From the Belief of the Immortality of the Soul, the Blessing or the Harassing of the Soul Towards People to the Worship of the Souls of Vietnamese People

Does the soul exist? If there exists where it is, what it is doing and if the soul does not exist why is it still appear in the daily lives of so many people, so many generations and many places in the world. Why is it so important for so many countries in the world to believe in the immortality of the soul and death? Faith in the dead and the next generation depends largely on a person’s religion and culture, on a community of people. For many Vietnamese, this belief goes from the belief that the soul only reaches its ultimate goal after many reincarnations, to the idea that life will now determine its final destiny. Consequently, one person can feel confident that he will eventually merge with the ultimate reality after death, others will surely reach Nirvana, and others will believe that he will be rewarded in heaven. So what is the truth? Because our beliefs affect our attitude, actions, and decisions, are we not interested in finding answers to that question? The dead are not finished but their souls still exist. Depending on the behavior of those who live with those who have died, they (those who are still alive) may be blessed by the soul or punished by the soul, encountering unfortunate things in life. This study provides a discussion of whether or not the existence of the immortal soul and the blessing or harassing of the soul for human life. How can humans limit the harassing and many blessings from the soul? Why does belief in the blessing and harassing of the soul become such a popular custom of worship among Vietnamese people?


Introduction
The concept of the soul is closely related to the notions of life after death, but there are very different ideas, even of the same religion, about what happens to the soul after the body dies. Many people follow certain religions and philosophies for the soul to be immaterial (Frede, 1956;Bremmer, 1983;Ngoc, 2002) while others think that the soul may have a material component (Tocarev, 1994;Sam, 1995) and some even try to find the block amount (weight) of the soul (Lang, 1974). Normal souls (but not always, as explained below) are said to be immortal (Kerferd, 1971). Socrates says the soul is a crystal (Essence). Plato states that the soul consists of the reason (Logos), affection (Thymos) and craving (Eros) (Algra, Barnes, Mansfeld, & Schofield, 1999). Aristote defines the soul as the activity of a living body and assumes that the soul will disappear when the body is no more, just like the activity of a knife is to cut, when the knife is damaged the cutting activity ceases again (Algra, Barnes, Mansfeld, & Schofield, 1999). Because of the concept of the soul in different ways, people still argue about whether or not there is a soul. Often the soul is understood as the spirit, the crystal of the person, as opposed to matter, to any biological organ of the body (Tien Duc Association, 1931;Thu, 1997;Thanh, 2018).
The Bible, the oldest book in the world, traces the history of man back to the time when the first human soul was created. Bible teachings are not infected with human philosophy and tradition. The Bible tells the clear truth about the soul: Your soul is a friend, the dead are completely no longer present, and those who are in God's memory will be resurrected at his appointed time. What does this knowledge mean to you? Jesus Christ said to his disciples: "You will know the truth, and the truth will set you free" (John 8:32, NW) (Christian, 2013). Yes, the truth has a liberating effect. But what does the truth about the soul free us from (Christian, 2013)? soul it will be about living happily ever after with him; on the contrary, if he does evil and does not believe in God, his soul will be punished and suffer in hell.
