E65: The Spiritual Domain of Stuff

To continue our exploration of stuff in the "7 Domains of Women's Health," today we're going to work on the spiritual domain. This is one of the seven domains, and it's the last one of this particular podcast series. If you haven't listened to the other ones, please plug in and find topics that might interest you.

But in this spiritual domain, they say you can't take it with you, meaning what you accumulate won't go with you when you die. At least most of us think that that's the case, but in some cultures, that's not the belief.

And for some cultures, even our own, we think they can't take it with them, but we put roses in the coffin, and even now we put flowers on the grave, as noted. And children who die young, their caskets, which are heartbreakingly small, often have a toy or other special object placed in the casket with them.

So what's our spiritual attachment to stuff? Of course, there are spiritual symbols, like the cross on a chain someone might wear around their neck, or a wedding ring where the thing, the stuff is an outward and visible sign of an inward and spiritual grace. But I think about what humans have placed in the graves of people they love or value. What is it that people are buried with? Which I've always learned was called "grave goods."

There are some examples maybe of cultures, I think in Nordic burials, where there's jewelry and swords, and Chinese burials with huge mounds and tons and tons of stuff and people in there.

Dr. Jones: We have our favorite anthropologist, Dr. Polly Wiessner, with us to shed light on things we want with us when we die. Polly is a cultural anthropologist, meaning she studies what people keep and the way they interact in their culture.

Thanks for joining us, Polly. So tell me a little bit about grave goods and what you know.

Dr. Wiessner: Well, I'm going to give you an idea of the spectrum, the wide spectrum of what's put in graves. In some burials, from Europe through Asia, they have pot burials. The pot is upside down and the pot holds the soul. So they put the body in and then they have a container for the soul.

Dr. Jones: Wait, wait, wait. Stop, stop, stop. How do they get the body in the pot? Do they wait until it's just bones and stick the bones in there?

Dr. Wiessner: No, the body is not in the pot. But the pot is on top of the body.

Dr. Jones: Oh, I got it.

Dr. Wiessner: Upside down. And that holds the soul.

Dr. Jones: Well, I definitely want that. I want my soul.

Dr. Wiessner: I was thinking the same. And then there are other burials which . . . you have quite a few burials that might have people's dogs with them. Some, as we know, unfortunately, have wives, people to accompany a person into the next world. Then you have large jars in Southeast Asia that contain the body and the soul. They build these huge pots.

In one Yang dynasty, that's before the state was established in China, they had a man buried with two horses in his chariot. And in Europe, they often have buried people with wagons to carry their stuff. And then you have, of course, jewelry. A lot of times, there are pots with food or with beer or something to feed people on their journey along the way. This is very common.

In some cultures, they have ceremonies at the burial site every year for a while where they bring more food. And of course, in some of the pyramids also people came in and brought food or drink for the deceased Pharaoh.

And then some have identity, like swords for warriors. Some have precious items to indicate their realm of influence.

So there are lots of reasons for this, but mostly they have to do with status-seeking or helping someone along on the journey or expressing identity.

Dr. Jones: Do you know if Neanderthal people buried their people?

Dr. Wiessner: They did.

Dr. Jones: Did they bury their dead with any things?

Dr. Wiessner: Red ocher and skins, yes. So they seemed to have ritualized burial at Neanderthal time, which is very interesting.

Dr. Jones: Yeah, because I think they had flowers, if they could find seeds or flowers in the burial parts.

Dr. Wiessner: Yeah.

Dr. Jones: So the concept of a burial, a ritual with some things that were important for that person or for the culture. The Bushmen in New Guinea, the people that you have studied, are they buried with any stuff?

Dr. Wiessner: The Bushmen are interesting because of their emphasis on social networks. What happens is the Bushmen are buried with the things they wore when they passed away, because people wouldn't want to touch them. They just wrap them in a blanket and bury them.

But the other possessions are taken by the children of the deceased, and they're handed out to the children of the exchange partners. And they say, "This has been a wonderful relationship. We want to keep it alive." That's what many funerals are about. They are connecting people who died and broke the connections and they're reconnecting people. Bushmen do that.

The Enga case, do you want to hear about that? It's very interesting.

Dr. Jones: I do. The Enga who are in New Guinea.

Dr. Wiessner: Yeah, in New Guinea. They're horticulturalists. This just shows how religious beliefs also affect burials. In the past, they believed that the ghost of the deceased would attack the descendants, bite them, and take them with him to the world of the dead. And so when somebody died, they didn't bury them with anything. They just took the corpse out far away from the village and buried it, and put a little plant just to mark that it was a grave.

With Christianity, the Christian dogma was that there's life after death. And they really tried to repress belief in ghosts as much as possible, and that has happened.

So today, the burials have become central to the societies and it's central to expressing status and love. And now they build right next to the house these huge, huge tombs that can cost like $20,000. That's a lot of money there. Very elaborate, decorated with pictures of the person.

And some of the Seventh-day Adventists believe in the Second Coming. So some of them build houses for the person to wait for the Second Coming. And there's a great amount of status expression in burials since the changeover to Christian beliefs.

Dr. Jones: Well, I think about giving away when someone dies, it's an opportunity for people to come in, their friends, and say, "Please take something that you want of my father or my mother's stuff to remember them by."

