像牌水陸畫=small-scale Buddhist shuilu paintings; 三字總持咒=three-word incantation; 瑜伽焰口施食=Buddhist ceremony of offering food to hungry ghosts; 薦亡=release souls of the dead; 往生=reborn into the western pure land
The small-scale Buddhist shuilu ("water and land") paintings of the Qing dynasty found in the Ruiying Temple at the Maijishan Grottoes were likely used primarily in the small-scale Buddhist ceremonies of offering food to hungry ghosts, a ritual with the accompanying three-words incantation of "ong a hong"(no semantic meaning). Based on documents related to these paintings, texts about being reborn into the western pure land, and the memories of the old people living at the foot of Mt. Maiji, the author of this paper concludes that this kind of small-scale ceremony would have been carried out at a specific time, during a mourning period or annual Ghost Festival for example, and at a specific place, usually in temples, residential yards, or other expedient locations.
