Hou Wang La 侯王腊 — The Fifth Taoist La Day and the Year’s Final Sacred Threshold

The classical text records: “十二月节日名侯王腊。” — the festival day of the twelfth month is named the Hou Wang La. To understand what this means, you need to understand the Five La (五腊) system as a whole.

Together the Five La Days cover the full range of the cosmic hierarchy — from heaven to earth, from the Way itself to the human social order. The Hou Wang La, as the fifth and final La Day, closes this cycle at the level of the lords and kings — the human authorities whose governance mirrors the divine administration above.

The classical text provides the most complete description of what the Five La Days require of practitioners:

Three things are prescribed for the Hou Wang La: setting pure offerings (设净供) to the divine authorities; building a retreat to seek blessing (建斋求福) through purification practice; and honoring the deceased ancestors (祠先亡) through memorial rites. The practitioner who performs all three on this day is formally designated a xiao zi (孝子, filial child) — one who fulfills their obligations to both the divine order and the ancestral lineage — and receives merit described as boundless.

Hou 侯 means marquis or lord — a title of nobility in the ancient Chinese feudal hierarchy. Wang 王 means king. Together, hou wang (侯王) refers to the lords and kings of the human social order — the earthly authorities whose governance is understood in Taoist cosmology as a reflection of the divine administration above. The Hou Wang La is the sacred day associated with this level of the cosmic hierarchy: the day when the merit of ritual practice flows through the channel of human authority and social order.

The classical text notes that the Five La Days are “connected with the Three Primordials” (通三元). The Three Primordials (三元) are the three great festivals of the Taoist year: the Upper Primordial (上元, the fifteenth of the first month), the Middle Primordial (中元, the fifteenth of the seventh month), and the Lower Primordial (下元, the fifteenth of the tenth month). Together the Five La Days and the Three Primordials constitute the eight most sacred days of the Taoist liturgical year — the “Eight Resolutions” (八解) mentioned in the classical text.

Understanding the broader structure of Taoist ritual practice provides context for how the Hou Wang La fits within this larger system. The purification ritual tradition (斋法) shows the inner dimension of practice that the Hou Wang La’s retreat component embodies. And the Taoist canon preserves the classical sources from which this sacred day’s mandate is drawn.