Death and Dying in Buddhism

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Death and Dying in Buddhism
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Death and Dying in Buddhism

• Many of the central themes found within Buddhist
  thought can be clearly seen when looking at
  Buddhist attitudes towards death and dying.
  These include
• Sa?sara
• The three marks of existence
• Karma
• Also, looking at death within Buddhism can
  provide an insight into how modern Buddhists
  practice across the world.

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Important Buddhist Doctrines

• Sa?sara
• All unenlightened beings are in a perpetual cycle
  of life death and rebirth known as sa?sara.
• Sa?saric existence is conditioned by three marks
  impermanence (anitya/ anicca), not-Self (anatman/
  anatta), and dis-ease (du?kha/dukkha).
• The teaching of anatman outlines that there is
  nothing that has a permanent Self, there is no
  underlying consciousness or sense of person that
  is carried from life to life.

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Important Buddhist Doctrines

• Karma
• Karma is an system of cause and effect in which
  all intentional actions generate a karmic result.
• Wholesome actions bring about good karmic results
  whereas unwholesome actions will bring about
  unpleasant karmic results.
• Karmic results are not necessarily immediate,
  they can take several lifetimes to come into
  fruition.
• The quality of an individuals death and rebirth
  is also influenced by their karma.

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Important Buddhist Doctrines

• Dependent Origination
• Dependent Origination is a Buddhist doctrine of
  causality.
• Everything within sa?sara is caused into
  existence, which in turn causes something else
  into existence.
• This is useful in understanding how rebirth
  works. When a person is alive they accumulate
  good and bad deeds. The resulting karma does not
  simply disappear at death. Instead, due to the
  remaining karmic seeds a new being is caused into
  existence so that remaining karmic results may
  take place.

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Dying Moments

• In Buddhist cultures it is believed that a good
  death is one in which the individual is conscious
  and aware of what is happening to them.
• The last moments of life can affect the nature of
  rebirth. The more calm and prepared a person is
  the better their rebirth is considered to be.
• The last thoughts of an individual will shape
  their future rebirth, this moment itself being
  dictated by prior karma.
• In most forms of Buddhism it is believed that
  death occurs after the last breath has been taken.

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What Happens After Death?

• What happens to an individual after they have
  died is not agreed upon within Buddhist thought.
• In Tibetan Buddhism, after the last breath is
  taken, the individual is in an intermediate state
  between their previous life and their new life.
  This state, known as the bardo can last up to 49
  days.
• In Theravada Buddhist doctrine rebirth is
  immediate. However, customs and rituals in
  Theravada countries such as Sri Lanka, Thailand,
  and Laos suggest that in practice most Buddhists
  believe in some forms of intermediate state of up
  to seven days.

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Death Rituals

• Within Buddhist practice there are no last rites
  that must be performed.
• If the family choose to do so there are certain
  acts that are understood to help the deceased.
  Chanting texts, including pirit, will generate
  merit that can be transferred to the deceased.
• A request for the refuges and precepts can be
  made. This can be done in Pali, the scriptural
  language of Theravada Buddhism, Tibetan, Chinese,
  Japanese or in English. There can be a homage
  paid to the Buddha, this would be repeated three
  times. There could be verses from Tibetan,
  Mahayana and Theravada literature depending upon
  the tradition of the deceased.

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Rituals and Local Customs

• Offering of cloth of the dead (mataka-vastra-puja)
  
• This ritual is found within Theravada cultures.
  Before a funeral monks are offered a white cloth
  which is intended to be used to make monastic
  robes. This ritual is used to generate merit for
  the deceased. During this ceremony, the following
  from the Mahaparinibbana Sutta is recited
• Formations truly they are transient,
• It is their nature to arise and cease,
• Having arisen, then they pass away,
• Their calming and cessationhappiness.

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• This is a white cloth that was offered to monks
  as part of the mataka-vastra-puja at a funeral in
  Laos (2007).

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Rituals and Local Customs

• Water is then poured into an overflowing cup to
  represent the transfer of merit whilst the
  following is chanted
• Just as water rained on high ground moves to the
  low land,
• even so does what is given here benefit the
  dead.Just as the rivers full of water fill the
  ocean full,even so does what is given here
  benefit the dead.
• The above verses have been translated for this
  document, or have been adapted from The Mirror
  of the Dhamma which can be found at
  www.bps.lk/olib/wh/wh054.pdf

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Rituals and Local Customs

• Ghost Month (China)
• In China there are a number of rituals that are
  performed in memory of the dead during the course
  of the ghost month. During this period the
  spirits of the dead are invited to the Buddhist
  monasteries to participate. One of the most
  important aspects is the recitation of the name
  Amitabha or the scripture of the Bodhisattva
  Kshitigarbha. This generates merit which can then
  be transferred to the dead. Offerings of food and
  incense are made to the buddhas whilst lists of
  the dead are read by monks to ensure that they
  share in the merit. The climax of the Ghost Month
  rituals is the offering of food and vast amounts
  of paper money to the hungry ghosts and abandoned
  souls and the transfer of the resulting merit
  to the deceased.

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• At the start of the Chinese Ghost Month laypeople
  buy yellow paper slips, called lotus seats, to
  be displayed in a hall in the monastery
  temporarily known as the Hall of Rebirth.  The
  lotus seats state the name of the person who
  bought it and the name of the being to whom it is
  dedicated. At the end of the Ghost Month they are
  burned along with the paper money.

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Rituals and Local Customs

• Ghost Month (Laos)
• In Laos there are two annual festivals for the
  deceased, both take place during the ninth lunar
  month.  The festival of rice packets decorating
  the earth is held on the first day of the new
  moon, and the festival of baskets drawn by lot
  takes place at full moon.  Both rituals are
  occasions for caring for deceased relatives,
  ghosts and agricultural divinities by
  transferring food and merit to them. In the
  former the lay people leave packets of rice
  wrapped in banana leaves around the temple as
  offerings to ghosts and the dead. The second
  festival is an occasion for remembering
  ancestors.  Laypeople prepare baskets filled with
  offerings, including food, plants and flowers,
  for their deceased relatives.  A paper slip on
  the basket states who it is from and who it is
  intended for.  The baskets are brought to the
  temple and assigned by lot to specific monks who
  then transfer the baskets to the deceased
  relatives.

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• People also make offerings to their ancestors at
  small shrines containing the relics of their
  bones collected after cremation.