Archive for the ‘Self Improvement’ Category
Ross Heaven asked:
Our fascination with perfume began thousands of years ago, with the burning of scented plants mixed with gums and resins to create incense that was used for ritual as well as practical purposes – for merging with the natural world to increase the effectiveness of hunting, for example, as well as for calling “the owner of the animals” to ensure plentiful game, and protection on the hunt itself.
Anthropological evidence shows that from around 7,000 – 4,000 BC olive and sesame oils were combined with plants and flowers to make the first ointments. Some anthropologists speculate that early hunters, having covered their bodies with the scent of fragrant plants to mask their smell and attract game, noticed the healing properties of the plants they used and their curative effects on wounds sustained in hunting, and this is what led to the formulation of ointments and balms. Others believe it was women who first began to explore the effects of different fragrances as they met them in the plants they worked with and gathered.
Whatever the true origin of our use of fragrance, by at least 2,697 BC, it was certainly well established and we read in The Yellow Emperor’s Classic of Internal Medicine, for example, of many uses for scented herbs.
By 430 BC in Wales, the laws of Dynwal Moelmud show that plant medicine had also come to be highly regarded in the West and was protected and encouraged by the state, with commerce, healing and navigation known as ‘the three civil arts’.
One of the interesting folk uses for fragrant herbs within these Welsh traditions was the practice of ‘burying illnesses’ beneath aromatic plants. The sin eater, for example, would lay out wooden stakes in his garden, beneath which he would bury an animal bone with the name of a patient scratched on it. He would then plant flowers or herbs on top of these ‘graves’, according to the nature of his patient’s illness: thyme for colds and fevers, for example, rosemary for lethargy, parsley to purify the blood, and marigolds, among their other more spiritual virtues, to ease skin complaints and inflammations.
All of these plants might today be used by a herbalist to cure the same ailments, either as a tea or a salve, but in this folk practice, it was the energetic or sympathetic connection between plant and patient (represented by the name on the bone) that mattered. Each morning the sin eater would walk his garden, whispering to the plants and crushing a few of their leaves between his fingers. As they then released their aroma, it carried away a little more of the illness until the patient was cured.
As in all shamanic practice, these plants were regarded as spirit allies who brought healing to the body, rather than medicinal substances. Chinese Taoists also believed, for example, that a plant’s fragrance was its soul, a belief later endorsed by the Gnostic Christians of 100-400 AD, for whom fragrance was the spirit of the plant and a gateway to the greater soul of the world. In their ceremonies surrounding death, the corpse was washed in perfume and incense lit around it so the soul of the deceased would mingle with these fragrances and, through them, find its way to god.
It is, however, the Egyptians that are most associated with perfume and who left most evidence of their fascination with the mystical attributes of scents. Manuscripts such as the Papyrus Ebers (1,550 BC) describe the use of plants such as elder, aloe, cannabis, and wormwood. Others, from even earlier, record the use of herbs in temple incense, oils and salves. Cinnamon was used to anoint the bodies of the living, for example, and myrrh – considered more precious than gold – to embalm the dead.
Wall paintings, such as those at the temple of Edfu, show the distillation of perfume from white lilies. Others depict the use of aromatic cones (called bitcones) as adornments for the heads of temple dancers. These cones would melt into the hair and release their fragrance as the maidens danced for the pharaohs and gods.
Another use for aromatics was in fragrant sweetmeats called kyphi (which means ‘welcome to the gods’). This mystical substance was eaten in the temples of Ra to induce states of trance. Through the audience with the gods this brought, healing dreams would result, which were said to be the most potent cure for grief and a comfort to the soul.
Incense cubes made from scented plants, gums and honey were also used by the Egyptians to consecrate their temples. The earliest known use of perfume bottles is also Egyptian and dates from around 1,000 BC.
But the use of fragrance to engage the gods was not restricted to China and Egypt. Quite independently of one another a number of cultures evolved through their experience the conviction that beautiful smells provided a doorway to another world.
The Hebrews used fragrance in their religious ceremonies and to initiate priests, for example; their anointing oil consisting of cinnamon, myrrh, and calamus, mixed with olive oil. The ancient Greeks also believed that perfume was god-given and that sweet aromas were how the deities made their presence known. They used the word arómata to describe the use of fragrance, making no distinction between medicinal and mystical perfumes, incense and medicine, or between spiritual and pragmatic uses. Every plant contained magic. Bay, for example, is a staple of Greek cooking, but was also used by the oracle priestesses of Delphi, who would sit within its smoke, heads covered, to enter the otherworld and allow the spirits to speak through them during their divinations.
In India, too, in ceremonies of prophecy, seers called dainyals would cover their heads with cloth and surround themselves with cedarwood smoke, the aroma of which would send them into trance and chanting.
Fragrant plants were also used extensively throughout Europe. In the Middle Ages, Hildegard of Bingen (1098-1179) was an ambassador for the connection between religion and the healing spirit of the plants. As well as an Abbess, Hildegard was a herbalist and is credited with the invention of sweet-smelling lavender water, which she saw as truly divine.
‘Carmelite water’ was also developed at this time and offered a ‘miracle cure’ for spiritual diseases such as melancholy (regarded as a form of soul loss) and for improving the powers of mind and vision. The monks who produced Carmelite water guarded its spiritual formula, but we now know it was based on melissa (a plant regarded as a ‘spiritual communicator’) and angelica (‘angel root’, which was equally effective against evil spirits and infectious diseases, both of them forms of ‘spirit intrusion’).
Another plant with a spiritually protective purpose during the Middle Ages was rue, which was also bestowed ‘second sight’. Indeed, rue was believed to be so powerful against conditions such as soul loss and melancholia that it was named from the Greek word, reuo (‘to set free’) and was used in many spells and formulas devised by the Welsh sin eaters, who knew it as gwenwynllys and used it as an antidote in cases of spiritual as well as physical poisoning.
