Recently, many news sources announced the discovery of a 200-year-old Mongolian Buddhist monk’s mummy (Ba). While most of us are familiar with the Egyptians’ rigorous mummification rituals,not all mummies are produced the same way. Oftentimes, natural mummification can result from ideal environmental factors occurring after death. Certain Buddhist sects have incorporated practices that recreate these perfect environment in their rituals in order to encourage post-mortem preservation.
Death and Buddhism
In Buddhism, it is believed that there are four main forms of human suffering: birth, old age, sickness, and death. Buddhism is an attempt to overcome the pain of living through the achievement of Nirvana, which symbolizes the defeat of desire, attachment,and death itself. This triumph over death is reflected in the ability of certain individuals to control their reincarnations (e.g. incarnate lamas) or to stop the process of decomposition after death (Bernstein 5). Some believers claim that mummified monks have achieved a deep state of meditation that elevates them to a state in which they are neither alive nor dead (10). Although this practice exists in certain Buddhist sects, it is highly criticized in others, as it is believed to be anathema to the religion’s belief in impermanence.
Sokushinbutsu
The Sokushinbutsu are Japanese monks of the Shingon Buddhist sect who became mummies through a process that started before they were even dead. This was practiced from the 11th to the 19th century, and resulted in a few dozen mummies. It is thought that hundreds more aspiring monks failed to become mummies.
The process of self-mummification took nearly 10 years and was divided in three 1,000-day periods. The first involved a diet consisting of only nuts and seeds gathered around the temple complex. At the same time, the aspiring mummy had to endure rigorous physical activity such as “meditating under icy cold mountain streams for hours on end” (Lowe 2). This was done to significantly lower body fat.
In the second period, the diet is changed to a small amount of bark and roots from pine trees in order to decrease moisture in the body. Towards the end of this period, a tea made from the sap of the urushi tree, a toxic substance normally used to make lacquer, is ingested. This induced vomiting, sweating, and urination, which caused further dehydration. The accumulation of the toxic sap in the body also functioned as embalming fluid and ensured that insects could not proliferate and devour the body.
The third and final period required the mummy-to-be to be buried alive in a chamber only large enough to fit a person sitting lotus-style. Their only connection to the outside world was through a tube, which also provided their only source of oxygen. They were given a bell to ring every day to signal that they were still alive. Once the bell could not longer be heard, the tube would be removed and the chamber would be sealed shut. Whether a person had become a Buddha or not could only be determined, three years, once the body had been exhumed (Davis).
Although the practice is no longer legal in Japan, a few of the mummies uncovered are on display in temples around the country for those seeking religious enlightenment or macabre thrills.
Sources:
BA, Oulimata. “Mongolian Buddhist Mummy, 200 Years Old, Is ‘Not Dead'” Headlines & Global News, Feb 07. 2015. Accessed Feb 8. 2015. http://www.hngn.com/articles/67228/20150207/mongolian-buddhist-mummy-200-years-old-dead.htm
BERNSTEIN, Anya. “MORE ALIVE THAN ALL THE LIVING: Sovereign Bodies and Cosmic Politics in Buddhist Siberia.” Cultural Anthropology 27, no. 2 (2012): 261-85.
DAVIS, Lauren. “The Gruesome and Excruciating Practice of Mummifying your Own Body.” io9, Feb 04. 2014. Accessed Feb 8. 2015. http://io9.com/the-gruesome-and-excruciating-practice-of-mummifying-yo-1515905564
February 15, 2015 at 3:00 am
Well isn’t that charming!
I watched a documentary on a mummified Buddhist monk somewhere in the Himalayas some years ago. The mummy was sitting in lotus position in a cave, and had been sitting there for… a long time. Also, some Buddhist bronzes are pretty creepy, I saw some reprensenting skeletal monks in meditation a couple of times, it gave me the chills really.
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February 19, 2015 at 5:56 pm
I’ve had never actually seen a Buddhist bronze depicting a skeletal monk, so I did a quick Google search and I must concur that they are as chill-inducing as you say. I like them though. It’s nothing I would decorate my house with, but fascinating nonetheless!
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February 17, 2015 at 11:51 pm
J’aime beaucoup le commentaire! 🙂
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February 19, 2015 at 5:50 pm
Celiver donne toujours de bons commentaires . C’est aussi à noter qu’elle n’est même pas dans mon équipe de collaboration! J’espère que cela lui méritera quelques points de plus dans son évaluation.
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March 8, 2015 at 4:28 pm
Oh, this is so sweet of you! Thank you! The same applies to you on my blog! Sorry for not replying any sooner, I hadn’t seen this!
Here’s a link to one of the best exhibitions I’ve ever seen: http://fondation-pb-ysl.net/fr/Art_sacre_du_Tibet-650.html
I also saw skelettal Buddhas here: http://www.btrts.org.sg/english-home Admittedly, it’s a long way to go from here 🙂
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February 23, 2015 at 9:25 pm
Wow, this post was very interesting! I have to admit, I don’t know much about mummification (unless The Mummy movies count as a reference…), and I have never even heard of self-mummification. I’m not sure I understand why they did this though. You mentioned achieving Nirvana, so was that the monks’ goal when they undertook the self-mummification process?
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February 23, 2015 at 10:28 pm
Yes, you understood perfectly. This was the way that certain sects of Buddhism tried to achieve Nirvana.
Many people know that reincarnation is an important part of Buddhism, but, at least initially, reincarnation is seen as being a bad thing. All life is seen as pain, so you ideally want to break out of, or rather to be liberated from, the cycle of existence. The monks who attempt this decade-long self-mummification ritual believe that they go into a state of meditation so deep that they both transcend life and death. The fact that they don’t rot is seen as evidence of this. So when a monk performing this ritual gets disinterred decades later, followers get to see whether their teacher has indeed reached Nirvana and become a living Buddha, or whether he has failed. Unfortunately, most of those who have tried have failed. Can you imagine, ten grueling years of torture only to fail in your bid for Nirvana? How terrible.
It’s actually an odd practice that only a handful of Buddhist sects even do, and the Sokushinbutsu are the most extreme. Most Buddhists believe that allowing your body to decompose and nourish other beings is the greatest act of generosity a human can perform, so Buddhist mummies are very niche.
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March 24, 2015 at 11:08 pm
I just came across this article – our worlds meet! 😉 : http://news.artnet.com/market/china-buddha-with-monk-mummy-stolen-relic-280244
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