Hindus mostly cremate the dead bodies. But the bodies of a Yogi or Sanyaasi is either buried or drowned in river.
Hindus mostly cremate the dead bodies. But the bodies of a Yogi or Sanyaasi is either buried or drowned in river.
My question is, if this is the practice in case of Sanyaasis or Yogis, then why in the Ishavasya Upanishad, the last 2 verses call upon Agni to burn the body?
My question is, if this is the practice in case of Sanyaasis or Yogis, then why in the Ishavasya Upanishad, the last 2 verses call upon Agni to burn the body?
Fire is to pure the body. But sanyasis are pure when living. Thus their bodies are not burnt. Moreover they can turn to life in samadhi. Their bodies are not burnt.
ReplyDeleteRight. I meant to ask that Ishavasya Upanishad must have been composed by some great Rishi, why is he calling upon Agni to burn his body which is not as per the ritual for Rishis?
ReplyDeleteTwo things we need to keep in mind 1). The word Agni means a natural phenomenon (part of pancha bhoota and not just fire. The physical fire is referred to as Vahni) and thus it is devataa - only three things are connected to Agni - Yagna, Jatara (digestive) and Paaka (cooking). Paaka is an extension of Jatara.
ReplyDelete2). So you're invoking Agni - means you're invoking the Devataa who is a career and not the physical fire - physical fire (Vahni) is considered to be one form of the physical manifestation of Agni - the other form is prakasha (luster). So when the Rishi says "Agni, now you can take me" means the Agni within the body can consume him. Here the agni is a career of the sacrifice to the gods it is used in the sense of merging oneself with the absolute (oneness).
If you carefully observe, many animals also know about the nearing of their death when death approaches. Also they don't eat anything - some don't eat anything for 2 days. They go and sit quietly in a secluded place and die peacefully - this is the perfect way to die. Unlike us where we make a hue cry of a normal natural thing called death.
We still fear death. You have a good point regarding the way one must die. But who wants to die.....
ReplyDelete'Fear of death' is the primordial thing which every "Sadhaka" has to face at some stage. Those who say they don't have the 'fear of death' are Jnaani or not ready for spirituality. With both of them there can be no argument. This is not something easy to face - at different stages the thing called death bothers us differently and in incremental manner. Aging and Death - the 2 main fear for Human beings is what our shastras say. So it is good that this thing has started. The biggest mystery indeed is death. In any materialistic society, people reject death as they are most scared about death - they also create unnecessary fear about death.
ReplyDelete