It was France, however, which emerged as Europe’s leader in the therapeutic use of fragrance. The term ‘aromatherapy’, in fact, was invented in 1928 by Rene Maurice Gattefoss, a French chemist whose interest was stimulated in essential oils when he burned his hand in a laboratory accident and plunged it into a pot of lavender oil to cool the burn. It healed within days, faster than any other treatment available at the time. Gattefoss was inspired and began to experiment with essential oils and fragrances from that day.
He also inspired others, including Jean Valnet, a French doctor who worked as an army surgeon in World War II, and found essential oils such as thyme, clove, and lemon to be just as effective in treating wounds and burns. He later extended his work with fragrances, using them with equal effectiveness to treat psychiatric problems.
Today there are over 20,000 commercial fragrances on the market and the number of new releases each year has increased by more than 400% since 1973. The age-old associations between pleasant smells, a healthy soul, and the visionary calling of perfumes to and from the gods has not been forgotten, however, even in these times.
Our fascination with perfume began thousands of years ago, with the burning of scented plants mixed with gums and resins to create incense that was used for ritual as well as practical purposes – for merging with the natural world to increase the effectiveness of hunting, for example, as well as for calling “the owner of the animals” to ensure plentiful game, and protection on the hunt itself.
Anthropological evidence shows that from around 7,000 – 4,000 BC olive and sesame oils were combined with plants and flowers to make the first ointments. Some anthropologists speculate that early hunters, having covered their bodies with the scent of fragrant plants to mask their smell and attract game, noticed the healing properties of the plants they used and their curative effects on wounds sustained in hunting, and this is what led to the formulation of ointments and balms. Others believe it was women who first began to explore the effects of different fragrances as they met them in the plants they worked with and gathered.
Whatever the true origin of our use of fragrance, by at least 2,697 BC, it was certainly well established and we read in The Yellow Emperor’s Classic of Internal Medicine, for example, of many uses for scented herbs.
By 430 BC in Wales, the laws of Dynwal Moelmud show that plant medicine had also come to be highly regarded in the West and was protected and encouraged by the state, with commerce, healing and navigation known as ‘the three civil arts’.
One of the interesting folk uses for fragrant herbs within these Welsh traditions was the practice of ‘burying illnesses’ beneath aromatic plants. The sin eater, for example, would lay out wooden stakes in his garden, beneath which he would bury an animal bone with the name of a patient scratched on it. He would then plant flowers or herbs on top of these ‘graves’, according to the nature of his patient’s illness: thyme for colds and fevers, for example, rosemary for lethargy, parsley to purify the blood, and marigolds, among their other more spiritual virtues, to ease skin complaints and inflammations.
All of these plants might today be used by a herbalist to cure the same ailments, either as a tea or a salve, but in this folk practice, it was the energetic or sympathetic connection between plant and patient (represented by the name on the bone) that mattered. Each morning the sin eater would walk his garden, whispering to the plants and crushing a few of their leaves between his fingers. As they then released their aroma, it carried away a little more of the illness until the patient was cured.
As in all shamanic practice, these plants were regarded as spirit allies who brought healing to the body, rather than medicinal substances. Chinese Taoists also believed, for example, that a plant’s fragrance was its soul, a belief later endorsed by the Gnostic Christians of 100-400 AD, for whom fragrance was the spirit of the plant and a gateway to the greater soul of the world. In their ceremonies surrounding death, the corpse was washed in perfume and incense lit around it so the soul of the deceased would mingle with these fragrances and, through them, find its way to god.
It is, however, the Egyptians that are most associated with perfume and who left most evidence of their fascination with the mystical attributes of scents. Manuscripts such as the Papyrus Ebers (1,550 BC) describe the use of plants such as elder, aloe, cannabis, and wormwood. Others, from even earlier, record the use of herbs in temple incense, oils and salves. Cinnamon was used to anoint the bodies of the living, for example, and myrrh – considered more precious than gold – to embalm the dead.
Wall paintings, such as those at the temple of Edfu, show the distillation of perfume from white lilies. Others depict the use of aromatic cones (called bitcones) as adornments for the heads of temple dancers. These cones would melt into the hair and release their fragrance as the maidens danced for the pharaohs and gods.
Another use for aromatics was in fragrant sweetmeats called kyphi (which means ‘welcome to the gods’). This mystical substance was eaten in the temples of Ra to induce states of trance. Through the audience with the gods this brought, healing dreams would result, which were said to be the most potent cure for grief and a comfort to the soul.
Incense cubes made from scented plants, gums and honey were also used by the Egyptians to consecrate their temples. The earliest known use of perfume bottles is also Egyptian and dates from around 1,000 BC.
But the use of fragrance to engage the gods was not restricted to China and Egypt. Quite independently of one another a number of cultures evolved through their experience the conviction that beautiful smells provided a doorway to another world.
The Hebrews used fragrance in their religious ceremonies and to initiate priests, for example; their anointing oil consisting of cinnamon, myrrh, and calamus, mixed with olive oil. The ancient Greeks also believed that perfume was god-given and that sweet aromas were how the deities made their presence known. They used the word arómata to describe the use of fragrance, making no distinction between medicinal and mystical perfumes, incense and medicine, or between spiritual and pragmatic uses. Every plant contained magic. Bay, for example, is a staple of Greek cooking, but was also used by the oracle priestesses of Delphi, who would sit within its smoke, heads covered, to enter the otherworld and allow the spirits to speak through them during their divinations.
In India, too, in ceremonies of prophecy, seers called dainyals would cover their heads with cloth and surround themselves with cedarwood smoke, the aroma of which would send them into trance and chanting.
Fragrant plants were also used extensively throughout Europe. In the Middle Ages, Hildegard of Bingen (1098-1179) was an ambassador for the connection between religion and the healing spirit of the plants. As well as an Abbess, Hildegard was a herbalist and is credited with the invention of sweet-smelling lavender water, which she saw as truly divine.
