Gauri Shankar Mishra, Aghori Baba drinking from a human skull. The Aghori are a Hindu sect believed to have split off from the Kapalika order (which dates from 1000 CE) in the fourteenth century. Both Kapalika and Aghori sects are worshipers of Lord Shiva. Aghori means non-terrifying in Sanskrit, and may refer to how members of the sect view death. This extremely secretive community is known to live in graveyards, wear ash from the pyre, and use human bones from graveyards for rituals. Image File history File links This is a lossless scalable vector image. ...
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In Hinduism, sadhu is a common term for an ascetic or practitioner of yoga (yogi) who has given up pursuit of the first three Hindu goals of life: kama (pleasure), artha (wealth and power) and even dharma (duty). ...
A Hindu ( , Devanagari: हिनà¥à¤¦à¥), as per modern definition, is an adherent of the philosophies and scriptures of Hinduism, and the religious, philosophical and cultural system that originated in the Indian subcontinent. ...
In Hindu culture, Kapalika means bearer of the skull-bowl. ...
Europe in 1000 The year 1000 of the Gregorian Calendar was the last year of the 10th century as well as the last year of the first millennium. ...
This 14th-century statue from south India depicts the gods Shiva (on the left) and Uma (on the right). ...
Shiva (IAST: , also spelled Siva; Hindi, Shiv) is one of the principal deities of Hinduism. ...
The Sanskrit language ( , for short ) is a classical language of India, a liturgical language of Hinduism, Buddhism, Sikhism, and Jainism, and one of the 23 official languages of India. ...
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Doctrines
Aghori ascetics, while being devotees of the Hindu god Shiva, are monists who adhere to the common Hindu belief in liberation (moksha) from the cycle of reincarnation (samsara). This liberation is a realisation of the self's identity with the absolute. Because of this monistic doctrine, the Aghoris maintain that all opposites are identical and that the conventional Hindu distinctions between purity and impurity are ultimately illusory. The purpose of embracing pollution through various practices is the realization of non-duality through transcending social taboos, and seeing the illusory nature of all conventional categories. The word ascetic derives from the ancient Greek term askesis (practice, training or exercise). ...
Monism is the metaphysical position that all is of one essential essence, substance or energy. ...
Moksha - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia /**/ @import /skins-1. ...
The Wheel of Life as portrayed within Buddhism, showing the cycle of Samsara, or reincarnation. ...
In essence, Aghoris base their beliefs on two principles. First, that the gods are perfect. Second, that the gods are responsible for everything; every rock, tree, animal, and even every thought. Due to this, everything that exists must be perfect, and to deny the perfection of anything would be to deny the gods. For this reason, Aghoris are known to prove their faith by challenging pre-conceived notions of the grotesque, and find the beauty or perfection in such conventionally taboo notions as, for example, cannibalism.
History Although akin to the Kapalika ascetics of medieval Kashmir, with whom there may be a historical connection, the Aghoris trace their origin to Kina Ram, an ascetic who is said to have lived 150 years during the second half of the eighteenth century. Kina Ram is thought to have been an incarnation of the Hindu god Shiva, as have been each of Kina Ram's successors. Necrophagy, the eating of corpse flesh, is attested to by a sixteenth century Persian source and in nineteenth century British accounts. In Hindu culture, Kapalika means bearer of the skull-bowl. ...
Symbols The Aghori ascetic is himself a symbol of the god Shiva. He goes naked or wears the shroud of a corpse, he covers himself in the ashes of the cremation ground--which would be polluting for an orthodox Brahmin--and his ritual practices are symbols of his non-dualistic beliefs. The corpse upon which he meditates is a symbol of his own body and the corpse devouring ritual is a symbol of the transcendence of his lower self and a realisation of the greater, all pervading self. A Brahmin (anglicised from the Sanskrit adjective belonging to Brahma) also known as Brahman belonging to ; Vipra, Dvija twice-born, is considered to be the Priest class (varna) in the ancient universal Varna System and a caste found all over the world, especially India and Nepal in Indian caste system...
Adherents Due to the secrecy of this religious sect, no official figures are available. At the end of the nineteenth century there were an estimated two or three hundred Aghori ascetics in Varanasi, though now there are perhaps as few as twenty living in their main centre. The Aghoris do, however, have a large lay following, and devotees from the Indian middle classes.
Headquarters The main akhada of Aghoris is Kina Ram's hermitage or ashram in Varanasi. Kina Ram's samadhi is a centre of piligrimage for aghoris and aghori devotees. Here Kina Ram is buried in a tomb or samadhi which is a centre of pilgrimage for Aghoris and Aghori devotees. Apart from this, any cremation ground would be a holy place for an Aghori ascetic. An akhada is a congregation in a military Hindu monastic order. ...
Onuphrius lived as a hermit in the desert of Upper Egypt in the late 4th century A hermit (from the Greek erēmos, signifying desert, uninhabited, hence desert-dweller) is a person who lives to some greater or lesser degree in seclusion and/or isolation from society. ...
An Ashram (Pronounced aashram) in ancient India was a Hindu hermitage where sages (See Rishi) lived in peace and tranquility amidst nature. ...
, VÄrÄasÄ« ( , Hindi: , IPA: ), also known as Benares, Banaras, or Benaras ( , Hindi: , , IPA: ), or Kashi or Kasi ( , Hindi: , ), is a famous Hindu holy city situated on the banks of the river Ganges (Ganga) in the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh. ...
Samadhi (Sanskrit, lit. ...
References - Dhallapiccola, Anna. Dictionary of Hindu Lore and Legend. ISBN 0-500-51088-1
- Svoboda, Robert. Aghora: At the Left Hand of God. ISBN 0-914732-21-8
Robert Edwin Svoboda (born 1953 - Texas, USA) is an American author and ayurvedic doctor who continually travels the globe giving lectures and courses related to the subjects of Ayurveda, Jyotish, Tantra and Eastern religious thought. ...
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