Cremation, Caste, and Cosmogony in Karmic Traditions.

universe is recreated (Parry 1994:31). Funerals are
procreative and create new life, and essential in this
process is the fact that at death it is men who give birth.
The father pays his debts to the ancestors by giving the
lineage a son, and the son repays his debts to his father
by giving him a new birth. At the moment of the
breaking of the skull and the releasing of ”the vital
breath”, the death pollution begins. The deceased only
dies when he is killed on the pyre, he is not dead before
he is burnt. As long as the soul clings to the body the
corpse is not “dead” because the most vital part of a
human is still present. It is only after the husband’s
cremation a wife becomes a widow. Cremation is a
human sacrifice; the son kills his father, the chief
mourner commits symbolically a homicide. Thus, the
death pollution starts at the moment of death or when the
soul is released from the body. The mourning period is
the repayment of the sin of burning the flesh (ibid:151-
152).
The funeral is a paradox because although the son
symbolically kills his father on the pyre, both the son
and father are “born” again and raised to a higher level
both socially and religiously. Pragmatically, one may see
both the father and the son as reborn through this
sacrifice; the father in another sphere and preferably in
the heavenly abode, whereas the son takes the father’s
place in the family and society (Parry 1994:181-184).
“Through a son he conquers the worlds, through a son’s
son he obtains immortality, but through his son’s
grandson he gains the world of the sun” (Manu IX, 137).
Finally, the corpse is returned to the river as ashes
(Knipe 1975:135). The ashes are often referred to as
”bones”. Bones are the product of the father’s semen and
thus a source to future fertility, and the cremation
destroys what one has to get rid of; sin and female flesh
(Parry 1994:188). When the body is burnt and the ashes
are immersed into Bagmati, this is a symbolic copulation
of the male semen (ashes) into the female water (the
river). Hence, reincarnation of the soul is like a seed
which is planted. A new plant needs a seed from its
parents in order to be born, and the old soul is
transferred and replanted when a new human is born.
The cosmological reproduction is parallel to the
biological reproduction – a cosmogonic process uniting
micro- and macro cosmos.
Funeral priests and the cost of death
There are two types of priests at Pashupatinath working
with death; Upadhyay Brahmans and Jaisi Brahmans.
The Upadhyay Brahmans are purer and ranked higher
than the Jaisi Brahmans. In Varanasi there is a particular
group of low-castes who cremate the dead people. At
Pashupatinath this occupation as undertaker is also
conducted by a group of Brahman priests. Jonathan
Parry uses the term Funeral priest for those who mourn
the deceased after the funeral (e.g. Parry 1994). I will
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follow this nomenclature but add another category; the
Cremation priest (figs. 1.5 & 1.6). The Upadhyay
Brahmans are those who may perform mourning rituals,
but they may also cremate. It is, nevertheless, mainly the
Jaisi priests who cremate, and these Brahmans cannot
perform the mourning rituals or the kirhya. Both these
groups of Brahmans may marry each other’s lineage.
There are 21 Brahman priests working as Cremation
priests employed solely with cremation, but at the temple
area they may engage in small business enterprises as
secondary work, such as selling cigarettes and
refreshments. There are between 10-15 Upadhyay
Brahman Funeral priests who observe death pollution
and morn the dead. Being an Upadhyay Brahman
conducing mourning rituals is more lucrative than being
a Cremation priest only. The ritual posts whereby a
priest may mourn the dead are popular to attain, but it is
only old Brahmans who may employ these ritual
positions. If the priest’s parents are alive, then the son
cannot take this type of ritual commitment, and only
when both the priest’s father and mother are dead,
cremated and mourned, the Funeral priest may mourn
other people’s sins and observe their death pollution.
Both the Upadhyay and Jaisi are Brahmans and they are
generally called Ghati Bahuns.
There are approximately 20 other people working with
the preparation of the pyres, engaged in selling and
bringing wood to the cremation platforms. These are
divided into two shifts – 11 assistants work during the
day shift and 9 assistants work at the night shift. These
workers come from different ethnic groups, including
Tibetan people and Sherpas. Then there are some people
engaged in different businesses such as selling hay to the
pyre, butter ghee to the lightening ceremony, and
bamboo sticks which are used in the cremation for
controlling and re-arranging the pyre during the
cremation. The Cremation priests work according to a
shift-rotation system. The 21 priests who cremate at a
regular basis at Pashupatinath are numbered from one to
twenty-one. Thus, according to which number the priests
have they will do the next cremation if it is their turn. If
priest number one conducted a cremation, then priest
number two will cremate the next, and so on. If
someone is sick or absent, then they just continue to the
next number, so every priest cremates the same number
of dead bodies each day, and consequently they earn the
same amount of money.
The profession is based on transmitted knowledge and
practice, and not on scriptures. The priests learn by
tradition, and the knowledge is passed on from the
grandfather to the father who passes the knowledge on to
the son, or from the local community to the novice. As
such they are trained as priests although not educated in
Sanskrit schools. Those who start cremating aiming to
become a Cremation priest must have attended the
bartamande ceremony. The novices used to be initiated
when they were 12-13 years old and then they could start