Skip to content

Lễ Thành phần (rite after the grave is completed)

Also called: Lễ đắp mộ, Thành mộ, Nhiễu mộ

  • Funeral and mourning rites

Culture and belief A record of custom.

Prayer text for Lễ Thành phần (rite after the grave is completed)2 texts, kept in Vietnamese, with an English summary.

By custom, when the grave pit has been filled and the grave has been completed, the children and grandchildren offer wine, burn incense and bow in gratitude before the grave, then ask to welcome the spirit home. At the pagoda there is the lễ nhiễu mộ (rite of walking around the grave), walking around the grave to bid farewell to the spirit.

At a glance

When it is held
When the grave has been completed
For whom
The newly deceased (at the grave)
Who makes the offering
The eldest son or the eldest grandson

Each family and each region may do it differently.

The offering tray

Folk practice, At the grave

Where the offerings are set
Before the new grave
OfferingVegetarian or notNotes
Tea, rice wine, water
Three cups of wine, one tuần hương (a set of incense sticks)According to the last two lines of the prayer text
Objects
Flowers, water, the portrait or the spirit tabletVegetarian

Buddhist, At the grave

When
After the burial is finished
Where the offerings are set
At the grave

Steps of the rite

Used across Vietnam, Folk practice, At the grave

  1. Filling the earth, completing the grave
  2. Arranging the offerings before the grave, offering incense, reading the prayer text
  3. Resting a moment, then reading the two lines asking to welcome the spirit home (according to some guides)
  4. In the countryside, the vãi (lay Buddhist women) hold incense, chant sutras and walk around the grave, each person throws a clod of earth onto the grave, called dong nhan

Used across Vietnam, Buddhist, At the grave

  1. Nhiễu mộ: walking around the grave, bidding farewell to the spirit
  2. Thanking the monks and the funeral guests

What is avoided

  • By custom, only after the burial is finished does one bow four times

Communities and regions

Sources

  • Văn khấn trong lễ tang (vankhan.vn)
  • Việt Nam phong tục, thiên I chương IX Tang ma (vi.wikisource.org)
  • Nghi thức tang lễ theo truyền thống Phật giáo (phatgiao.org.vn)

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.