Ancestor Veneration
Honoring ancestors through proper ritual demonstrates filial piety.
Rituals honoring ancestors are central to Confucian practice. They express gratitude, maintain connection with the past, and cultivate proper attitudes of respect and remembrance.
Sacrifice to the ancestors as if they were present.
Ancestor rites express the virtue of filial piety.
Analects
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- What Confucianism says about reverence and ritual
Offerings to ancestors are made as though they were present. The instruction concerns the attention you bring, not what the dead are thought to receive.