Funeral Planning

At some point in our lives, we all come to realize that death is a part of life. Cultural diversity provides a wide variety of lifestyles and traditions for each of the unique groups of people in our world. Within these different cultures, the rituals associated with death and burial can also be uniquely diverse. Many consider ritualistic traditions that differ from their own to be somewhat strange and often perceive them as unnatural. A prime example would be the burial rituals of the Native American people.

The temples, pyramids, tombs, and religious artifacts left behind all tell us that the Ancient Egyptians believed in the resurrection of the dead. Their belief in immortality was the fundamental driving force behind their religion. “The formulae which were declared to have been recited during the performance of ceremonies were written down and copied for scores of generations, and every pious, well-to-do Egyptian made arrangements that what had been done and said on behalf of Osiris should be done and said for him outside and inside his tomb after his death.” (Liturgy of Funeral Offerings, pg.2) This illustrates just how important the ceremony and the process was to the Egyptians. Their belief in the afterlife and the importance of the ceremonial steps taken to get them there caused them great concern with their own funerals. Today, everyone has an idea of what they would like to do for their own funeral as well. We may follow in the same patterns as our family heritage has done for generations with either a traditional funeral or cremation, or we may have a newer alternative in mind for our self. Even though we may not be preparing for an afterlife, we still have an

Every individual experiences the act of death, and most persons experience the death of someone they know of. Whether family, kin, or someone infamous, the living deal with the process of dying. Anthropology seeks to understand the universal process of death ritual and how different cultures deal with death differently. An anthropologist can extract social values of a given culture, past or present, from how death ceremony is practiced. Such values could be regarding political hierarchy or an individual’s status in a society, and about a culture’s spiritual or religious faith. By exploring death ceremony in ancient Egypt, contemporary Hindu death practice in India, and current North American funerary rites, it can be illustrated that

The article, “10 Burdens Funeral Directors Carry”, written by Caleb Wilde expresses the unique struggles of those working the funeral business. They face numerous challenges through trying to aid and support those mourning a loved one. This often over looked and underappreciated field offers a salient as well as specific service desperately needed by each community. By encountering: depression, psychosis, isolation, stress, workaholism and death itself funeral directors make numerous personal sacrifices to continue to provide honor and respect to the dead.

Today the Chinese population still follows these traditions with a few small exceptions of modern times. All elders are given respect in the Chinese society, those living or deceased. There is a question that still remains in this culture on how to prepare a funeral of unmarried adults and children. No respect is given to a person who died as a bachelor or bachelorette, or if they did not have children. They are not considered an elder and do not have children that prepare the funeral for them. Children are also shown no respect because they do not have anyone to prepare their death ritual. They are left at their funeral home and the family members preform these burials in silence. The children in Chinese families prepare funerals for elders. It is considered proper for the children of the deceased to go into debt in order to pay respect for the older people at the funeral. The body of the dead must be washed with care, dusted with talcum powder, and dressed in the nicest clothes from the personal wardrobe before being placed in the casket for burial. All of the other clothing that belongs to the deceased elder must be burned. The deceased is never dressed in red because it is believed that it will turn the corpse into a ghost. The body is placed on a yellow cloth with the face covered, and then the body is covered with a blue cloth. All statues of deities are covered with red paper and all mirrors are removed from site in the home when preparing the home for the death ritual. The mirror is removed so that no one sees the coffin in the mirror. If someone sees the coffin in the mirror, it is believed that you will have a death within your own family soon. A white cloth is hung in the doorway and a gong is placed outside the door of the home of the deceased. If the person who is deceased is a male, it is placed on the left side; if female, it is placed

The history of ceremonies for care of the dead goes back as far as 60,000 BC when the Neanderthals used flowers and animal antlers to decorate the dead. Embalming originated in 4000 BC with the Egyptians but was uncommon there until 3400 BC. Embalming was first introduced in to the US by Dr. Thomas Holmes (1817-1900)

Dead?" AlterNet. In this article, Frankie Colmane looks into how dead bodies are treated in the United State even after Mitford's expose of the funeral industry was published. The article takes both a philosophical and scientific issue with the procedure of embalming sighting proven negative effects to human beings and the environment. Colmane shows that even though people are aware of the malfeasance and misappropriations of the funeral industry following pieces like Mitford's, very little has changed. Therefore problems that have been discussed in earlier works should not be forgotten. Rather they should be continually brought up until the issue is solved. During the 1800s, embalming became common practice because the dead family member would lie in state within the home for a period of days or weeks until it would be buried (Colmane 2010). The article shows the duplicity such as when "funeral directors were arguing forcefully against charges that their mediation between the living and the dead translated into social obstruction that barred the stricken from facing death with maturity, realism, and honest" (page 2). This article will be used to illustrate that things have not changed with funereal practices despite the publication of Mitford's essay.

