Death Ritual And Belief

Download or read book Death, Ritual and Belief written by Douglas Davies and published by Bloomsbury Publishing. This book was released on 2017-11-02 with total page 321 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Death, Ritual and Belief, now in its third edition, explores many important issues related to death and dying, from a religious studies perspective, including anthropology and sociology. Using the motif of 'words against death' it depicts human responses to grief by surveying the many ways in which people have not let death have the last word, not simply in terms of funeral rites but also in memorials, graves, and in ideas of ancestors, souls, gods, reincarnation and resurrection, whether in the great religious traditions of the world or in more local customs. He also examines bereavement and grief, experiences of the presence of dead, near-death experiences, pet-death and the symbolic death played out in religious rites. Updated chapters have taken into account new research and include additional topics in this new edition, notably assisted dying, terrorism, green burial, material culture, death online, and the emergence of Death Studies as a distinctive field. Case studies range from Anders Breivik in Norway, to the Princess of Wales, and to the Rapture in the USA. A new perspective is also brought to his account of grief theories. Providing an introduction to key authors and authorities on death beliefs, bereavement, grief and ritual-symbolism, Death, Ritual and Belief is an authoritative guide to the perspectives of major religious and secular worldviews.

Download or read book Death, Ritual, and Belief written by Douglas Davies and published by Bloomsbury Publishing. This book was released on 2002-06-01 with total page 272 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Describing a great variety of funeral ritual from major world religions and from local traditions, this book shows how cultures not only cope with corpses but also create an added value for living through the encouragement of afterlife beliefs. The explosion of interest in death in recent years reflects the key theme of this book - the rhetoric of death - the way cultures use the most potent weapon of words to bring new power to life. This new edition is one third longer than the original with new material on the death of Jesus, the most theorized death ever which offers a useful case study for students. There is also empirical material from contemporary/recent events such as the death of Diana and an expanded section on theories of grief which will make the book more attractive to death counsellors.

Download or read book Death, Ritual, and Belief written by Douglas J. Davies and published by A&C Black. This book was released on 1997-01-01 with total page 272 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Describing a variety of funeral ritual, from major world religions and from local traditions, this book shows how cultures cope not only with corpses but also create an added value for living through the growth of afterlife beliefs. The key theme of the book is the rhetoric of death -- the way cultures use the most potent weapon of words to bring new power to life. Human identity and its transformation through mortuary rites is explored through the mummies of Chile and Egypt; African sacrificial deaths; Indian cremations; immigrant cemeteries in the USA; ancestor rites in Eastern religions and Mormonism; and the freezing of the dead in cryonics. Research findings are presented on cremation and afterlife beliefs, especially reincarnation, sensing the presence of the dead, and the death of pets in Britain, to show how mortuary rituals are constantly changing in response to death as a major feature of the human environment.

Download or read book Death and Changing Rituals written by J. Rasmus Brandt and published by Oxbow Books. This book was released on 2014-07-31 with total page 481 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The forms by which a deceased person may be brought to rest are as many as there are causes of death. In most societies the disposal of the corpse is accompanied by some form of celebration or ritual which may range from a simple act of deportment in solitude to the engagement of large masses of people in laborious and creative festivities. In a funerary context the term ritual may be taken to represent a process that incorporates all the actions performed and thoughts expressed in connection with a dying and dead person, from the preparatory pre-death stages to the final deposition of the corpse and the post-mortem stages of grief and commemoration. The contributions presented here are focused not on the examination of different funerary practices, their function and meaning, but on the changes of such rituals _ how and when they occurred and how they may be explained. Based on case studies from a range of geographical regions and from different prehistoric and historical periods, a range of key themes are examined concerning belief and ritual, body and deposition, place, performance and commemoration, exploring a complex web of practices.

Download or read book Death, Ritual, and Belief written by Douglas Davies and published by Bloomsbury Publishing. This book was released on 1997-07-01 with total page 272 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Describing a variety of funeral ritual, from major world religions and from local traditions, this book shows how cultures cope not only with corpses but also create an added value for living through the growth of afterlife beliefs. The key theme of the book is the rhetoric of death -- the way cultures use the most potent weapon of words to bring new power to life. Human identity and its transformation through mortuary rites is explored through the mummies of Chile and Egypt; African sacrificial deaths; Indian cremations; immigrant cemeteries in the USA; ancestor rites in Eastern religions and Mormonism; and the freezing of the dead in cryonics. Research findings are presented on cremation and afterlife beliefs, especially reincarnation, sensing the presence of the dead, and the death of pets in Britain, to show how mortuary rituals are constantly changing in response to death as a major feature of the human environment.

Download or read book Death, Ritual, and Bereavement written by Ralph Houlbrooke and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2020-01-10 with total page 211 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Originally published in 1989, Death, Ritual and Bereavement examines the social history of death and dying from 1500 to the 1930s. This edited collection focuses on the death-bed, funerals, burials, mourning customs, and the expression of grief. The essays throw fresh light on developments which lie at the roots of present-day tendencies to minimize or conceal the most unpleasant aspects of death, among them the growing participation of doctors in the management of death-beds in the eighteenth century and the creation of extra-mural cemeteries, followed by the introduction of cremation in the nineteenth century. The volume also underlines the importance of religious belief, in helping the bereaved in past times. The book will appeal to students and academics of family and social history as well as history of medicine, religion and anthropology.

Download or read book Medieval Death written by Paul Binski and published by Cornell University Press. This book was released on 1996 with total page 244 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this richly illustrated volume, Paul Binski provides an absorbing account of the social, theological, and cultural issues involved in death and dying in Europe from the end of the Roman Empire to the early sixteenth century. He draws on textual, archaeological, and art historical sources to examine pagan and Christian attitudes toward the dead, the aesthetics of death and the body, burial ritual, and mortuary practice. Illustrated throughout with fascinating and sometimes disturbing images, Binski's account weaves together close readings of a variety of medieval thinkers. He discusses the impact of the Black Death on late medieval art and examines the development of the medieval tomb, showing the changing attitudes toward the commemoration of the dead between late antiquity and the late Middle Ages. In one chapter, Binski analyzes macabre themes in art and literature, including the Dance of Death, which reflect the medieval obsession with notions of humility, penitence, and the dangers of bodily corruption. In another, he studies the progress of the soul after death through the powerful descriptions of Heaven, Hell, and Purgatory in Dante and other writers and through portrayals of the Last Judgment and the Apocalypse in sculpture and large-scale painting.