ancestral worship
Honoring deceased relatives
Ancestral worship is reverence for deceased family members, treating them as spiritual beings who can influence the living.
Common in East Asian, African, and indigenous traditions, it involves rituals, offerings, and prayers directed toward ancestors: The family maintained an altar for ancestral worship.
The practice reflects beliefs that the dead remain connected to their descendants and deserve ongoing honor.
- libationCeremonial drink offering
- folkloreInherited cultural narratives
- ritualsCeremonial repeated practices
- kinshipState of being related
- lineageDescent from progenitors
incense · tomb sweeping · shamanism · funerary rites · death anniversary · Confucianism · sacred sites · afterlife · oral tradition · family tree · filial piety · altar · burning incense · reincarnation · joss paper · Taoism · indigenous practices · offering
ancestral worshipmonotheism
Belief in one god
theism · nature worship · animism · idol worship · self-worship