However, this is not the original reason for this cultural custom. The earliest origin should be Xiaoya Cai Wei in China's first poetry collection "The Book of Songs": "I have been there, Liu Yiyi; Today, I will think about these ancient poems, "Rain and snow are raining". There are three reasons: first, this poem comes from the Book of Songs, which is a well-known sentence; Secondly, "Willow" has no meaning of farewell, but it expresses the parting feelings of soldiers before going out to war, which laid the cultural tone for later farewell poems; Thirdly, The Book of Songs, as one of the Five Classics, has a profound and extensive cultural background. The ancients paid attention to "no words and no place" in their poems, which of course came from classics.
As far as the behavior itself is concerned, there may be a fourth reason, which is dominated by a religious sentiment. The folk custom of inserting willows in Tomb-Sweeping Day is to commemorate Shennong, the ancestor of farming. In some places, people put willow branches under the eaves to forecast the weather. There is an old saying that "the willow branches are green and the rain is raining;" The saying that there is another village. During the period of Huang Chao, it was stipulated that "Qingming lasts for a period, and Liu Dai is the number". After the failure of the uprising, the custom of wearing willow was gradually eliminated, and only willow was popular. Willow has a strong vitality. When the willow branches are inserted in the soil, they live, where they are inserted, and when they are inserted year after year, they become gloomy everywhere. There is another saying in Tomb-Sweeping Day: It turns out that China people regard Tomb-Sweeping Day, July 30th and the first day of October as the three major ghost festivals, which are the time for ghosts to haunt and explore secluded places. In order to prevent the harassment and persecution of ghosts, people put willows and put them on. Willow has the function of ward off evil spirits in people's minds. Influenced by Buddhism, people think that willows can exorcise ghosts and call them "ghost trees". Guanyin dipped willow branches in water to help all beings. Jia Sixie of the Northern Wei Dynasty said in the Book of Qi Yao Min: "Put a willow branch on the house, and a hundred ghosts will not enter the house. "Tomb-Sweeping Day is Halloween. When wicker sprouted, people naturally inserted willows to ward off evil spirits. Therefore, Liu has mysterious religious feelings in people's hearts.
In a word, there should be four reasons for "farewell": homophonic feeling, philosophical enlightenment, cultural inheritance and religious emotion.
In ancient times, due to inconvenient transportation and underdeveloped communication, it was often difficult for relatives and friends to meet for several years, so the ancients paid special attention to parting. On the occasion of parting, people often set up wine farewell parties, fold willows to send them away, and sometimes sing poems to bid farewell, so parting has become the eternal theme of ancient literati.
Farewell poems generally describe the scenery according to time and place, express the feelings of parting, and thus reflect the author's thoughts and feelings. The common images in farewell poems are pavilion, willow, dusk, wine and autumn. Poetry titles often have words such as "give, don't, send". The content of farewell includes writing about the differences between husband and wife, relatives, friends and colleagues, and even rushing by. The technique used is often to express one's mind directly or to express one's feelings by borrowing scenery. Some of its artistic features are bold and broad-minded, some are euphemistic and implicit, and some are shallow and affectionate.