The Lantern Festival, also known as Yuanxiao Jie or Teng Chieh, is celebrated on the 15th day of the first lunar month, marking the close of the Chinese New Year period. It is a festival of illumination and renewal, where glowing lanterns, riddles, and shared sweets become vessels of celebration and deeper symbolism. While its outward joy is radiant and communal, the Lantern Festival also carries profound spiritual and metaphysical meanings—honouring wholeness, harmony, and the return of light.
This full moon festival dates back over two thousand years, with influences from Taoist rituals, Buddhist practices, and ancient folk traditions. Originally linked with offerings of light to the heavens, the lighting of lanterns symbolised the guiding of wayward spirits and a connection to celestial forces. Over time, the lantern became a symbol of wisdom, hope, and clarity, casting not only physical but inner light.
One of the most enchanting customs of the festival is the display and release of lanterns, which range from humble paper globes to elaborate works of artistry depicting mythical creatures, folk stories, or spiritual themes. Some float skyward, others drift on water—each lantern a prayer or wish made visible. In some traditions, lantern riddles are written and solved, merging playfulness with contemplation.
The roundness of the lantern and the full moon is deeply symbolic in Chinese cosmology, representing completeness, family reunion, and the cyclical nature of time. The moon on this night is considered particularly luminous, evoking beauty, unity, and the subtle dance between light and shadow.
Culinary traditions also carry metaphysical significance. The most famous food of the Lantern Festival is tangyuan—sweet glutinous rice balls often filled with sesame, red bean, or peanut paste. Their round shape mirrors the moon and the lantern, and they are eaten to invoke togetherness, continuity, and harmony. In each bite is the taste of reunion, tradition, and the quiet sweetness of belonging.
Spiritually, the Lantern Festival is a moment of transition and clarity. The fiery brightness of the lanterns does not only dispel the winter darkness, but symbolises the inner illumination needed to step forward into a new cycle with clear intention. It invites the soul to let go of what is past and move toward renewal with grace.
Philosophically, the festival holds a Taoist and Buddhist resonance—light as the dissolution of ignorance, the rising lantern as the ascent of spirit. The act of lighting a lantern becomes a meditation, a small, luminous gesture that mirrors the inner journey toward awakening.
Artistically, the festival is resplendent with colour, movement, and sound. In many regions, lion dances, music, and processions accompany the lantern displays, bringing together sacred ritual with community joy. Yet even amidst the festivity, there is a hushed beauty to the sight of lanterns drifting into the night sky—a silent offering, a shared moment of wonder.
The Lantern Festival is ultimately a celebration of light, connection, and completion. It marks not only the end of the New Year festivities, but a luminous threshold into the year ahead. In lantern and moon, in sweetness and song, the festival invites us to remember that even in darkness, the light within and around us can rise, soft and sure, to guide the way forward.
