Connected with the Tibetan funeral itself there is much interesting ritual. Thus, when the officiating /ama is pre- paring to assist at the removal of the corpse from the house,
1 Cf. Waddell, Gazetteer of Sikhim, p. 388.
* “In Ceylon, death-feasts are given, to the Bhtkkhus, seven days, one month, and one year after the death. These feasts are given “in the name of” the dead, to whom also the merit is offered. This, under certain circumstances, helps the dead to attain higher rebirth.’—Cassius A. Pereira,
3 Cf. Waddell, Gazetteer of Sikhim, pp. 391 and 383.
The Death Ceremonies 25
he presents a ‘scarf of honour’ to the corpse and, addressing the corpse as the deceased, advises it to partake freely of the food offered, warns it that it is dead and that its ghost must not haunt the place or trouble living relatives, saying in conclusion, ‘ Remember the name of thy spiritual /aa-teacher, which is... [so and so], and by his aid take the right path— the white one. Come this way!’!
Then, as the /ama begins to lead the funeral procession, he takes hold of one end of the long scarf, the other end having been tied to the corpse, and begins to chant a liturgy to the accompaniment of a miniature hand-drum (having loose-hanging knotted cords attached, which, striking the drum as it is twirled by the hand of the /ama, cause it to sound) and of a trumpet made of a human thigh-bone. When there are a number of priests, the chief priest, going before the rest, rings a handbell (as the Breton priest does in a Breton peasant funeral procession), and the other priests assist with the chanting and the music, one blowing at intervals the sacred conch-shell, another clashing brass cymbals, and perhaps another twirling the small drum, or blowing the thigh-bone trumpet. From time to time the chief /@ma looks back to invite the spirit to accompany the body and to assure it that the route is in the right direction. After the corpse-bearers come the main body of mourners, some bearing refreshments (to be in part cast on the funeral-pyre for the benefit of the deceased and in part partaken of by the priests and mourners), and last of all the weeping and wailing relatives. Such priestly guiding of the deceased’s spirit is for the laity alone, for the spirits of deceased /@mas, having been trained in the doctrines of the Bardo Thédol, know the right path and need no guidance.
In Tibet itself all known religious methods of disposing of a corpse are in vogue; but, owing to lack of fuel for purposes of cremation, ordinarily the corpse, after having been carried to a hill-top or rocky eminence, is chopped to pieces and, much after the Parsee custom in Persia and Bombay, given to the birds and beasts of prey. If the corpse be that of a nobleman, whose family can well afford
1 Cf, Waddell, Gazetteer of Stkhim, pp. 391 and 383.
26 Introduction
a funeral pyre, it may be cremated. In some remote districts earth burial is customary; and it is commonly employed everywhere when death has been caused by a very contagious and dangerous disease, like small-pox for example. Other- wise, Tibetans generally object to earth burial, for they believe that when a corpse is interred the spirit of the deceased, upon seeing it, attempts to re-enter it, and that if the attempt be successful a vampire results, whereas crema- tion, or other methods of quickly dissipating the elements of the dead body, prevent vampirism. Sometimes, too, as among the Hindus, corpses are cast into rivers or other bodies of water. In the case of the Dalai Lama and the Tashi Lama, and of some very great man or saint, em- balming is practised; and the corpse, in a way somewhat resembling the ancient Egyptian embalming process, is packed in a box of marsh salt, usually for about three months, or until the salt has absorbed all the watery parts of the corpse. Then, after the corpse is well cured, it is coated with a cement- like substance made of clay, pulverized sandal-wood, spices, and drugs. This adheres and hardens; and all the sunken or shrivelled parts of the body, such as the eyes, cheeks, and stomach, having been rounded out by it to their natural proportions, a very Egyptian-like mummy is_ produced. Finally, when thoroughly dried and then covered with a paint made of dissolved gold, the mummy is set up like an image in a sort of Tibetan Westminster Abbey.
At Shigatze, the seat of the Tashi Lama, there are five such funereal temples. With their double roofs, resplendent with gold, they resemble the palaces or royal shrines of China. In size and embellishment they differ, in accordance with the rank and wealth of the mummies occupying them, some being inlaid with gold, some with silver.!. Before these enshrined mummies prayer is offered up, incense burnt, and elaborate rituals are performed, as in the ancestral cults of the Chinese and Japanese.
The four Northern Buddhist methods of disposing of a corpse correspond to those mentioned in various of the sacred
1 Ct. Ekai Kawaguchi, Three Years in Tibet (Madras, 1909), p. 394.
The Death Ceremonies 27
books of the Hindus: a human body is said to consist of four elements,—earth, water, air, and fire,—and it should be returned to these elements as quickly as possible. Cremation is con- sidered the best method to adopt. Earth-burial, as among Christians also, is the returning of the body to the element Earth; water-burial is the returning of the body to the element Water, air-burial, to the element Air—the birds which devour the corpse being the denizens of the air; and fire-burial, or cremation, the returning of the body to the element Fire.
When air-burial is adopted in Tibet, even the bones of the corpse, after the birds have stripped them of flesh, are disposed of by being hammered to bits in small cavities in the rocks of the funereal hill, then mixed with flour and formed into a dough and given to the birds to devour! The Tibetan air-burial is thus more thorough than that of the Parsees, who allow the bones of thcir dead to remain in the air and slowly decompose.
