The meaning of Sima Wen Gong’s ban on looking at lanterns in classical Chinese

This sentence comes from "Xuan Qu Lu", which means: Sima Guang did not allow his family to go out to watch the lanterns. (Sima Wen Gong refers to Sima Guang, who was posthumously named Wen Guo Gong after his death).

The original text in "Xuan Qu Lu" records that Sima Wen Gong was forbidden to look at the lanterns:

Sima Wen Gong was living in Luoyang for leisure. It was the Lantern Festival, and his wife wanted to go out to look at the lanterns. The Duke said : Why bother to go out to see if you have lights on at home? The woman said, "I also want to see tourists." The Duke said: Is someone a ghost?

Translation:

Sima Guang was living in Luoyang. On the day of the Lantern Festival, his wife wanted to go see the lanterns. Sima Guang said, there are lights at home, so why go out to see? The lady said she wanted to see the tourists by the way. Sima Guang said: Then am I a ghost?

Extended information:

"Xuanqulu" is a collection of jokes and humorous novels in classical Chinese compiled by Benzhong in the Song Dynasty. The author was Lu Benzhong (1084-1145) of the Song Dynasty, courtesy name Juren, a native of Shouzhou (now Fengtai, Anhui Province). He was an important Taoist, famous poet and poetic critic at the turn of the Southern and Northern Song Dynasties.

His writings are extensive, and those that are currently intact or partially extant include: "Spring and Autumn Collection", "Lu's University Commentary", "Pain Ding Lu", "Tong Meng Xun", "Guan Zhen", "Journal of Teachers and Friends", "Zi Wei" "Miscellaneous Comments", "Ziwei Miscellaneous Notes", "Xuanqulu", "Donglai Poetry Collection", "Ziwei Ci", "Ziwei Poetry", etc., and can be found in various bibliographic records. There are many deceased people. However, so far, there has been no information about Lu Benzhong. This compilation of the complete works brings obvious constraints to both the study of Lu Benzhong and the in-depth study of Song Dynasty culture and literature.