Ullambana vs. Zhongyuan Jie

[Rewrite — the question this page answers: are Ullambana and Zhongyuan Jie the same festival? Open with the honest short answer — same day, the fifteenth of the seventh month, two frameworks — in snippet-liftable form.]

[Rewrite — Ullambana / Yulanpen: the Buddhist frame. The Yulanpen Sutra, Mulian, offerings to the sangha on behalf of ancestors. Link the Mulian exhibit where it exists rather than retelling it.]

[Rewrite — Zhongyuan Jie: the Taoist and folk frame. The Middle Primordial, the officials of the three realms, the wandering dead. This paragraph needs the most careful review — it is the one most often mangled by English-language sources.]

[Rewrite — how they coexist in practice: one temple, one day, both vocabularies; diaspora usage in the US. Close by pointing at the finder for observances rather than adjudicating labels.]