Sacred Tradition or Morbid Feast?

Can you imagine how would you feel if you saw your beloved ones being eaten by vultures when they’re deceased? Well, most of you may find this to be gross and unthinkable, but far in Tibet, this is a daily reality.

Stupa burial and cremation are reserved for high lamas who are being honored, while sky burial is meant for the corpses of commoners. However, it is not considered appropriate for children under 18, pregnant women or those who have died of infectious diseases or accidents.

Sky burial has a great religious meaning. Tibetans are encouraged to witness it in order to confront death in an open way and to feel the impermanence of life. They believe that the corpse is nothing more than an empty vessel. The soul of the deceased has exited the body to reincarnate into another circle of life. It is believed that the Drigung Kagyu order of Tibetan Buddhism established the traditions in this land of snow, although there are well-known versions of this origin.

During this ritual, the corpse is offered to the vultures and it is believed that the vultures are Dakinis – Tibetan equivalent of angels – which will take the soul into the heavens, understood to be a windy place where souls await reincarnation into their next lives.

Sounds interesting, huh? But that’s not all…

This donation of human flesh to the vultures is considered virtuous because it saves the lives of small animals which vultures might otherwise capture for food. Sakyamuni, one of the Buddhas, demonstrated this virtue by saving a pigeon feeding the vulture with his own flesh. After death, the deceased will be left untouched for three days. Monks will chant around the corpse and before the day of the sky burial, the corpse will be cleaned and wrapped in white cloth. The corpse is positioned in a fetal position and the ritual of sky burial begins before dawn.

Lamas lead a ritual procession to the charnel ground, chanting to guide the soul. There are few charnel grounds in Tibet, they are usually locater near monasteries and few people would visit charnel grounds except the ones who want to witness this ritual.

After the chanting, the body breakers prepare the corpse to be consumed by the vultures; the body is unwrapped and the first cut is made on the back. Hatchets and cleavers are used to quickly cut the body in a definite and precise way.

Flesh is cut into chunks of meat; the internal organs are cut into pieces; bones are smashed into splinters and then mixed with tsampa - roasted barley flour. As the body breakers begin, juniper incense is burned to summon the vultures for their task. During the process of breaking up the body, those enormous birds circle overhead, awaiting their feast and are waved away by the funeral party, usually consisting of the friends of the deceased, until the body breakers have completed their task. After the body has been totally separated, the pulverized bone mixture is scattered on the ground. The birds land and hop, grabbing for food. To assure ascent of the soul, the entire body of the deceased should be eaten and after the bone mixture, the organs are served and then the flesh.

This tradition has aroused curiosity amongst those who are not Tibetan. However, Tibetans object visits by the merely curious and only the funeral party should be present at the ritual. Photography is strictly forbidden due to the belief that photographing the ritual negatively affects the ascent of the soul.

Marco, a basque man who has travelled all over the world with his wife, and who has made a trip around the world which lasted 383 days by the way, has manage to record part of the ceremony and here we can watch the video. I will be soon uploading an e-mail intervew I had with him.