Many of the central themes found within Buddhist thought
can be clearly seen when looking at Buddhist attitudes
towards death and dying. These include:
• Saṃsāra
• The three marks of existence
• Karma
Also, looking at death within Buddhism can provide an
insight into how modern Buddhists practice across the
world.
Saṃsāra
• All unenlightened beings are in a perpetual cycle of life
death and rebirth known as saṃsāra.
• Saṃsāric existence is conditioned by three marks:
impermanence (anitya/ anicca), not-Self (anātman/
anattā), and dis-ease (duḥkha/dukkha).
• The teaching of anātman 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.
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 individual’s death and rebirth is also
influenced by their karma.
Dependent Origination
• Dependent Origination is a Buddhist doctrine of causality.
• Everything within saṃsāra 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.
• 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.
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 Theravāda Buddhist doctrine rebirth is immediate.
However, customs and rituals in Theravāda 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.
• 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.
• Offering of cloth of the dead (mataka-vastra-puja)
• This ritual is found within Theravāda 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 cessation—happiness.
This is a white
cloth that was
offered to
monks as part
of the matakavastra-puja at a
funeral in Laos
(2007).
• 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
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 Amitābha 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.
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.
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.
People also make
offerings to their
ancestors at small
shrines containing
the relics of their
bones collected after
cremation.