Hindu Views on Death Flashcards
What is a marga?
A marga is a path toward, or a way of reaching, salvation
What is a Karma Marga?
“Path of Action”
- The oldest conception of the afterlife coming from the Vedas
- properly performing one’s religious and ethical duties
What is Jnana Marga?
“Path of Knowledge”
- less emphasis on worldly action
- emphasis on attaining knowledge about the atman and its eternal fate
- the World of Fathers is just a temporary resting place for the soul, before it returns to Earth
- informed by the Upanishads
What is Bhakti Marga?
“Path of Devotion”
- Renounces the Caste System, which makes enlightenment accessible to anyone
- Only thing you need to have is full devotion to God
- Allows for a personal and intimate relationship with one’s god; based on love and devotion
What is the World of Fathers?
A version of Heaven
- place of beauty
- in the “realm of light” with the gods
- a sense of paradise
- focus was placed on having a son and becoming a father in order to gain access
- woman’s fate in the afterlife was dependent on her husband
What is Naraka?
A version of Hell
- located beneath the Earth
- fateful images of:
- intestines being plucked out by birds
- drinking blood, pus, and urine
- being torn in half
- being burned
What is the concept of Karma?
Action (every thought & behaviour in our lives generates karma)
What are Hungry Ghosts (pret & pitri)?
After death, the soul stays close to the body for weeks, so it must be helped to the afterlife through worship and offerings
“During this time of waiting for their proper rituals and offerings, the soul is considered a malevolent hungry ghost, called PRET”
Hungry ghosts are feared as they are viewed as being able to create illness and disaster
This reinforces the importance of ritualized karma
“Once the rituals have been properly performed, the soul then transforms into a benevolent ancestor, called PITRI”
What is Samsara?
It is the continuous cycle of birth, life, death, and rebirth
What is Reincarnation?
After bodily death, being reborn in a new physical form, back into the cycle of samsara based on our karma
(Goal is to reach Brahmin level in the caste system)
(Aimed for attaining Moksha (enlightenment) which can only be done by reaching Brahmin)
What is Moksha?
Enlightenment
- release from the cycle of rebirth
- transcendent state attained from being released from the cycle of rebirth
What is Puranas?
Additional Indian text that provide more information
- This is where Bhakti Marga came from
- Indian literature involving myth, folklore, cosmologies, and philosophies
What are the Hindu Death Rituals?
CREMATION AND DUMPING IN SACRED WATER
- requires cremation as soon as possible
- the body is purified with water and freshly shrouded
- the body is carried by loved ones to the cremation site and placed on a funeral pyre
- typically a son or male relative will walk around the pyre 3 times, each time blessing the body with water
- then the fire is set
SATI
- an outlawed funeral custom
- wife of deceased man immolates herself on husband’s funeral pyre
- or will take her own life in another way shortly following his death
- Sati: “virtuous woman”
- derived from mythology that the wife of Shiva sacrificed herself for him
What is the importance of sacred rivers?
- they were believed to have spiritual and physical purification properties
- viewed as gods/goddesses with the ability to purify souls of the dead
- thought that being placed in the sacred river could possibly raise their souls in the caste system in their future lives and ultimately reach moksha
