How do you define the boundaries between folklore, feudal superstition and religion?

Personally, I think folk customs cover a wide range, including superstition and religion. The definition of comparison specification:

Folk custom, that is, folk custom, refers to the life culture created, enjoyed and passed down by the broad masses of people in a country or nation. It originated from the needs of human social group life, and constantly formed, expanded and evolved in specific nationalities, times and regions, serving people's daily lives.

Folk customs in various places are related to humanities, which can also be said to be formed by the living habits of local people.

Folk custom is one of the most suitable cultures for people's physical and mental inheritance-there is productive labor in labor, daily life in daily life, traditional festivals in traditional festivals and social organizations in groups. Folklore also needs to be standardized in all stages of life growth-married people need a wedding ceremony or ceremony to gain social recognition, and there are folk customs in people's spiritual consciousness-and many taboos in life are like this: they are not allowed to be at home from New Year's Eve to the second day of junior high school.

Although folk customs are varied and varied, they are not all-inclusive. Folk customs, as the name implies, are deeply rooted in the collective. In time, people passed it down from generation to generation, and in space, it spread from one region to another-the custom of lucky money is like this every year, which is an example. Of course, folk customs are not monolithic, and there will be various versions in the process of inheritance. Otherwise, why do you eat rice cakes in the north and south of jiaozi during the Spring Festival? Folklorists call this phenomenon "the variation of folklore". Although folk customs often change over time, they all have their own distinct types or patterns, do you know? Diaojiaolou in the south and quadrangles in the north are two different types of residential buildings.

Folklore is such a basic force that comes from the people, inherits from the people, regulates the people, and is deeply hidden in people's behavior, language and psychology. We enjoy it and are willing to accept the protection of this model specification!

Folklore involves a lot of content, and its research field is still expanding until today. As far as the recognized folk customs are concerned, folk customs include the following main parts:

1 Folk custom of productive labor

2 Folk customs in daily life

3 social organization folk custom

Festive folklore at the age of 4

5 life etiquette

6 entertainment folk custom

7 Folk ideas

8 folk literature

Feudal superstition is a special term established by convention after the liberation of our country, which refers to people's thoughts and behaviors of believing in astrology, divination, witch doctors, geomantic omen, signs of life, ghosts and gods, etc. These things existed in primitive society and slave society, but because they prevailed in feudal society, people called them feudal superstitions. Feudal superstitious activities refer to related activities carried out by gods, witches, fortune tellers and geomancers who cheat money by feudal superstitious thoughts and behaviors, including lottery, divination, fortune telling, divination, inviting gods, exorcising ghosts, seeing geomantic omen and treating diseases with water.

Feudal superstition is a backward and ignorant blind belief handed down by primitive humans, and it is also a means for a few ruling classes to fool the lower classes. It takes advantage of people's fear of the disabled and their desire for life to highlight some fates that have no causal connection, so that in the atmosphere of ignorance and mysterious superstition, fear overcomes strength, evil overcomes justice and cruelly destroys goodness.

Superstition is born in nature, but ignorance in nature. They attribute their life and death to the omnipresent, omnipotent and omnipotent gods, blame diseases on magic, blame disasters on retribution, blame death on opponents' magic, and regard life as the return of the soul. The so-called "life and death have a life, wealth is in the sky" of Confucianism in China is a typical feudal superstitious view of destiny.

Confusing superstition with feudal superstition obliterates the basic difference between them. In the primary stage of socialism in China, the feudal class as a class has ceased to exist, and the feudal economic base has long been replaced by the socialist economic base. When the broad masses of the people become the masters of a socialist country, they support the Four Cardinal Principles and the socialist system. The activities they miss or engage in, such as drawing lots, divination, fortune-telling, fortune-reading, geomantic omen, exorcising ghosts, dancing with gods, etc., do not belong to the ideological and political reflection of feudal absolutism; It is purely folk and folk activities under the socialist conditions of eliminating class oppression and class exploitation, and the fundamental interests of the people are the same. There is neither a feudal class foundation nor a feudal political and economic foundation. Therefore, this superstitious activity is not necessarily related to feudal absolutism in ideological and political aspects. It does not have the essential characteristics of society, nor is it a unique or unique social phenomenon in feudal society. (See Religion 1996 No.3 and No.4).

To sum up, the word "feudal superstition" can neither contain the connotation and extension of the word "superstition" abroad, nor contain the connotation and extension of the narrow sense of "superstition" established in contemporary China. Therefore, it is biased to use the word "feudal superstition" to summarize superstitious activities such as lottery, divination, fortune telling, fortune telling and geomantic omen in our contemporary society.

There are many kinds of religious beliefs and organizations, so it is difficult for scholars to give a generally accepted definition of total price. In order to overcome the mistake of treating religion with cultural prejudice, the best way is to start with what religion is not.

First of all, religion should not be equated with monotheism (believing in one god). Secondly, religion should not be equated with moral laws that control the behavior of believers-similar to the commandments that Moses got from God in legend. Third, religion may not explain how human beings came into being. Fourth, don't equate religion with supernatural things, so religion must contain a belief in the world outside the scope of perception.

So what is religion? Almost all religions have the following characteristics: religion contains a set of symbols that can inspire reverence and awe, and is associated with rituals or celebrations (such as church worship) implemented by believers. Sociologists usually think that the existence of collective celebrations is a major factor to distinguish religion from witchcraft, although the boundary between them is not clear.

If religion is simply defined by the above-mentioned method of excluding from conceptual extension, then all these popular things in the world can hardly be called religion. The definition of "concept" is a summary and refinement of the general cognitive results of society, rather than weaving a new concept. We can't easily rule out the extension of the concept, even for the purpose of so-called "definition", orange juice can't be called full orange. Religion must include witchcraft and superstition. How can it be across the board?

To sum up, feudal superstition is different from religion and folk custom, but religion exists in folk custom.