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| Figure 1: Hungry Ghosts Festival offerings at an altar (Source: China Travel) |
There are specific occurrences that are consistent among all humans: for example, the need to eat, reproduction and child rearing, and death and dying. While these are universal instances the reactions to these vary across cultural groups, leading to specific rituals, beliefs, values, and more. This post will address one such example concerning coping with death and dying: the Hungry Ghosts Festival.
Among the Chinese, who observe the Lunar Calendar, there are specific celebrations associated with certain months. The seventh lunar month is considered the Ghost Month because at the beginning of this month the dead are released from the underworld and left to roam free across the Earth. During their time in the underworld the dead were deprived of food, affection, and other necessities, leading them to be wearing, hungry, and angry upon their arrival to dwell among the living. This results in the Chinese practicing a series of rituals to appease the ghosts, of which the most important is the Hungry Ghosts Festival.
The Hungry Ghosts Festival is celebrated in the middle of the Ghost Month, and in 2025 this specific festival falls on today’s date, September 6, 2025. The Hungry Ghosts Festival can last one to several days, ultimately depending on the community’s resources. If the community has excess money and resources the festival lasts longer than those communities with less. The purpose of the Hungry Ghosts Festival is to provide offerings to appease the weary and angry dead to prevent them from enacting revenge or taking their anger out on the living.
To appease the dead within individual homes the residents place their ancestral tablets on a table, along with burning incense and several fresh meals throughout the day. Community members will also burn incense, light paper lanterns, and place food at specific monuments and locations of importance to the deceased (Figure 1). At each location individuals will share information with the deceased, either asking for blessings or forgiveness depending on what news is shared. Performances, including but not limited to operas, are performed to entertain the deceased. A large feast is the pinnacle of the Hungry Ghosts Festival, with a place or two set aside and left empty for the ghosts.
The origins of this specific festival are tied back to Buddhism. According to lore a young man’s mother died and she was punished in the underworld because she led a selfish and cruel life. Following Buddhist doctrine the man was able to release his dead mother from her torment by chanting, singing, and making food offerings. Over time the Hungry Ghosts Festival transformed to meet Chinese Daoist beliefs, and it is practiced in combination with the traditional Buddhist and newer Daoist traditions and values. Unfortunately, due to changing cultural values among the Chinese fewer and fewer of them are celebrating the Hungry Ghosts Festival, leading it to be endanger of becoming a defunct cultural tradition. There are Chinese populations across the Asian continent that continue this tradition, however.
Works Cited
Chan, Selina Ching. "Moral Taste: Food for Ghosts in Hong Kong's Chaozhou Hungry Ghosts Festival." Journal of Chinese Dietary Culture (2017): 51-85. Print.
Chan, Selina Ching, and Shengdan Cai. "Preserving and exhibiting intangible cultural heritage via virtual museum: A case study of the Hungry Ghosts Festival in Hong Kong." The International Archives of the Photogrammetry, Remote Sensing and Spatial Information Sciences 48 (2023): 405-411.
China Highlights. Hungry Ghost Festival. 2025. Electronic. 8 July 2025.