For the majority of Vietnamese people, for a long time, in their life, they always perceive that "everything has a soul", in which the soul of man is the most sacred and important. It is not known since when, in the life of Vietnamese people, they have formed a habit of worshiping the souls of the dead and become a typical folk belief of Vietnamese people.
The custom of worshiping souls is a kind of folk belief that has existed for a long time and is very popular in the spiritual life of the masses in North, Central and South Vietnam. Thanks to the recognition and clear rules of the worship in the legal documents of feudal dynasties through the historical periods of the nation, this belief was strengthened, maintained and developed until today.
During the course of existence and development, like other forms of folk beliefs, the acquisition, adjustment, and usage of the world's cultural movements, beliefs and religions are inevitable. In Vietnam in particular and in East Asian countries in general, Buddhism and Taoism have a great influence on all aspects of people's lives, especially in religious activities. In traditional Vietnamese thoughts, along with Confucianism, Buddhism and Taoism were introduced very early (around the end of the second century). These religions did not face native beliefs, developed freely and had a great impact on the religious life of Vietnamese people from the past to till the present.
The Vietnamese nation has a democratic tradition, which promotes harmony and desire for discovering new things. The ideology is not bound to a certain framework; therefore, since Buddhism and Taoism were introduced into Vietnam, ancient Vietnamese people have actively opened the door, welcomed the essence of that ideology, filtered, integrated and transformed it into a unique one suitable for the living conditions to serve the common interests of the nation. One of those harmonies was clearly shown in the custom of worshiping souls, which is popular in almost every part of Vietnam.
In addition to Buddhism and Taoism, Vietnamese beliefs are also influenced by other international religions such as Christianity, Protestantism, and Islam. However, the most powerful influence on the religious life of Vietnamese people is probably Buddhism (Tien Duc Association, 1931;Giau, 1973;Lang, 1974) and Taoism (Ngoc, 2002;Hinh, 2007).
As a kind of folk belief of Vietnamese people, the custom of worshiping souls not only contains cultural and moral values but also shows the outlook on life and the world of a large number of Vietnamese people. Despite its certain negative effects, the custom of worshiping souls has a positive influence on the life of each individual, community, and society. Apart from typical forms of folk beliefs such as the worship of mother goddesses and the worship of village tutelary gods, which are very popular in the lives of the whole Vietnamese people, the worship of souls is also a way to show good values of Vietnamese people and satisfy the spiritual needs of each individual, family, and community.