‘Carmelite water’ was also developed at this time and offered a ‘miracle cure’ for spiritual diseases such as melancholy (regarded as a form of soul loss) and for improving the powers of mind and vision. The monks who produced Carmelite water guarded its spiritual formula, but we now know it was based on melissa (a plant regarded as a ‘spiritual communicator’) and angelica (‘angel root’, which was equally effective against evil spirits and infectious diseases, both of them forms of ‘spirit intrusion’).
Another plant with a spiritually protective purpose during the Middle Ages was rue, which was also bestowed ‘second sight’. Indeed, rue was believed to be so powerful against conditions such as soul loss and melancholia that it was named from the Greek word, reuo (‘to set free’) and was used in many spells and formulas devised by the Welsh sin eaters, who knew it as gwenwynllys and used it as an antidote in cases of spiritual as well as physical poisoning.
It was France, however, which emerged as Europe’s leader in the therapeutic use of fragrance. The term ‘aromatherapy’, in fact, was invented in 1928 by Rene Maurice Gattefoss, a French chemist whose interest was stimulated in essential oils when he burned his hand in a laboratory accident and plunged it into a pot of lavender oil to cool the burn. It healed within days, faster than any other treatment available at the time. Gattefoss was inspired and began to experiment with essential oils and fragrances from that day.
He also inspired others, including Jean Valnet, a French doctor who worked as an army surgeon in World War II, and found essential oils such as thyme, clove, and lemon to be just as effective in treating wounds and burns. He later extended his work with fragrances, using them with equal effectiveness to treat psychiatric problems.
Today there are over 20,000 commercial fragrances on the market and the number of new releases each year has increased by more than 400% since 1973. The age-old associations between pleasant smells, a healthy soul, and the visionary calling of perfumes to and from the gods has not been forgotten, however, even in these times.
Ross Heaven asked:
In the County of Hereford was an old Custom at Funerals, to hire poor people, who were to take upon them all the Sins of the party deceased… The manner was that when a Corpse was brought out of the house and laid on the Bier; a Loaf of bread was brought out and delivered to the Sin-eater over the corps, as also a Mazer-bowl full of beer, which he was to drink up, and sixpence in money, in consideration whereof he took upon him all the Sins of the Defunct, and freed him (or her) from Walking after they were dead.
John Aubrey, Remains of Gentilism
When I was a child my family moved to the Herefordshire countryside, in the shadow of the Welsh Black Mountains and deep in the heart of Celtic mythology. At the edge of the village, alone and isolated from the rest of the scant community there was a small cottage, long fallen to disrepair; a place I was always warned to stay clear of. For in this cottage there lived a madman, who was somehow unclean and undesirable to the village… so they said. Inevitably I found my way to this place.
His cottage stood at a crossroads, just back from the road itself and surrounded by tall bushes and trees. It was a walk of about a mile from the village and there were no other houses anywhere near it. It felt somewhat like the fairytale cottage of a witch, a place you stumble upon in error, after which your life is never the same. As I stood looking at this mysterious cottage, whose lopsided architecture had begun to take on the form of the surrounding land, the door opened and its single inhabitant emerged.
He was old, thin, and dressed oddly for the times (the 1970s) in white collarless shirt, black trousers and waistcoat, like a 1940s off-duty doctor or the cinema version of a period railway signalman. A gold chain and fob watch hung from the pocket of his waistcoat. So this was the madman I had been warned away from. He began to talk to me about flowers and herbs and his life story. He had been a Sin Eater.
THE SIN EATER
There is little written or known of Sin Eaters. It is an ancient tradition, practiced in many countries of the world, and integrated into the Catholic ritual of the last rites. It is supposedly derived from the ‘scapegoat’ described in Leviticus xvi. 21, 22, where the wrongdoings of another are ascribed to an innocent. In the Hebrew ritual of the ‘scapegoat’, Aaron confessed all the sins of the children of Israel on the Day of Atonement, above the head of a live goat that was then sent out into the wilderness to die, symbolically bearing their sins.
As a shamanic tradition, a Sin Eater would be employed by the family of a deceased person, or sometimes by the church, to eat a last meal of bread and salt from the belly of the corpse as it lay in state. By so doing it was believed that the sins of the dead person would be absorbed and the deceased would have clear passage to the hereafter. The Sin Eater was given a few coins for his trouble but other than that was avoided (literally ‘like the plague’) by the community who regarded him as sin-filled and unclean as a result of his work. That is why Sin Eaters usually lived at the edge of the village and children were warned away from them.
The role of the Sin Eater was, in essence, that of a shamanic healer. It was his job to remove negativity and the spirit of disease from the dead (and, often, the living) and make the gods available to them. Their teachers in this work were the spirits themselves and, in the case of the Sin Eater I knew, the Old Testament which, read shamanically, reveals many rituals for cleansing and healing that have been mysteriously lost in the New Testament, which has also rewritten the nature of the god(s) from many to one (e.g. Genesis 1 26: ‘Let us make man to our image and likeness’. Genesis 2 22: ‘Behold Adam is become as one of us, knowing good and evil’).
THE NATURE OF SIN
In Sin Eating tradition, a sin is a blemish or a weight on the soul which will hold it trapped in the Middle World in a sort of purgatory or limbo while that sin remains. The Sin Eater’s job is to free the soul by devouring this ‘blemish’.
The seemingly simple ritual of eating from the body of the deceased therefore masks a number of more complicated shamanic manoeuvres.
Firstly, the action of eating from the belly of the deceased is, of course, a form of extraction medicine. It is assumed that the ‘food’ will absorb the sins from the corpse since spirit craves matter and the spirit of the disease (sin) will therefore be attracted to the stronger life force of the ‘living’ food than the dead corpse. When the food is eaten, the weight on the soul is therefore removed.
