The subject of death and dying has its own folklore in India, and here the Veda pandits are not immune. To begin, the vocabulary of thanatos, like that of eros, is circumvented to every extent possible. Terms for the burning ground (smasana), cremation (antyesti), ancestor rituals (sraddha), and funeral priest (apara-vetta) all require pronominal circumlocutions (“there,” “then,” “those,” “that one,” respectively). The word for widow (vedhava) is unspeakable. Unlike the easy discussion of Vedas and Sutras, pandits are uncomfortable talking about current funerals with procedures found in texts separated from auspi cious rites of passage. When a certain temporal distancing has intervened, a few terms regain normal use, such as words for annual and monthly obser
vances for the deceased (abdika and masika, respectively). At times these sensitivities create tensions. As noted earlier, Mitranarayana expressed sur prising displeasure with his own guru over refusal to administer last rites for Mitranarayana’s ahitagni father.
One folkloric theme has to do with time, sequential deaths in a particular family, for example. Among the Bhamidipatis, Baballa died, then his son, then his wife, all within eleven months. Shortly after Cayanulu’s death his son-in law became victim of a fatal scooter accident. Duvvuri Yajulu’s eldest daugh ter died only months after his wife and Surya Prakasa Avadhani noted that Duvvuris not only had a pattern of the auspicious wife dying first but many die in Dhanur-masa, the month of Dhanus or Sagittarius. There is widespread belief that fates are determined and the arrival of Mrtyu, Death, is no hap penstance. Protective measures such as wearing selected gemstone rings for either defense or supplication concern specific nava-graha, nine planets, Sani
Becoming a Householder 185
(Saturn), Kuja (Mars), and the lunar eclipse nodes Rahu and Ketu being those most feared in one’s horoscope.
Another folkloric aspect concerns space. When a house has been vis ited by Mrtyu it must be vacated for a time. Bulusu Cayanulu’s house was boarded up for a year and his widow, Subbalaksmi, found it necessary to live in Rajahmundry after his sudden demise in the house, apparently under an inauspicious constellation. Lanka’s house, also closed, was opened only once a month for masika rites at the place of his death. Laksmikanta and her fifth son, Renducintala Yajulu Narayana, recall the death in Kasi (Varanasi) of hus band and father when authorities demanded that the special funeral known as losta-cayana be done on the opposite bank of the Ganges, not the Kasi side, quite contrary to his desire. Rites were permitted only when it became known that he was a highly honored ahitagni who had performed more soma sacri fices than anyone in India.
A widow in the agrahara is conspicuous by her absence. She is no longer the auspicious married woman (su-mangali) but an inauspicious (a-mangali) person who must wear white with head cover, no flowers, perfume, eye make-up, or pasupu-kunkum, the auspicious turmeric and vermilion cos
metic. She remains away from auspicious events. Her mangala-sutra marriage necklace was broken on the day of her husband’s cremation. As T. S. Madan phrased it, she “has lost her own blessedness as well as the power to bless.”24 In contemporary India her existence is not as bleak as in former times and the practice of sati, self-immolation on her husband’s pyre, is considered ancient, foreign, and barbaric in coastal Andhra. Today she may no longer be required to sleep on the ground, regularly shave her head, or restrict herself to a single meal a day, although some do choose the last as appropriate. The Tadithota fes
tival that opened this chapter would not be a choice for her as she is an inaus picious sight to others and remains at home. Although she eats food with no spices and regularly fasts she may still travel to visit children and grandchil dren and enjoy pilgrimages to local or far off sacred sites. As Subbalaksmi noted in Chapter 3 she experienced a kind of rebirth in learning to read and recite praises of deities and she was happy to return to her old neighbors in Sriramapuram after a year’s absence.25
A tradition apparently not practiced in full outside of Andhra is the spe cial funeral for an auspicious wife who dies “out of order,” that is, before her older spouse. Never becoming a widow, she remains auspicious and her last rites are positive ones. Known as musi-vayanam in Telugu, it is remarkable for its female-directed procedures, including a brahma-muttaiduva, a special Brahman priestess who ritually embodies the preta, the spirit of the deceased released from the cremated body, reverses time until she is a bride again,186 vedic voices
transforms her into the goddess Gauri and (in direct conflict with brahmanical sraddha programs of absorption into either her husband’s lineage of ancestors or her own maternal lineage) dispatches her to Gauri-loka, the heaven of the great goddess spouse of Siva.
This is a dramatic, sometimes boisterous ritual, essentially a possession (avesa) of the Brahman priestess by the deceased who may act out objections to her pre mature demise. Two cases of musi-vayanam were mentioned in Chapter 3, Rama Suryakanta, Bulusu Cayanulu’s first wife, who died of typhoid at the youthful age of twenty-four after bearing a single child. Duvvuri Yajulu’s wife Surya, who died after a full life and delivery of fourteen children, also received musi-vayanam in 1996. The husband does not participate although he sometimes watches from a distance two crowds of all-women mourners, those from her natal side and those from his side, converge. They present in winnowing fans separate offerings at the feet of the deceased-as-priestess and then take away as prasada, grace, the consecrated leavings of the goddess—bananas, turmeric, saffron, incense, little mirrors, combs, and bangles—each woman receiving these in a winnow. Since it is auspicious for the wife to die first, she having succeeded in protecting her husband from the grim reaper, it is the sole providential funeral, and mourners, all with flowers in their hair, may shed no tears or express any sorrow, only admi
ration for one who escaped the dreadful fate of widowhood.26 That which lies beyond death for the householder Veda pandit and patni is the subject of numerous agrahara or sabha discussions and is closely related to the matter of renunciation reviewed earlier. Deliberations, to the ear of an outsider, are firmly constricted by a universal belief in the unitary nature of Veda, the inadmissibility of any change in worldview between the Samhitas and the Upanisads, for example, thus ruling out acceptance of innovative doctrines of karma and rebirth in the latter. Karma, samsara, and moksa are simply read back into “the Veda” as a whole and no historic or linguistic shift may be considered. Discussion of these subjects, however, certainly provokes queries: Does a lifetime of agni-hotra or yajna lead to any afterlife rewards? Baballa thought his performance of aruna-ketuka would allow him to enter the world of Brahma, brahma-loka, and communicate with the absolute lord without hindrance. Does drinking soma produce results beyond the here and now? When funeral texts state that the deceased join their ancestors in heaven, which heaven is this? Is it the same one reached by a ladder in the vaja-peya? Many are the queries, but replies do not always form a consensus. The last part of Chapter 6 reviews the final samskara, death rites, including special funerals designed only for ahitagni and their patni.