Research Methodology
The author is a person who was born and brought up in the rural areas of Vietnam. When I was children, I have witnessed funeral rituals in my families: worshiping the deceased (grandfathers, grandmothers, aunts, uncles, etc.) and worshiping the souls of people who died in rivers, markets, wars, etc. in communal temples and in pagodas. With my innocence at that time, I thought that the dead members of my families were not gone, still existed and sometimes visited the living ones on fifteenth day of the lunar month (the full-moon day), the first day of the lunar month, Lunar New Year's Day, and especially their death anniversary (the date when they died). For those who were not worshiped, there would be one day when they were "offered food"; that was the wandering souls' day (the fifteenth day of the seventh month of the lunar calendar) every year.
When I grew up and started to choose my career, I decided to study philosophy and religion and had better conditions to further study those rituals. In order to search for the materials to write up my article, apart from studying ancient bibliographies, the author also conducted practical surveys in many localities and directly got involved in the worshiping rituals in all three Northern -Central -Southern regions of Vietnam. Based on my own understanding of folk beliefs and religion, as well as the research results on the worship of souls of Vietnamese people, the author conducted the study titled "From the Belief of the Immortality of the Soul, the Blessing or the Harassing of the Soul towards People to the Worship of the Souls of Vietnamese People".

Views on the Soul of Vietnamese People
In the folk belief of Vietnamese people, a living person is a combination of two parts: the "body" and the "soul". The body can be understood as the physical, visible part of a human being. The soul is an immaterial, abstract ass.ccsenet.org Asian Social Science Vol. 16, No. 3 2020 part related to people's spirit, thoughts, and feelings.
According to that folk belief, human beings have two groups of souls: three souls and seven spirits. Women have two spirits as many as men; so they have nine spirits. These souls settle in human beings and mingle with the bodies to form living human beings. Humans (bodies) receive the souls on the date of birth or the date of conception.
Souls are only spiritual souls and spirits are material souls. Souls are more sacred than spirits, so when someone is alive, due to respect, people avoid talking about his or her soul. Spirits can be both beneficial and harmful in everyday life. Spirits have different characteristics, depending on whether a person has a good or bad spirit. Some people have good spirits while others have bad and evil spirits. Good spirits bring happiness and good luck, so people try to meet people with good spirits. Bad spirits have negative effects on everything, so people try to stay away from people with bad spirits.
There are also different viewpoints about souls among the researchers studying Vietnamese folk beliefs. The Dictionary of Vietnamese Culture and Traditional Customs defines souls as "the souls of the dead in the underworld, which are possible to stay around their living relatives" (Y & Huy, 2011, p. 17) Souls may also be the souls of the dead drifting from other places, whose identities are unknown and are buried by the villagers. Souls are also "the wandering souls of all kinds from kings to common people, from the rich to the poor" (Trang & Tuong, 1999, p. 138) "People believe in ghosts and gods, so they think that the dead have souls and senses like the living, and in the underworld, there are also happy or unhappy people like on earth. Those whose children keep worshiping will have a place to come back whereas unfortunate or heirless people who are not worshiped will feel distressed in the underworld" (Binh, 2005, p. 151).
According to Buddhism, human beings are combined from five elements called Skandhas (five aggregates) including: form, sensation, perception, mental formation, and consciousness. Of these elements, the form is the tangible element (material element) that makes up the physical part of a human being. The remaining elements, including sensation, perception, mental formation, and consciousness, are invisible elements, corresponding to the elements of feeling, perception, reason, and awareness. The combination of these four invisible elements makes up the spiritual part of a human being.
In its philosophy, Buddhism believes that life is a cycle with the unit of "Kalpa" (a cycle of birth -death). All happy or suffering conditions of earthly people are effects of corresponding causes, called "sowing what you reap" (Giau, 1973;Binh, 2005) "Causes" can be created from previous Kalpas or in the present Kalpa. If people do not take enough "effects" while they are alive, they will take them in their next Kalpa (Binh, 2005).
According to the law of cause and effect in Buddhism, after people die, their souls will leave their bodies. Their souls, depending on their karmas (created when they were alive) will be reborn according to "sixth paths" (six ways), including: Celestials (the realm of gods): Buddha, Bodhisattva, etc.; Human beings: people (rich, poor, happy, unfortunate, etc.); Asuras: Ghosts and spirits (intermediary level); Animals: buffaloes, cows, pigs, etc.; Hungry ghosts: often live in wet, dirty places; Hells: way of the wicked (the underworld, corresponding to 18 layers of hell).
Also from Buddhism's point of view, after their death, people's right-doings and wrong-doings will be judged by "Ten Kings of the hell" (ruled by Earth-Store Bodhisattva) within seven weeks, corresponding to seven gates of the hell (Binh, 2005;Thanh, 2018). Therefore, in the funerals of Vietnamese people, there was a forty-nine-day worshiping ceremony, in which the souls are sent to pagodas where the monks will pray for their freedom from sufferings. According to the concepts of "samsara -cause, and effect", after forty-nine days, the souls will be under the control of the officials in the underworld. These officials will carefully consider all big and small things that people did when they were alive to decide how they will be reborn: become human beings, become animals or be exiled to the underworld and subject to severe harassing.
Thus, the view of the soul in the East and the West has many similarities that are the immortality of the soul, the soul capable of influencing those who are still alive. Perhaps because of that, the worship of the soul has existed in the practical life of humanity both in the East and in the West.

