Cremation, Caste, and Cosmogony in Karmic Traditions.

e reincarnated into regarding spiritual prosperity (the
various hells are excluded). There are divergent opinions
whether or not a spirit can take on a vegetarian
incarnation, but if it is possible, being born in the body
of a fruit or vegetable is highly inauspicious. Following
the ladder of fortunate incarnations, it is better to be born
as a chicken than a potato. Nevertheless, being born as a
chicken is a less favourable condition and represents a
more polluted body than being born as a cow. Within the
human realm, being born as a king is better than being
born as a sweeper. On the right hand side, the scheme
culminates in the Brahmans eating non-flesh. A Chhetri
eating a chicken is ranked second, and at the very
bottom the katto-priest who ate the purest flesh of them
all; the king’s flesh. The conclusion is: The more
polluted the flesh a man eats, the purer the individual
becomes, and the more pure the flesh that is eaten, the
more impure the individual becomes. It is important to
stress that by polluted flesh in this case I mean bodies
that are unfavourable for incarnation.
The main limitation with this scheme is that it is purely
seen from a “profane” point of view in the sense that a
person’s individual skills of transforming impurity into
purity is not taken into consideration. Thus, this scheme
may illustrate what happens if people live ordinary
(“profane”) lives without transcending the qualities of
the consumed matter. This is particularly evident among
the ascetics and especially the Aghoris, but similar
processes are also manifest among for instance cows;
namely the creation of holiness by digestions of sins and
impurity. The mouth of the cow is impure, but the faeces
are pure. The Aghoris aim to restore the life of the
wicked and therefore they prefer low-castes and extra
impure flesh. Moreover, the ascetics are holy in
accordance with the degree of capability of transforming
impurity into purity. Thus, in a cosmogenetic
perspective holiness is not a matter of staying pure by
avoiding impurity, but it is the capability of transforming
other peoples’ impurity into purity and thereby erasing
sin and inauspiciousness in the world. Holiness is the
process; purity is the product. Holiness implies the
transformative capacity of turning other people’s sins
into purity. Holy persons are by necessity pure, but pure
people are not necessarily holy.
Holy persons may achieve a high status in society,
whereas pure people may not, and consequently, even if
Brahmans maintain their own purity they are not
necessarily perceived as holy or high ranking in social
terms. Being holy and high ranking in a ritual and
religious sense implies that the individual capabilities
are used for the general welfare and benefit of the people
who do not possess such qualities. Therefore, the
relation between the consumption of dead flesh and the
purity of the consumer’s own flesh is not about social
rank (fig. 4.4), but about degrees of contamination
through the consumption of different types of flesh prior
to personal capabilities of transcending these gross
matters. Purity and pollution are either creative or
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destructive qualities that can be transferred onto
substances. “Inauspiciousness flows…through the
“connections of the body”…between persons, and when
these connections are transformed (at birth) or attenuated
and created anew (at marriage) inauspiciousness flows
over, as it were, and must be channelled or removed.
The inauspiciousness of death is largely a result of the
dead person’s continued existence as a disembodied
pret…” (Raheja 1988:147). Holiness is the capability to
transform impurity into purity by one’s own means.
Divinity is truly the quality of partaking in cosmogony
by transforming chaos into cosmos, and for humans this
is only possible through sacrifice as a ritual practice.
Katto and the sins of kingdom
“Royal symbolism is, I believe, constructed out of nonroyal
symbolism, both logically and probably also
historically…all symbolic constructions of authority
involve the same elements” (Bloch 1987:271-272).
Thus, the rationale regarding katto and the Aghoris
shares the same cultural logic. Although the Aghoris are
outside society they are not outcastes since they are able
to transcend impurity and convert chaos into cosmos.
They prove their holy status by defiling themselves. If
they are holy, then they are capable of transforming
impurity into purity by transcending materiality. The
question is then why an Aghori sadhu cannot eat katto,
instead of a Brahman priest who becomes the earth’s
most impure person? The Aghoris possess the capability
of transcending death and the sins connected to flesh, but
there are some important differences between the
Aghoris and the priests consuming katto. The Aghoris as
sadhus have neither a home nor a family. The lack of
these two social institutions, or basically being a
Householder, disqualifies sadhus from partaking in state
rituals. Important in this discussion is also the fact that
numerous low-caste people at Pashupatinath tried to
become the katto-priest due to the financial promises,
but they were ritually unfit for the rite: They were too
impure prior to the ritual. The katto-ritual had to be
performed by a pure Brahman priest.
The process when the Brahman priest eats katto is a
means of securing the king eternal freedom and
liberation from this world. Creating cosmos, whereby
the king becomes Vishnu in the heavenly abode so he
successively can redistribute his body back to society
creating castes, is a process which involves the
consumption of parts of the king’s corpse. Following
Hocart, the Brahmans’ role in society is to assist the king
in his sacrifices. It is their duty and dharma to function
as sacrificers. The cremation of the king is his last and
most important sacrifice whereby he sacrifices himself
on behalf of society, which is re-created as a
cosmogenetic event. Whereas the sadhus are outside
society and focusing on their individual liberation from
samsara, the king has a responsibility for all.