In a Tibetan funeral of the ordinary sort, neither a coffin nor any corpse-receptacle is used. The corpse after being laid upon its back on a sheet or piece of cloth spread over a framework, commonly made of a light material like wicker affixed to two poles, is covered with a pure white cloth. Two men, inserting their heads between the projecting ends of the two poles, act as pall-bearers. In Sikkim, however, the corpse is carried thus sitting, in the embryonic posture described above.
Both in Sikkim and in Tibet every funeral is conducted in strict accordance with the directions which have been given by the astrologer who cast the death-horoscope, in- dicating who shall touch or handle the corpse, who shall carry it, and the form of the burial. The astrologer also declares what kind of evil spirit caused the death, for in popular belief—as also among the Celtic peoples of Europe— no death is natural, but is always owing to interference by one of the innumerable death-demons. The astrologer announces, too, what ceremonies are necessary to exorcize the death-demon
1 The men who perform this part of the burial belong to a special caste, and, being regarded as unclean, are ordinarily shunned by other Tibetans.
28 Introduction
from the house of death, what special rituals need to be read for the benefit of the spirit of the deceased, the precautions necessary to secure for the deceased a good rebirth, and the country and sort of family in which the rebirth will occur.
In Sikkim, on the space of ground levelled for the funeral- pyre, a mystic diagram, symbolical of the Happy Realm of Sukhavati, or the Red Western Realm of Happiness (see text, p. 113), is outlined with flour and divided into com- partments, the central space (upon which the funeral-pyre is built) being dedicated to the Dhyani Buddha Amitabha. At the beginning of the cremation ceremonies the chief dama visualizes the funeral-pyre as being the mandala of Amitabha, and the fire as being Amitabha, who, as in our text (see p. 113), personifies the element Fire. Then the corpse itself, when laid upon the pyre, is visualized as the szandala of Amitabha and its heart as the dwelling-place of Amitabha. As the fire begins to grow in volume, sweet-smelling oils and spices and sandal-wood and incense-sticks are cast into it in sacrifice, as in the Hindu ritual of Homa, or sacrifice to fire. Finally, as the cremation ceremonies end, the priests and the mourners visualize the spirit of the departed as being purged of all karmic obscurations by the fire which is Amitabha, the Incomprehensible Light.
Such, in brief, is the mysticism underlying the beautiful | rites performed for the dead at the place of cremation in Sikkim.
In all other forms of burial, throughout Tibet or territories under Tibetan influence, a parallel or corresponding funeral service, based on the same symbolical rituals, is performed, with variations according to sect and province.
Vil. THE BARDO'! OR AFTER-DEATH STATE
From the moment of death and for three and one-half or sometimes four days afterwards, the Knower, or principle of
* Bar-do literally means ‘between (Bar) two (do)’, i.e. ‘between two [states |’—the state between death and rebirth—and, therefore, ‘ Intermediate’ or ‘Transitional (State}]’. The translator, in certain instances, favoured ‘ Un- certain {State]’ as its English rendering. It might also be rendered as ‘ Twilight [State]’.
tHE ARTER-DEATH STATE 29
consciousness, in the case of the ordinary person deceased, is believed to be thus in a sleep or trance-state, unaware, as a rule, that it has been separated from the human-plane body. This period is the First Bardo, called the Chikhai Bardo (Tib. fchi-khahi Bar-do), or ‘ Transitional State of the Moment of Death’, wherein dawns the Clear Light, first in primordial purity, then the percipient, being unable to recognize it, that is to say, to hold on to and remain in the transcendental state of the unmodified mind concomitant with it, perceives it karmically obscured, which is its secondary aspect. When the First Bardo ends, the Knower, awakening to the fact that death has occurred, begins to experience the Second Bardo, called the Chonyid Bardo (Tib. Chés-nyid Bar-do), or ‘ Transi- tional State of [the Experiencing or Glimpsing of] Reality’ ; and this merges into the Third Bardo, called the Sidpa (or Sidpat) Bardo (Tib. Srid-pahi Bar-do), or ‘ Transitional State of [or while seeking] Rebirth’, which ends when the principle of consciousness has taken rebirth in the human or some other world, or in one of the paradise realms.
As explained in Section III, above, the passing from one Bardo to another is analogous to the process of birth; the Knower wakes up out of one swoon or trance state and then another, until the Third Bardo ends. On his awakening in the Second Bardo, there dawn upon him in symbolic visions, one by one, the hallucinations created by the £armic reflexes of actions done by him in the earth-plane body. What he has thought and what he has done become objective: thought- forms, having been consciously visualized and allowed to take root and grow and blossom and produce, now pass in a solemn and mighty panorama, as the consciousness-content of his personality.
In the Second Bardo, the deceased is, unless otherwise enlightened, more or less under the delusion that although
1 Some of the more learned /amas—chiefly of the Gelugpa, or Yellow-Hat Sect—believe that the highly symbolic visions of the one hundred and ten principal deities of the Chényid Bardo are seen only by devotees of some spiritual advancement who have studied Tantricism; and that the ordinary
person when deceased will have visions more like those described in the Sidpa Bardo.
30 Introduction
he is deceased he still possesses a body like the body of flesh and blood. When he comes to realize that really he has no such body, he begins to develop an overmastering desire to possess one; and, seeking for one, the karmic predilection for sangsaric existence naturally becoming all-determining, he enters into the Third Bardo of seeking Rebirth, and even- tually, with his rebirth in this or some other world, the after-death state comes to an end.