A comprehensive survey of how religions understand death, dying, and the afterlife, drawing on examples from Christian, Jewish, Hindu, Buddhist, and Shamanic perspectives. Considers shared and differing views of death across the world's major religions, including on the nature of death itself, the reasons for it, the identity of those who die, religious rituals, and on how the living should respond to death Places emphasis on the varying concepts of the 'self' or soul Uses a thematic structure to facilitate a broader comparative understanding Written in an accessible style to appeal to an…mehr
A comprehensive survey of how religions understand death, dying, and the afterlife, drawing on examples from Christian, Jewish, Hindu, Buddhist, and Shamanic perspectives.
Considers shared and differing views of death across the world's major religions, including on the nature of death itself, the reasons for it, the identity of those who die, religious rituals, and on how the living should respond to death Places emphasis on the varying concepts of the 'self' or soul Uses a thematic structure to facilitate a broader comparative understanding Written in an accessible style to appeal to an undergraduate audience, it fills major gap in current textbook literatureHinweis: Dieser Artikel kann nur an eine deutsche Lieferadresse ausgeliefert werden.
Angela Sumegi is Assistant Professor of Religion at Carleton University, Ottawa, Canada. She is the author of Dream Worlds of Shamanism and Tibetan Buddhism (2008). Outside academia, she teaches Buddhist meditation and is the founder and director of a Canadian charity that supports Tibetan refugee children in India.
Inhaltsangabe
Preface ix
Acknowledgments xiii
1 Understanding Death 1
Return from the Dead 4
Debates and Definitions 9
Death and the Self 14
Ritual and Transformation 19
Notes 22
References and Further Reading 22
2 Primal Perspectives on Death 25
Soul Theories of Primal Peoples 28
The Destiny of Souls 34
Afterlife among theWarao 35
Rituals of Departure 40
A Conversation on Understanding Death 44
References and Further Reading 46
3 Death in the Ancient World 49
Egypt 51
Egyptian Soul Theory 52
Transforming the Body 54
Egyptian Afterlife 56
The Story of Osiris 58
Mesopotamia 61
Gilgamesh and the Search for Immortality 63
The Spirits of the Dead in Mesopotamian Culture 64
