| Philosophy and Religion / Vishnu-smriti (Vishnu sutra) |
Vishnu-smriti (Vishnu sutra / Vaishnava Dharmasâstra)
Funeral Ceremonies
XIX.1
1. He must not cause a member of a twice-born caste to be carried out by a Sûdra (even though he be a kinsman of the deceased);
2. Nor a Sûdra by a member of a twice-born caste.
3. A father and a mother shall be carried out by their sons (who are equal in caste to their parents).
4. But Sûdras must never carry out a member of a twice-born caste, even though he be their father.
5. Those Brâhmanas who carry out (or follow the corpse of) a (deceased) Brâhmana who has no relatives shall attain a mansion in heaven.
6. Those who have carried out a dead relative and burnt his corpse, shall walk round the pile from left to right, and then plunge into water, dressed in their clothes.
7. After having offered a libation of water to the deceased, they must place one ball of rice on blades of Kusa grass, (and this ceremony has to be repeated on each subsequent day, while the period of impurity lasts.)
8. Then, having changed their dress, they must bite Nimba leaves between their teeth, and having stepped upon the stone threshold, they must enter the house.
9. Then they must throw unbroken grains into the fire.
10. On the fourth day they must collect the bones that have been left.
11. And they must throw them into water from the Ganges.
12. As many bones of a man are contained in the water of the Ganges, so many thousands of years will he reside in heaven.
13. While the term of impurity lasts, they must continually offer a libation of water and a ball of rice to the deceased.2
14. And they must eat food which has been bought, or which they have received unsolicited.3
15. And they, must eat no meat.4
16. And they must sleep on the ground.
17. And they must sleep apart.
18. When the impurity is over, they must walk forth from the village, have their beards shaved, and having cleansed themselves with a paste of sesamum, or with a paste of mustard-seed, they must change their dress and re-enter the house.
19. There, after reciting a propitiatory prayer, they must honour the Brâhmanas.
20. The gods are invisible deities, the Brâhmanas are visible deities.
21. The Brâhmanas sustain the world.
22. It is by the favour of the Brâhmanas that the gods reside in heaven; a speech uttered by Brâhmanas (whether a curse or a benediction) never fails to come true.
23. What the Brâhmanas pronounce, when highly pleased (as, if they promise sons, cattle, wealth, or some other boon to a man), the gods will ratify; when the visible gods are pleased, the invisible gods are surely pleased as well.
24. The mourners, who lament the loss of a relative, shall be addressed by men gifted with a tranquil frame of mind with such consolatory speeches as I shall now recite to thee, O Earth, who art cherished to my, mind.
XX.5
1. The northern progress of the sun is a day, with the gods.
2. The southern progress of the sun is (with them) a night.
3. A year is (with them) a day and a night;
4. Thirty such are a month;
5. Twelve such months are a year.
6. Twelve hundred years of the gods are a Kaliyuga.6
7. Twice as many (or two thousand four hundred) are a Dvâpara (Yuga).
S. Thrice as many (or three thousand six hundred) are a Tretâ (Yuga).
9. Four times as many (or four thousand eight hundred) are a Krita Yuga.
10. (Thus) twelve thousand years make a Katuryuga (or period of four Yugas).
11. Seventy-one Katuryugas make a Manvantara (or period of a Manu).
12. A thousand Katuryugas make a Kalpa.
13. And that is a day of the forefather (Brahman).
14. His night also has an equal duration.
15. If so many such nights and days are put together that, reckoned by the month and by the year, they make up a period of a hundred years (of Brahman) it is called the age of one Brahman.
16. A day of Purusha (Vishnu) is equal in duration to the age of one Brahman.
17. When it ends, a Mahâkalpa is over.
18. The night following upon it is as long.
19. The days and nights of Purusha that have gone by are innumerable;
20. And so are those that will follow.
21. For Kâla (time) is without either beginning or end.7
22. Thus it is, that in this Kâla (time), in whom there is nothing to rest upon, and who is everlasting, I can espy nothing created in which there is the least stability.
23. The sands in the Ganges and (the waters pouring down from the sky) when Indra sends rain can be counted, but not the number of 'Forefathers' (Brahmans) who have passed away.
24. In each Kalpa, fourteen chiefs of the gods (Indras) go to destruction, as many rulers of the world (kings), and fourteen Manus.
25. And so have many thousands of Indras and hundred thousands of princes of the Daityas (such as Hiranyakasipu, Hiranyâksha, and others) been destroyed by Kâla, (time). What should one say of human beings then?
26. 'Many royal Rishis too (such as Sagara), all of them renowned for their virtues, gods and Brahmanical Rishis (such as Kasyapas) have perished by the action of Kâla.
27. Those even who have the power of creating and annihilating in this world (the sun, moon, and other heavenly bodies) continually perish by the act of Kâla; for Kâla (time) is hard to overcome.8
28. Every creature is seized upon by Kâla and carried into the other world. It is the slave of its actions (in a former existence). Wherefore then should you wail (on its death)?
29. Those who are born are sure to die, and those who have died are sure to be born again. This is inevitable, and no associate can follow a man (in his passage through mundane existence).9
30. As mourners will not help the dead in this world, therefore (the relatives) should not weep, but perform the obsequies to the best of their power.
31. As both his good and bad actions will follow him (after death) like associates. what does it matter to a man whether his relatives mourn over him or no?