Soul Classification
Through the above study, it can be seen that although there are different interpretations of "body" and" soul", they are similar in one viewpoint: When people die, there will be a separation of their souls and their bodies. All the conceptions show that when a person dies, his or her body will dissolve over time whereas his or her soul will continue to exist.
With the theory of "samsara -cause and effect", it is obvious that Buddhism indicates the infinite cycle of the ass.ccsenet.org Asian Social Science Vol. 16, No. 3 2020 existence of souls. This is the basic difference between the Buddhist concept and the relief of worshiping souls of Vietnamese people. Based on the viewpoints of Buddhism, when grandparents, parents, and relatives die, their souls must follow the samsara, life afterlife. All the credit -sin, good -evil, good -bad of each individual when he or she is alive will lead to how his or her soul goes to the next life. According to Buddhist teachings, with the unlimited power of Buddha Dharma, the ten kings of hell will not miss any souls. Accordingly, it is impossible for ancestors' souls to "go home" with their descendants or forsaken souls or hungry ghosts to wander on earth.
Despite the contradiction in whether there is the existence of souls around the living, over the past thousands of years since Vietnamese people accepted Buddhism in their religious life, they still maintain both philosophies of life, interweave and blend them into a collection of mixed beliefs which shows the harmony of Vietnamese people through many generations.
With studies, hundreds of years ago (Lang, 1974;Binh, 2005;Thanh, 2018) and even today (Duy, 2002;Anh, 2005;Hinh, 2007) show that Vietnamese people divide souls into two types: souls with owners (relatives) and souls without owners (forsaken souls). Souls with owners, i.e. those with usual death (death due to old age, sickness, or the standards of longevity on earth specified in the Crux's book) are worshiped by their relatives and descendants. Forsaken souls are lonely souls without being worshiped by anyone. who had no descendants after his death despite having been buried as usual and taken to the ancestral spirits' residence, but did not know where to go due to the absence of descendants, should become a forsaken soul. When hungry, no one offered a bowl of rice, when cold, no one sent a coat. Vietnamese Dictionary says, "A forsaken soul is the soul of a dead person without being worshiped by his or her relatives" (Phe, 2005, p. 87). Having a baby does not mean that after death becomes an ancestral soul in the house, there is also an important condition that the child can live, mature, get married and reproduce. Therefore, it is the responsibility of the parent to give birth to a child who can take care of the child and help the children to form an adult family. In this way, it is ensured that the worship continues, creating generations of ancestor worship. With that in mind, Vietnamese people take care of their children very carefully, teach them traditional knowledge, and organize marriage for them when they reach their age. If conditions permit, they also do their best to take care of married children with new decent accommodation and take care of great-grandchildren. The generations of the family go on and on, the dead never become evil spirits, while this can happen at any time if the offspring do not continue to multiply.
Another condition is that the person naturally dies due to old age or illness, and is buried as usual. For Vietnamese people, suicide, drowning, death, traffic accident, fire death, difficult childbirth, severe death or starvation in the street market, etc., all those deaths are abnormal deaths to these causes are not classified as ancestral souls that become wandering souls. Elderly people are invited by the family members to come and preside over the funeral and chant "prayers". How to bring dead souls to the right place of ancestral souls is important. Therefore, the Vietnamese people have to organize a "good-soul" chanting ceremony to lead the souls of the dead step by step to their destination. So the "tiễn hồn" (sending off the dead to the land) is also known as the "guide for the soul". Only after going through certain funeral rites and reaching the residence of ancestral souls, the souls of the dead will be considered ancestral spirits in the home.
All the above biochemical viewpoints have created the existence of souls after death in the minds of Vietnamese people. Therefore, a long time ago, the habit of worshiping the dead (souls) was formed in the daily spiritual activities of Vietnamese people. That habit has lasted for a long time, gone through many generations and become the custom of Vietnamese people. However, along with the changes of the time and the exchange and adaptation of cultural flows in the world during the integration period, this worship custom has changed compared to the original form and both positively and negatively affected the awareness as well as social behaviors of part of Vietnamese people.

Faith in the Blessing and the Harassing of the Soul
Normally, dead souls that are not of the ancestor's souls are considered to be ghosts, that is, death due to shipwreck, war dead, suicide, dead in the streets, etc. or have no descendants of worship. Such dead people are called abnormal deaths. Such unusual deaths are said to be unable to return to their homes. The devil has no shelter, there was no food to eat, no water to drink, no clothes to wear, etc. and so on wandering all day long, no one is worshiping. Therefore, these souls will generate hatred towards the living. In Vietnam, the 7th lunar month every year, according to the popular concept called "the month of the soul" or the month of "opening the grave" (Figure 1). According to folklore, the seventh lunar month is the month in which "the devil is most active".