The food itself varied according to the Sin Eater’s lineage. Sometimes it was bread and ale, sometime merely salt and water. The latter was more useful to the Sin Eater as salt water is an aid to purging, the unseen part of the sin eating ritual being for the healer to go out into nature following his corpse-side duties in order to vomit away the sins he was now carrying and allow the Earth itself to defuse them. In another variant the Sin Eater would free himself of the sins he had taken on by casting them into a body of water and reciting an incantation.
Secondly, as the Sin Eater went about his duties with the corpse he would also be praying for the soul to be free of its attachments to the Earth so it might enter the Kingdom of Heaven. This is, in effect, psychopomp work, the ‘escorting of the dead’. The belief of the Sin Eater is that the deceased carries guilt and shame within the soul as a result of his or her misdemeanours and inappropriate actions towards others – or, indeed, because of their actions towards the deceased. The soul, in fact, can be damaged in two ways: either because the person who carried it has acted in a way that has caused pain to another (a parallel here with the Buddhist notion of ‘right-living’ – that no matter what our interactions with others or what they do to us, there is a correct way for us to behave in order to preserve our spiritual integrity) or because they were the victims of shameful acts and now carry guilt which is actually not their weight to bear. The victim of sexual abuse, for example, may sometimes come to believe, at an unconscious or deep soul level, that they were somehow to blame or ‘invited’ such abuse. This may be incorrect but it is the belief itself and the shame of the event rather than the reality of what happened that causes the wound to the soul.
Thirdly, the ritual of sin eating is a community healing for the people present at the wake. When a relative or close friend dies, there is often a feeling of guilt on the part of those who live on – ‘why couldn’t I have done more to help?’, ‘why didn’t I pay more attention to him when he was alive?’ etc. This guilt arises as a result of the perceived sin of neglect on the part of the relative or friend. The ritual of sin eating helps to assuage this guilt as well since the relative can at least see that the deceased has been helped and healed through his employment of the Sin Eater.
HEALING THE LIVING
Sin Eaters rarely work just with the dead. Many of them, because of their closeness to nature and rural location, were also skilled exponents of folk medicine.
Folk medicine can be described as ‘root doctoring’ or herbalism, which works with both the medicinal properties and spirit of the plants. Thus, a tonic made from vervain was known to be helpful for easing depression, paranoia and insomnia (all symptoms of guilt or shame as a consequence of being in the presence of sin), but the plant could also be used as a talisman to drive away ‘evil spirits’.
By the same token, marigolds could be used to treat skin rashes, inflammation and ulcers (perhaps stress-induced as a result of the sinful situation), and at the same time, to soothe and calm the soul. The 13th century herbalist Aemilius Macer, for example, wrote that marigold flowers have the power to draw “wicked humours out”. (Interestingly, marigolds are used, even today, in Amazonian Peru in the shamanic practice of soul retrieval).
The client visiting the Sin Eater would find, first of all, a confessor to whom they would announce their sins. In this respect, the healer plays the role of anam cara – the ‘soul friend’ whose task it was to listen without judgement or prejudice to what was spoken, the intention being only to understand the nature of the problem and its impact on the soul. Even this simple action can have a profound healing effect since it unburdens the soul of its guilt, hence its enduring practice in Catholic confessionals, as well as its modern incarnation in counselling and psychotherapy (“the talking cure”).
Having heard his client, the Sin Eater might then offer advice from ‘the land of the dead’ (the spiritual world) for how these sins could be recompensed. The advice itself was often of a practical nature, the belief being that sins need to be reversed in this lifetime and with action in the world, rather than simple prayer, for example.
The penitent might therefore be advised to make an offering, not to the spirits, but to the person he had harmed. This is a quite different dynamic from the notion of ‘karma’, for example, where our good and bad deeds are weighed in the balance at judgement day and, perhaps, we must return in a new life to atone for our sins. In sin eating practice it is understood that ‘karma’ must be dealt with immediately in the here-and-now since any sin has the power to erode the soul, leading to ill-health and further corruption.
A potion of flowers or plants, as per above, might then be administered to the client in order to balance and soothe the soul. In this way, sin eating – a practice perhaps more than 1000 years old – recognises a mind-body-spirit connection that modern science is only now starting to acknowledge, for the plant medicine itself would work on the troubled body and mind as well as healing the wounds of the soul.
THE ALONENESS OF THE SIN EATER
The most paradoxical aspect of the Sin Eater’s life was his role of being central to the well-being of the community but also ostracized from it. The Sin Eater was typically a man who spent much of his life alone, disparaged by the community he served – and yet, in one way at least, the most important member of that community for without him no-one who had sinned could enter the Kingdom of Heaven. At the same time, he was regarded as unclean, as strange and mad – and yet, if he was unclean, it was because of the sins he was eating. The sins of the community, not his own.
We often find this solitariness among people of spiritual power. A time of aloneness is a requisite in many shamanic initiations and in some traditions the shaman will also live on the outskirts of the community, representing in a physical and symbolic way his dwelling on the threshold or boundary, the ‘betwixt and between’ place of human and spiritual connection. In our fairytales and myths, as well, crones, witches, and other unusual people tend to live alone in woods and shadowlands.
The emotional hardship of the Sin Eater’s life, along with the decline of spiritual belief in our modern cities are perhaps two of the reasons why sin eating is no longer a central practice in funerary rites, although it survives symbolically. In Ireland, for example, it is still common for the corpse to lie in state in the family home and at one such funeral I attended in the mid-1980s, a service was held over the coffin and our host then offered a glass of wine and a funeral biscuit to each guest, handing it to us across the coffin itself. The burial-cakes still made in parts of rural England (Shropshire and Cumberland, for example) are also symbolic relics of the sin eating tradition.
