How Hindus Face Death
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This paper will be concerned with the ways in which the Hindus have faced death, from ancient to contemporary times. One of the basic beliefs of Hinduism is that each person possesses a soul, or atman. The atman, unlike the physical body, is immortal. Because of this, the atman is passed on from one lifetime to the next in the process which is known as reincarnation, or rebirth. The Hindu term for this phenomenon is samsara, which may be defined as "the round of birth, death and rebirth, understood as a cycle of transmigration from one living form into another" (Bishop and Darton 189). The concept of samsara is related to that of karma, which refers to "a person's actions and the consequences thereof" (McDowell and Stewart 289). According to the law of karma, if a person performs good deeds, good consequences will result; however, if a person performs immoral acts, suffering and pain will be the result. In the Hindu conception of death, it is believed that a person's karma, like the atman, is carried forth during the process of reincarnation. Thus, the quality of a person's previous life determines that of the current life, and the actions performed during the present life in turn determine the quality of that person's future lives. In the Hindu belief system, a person with good karma may be rewarded by moving up to a higher social class in the next life; whereas a person with bad karma may be punished by being reborn in a lower caste or as an animal (Ibid.). Ho
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spirit doomed to roam the earth forever (Ibid. 182). Cremation is an important element in Hindu funerals because the corpse is considered impure. Thus, the funeral rite often utilizes a funeral pyre in which the body is supposedly purified while at the same time being disposed of. By extension of this purity factor, it may also be noted that "the nearest relatives of a dead person are considered ritually impure for a time following death" (Bishop and Darton 203). Because of this emphasis on purification, a great deal of ritual cleansing of both the corpse and of the participants takes place during a Hindu funeral. This concern with purification also causes many devout Hindus to try to be near the Ganges River, which is considered sacred, at the time of their death. The banks of Ganges within the holy city of Benares are particularly favored. Because of this, Benares has become a center for Hindu funeral rites, a fact which "reflects the belief of pious Hindus that death in or near the Ganges at Benares results in moksha" (Kinsley 3).
The funeral ritual generally lasts several days, and only the closest relatives of the deceased are invited to attend. The eldest son of the deceased is usually called upon to perform the var
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Approximate Word count = 1889
Approximate Pages = 8 (250 words per page)
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