to her mouth, it turned into red fire.
Too heartbroken and sympathetic, Maudgalyayana returned to find Buddha to ask for a way to save his mother. Buddha taught him: "No matter how great your supernatural powers are, you are not strong enough to save your mother. Only by joining forces with monks from all ten directions can you hope to save her. The fifteenth day of the seventh lunar month is the appropriate day. On the fifteenth day of the seventh lunar month, a vegetarian altar should be set up to pray and a feast should be held to invite monks to eat. Before eating, these monks will follow Buddha's teachings and focus on praying for the donor's parents and grandparents of seven generations to be liberated."
Maudgalyayana did as the Buddha taught, and indeed his deceased mother was freed from the realm of hungry ghosts. The way of praying for the deceased is called Vu Lan Bon Phap, the ceremony is called Vu Lan Bon Hoi, and the sutra recording the above story is called Vu Lan Bon Kinh.
Since then, every year, when this day approaches, the women in the family are busier with the work of preparing to worship the Full Moon in gratitude to their ancestors, going to the temple to pray to Buddha to bless the family and parents with peace and happiness, and busily preparing offerings to all living beings.
The great filial Bodhisattva Maudgalyayana saved his mother from the realm of hungry ghosts. Vu Lan is an annual festival to commemorate the kindness of parents (and ancestors in general). Regarding the filial example of Maudgalyayana, Venerable Thich Thanh Tu wrote: This festival has great significance because this is the day Venerable Maudgalyayana saved his mother from suffering in hell. Why is Maudgalyayana a disciple of Buddha, as well as many other Arhats, but we place such importance on it? Because Vietnamese people have long placed great importance on filial piety, and their ancestors and parents all put filial piety first. The example of Maudgalyayana is a shining example of the filial piety of children towards their parents, so it is very suitable for Vietnamese Buddhism. Therefore, Buddhism in our country considers Vu Lan festival very important, to remind all Buddhists to be aware that this festival is a beautiful image, a shining example, we must always remember and know, and cannot ignore it.
As a child, we must never forget our parents' kindness. This body belongs to our parents, but if we abandon it and are ungrateful, it is meaningless and unworthy of being a human being. Therefore, filial piety is a truth for us.
Therefore, Vu Lan Festival is not only a festival to celebrate Buddha, Bodhisattva, Arhat, Maudgalyayana, but also a day to remind us of the noble spirit of our ancestors. We remember that Vu Lan Festival has such great significance, not just to pray for our grandparents to be reborn in the Pure Land, but also to always think of our duty as children to our parents, think of how much love our parents have for us, and try to repay our parents' great kindness, only then can we be worthy of being filial children.
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