32. But as long as his relatives remain impure, the departed spirit finds no rest, and returns to visit (his relatives), whose duty it is to offer tip to him the funeral ball of rice and the water libation.
33. Till the Sapindîkarana10 has been performed, the dead man remains a disembodied spirit (and is afflicted with hunger and thirst). Give rice and a jar with water to the man who has passed into the abode of disembodied spirits.
34. Having passed into the abode of the manes (after the performance of the Sapindîkarana) he enjoys in the shape of celestial food his portion of the Srâddha (funeral oblation); offer the Srâddha, therefore, to him who has passed into the abode of the manes.
35. Whether he has become a god, or stays in hell, or has entered the body of an animal, or of a human being, he will receive the Srâddha offered to him by his relatives.
36. The dead person and the performer of the Srâddha are sure to be benefitted by its performance. Perform the Srâddha always, therefore, abandoning bootless grief.
37. This is the duty which should be constantly discharged towards a dead person by his kinsmen; by mourning a man will neither benefit the dead nor himself.
38. Having seen that no help is to be had from this world, and that his relations are dying (one after the other), you must choose virtue for your only associate, O ye men.
39. Even were he to die with him, a kinsman is unable to follow his dead relative: all excepting his wife are forbidden to follow him on the path of Yama.11
40. Virtue alone will follow him, wherever he, may go; therefore do your duty unflinchingly in this wretched world.
41. To-morrow's business should be done to-day, and the, afternoons business in the forenoon; for death will not wait, whether a person has done it or not.12
42. While his mind is fixed upon his field, or traffic, or his house, or while his thoughts are engrossed by some other (beloved) object, death suddenly carries him away as his, prey, as a she-wolf catches a lamb.
43. Kâla (time) is no one's friend and no one's enemy: when the effect of his acts in a former existence, by which his present existence is caused, has expired, he snatches a man away forcibly.13
44. He will not die before his time has come, even though he has been pierced by a thousand shafts; he will not live after his time is out, even though he has only been touched by the point of a blade of Kusa grass.
45. Neither drugs, nor magical formulas, nor burnt-offerings, nor prayers will save a man who is in the bonds of death or old age.14
46. An impending evil cannot be averted even by a hundred precautions; what reason then for you to complain?
47. Even as a calf finds his mother among a thousand cows, an act formerly done is sure to find the perpetrator.15
48. Of existing beings the beginning is unknown, the middle (of their career) is known, and the end again unknown; what reason then for you to complain?16
49. As the body of mortals undergoes (successively the vicissitudes of) infancy, youth, and old age, even so will it be transformed into another body (hereafter); a sensible man is not mistaken about that.
50. As a man puts on new clothes in this world, throwing aside those which he formerly wore, even so the self of man puts on new bodies, which are in accordance with his acts (in a former life).17
51. No weapons will hurt the self of man, no fire burn it, no waters moisten it, and no wind dry it up.
52. It is not to be hurt, not to be burnt, not to be moistened, and not to be dried up; it is imperishable, perpetual, unchanging, immovable, without beginning.
53. It is (further) said to be immaterial, passing all thought, and immutable. Knowing the self of man to be such, you must not grieve (for the destruction of his body).
Footnotes
1. 1. M. V, 104.--2. V. III, 26.--6 M.V, 103; Y. III, 26.--7, 8. Y. III, 7, 12, 13.--14-17. M. V, 73; Y. III, 16. 'Chapters XIX-XXXII contain the section on Âkâra, "Holy Usage." (Nand.)
2. The duration of the impurity varies according, to the caste &c. of the deceased. See XXII.
3. The particle ka, according to Nand., indicates that factitious salt must also not be used by them, as stated in a Smriti.
4. Nand. refers the particle ka to an implied prohibition to eat fish, which he quotes from a text of Gautama (not found in his Institutes).
5. 1-3. M. I, 67.--6-9. M. I, 69, 70.--10. M. I, 71.--11. M. I, 79.--12-14. M. I, 72.--30. Y. III, 11.
6. The Kaliyuga itself consists of a thousand years only; but it is both preceded and followed by a twilight lasting a hundred years. It is similar with the three other Yugas. (Nand.)
7. 'Kâla means Vishnu in this place.' (Nand.)
8. Here also Kâla, the god of time, is another name for Vishnu. (Nand.)
9. The same proverb occurs in the Râmâyana II, 84, 21, and in the Bhagavadgitâ II, 27. See Böhtlingk, Ind. Sprüche, 2383.
10. See XXI, 12.
11. This is an allusion to the custom of Sattee. (Nand.) See XXV, 14.
12. This proverb is found in the Mahâbhârata also (XII, 6536. &c.) See Böhtlingk, Ind. Sprüche, 6595.
13. This proverb is also found in the Mahâbhârata XI, 68, and Râmâyana IV, 18, 28, and other works. See Böhtlingk, 3194.
14. 'Neither will presents of gold (to Brâhmanas) or other such {footnote p 82} acts of liberality save him, as the use of the particle ka implies.' (Nand.)
15. This proverb is also found in the Mahâbhârata XII, 6760, Pañkatantra II, 134, and other works. See Böhtlingk, Ind. Sprüche, 5114.
16. This proverb is also found in the Bhagavadgitâ. II, 28. See Böhtlingk, Ind. Sprüche, 704.
17. Regarding transmigration, see below, XLIV, XLV.
YOU MAY ALSO LIKE