Forsaken Souls
or have no rel n roads, at ma dark clouds, in as, hanging abo to the custom m the belief th ill ruin their b on, the worship ace of the coun these lonely so people who d e who die with erefore, earthl must rob the summer, as w sery of the so amily ath (death ann was the date wh p of ancestors there are impo or work, taking pray for goo tes from the be their ancestor n between the l quy thổ, cốt n uried in the gr allowed to fly dissolve into th consider their s) atives and frie arkets and the drizzles, or li out the places m of worshiping at these souls business, peopl p of forsaken s ntry and village ouls are left hu die from injust hout anyone w ly people must porridge put i well as on the fu ouls of the dea Vol. 16,No. 3 niversary), whi hen their ances is also carried ortant events in g examinations d luck or to s elief that the l rs and ancesto living and the nhục tê ư, hạ â round, their bo y to the sky). he ground and ancestors' sou ends. These ar eir bodies were e on tree bran where they di g souls outsid can also adve le worship the souls is also a e.  Thu, 2004, p. 115).
According to Dai Nam Nhat Thong chi, in Nghe An and Quang Binh provinces, "In 1449, the temples for worshipping souls were built but no one made offerings. In 1464, the offerings were prepared to sacrifice to souls and were divided into upper, middle, and lower levels like the offerings made to all gods; every year, the mandarins were ordered to make offerings in three seasons (spring, summer, autumn) and this became the custom" (Hinh,207,p. 75). According to Phan Huy Chu, "This ceremony began from the beginning of the Le Dynasty, continued and remained unchanged" (Chu, 1992, p. 143).
In Hue, on the 23rd of the fifth month of the lunar calendar, people in Hue solemnly organize a ceremony to worship souls. This ritual is organized for both family and community people in the same area, ward, district, etc. The ceremony of worshiping souls in Hue is organized in such a solemn manner was because in 1885 the citadel was lost to the French. The period of 1883 -1885 was the most sensitive period in the history of Vietnam in the Nguyen Dynasty (An, 1972;Giau, 1973). In 1883, after the French fired a gun into Thuan An, Hue Citadel fell into a dangerous position and the court was afraid and nervous. At this time, only Ton That Thuyet was determined to maintain the standpoint of fighting the French. According to some records, it seemed that most families suffered from loss after the event. About 9,300 soldiers and civilians were killed on the spot. They were soldiers, people, officials, teachers, and so on, dying for many reasons. They might die due to the guns and bullets of the French, or due to jostling and stomping on each other while running away. They might fall when trying to climb out of the citadel or misstepped into the numerous lakes in the citadel, especially Tinh Tam Lake (An, 1972).
Thus, souls (spirits) are souls of people in the family and clan (ancestors, those who are dead); Forsaken souls can be understood as the souls of the dead without being worshiped. They may be homeless people, people with no relatives or people who had families and relatives but had to leave their homeland and died while fleeing from the war in troubled times; They can be merchants who traveled everywhere and soldiers on battlefields who unfortunately died and could not find their relatives and no one knew their names to worship every year. They can be coastal fishermen, whose lives were associated with the sea, floating, wandering on the waves, unfortunately died because of storms and their souls wandered everywhere. They became lonely souls that had no one and no place to worship.

Conclusion
Originating from different beliefs in souls, Vietnamese people have different ways to worship these souls with various forms of performance and practice. However, when entering different classes of people, these forms of worship have changed and become profound folk beliefs. Through studying the custom of worshiping souls, it can be concluded that: The worship of souls is a socio-historical phenomenon. It is not only the behavior of the living towards their ancestors and the homeless dead, but also the behavior among those who still are living in this world. This is a humanistic belief, demonstrating good natures of Vietnamese people: respecting affection, loving people, and feeling pity for unfortunate fates. This belief has integrated four immeasurables of Buddhism to form an extremely humanistic custom.
Apart from being a traditional spiritual ritual, with the influence of Buddhism, the worship of souls has many other meanings, including the thoughts of praying for peacefulness and good crops of inhabitants in the past and today. In human life, people always face risks, uncertainties, and catastrophes, so they need to be blessed by the dead.
So far, the worship of souls still plays a very important role in the spiritual life of Vietnamese people. Along with the development of society, this custom has changed in both positive and negative directions. However, the values that it brings are undeniable, in which there are factors of Buddhism, Taoism, and many other religions. Knowing how to select and integrate the progressive elements of foreign religions into the forms of folk beliefs, including the worship of souls, makes the beliefs more abundant and diverse. This is a unique feature in the cultural tradition and habits and customs of the Vietnamese nation. Together with other folk beliefs, the custom of worshiping souls has also become a beauty in the diverse beliefs of Vietnamese people. Thus, in order to study the folk culture of Vietnamese people, it is necessary to study the forms of folk beliefs and the worship of souls is a typical example.

Ethical Clearance
I confirm that the paper is original unpublished work, not submitted or to be submitted for consideration elsewhere. All procedures performed in studies involving human participants were in accordance with the ethical standards in academic research.