I think of my favorite ritual, because I'm kind of food oriented. I'm like a lab, I guess, a Labrador Retriever. I'm cuddly and I'm a food-oriented person. But I like the idea of after the ceremony, everybody brings food and they have a big party, and what everybody brings is their favorite food. And so what you end up with is a lot of stuff that holds food if they don't take it away or come and get it. But lots and lots of foodstuff to celebrate and have a big party.

But yeah, I think if I die, I want a big party so people can take away something of mine that they might want to have.

Dr. Wiessner: Well, in New Guinea now, the elders, when they know they're going to die soon, they don't want to miss their party. So they have their funeral party held before they die, and so that they can eat the pork and celebrate with everybody.

Dr. Jones: That sounds great.

Dr. Wiessner: I know.

Dr. Jones: I'm up for it. If I could come up with a date . . . and I still have to have an appetite, and I would have to be with it enough to enjoy my party.

So they kind of know. That's pretty interesting. Do they ever get the time wrong? Or do people not come because they don't think someone is going to die?

Dr. Wiessner: Oh, no, they do it probably months before they die. When they die, they often go out into the forest, and they sit in these little huts, and they try to transition. But usually when they have their funeral feast, they die within a year. They kind of have a sense of it. I think it's a great idea.

Dr. Jones: I think so. I mean, people always say, "I would love to be a fly on the wall at my funeral. I'd love to see what people say. What do they bring for yummies at the party, and will people get enough to drink? And would they take something fun? I want to see who takes what."

This is a personal thing about stuff. My father was cremated with his wedding ring, and I've talked about this in another episode of this 7 Domains of Stuff. He was born with this wedding ring, which is our family ring. All of us have a copy of this ring, and it was my mom's choice, but I wanted it saved for the family that followed him. I wanted it given away, but it wasn't my choice to make.

I'd say I was very upset that the ring was cremated with him because it wasn't even the ring anymore by the time he had ashes. And so I don't know. Polly, do you have friends or family that were buried with things?

Dr. Wiessner: Well, when my mother died . . . and she was a really fun and crazy character. So we wrapped her up in her favorite Indian blanket, we put a really crazy flowered feathered hat on her head, and we put all her favorite stuffed animals. She was a little bit moving into the sunset mentally, and so we put them in her arms. We put them in the arms, and then I said to the undertaker, "She wanted to be cremated, and she didn't want to be cold. So we've got her all wrapped up. Just take her and cremate her right away."

Dr. Jones: With all those things?

Dr. Wiessner: All those things, yep. And then the next day, he came back with the ashes, and I sat there for two hours staring at the ashes, saying, "How can this transformation be?"

Dr. Jones: Yeah. Did your dad have any stuff?

Dr. Wiessner: No. He said, "That blank-blank undertaker is not going to get me." He was the one in town. And so he made an agreement with him that when he died, he would just be wrapped in a blanket and taken to the hospital to give his body to science. And the undertaker just put him in the back seat of the car with no stuff.

Dr. Jones: I think for many of us who would like to have . . . particularly those of us in the medical field who realize the gift for people who gave their bodies to science or to medical students for anatomy, we didn't leave any stuff. Our bodies just went right to the anatomy lab. I think we were embalmed.

I've had that thought for myself, as I don't want to take any stuff with me. But if my body can be of use somewhere, if I can teach somebody, if somebody wants to look at my insides, just make sure you take my ring off and give it to my son. I don't want my ring on. That's all I want.

Well, any stuff you want buried with you for future anthropologists to find, Polly?

Dr. Wiessner: I want to have the ashes of my beloved cockatoo and maybe the ashes of my parents. And then I think I'll let my kids choose what's going to accompany me into the next world.

Dr. Jones: Yeah. I think that when we die, we are still in the memories of the people who love us or hate us. And if we died and something important was put with us, then the memory for those people who went to our funeral and knew that that item went with us, then that memory of us has that thing with us. So in the collective holographic memory of all the people we knew and loved, if they knew that we were buried or cremated with a special thing, then that thing becomes a part of the memory of us. The thing becomes part of this bigger memory.

Early on, and even today, some of the things we carry with us in this life and to our grave have significant spiritual value. And I've been rethinking, now that I think about the holographic memory of me when I die, maybe I do want something there so people say, "Oh, yeah, she was buried or cremated with this thing, and now I'll always think of her and that thing together." So I'm really grateful for you helping us think about this stuff.

Dr. Wiessner: Well, thank you, Kirtly. And I think for your kids, also, the idea that they send you off with something meaningful is very comforting to them.

Dr. Jones: Well, that's a conversation that I might need to have. 

So for people listening, maybe that's a conversation that you should have sooner than later. To end out our 7 Domains of Stuff, I'm going to offer a haiku.

My stuff is with me
The beloved memories, Mm
I'll get rid of that

For those who are counting haiku words, I think "mm" doesn't count as a word, so I'm going to throw that in as a non-word.

I hope your stuff is a treasure and not a burden. And for all of you listening to "7 Domains of Women's Health," there are seven short podcasts on the 7 Domains of Stuff, and you can pick them out as your interest leads you and listen to them wherever you get your podcasts. Thanks, Polly, for joining us, and thank you all for listening to the 7 Domains of Stuff.