In other countries sin eating still continues in a more original form. In Bavaria, for example, a corpse cake is placed on the ****** of the deceased before being eaten by the closest relative. In the Balkans a small bread image of the deceased is made and eaten by members of the family. In Holland, doed-koecks (dead-cakes) are eaten, each marked with the initials of the deceased.
As the modern world enters what we might call a sin-filled age of terrorism, warfare, and territorial invasion, perhaps it is time for a revival of this powerful healing tradition, for the sake of all our souls.
In the County of Hereford was an old Custom at Funerals, to hire poor people, who were to take upon them all the Sins of the party deceased… The manner was that when a Corpse was brought out of the house and laid on the Bier; a Loaf of bread was brought out and delivered to the Sin-eater over the corps, as also a Mazer-bowl full of beer, which he was to drink up, and sixpence in money, in consideration whereof he took upon him all the Sins of the Defunct, and freed him (or her) from Walking after they were dead.
John Aubrey, Remains of Gentilism
When I was a child my family moved to the Herefordshire countryside, in the shadow of the Welsh Black Mountains and deep in the heart of Celtic mythology. At the edge of the village, alone and isolated from the rest of the scant community there was a small cottage, long fallen to disrepair; a place I was always warned to stay clear of. For in this cottage there lived a madman, who was somehow unclean and undesirable to the village… so they said. Inevitably I found my way to this place.
His cottage stood at a crossroads, just back from the road itself and surrounded by tall bushes and trees. It was a walk of about a mile from the village and there were no other houses anywhere near it. It felt somewhat like the fairytale cottage of a witch, a place you stumble upon in error, after which your life is never the same. As I stood looking at this mysterious cottage, whose lopsided architecture had begun to take on the form of the surrounding land, the door opened and its single inhabitant emerged.
He was old, thin, and dressed oddly for the times (the 1970s) in white collarless shirt, black trousers and waistcoat, like a 1940s off-duty doctor or the cinema version of a period railway signalman. A gold chain and fob watch hung from the pocket of his waistcoat. So this was the madman I had been warned away from. He began to talk to me about flowers and herbs and his life story. He had been a Sin Eater.
THE SIN EATER
There is little written or known of Sin Eaters. It is an ancient tradition, practiced in many countries of the world, and integrated into the Catholic ritual of the last rites. It is supposedly derived from the ‘scapegoat’ described in Leviticus xvi. 21, 22, where the wrongdoings of another are ascribed to an innocent. In the Hebrew ritual of the ‘scapegoat’, Aaron confessed all the sins of the children of Israel on the Day of Atonement, above the head of a live goat that was then sent out into the wilderness to die, symbolically bearing their sins.
As a shamanic tradition, a Sin Eater would be employed by the family of a deceased person, or sometimes by the church, to eat a last meal of bread and salt from the belly of the corpse as it lay in state. By so doing it was believed that the sins of the dead person would be absorbed and the deceased would have clear passage to the hereafter. The Sin Eater was given a few coins for his trouble but other than that was avoided (literally ‘like the plague’) by the community who regarded him as sin-filled and unclean as a result of his work. That is why Sin Eaters usually lived at the edge of the village and children were warned away from them.
The role of the Sin Eater was, in essence, that of a shamanic healer. It was his job to remove negativity and the spirit of disease from the dead (and, often, the living) and make the gods available to them. Their teachers in this work were the spirits themselves and, in the case of the Sin Eater I knew, the Old Testament which, read shamanically, reveals many rituals for cleansing and healing that have been mysteriously lost in the New Testament, which has also rewritten the nature of the god(s) from many to one (e.g. Genesis 1 26: ‘Let us make man to our image and likeness’. Genesis 2 22: ‘Behold Adam is become as one of us, knowing good and evil’).
THE NATURE OF SIN
In Sin Eating tradition, a sin is a blemish or a weight on the soul which will hold it trapped in the Middle World in a sort of purgatory or limbo while that sin remains. The Sin Eater’s job is to free the soul by devouring this ‘blemish’.
The seemingly simple ritual of eating from the body of the deceased therefore masks a number of more complicated shamanic manoeuvres.
Firstly, the action of eating from the belly of the deceased is, of course, a form of extraction medicine. It is assumed that the ‘food’ will absorb the sins from the corpse since spirit craves matter and the spirit of the disease (sin) will therefore be attracted to the stronger life force of the ‘living’ food than the dead corpse. When the food is eaten, the weight on the soul is therefore removed.
The food itself varied according to the Sin Eater’s lineage. Sometimes it was bread and ale, sometime merely salt and water. The latter was more useful to the Sin Eater as salt water is an aid to purging, the unseen part of the sin eating ritual being for the healer to go out into nature following his corpse-side duties in order to vomit away the sins he was now carrying and allow the Earth itself to defuse them. In another variant the Sin Eater would free himself of the sins he had taken on by casting them into a body of water and reciting an incantation.
Secondly, as the Sin Eater went about his duties with the corpse he would also be praying for the soul to be free of its attachments to the Earth so it might enter the Kingdom of Heaven. This is, in effect, psychopomp work, the ‘escorting of the dead’. The belief of the Sin Eater is that the deceased carries guilt and shame within the soul as a result of his or her misdemeanours and inappropriate actions towards others – or, indeed, because of their actions towards the deceased. The soul, in fact, can be damaged in two ways: either because the person who carried it has acted in a way that has caused pain to another (a parallel here with the Buddhist notion of ‘right-living’ – that no matter what our interactions with others or what they do to us, there is a correct way for us to behave in order to preserve our spiritual integrity) or because they were the victims of shameful acts and now carry guilt which is actually not their weight to bear. The victim of sexual abuse, for example, may sometimes come to believe, at an unconscious or deep soul level, that they were somehow to blame or ‘invited’ such abuse. This may be incorrect but it is the belief itself and the shame of the event rather than the reality of what happened that causes the wound to the soul.
