In Buddhism, Pretas, the "Hungry ghosts" are pitiable creatures with huge, empty stomachs which suffer constant hunger...
Buddhists believe that beings are reborn as hungry ghosts because of their greed, envy, addiction, obsession, and compulsion and jealousy...
And yet, in the summer there are hungry ghost festivals throughout Asia that feature food and entertainment for the hungry ghosts...
The origin of Buddhist "hungry ghosts" is in Hinduism, where originally Preta was understood as the ghost of any deceased individual. The Sanskrit word "preta" (प्रेत) literally means "departed, deceased, a dead person" derived from "pra-ita" meaning "gone forth, departed"...
Today, the dead are burned and the food is given to them "for a year, until they reincarnate"...But I wonder if this belief about the hungry dead originates from the time before Hindus started to be burn their dead and before Hindus started believing in reincarnation?
Here is why. Today the Hindu families ritually feed the deceased "whose spirit is often symbolised by a clay mound somewhere in the house"...Why? Is this a remnant of the memory of the the time when the dead were buried under the mounds of clay (earth), under tumuli?
Is it possible that this belief and ritual came to India from the steppe with the Indo-Europeans? Who did bury their dead under the tumuli. And is it possible that these are actually remnants of the ancient Ancestor Cult?
The same ancestral cult featuring ever hungry and thirsty ancestors found among the Slavs for instance? I talked about this in many of my posts, like "Soul breads", "Dead man loaf" and , in which I talked about the breads made for the hungry dead...
It is interesting that Hindus feed their "hungry dead" rice balls, "which are said to symbolise the body of the deceased"...Just like in the Slavic ancestor cult where ancestors are believed to be the source of grain.
I talked about this in my post "Diduch", about Diduch (grandfather), symbolic representation of the the dead ancestors who govern the lives of the living...
Romans too saw direct link between the dead and the grain. I talked about this in my article "Lapis Manalis", about the sacred water stone which covered the entrance into the underworld/grain storage pit...
BTW, while I was looking for a suitable illustration for "lapis manalis" (we don't know what it actually looked like), the sacred stone used as part of a Roman "aquaelicium" (calling of the waters), rain making ceremony performed during droughts, I suddenly realised what cup and ring marks look like...
We find the same link between the dead, the god of the dead, Osiris and grain in Egyptian religion too. I talked about this in these articles where I talk about why Egyptians believed that grain grows from the body of Osiris...I talked about this in my post "The beard of Osiris" and "Braided beard"...
It is this life giving power of the dead, which Pluto (Hades), the giver of wealth, appropriated for himself. And this is why Hades and Persephone are depicted sitting on their throne in the land of the dead, with sheafs of wheat and flowers...I talked about this in my post "Pluto"...
In the Mesopotamian and Hittite ancestor cult, we also find hangry and thirsty ancestors who are also linked to rain and grain. Talked about this in my article "Care of the dead" about the care of the dead in Mesopotamia and Anatolia...
"...humiliation of the Hittite kingdom is the result of the fact that the Hittites have forgotten to respect the sacred bond with their dead..." - Last Hittite king Suppiluliuma II.
Statue of Suppiluliuma II, Hatay Archeology Museum
The last thing that I will say about the "hungry ghosts" is that in China the hungry ghost festival is held on the 15th day of the 7th lunar month which corresponds to Jul/Aug in Gregorian calendar...
During the festivals, people give food to the hungry ghosts and hope for blessings from their ancestors in return...This is the old contract between the dead and the living. The living feed the dead so that the dead will feed the living...The contract the Hittites broke...
The Chinese seventh lunar month, is actually known as the "Ghost Month" or "Hungry Ghost Month," and is believed to be a time of the year when the gates of the underworld open, allowing spirits to roam the earth...
Very interesting, considering that in Mesopotamia, July, or month of Ab, was dedicated to the dead and the dead god, Tammuz, who died and went to the underworld...You can read more about this here...
The rituals of this month, consisted in eating bread in the funeral feasts for the dead god of life, who now reposed in hell, and in carrying torches by night for the souls of the dead who during this month ascended from the underworld to the world of the living...
Interesting, right?