In ancient Egypt, food offerings were made to the dead. In ancient Greece, pictures of feasts and their favorite things along with food were offered. The overall funeral between the two cultures was very similar in the way things were conducted, however grievers were different. In ancient Greece, people wore black robes and women cut their cheeks and hair to show their grief. In ancient Egypt, people showed their grief through the floral collars they wore . While the beliefs of the afterlife and funerals don’t differ tremendously between the two places, the way they handled the actual body did. In ancient Greece, they buried the dead so the dead who had good hearts would be ensured to make it to the good parts of the afterlife. In ancient Egypt, they used their advanced technologies to preserve bodies through mummification, so the dead could come out of the dead to accept offerings and essentially live forever. Sometimes, afterlife religious practices involved sacrifices which were found in different parts of life leading to the next idea.

I have read pages nine through twenty of our assigned book, Death and Dying in America. These few pages cover a variety of topics, mainly the history of how Western societies have handled death in the past.

Literature review was not extensive for the purposes of this project, but future research may shape the results of this study. An important limitation to consider is that the financial aspect was not researched in depth. It was undetermined how much of the funeral cost would be covered by my life insurance policy, and prices I received from the funeral directors and former pastor were only general estimates. Some funeral expenses were likely not accounted for because of the brevity of the interviews. Another factor to consider is that the interview with my family members was conducted in a single group sitting. Individuals may not have felt comfortable expressing their opinions amongst the group, and group think may have played a role in the answers received. Wishes for my funeral services may also change with the course of time, and some aspects of the funeral may have been forgotten in the initial interview process. Private interviews should be conducted in the future, and the dialogue about death should be ongoing to account for these

Because of this, people received payment to bury the dead. The way they buried people was very simple, they threw them all into a pit, and then covered the pit with dirt. A dead man received no more recognition than a dead goat would today.

Funeral ceremonies were extremely elaborate, especially for upper class citizens. Funerals had five parts in Ancient Rome; the procession, the cremation and burial, the eulogy, the feast, and the commemoration. Ceremonies began closely after death, as soon as all necessary preparations were made. At the home, the deceased’s body would be washed with warm water and then anointed. If the deceased person had held office, a wax impression of his features would be taken. Next, the body would be dressed in in a toga with all the regalia of the rank he was allowed to wear. Incense would be burned and pine woul dbe places outside the door to signify death in the house. In early and late times, when burial was more popular than cremation, a coing would be placed in between the teeth of the deceased, as payment for Charon, the ferryman of the underworld. These rites were simplified in poorer funerals, as well as done by a family member. However, for the rich, an undertaker, or designator, would do so().

In ancient Egypt much like today the more money or power or influence you had the grander your burial. people with more money had grander sarcophaguses or caskets as they are known today. There burial place was also a status symbol many not smooch today but within western culture and also other cultures rich influence family had tombs were they could lay to rest all the dependents of the family Egypt had large pyramids that served as tombs. Though our tombs were not booby trapped like the Egyptian pyramids.

In pursuing this further, there are several aspects to this topic; such as, preplanning, financial planning, cost, and the surviving family members. Funeral planning is something we all will have to do at one point in our lives, but where should we begin? It is a good idea to start with the preplanning of the funeral. Preplanning is crucial; it provides piece of mind, especially for surviving family. As said earlier, discussing one 's mortality is an extremely uncomfortable topic; however, by preplanning a funeral, it will relieve the family of having to make important decisions during a period of immense stress and grief. Furthermore, preplanning gives time to explore the options for a ceremony and allows time to discuss the financial aspects. It also gives a chance to choose a funeral home that best suit ones needs and budget.

The importance of burial plays a great part during the time period of The Ancient Romans as they had a strong emotional attachment to the ceremonial burial of the deceased and considered it such an honourable achievement to partake in such a religious ritual such as the funeral and burial. The Romans also wanted to demonstrate iusta facere towards the dead - the great deal of respect they had as well as the rights they had as the departed.