Dictionary of all Scriptures & Myths

Understanding Global Symbolism


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CREMATION OF THE CORPSE

A symbol of the purification of the soul or the lower self by means of the functioning of buddhi (fire).

"There is, indeed, no doubt that the very ancient association of the ideas of Fire and of spiritual Purification goes back, in the first instance, to the conception of the soul being necessarily stained by the very fact of its connection with the body, and of those stains being finally removed by the body's death and cremation. We find this severely self-consistent view scattered up and down Hellenic religion and literature. . . . The Fire is, at bottom, so spiritual and so directly busy with the soul alone, that it is ever identical with itself in Heaven, Hell, Purgatory, and on earth, and stands for God himself; and that its effects are not the destruction of a foreign substance, but the bringing back, wherever and as far as possible, of the Fire-like soul's disposition and quality to full harmony with its Fire-source and Parent, God Himself." – F. VON HUGEL, Mystical Element, Vol. II. p. 125.

See Also

BURNING
CORPSE
FIRE
FUNERAL PILES
KABANDHA
NANNA
PURGATORY