Thirdly, the ritual of sin eating is a community healing for the people present at the wake. When a relative or close friend dies, there is often a feeling of guilt on the part of those who live on – ‘why couldn’t I have done more to help?’, ‘why didn’t I pay more attention to him when he was alive?’ etc. This guilt arises as a result of the perceived sin of neglect on the part of the relative or friend. The ritual of sin eating helps to assuage this guilt as well since the relative can at least see that the deceased has been helped and healed through his employment of the Sin Eater.
HEALING THE LIVING
Sin Eaters rarely work just with the dead. Many of them, because of their closeness to nature and rural location, were also skilled exponents of folk medicine.
Folk medicine can be described as ‘root doctoring’ or herbalism, which works with both the medicinal properties and spirit of the plants. Thus, a tonic made from vervain was known to be helpful for easing depression, paranoia and insomnia (all symptoms of guilt or shame as a consequence of being in the presence of sin), but the plant could also be used as a talisman to drive away ‘evil spirits’.
By the same token, marigolds could be used to treat skin rashes, inflammation and ulcers (perhaps stress-induced as a result of the sinful situation), and at the same time, to soothe and calm the soul. The 13th century herbalist Aemilius Macer, for example, wrote that marigold flowers have the power to draw “wicked humours out”. (Interestingly, marigolds are used, even today, in Amazonian Peru in the shamanic practice of soul retrieval).
The client visiting the Sin Eater would find, first of all, a confessor to whom they would announce their sins. In this respect, the healer plays the role of anam cara – the ‘soul friend’ whose task it was to listen without judgement or prejudice to what was spoken, the intention being only to understand the nature of the problem and its impact on the soul. Even this simple action can have a profound healing effect since it unburdens the soul of its guilt, hence its enduring practice in Catholic confessionals, as well as its modern incarnation in counselling and psychotherapy (“the talking cure”).
Having heard his client, the Sin Eater might then offer advice from ‘the land of the dead’ (the spiritual world) for how these sins could be recompensed. The advice itself was often of a practical nature, the belief being that sins need to be reversed in this lifetime and with action in the world, rather than simple prayer, for example.
The penitent might therefore be advised to make an offering, not to the spirits, but to the person he had harmed. This is a quite different dynamic from the notion of ‘karma’, for example, where our good and bad deeds are weighed in the balance at judgement day and, perhaps, we must return in a new life to atone for our sins. In sin eating practice it is understood that ‘karma’ must be dealt with immediately in the here-and-now since any sin has the power to erode the soul, leading to ill-health and further corruption.
A potion of flowers or plants, as per above, might then be administered to the client in order to balance and soothe the soul. In this way, sin eating – a practice perhaps more than 1000 years old – recognises a mind-body-spirit connection that modern science is only now starting to acknowledge, for the plant medicine itself would work on the troubled body and mind as well as healing the wounds of the soul.
THE ALONENESS OF THE SIN EATER
The most paradoxical aspect of the Sin Eater’s life was his role of being central to the well-being of the community but also ostracized from it. The Sin Eater was typically a man who spent much of his life alone, disparaged by the community he served – and yet, in one way at least, the most important member of that community for without him no-one who had sinned could enter the Kingdom of Heaven. At the same time, he was regarded as unclean, as strange and mad – and yet, if he was unclean, it was because of the sins he was eating. The sins of the community, not his own.
We often find this solitariness among people of spiritual power. A time of aloneness is a requisite in many shamanic initiations and in some traditions the shaman will also live on the outskirts of the community, representing in a physical and symbolic way his dwelling on the threshold or boundary, the ‘betwixt and between’ place of human and spiritual connection. In our fairytales and myths, as well, crones, witches, and other unusual people tend to live alone in woods and shadowlands.
The emotional hardship of the Sin Eater’s life, along with the decline of spiritual belief in our modern cities are perhaps two of the reasons why sin eating is no longer a central practice in funerary rites, although it survives symbolically. In Ireland, for example, it is still common for the corpse to lie in state in the family home and at one such funeral I attended in the mid-1980s, a service was held over the coffin and our host then offered a glass of wine and a funeral biscuit to each guest, handing it to us across the coffin itself. The burial-cakes still made in parts of rural England (Shropshire and Cumberland, for example) are also symbolic relics of the sin eating tradition.
In other countries sin eating still continues in a more original form. In Bavaria, for example, a corpse cake is placed on the ****** of the deceased before being eaten by the closest relative. In the Balkans a small bread image of the deceased is made and eaten by members of the family. In Holland, doed-koecks (dead-cakes) are eaten, each marked with the initials of the deceased.
As the modern world enters what we might call a sin-filled age of terrorism, warfare, and territorial invasion, perhaps it is time for a revival of this powerful healing tradition, for the sake of all our souls.
Helene Rothschild asked:
Do you typically find yourself stressed around Christmas? Would you like to feel relaxed and enjoy the preparation and celebrations? If you do not think that is possible, then read on.
First of all, I want to address the cause of stress which is negative, fear-based thinking. It is often destructive to our health and relationships. Stress can also prevent us from enjoying the festivities and the spirit of Christmas.
For example, we feel stressed when we worry about giving the perfect gift, or if we have enough money and/or time to purchase presents and/or prepare the holiday meals. Stress occurs when we believe that we should do something or we are not okay. We are also likely to feel guilty about the situation. For example, we may think that if we do not purchase an expensive gift, we are a bad person.
Just avoiding the words I should, and switching to the positive, love-based words such as I prefer, I want to, I wish to, and I will, can bring you great relief from stress. The truth is that whatever you do or don’t do you are okay and a good person.
You may be thinking, what about other people’s reactions? They will feel angry, hurt, rejected, or neglected. It is my belief that if you share your truth in a loving way, people will feel fine. For example, “I wanted to give you a gift (or visit you) but my funds are low. Thank you for understanding.”
The following are different ways and examples that can help you enjoy a stress free holiday.
