When I was a sixth-grade student, my grandmother passed away. Everyone was very sad. We believed in Buddhism, so we must abide by Buddhism practices during the funeral. For me, "Burning ghost money" is an impressive custom. At a large place, my relatives and I formed a circle. We held our hands. A pile of ghost money and paper houses were put at the center of the circle. The money and houses are given to the dead person. We burned them and asked the dead person to take them. A Taoist master held a huge sword and he waved it in the sky. This behavior was to prevent the vicious ghost to rob the money. I remembered that all children felt very hot and extremely impatient.
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【People form a circle and they hold hands.】 (Taken from Google Graphics.) |
According to Taiwan's Buddhism belief, before people are born, they borrow some paper money from the God in the non-human world. After they die, they must return money. Thus, we burn some paper money for the dead, and they can pay back their debts. We also burnt a paper house, so the dead person can live in the house, in the non-human world.
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【A pile of ghost money.】 (Taken from Google Graphics.) |
"Burning ghost money" suggests some cultural implications. It means that: "Before people die, they have to pay off their debts. In addition , it demonstrates people’s filial piety, a very important virtue in Chinese society .
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【Ghost money】 (Taken from Google Graphics.) |
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