Skip to content

Cúng giỗ hậu (death anniversary kept by a lineage, village or pagoda)

Also called: Mua hậu, Giỗ hậu họ, Hậu điền, Ky điền

  • Ancestors and death anniversaries

Culture and belief A record of custom.

Each family and each region may do it differently.

What is Cúng giỗ hậu (death anniversary kept by a lineage, village or pagoda), and when is it held?

Giỗ hậu is the death anniversary of someone with no son to keep the worship, observed instead by the lineage, village, temple or pagoda, because in life that person gave money or fields to it[1]. Toan Ánh (2001) notes that this was called mua hậu (buying the hậu), and that many villages wrote its terms into their village covenant[1].

Toan Ánh also notes that nowadays in many families without a son, the daughters keep their parents' anniversaries, and sometimes the daughters' children keep their grandparents'[1].

What to prepare

  • While still aliveThe buyer of the hậu hands over money or fields; the money goes into the village fund to buy ritual objects, extend the temples and communal house, or serve public works[1].
  • WhereThe giỗ hậu is held at the nhà hậu, a separate building at the communal house or pagoda used for these anniversaries[1].
  • Who praysAt the communal house the prayer is usually said by the shrine keeper or the village elder (tiên chỉ); at the pagoda by a monk[1].

Step by step

  1. At the lineage hall, the head of the lineage makes the offering and invites some descendants of the lineage[1].
  2. At the communal house, besides the offering to the person being commemorated, the villagers prepare an offering to announce to the Thành hoàng (village tutelary deity)[1].
  3. At the pagoda, a monk prays and chants sutras for the peace of the departed soul[1].
  4. After the offering, the village notables share out the offerings, eating them at the communal house or taking them home[1].

Why it is done this way

Toan Ánh explains the belief that offerings reach the departed only when someone of the same blood prays to them, so everyone hoped for a son to keep the incense burning[1]. Those without a son who could not adopt an heir, and who feared a later heir might drop the anniversary, entrusted it to the lineage, village or pagoda[1].

He distinguishes hậu điền, fields a childless person gives to the lineage or village so as to receive anniversary offerings, from ky điền, fields handed to the village so that it keeps the anniversary for oneself or for one's parents[1]. Some lineages accepted fields from a daughter who married and had no children, then worshipped her at the lineage hall; that anniversary is called giỗ hậu họ[1].

Communities and regions

Sources

  1. Toan Ánh (2001). Phong tục thờ cúng tổ tiên trong gia đình Việt Nam. Hà Nội: NXB Văn hoá Dân tộc

Part of the open datasets Types of Vietnamese offering rites and Vietnamese offering procedures, licensed CC BY 4.0.

More ritesDeath anniversaries, Tết, the home, business, the life cycle, village and ethnic rites.