A) Give low-cost or no-cost gifts by:
1) Sending a free internet e-card.
2) Mailing a card with a loving message.
3) Giving gifts you make. Examples include: a cake, pie, jewelry, painting, potholders, or candles.
4) Agreeing with family and/or friends that everyone purchase and gift wrap one present with a specific cost limit. It can be as low as $5 to $10.Then place them all in the middle of the room and each guest picks a number written on a folded piece of paper. People then choose a present in the order of their numbers. They open and display their present to everyone. After all the guests have their turn, they can choose to trade their gifts.
5) Doing the same as above except instead of purchasing a gift, everyone is asked to bring something they have in their home (commonly called a white elephant) to offer as a present.
6) Offering a personal service. This is only limited by your imagination. Examples include: a massage, a pedicure, cook a meal, clean the garage or cabinets, help them organize their closets or office, paint a room, wash their car, watch their children, or walk their dog.
B) Have inexpensive Christmas Dinners by:
1) Inviting everyone to bring a dish and/or drink to share (a potluck).
2) Asking people to donate money for the food and share in the cooking and cleaning-up.
C) Enjoy time with your family by:
1) Letting go of all expectations of anyone being different.
2) Realizing that what people do or say is about them and not you.
3) Knowing that you are okay no matter what anyone says or does.
4) Taking care of your own needs and wants.
5) Accepting people the way they are.
D) Plan ahead by:
1) Purchasing gifts on sale all year long.
2) Starting to make your lists early in November.
3) Finishing your shopping early in December.
Finally, we can avoid stress or let it go when we remember the true essence of Christmas. It is about expressing our caring and love. The Christmas Season reminds us what is important to do all year long. It is always a gift to others and ourselves when we express consideration, appreciation, and gratitude. A smile, a random act of kindness, acknowledgement, and being present are wonderful gifts to give and receive. Christmas is about feeling peaceful and loving, and that is also our major contribution to world peace.
Do you typically find yourself stressed around Christmas? Would you like to feel relaxed and enjoy the preparation and celebrations? If you do not think that is possible, then read on.
First of all, I want to address the cause of stress which is negative, fear-based thinking. It is often destructive to our health and relationships. Stress can also prevent us from enjoying the festivities and the spirit of Christmas.
For example, we feel stressed when we worry about giving the perfect gift, or if we have enough money and/or time to purchase presents and/or prepare the holiday meals. Stress occurs when we believe that we should do something or we are not okay. We are also likely to feel guilty about the situation. For example, we may think that if we do not purchase an expensive gift, we are a bad person.
Just avoiding the words I should, and switching to the positive, love-based words such as I prefer, I want to, I wish to, and I will, can bring you great relief from stress. The truth is that whatever you do or don’t do you are okay and a good person.
You may be thinking, what about other people’s reactions? They will feel angry, hurt, rejected, or neglected. It is my belief that if you share your truth in a loving way, people will feel fine. For example, “I wanted to give you a gift (or visit you) but my funds are low. Thank you for understanding.”
The following are different ways and examples that can help you enjoy a stress free holiday.
A) Give low-cost or no-cost gifts by:
1) Sending a free internet e-card.
2) Mailing a card with a loving message.
3) Giving gifts you make. Examples include: a cake, pie, jewelry, painting, potholders, or candles.
4) Agreeing with family and/or friends that everyone purchase and gift wrap one present with a specific cost limit. It can be as low as $5 to $10.Then place them all in the middle of the room and each guest picks a number written on a folded piece of paper. People then choose a present in the order of their numbers. They open and display their present to everyone. After all the guests have their turn, they can choose to trade their gifts.
5) Doing the same as above except instead of purchasing a gift, everyone is asked to bring something they have in their home (commonly called a white elephant) to offer as a present.
6) Offering a personal service. This is only limited by your imagination. Examples include: a massage, a pedicure, cook a meal, clean the garage or cabinets, help them organize their closets or office, paint a room, wash their car, watch their children, or walk their dog.
B) Have inexpensive Christmas Dinners by:
1) Inviting everyone to bring a dish and/or drink to share (a potluck).
2) Asking people to donate money for the food and share in the cooking and cleaning-up.
C) Enjoy time with your family by:
1) Letting go of all expectations of anyone being different.
2) Realizing that what people do or say is about them and not you.
3) Knowing that you are okay no matter what anyone says or does.
4) Taking care of your own needs and wants.
5) Accepting people the way they are.
D) Plan ahead by:
1) Purchasing gifts on sale all year long.
2) Starting to make your lists early in November.
3) Finishing your shopping early in December.
Finally, we can avoid stress or let it go when we remember the true essence of Christmas. It is about expressing our caring and love. The Christmas Season reminds us what is important to do all year long. It is always a gift to others and ourselves when we express consideration, appreciation, and gratitude. A smile, a random act of kindness, acknowledgement, and being present are wonderful gifts to give and receive. Christmas is about feeling peaceful and loving, and that is also our major contribution to world peace.
Dr.T.V.Rao MD asked:
The human life continues to be a struggle to live and prosper. In spite of several difficulties, human race and humanity survives and runs the world. In the teachings of Bhagavat Gita one sees it as a mystery or one speaks of it or hears of it as a mystery, but no one knows (Gita 1;29) stands true to happenings in the world. India is a land of culture, great heritage and enlightment. The history has shown that there are few people who come in near to the sufferings of human race. It is the unforgettable, Vivekananda. Swami is a source of great inspiration. His teachings are more important today than yesteryears as the changing responses to the present day circumstances, when the ideology of religion is totally misunderstood. Swamiji was an extraordinary creation of almighty, inherited his strength from Sri Ramakrishna. Vivekananda wished to be alone, never identified with any cult, and changed his name several times to avoid identity and followers. However he was named to be Vivekananda a little before his departure to America in May 1847 by Raja Ajit Singh of Ketri. Many believed Vivekananda had utmost potential to spread the message of India’s strength veiled with poverty of masses. He has told the West that Atma (force which rules everyone) is same in all, ruled by almighty. There is neither ruler nor subjects. Many Socialistic philosophies of the Europe have never equaled Swami’s teachings, but only created conflicts on capitalism and unrest of masses. With a huge population of millions, India survives as a peace loving nation with the teachings of Gita and Vivekananda”s ideology. Swamiji believed that we create our destiny, few people are lucky to have biographies written but words of swamiji’s teachings are a living biography which continues with saga of humanity. Swamiji’s extraordinary potentials are real gift of Sri Ramakrishna, who never influenced him with dogmatic ideas but only transformed with simple and honest living. His travel to the West was an explosion of Atom of Hinduism to the several free thinkers. His message was simple that Hinduism believes in wiping the tears of suffering humanity than creating followers and increase the masses of religious believers of their sect. He influenced so many in the West to accept that all religions lead us to same God and how you accept the truth lies with you. He has voiced his concern for poor and deprived. Today we progressed to mix God with religion, for exploitation and ultimately for our political ends. The greatest concern of the 21st century is growing intolerance to other religions forgetting the God as almighty who controls everyone. The great question how long this existing strife continues in India a question which will answered in the complete works of Vivekananda.
Vivekananda has become an embodiment of the East and West. The words of the Romain Rolland that Vivekananda embraced all the paths of spirit and four yoga’s in their entirely, renunciation and service, arts and science, religion and action from the most spiritual to the most practical, and proved that he was the personification of harmony of all human energy. The most important words true to his compassion to all humans, is expressed as each soul is potentially divine. The words of Rabindra Nath Tagore; “if you want to understand India study Vivekananda, in him everything is positive nothing negative.” Passing through turbulent waters in Kanyakumari, he prayed to his master Sri Ramakrishna, and mother Sharada Devi and consecrating to the service of outcast, starving, oppressed humans (Narayana’s). He has expressed that religion without concern for the poor and sufferings was much dry straw. At Kanyakumari Swami became the patriot and prophet in one. Propagated the message “TRUTH IS MY GOD, THE UNIVERSE IS MY COUNTRY”. I believe in GOD and I believe in MAN I believe in going even to hell to save others.
Today India is an emerging nation with human problems in new dimension and least concern for co-humans. The practice of Swami Vivekananda can change many hearts and bring light co humans. The spirit of VIVEKANANDA lives like a fire that has been burning for more than 100 years.
The human life continues to be a struggle to live and prosper. In spite of several difficulties, human race and humanity survives and runs the world. In the teachings of Bhagavat Gita one sees it as a mystery or one speaks of it or hears of it as a mystery, but no one knows (Gita 1;29) stands true to happenings in the world. India is a land of culture, great heritage and enlightment. The history has shown that there are few people who come in near to the sufferings of human race. It is the unforgettable, Vivekananda. Swami is a source of great inspiration. His teachings are more important today than yesteryears as the changing responses to the present day circumstances, when the ideology of religion is totally misunderstood. Swamiji was an extraordinary creation of almighty, inherited his strength from Sri Ramakrishna. Vivekananda wished to be alone, never identified with any cult, and changed his name several times to avoid identity and followers. However he was named to be Vivekananda a little before his departure to America in May 1847 by Raja Ajit Singh of Ketri. Many believed Vivekananda had utmost potential to spread the message of India’s strength veiled with poverty of masses. He has told the West that Atma (force which rules everyone) is same in all, ruled by almighty. There is neither ruler nor subjects. Many Socialistic philosophies of the Europe have never equaled Swami’s teachings, but only created conflicts on capitalism and unrest of masses. With a huge population of millions, India survives as a peace loving nation with the teachings of Gita and Vivekananda”s ideology. Swamiji believed that we create our destiny, few people are lucky to have biographies written but words of swamiji’s teachings are a living biography which continues with saga of humanity. Swamiji’s extraordinary potentials are real gift of Sri Ramakrishna, who never influenced him with dogmatic ideas but only transformed with simple and honest living. His travel to the West was an explosion of Atom of Hinduism to the several free thinkers. His message was simple that Hinduism believes in wiping the tears of suffering humanity than creating followers and increase the masses of religious believers of their sect. He influenced so many in the West to accept that all religions lead us to same God and how you accept the truth lies with you. He has voiced his concern for poor and deprived. Today we progressed to mix God with religion, for exploitation and ultimately for our political ends. The greatest concern of the 21st century is growing intolerance to other religions forgetting the God as almighty who controls everyone. The great question how long this existing strife continues in India a question which will answered in the complete works of Vivekananda.
Vivekananda has become an embodiment of the East and West. The words of the Romain Rolland that Vivekananda embraced all the paths of spirit and four yoga’s in their entirely, renunciation and service, arts and science, religion and action from the most spiritual to the most practical, and proved that he was the personification of harmony of all human energy. The most important words true to his compassion to all humans, is expressed as each soul is potentially divine. The words of Rabindra Nath Tagore; “if you want to understand India study Vivekananda, in him everything is positive nothing negative.” Passing through turbulent waters in Kanyakumari, he prayed to his master Sri Ramakrishna, and mother Sharada Devi and consecrating to the service of outcast, starving, oppressed humans (Narayana’s). He has expressed that religion without concern for the poor and sufferings was much dry straw. At Kanyakumari Swami became the patriot and prophet in one. Propagated the message “TRUTH IS MY GOD, THE UNIVERSE IS MY COUNTRY”. I believe in GOD and I believe in MAN I believe in going even to hell to save others.
Today India is an emerging nation with human problems in new dimension and least concern for co-humans. The practice of Swami Vivekananda can change many hearts and bring light co humans. The spirit of VIVEKANANDA lives like a fire that has been burning for more than 100 years.