Spiritual Forum

This is an invention of modern western society. If death, then it should be nice and tolerable.

How brutal those Taliban are! They cut off heads! It is so inhuman!

The corpse must look beautiful, if possible. We exchange blood by embalming fluid and have a nice hair style. We take a good make up and make all appearances of death (blue spots on the body, fingers etc.) disappear. Mom must look good in her coffin. Oh, how she smiles...

Most battles in modern wars are fought in front of big screens. Bombs falling from high above, and rockets hit their targets far away.

We don`t like speaking of death and dying in front of kids. Did you know, that most people nowadays die in a hospital? Only a few pass awaat home surrounded by their loved ones.

I want you to look these pics: http://www.jeffagrarian.com/?p=141

There was a time people had those photos in their homes. They often were the only pics they had. A photo of dead mom? Can you imagine today? Only a few can...

The aesthetics of death is a modern way denying the scares of death.

In 150 years the avarage life time has doubled. In former times death was much more often a companion of families. From 10 kids almost 5 died before they got 10. Big families had to deal with it.  Death had a face.

Here is a Grimm tale which I find very deep and honest:

The aged mother

Image: The aged mother

In a large town there was an old woman who sat in the evening alone in her room thinking how she had lost first her husband, then both her children, then one by one all her relations, and at length, that very day, her last friend, and now she was quite alone and desolate. She was very sad at heart, and heaviest of all her losses to her was that of her sons; and in her pain she blamed God for it. She was still sitting lost in thought, when all at once she heard the bells ringing for early prayer. She was surprised that she had thus in her sorrow watched through the whole night, and lighted her lantern and went to church. It was already lighted up when she arrived, but not as it usually was with wax candles, but with a dim light. It was also crowded already with people, and all the seats were filled; and when the old woman got to her usual place it also was not empty, but the whole bench was entirely full. And when she looked at the people, they were none other than her dead relations who were sitting there in their old-fashioned garments, but with pale faces. They neither spoke nor sang; but a soft humming and whispering was heard all over the church. Then an aunt of hers stood up, stepped forward, and said to the poor old woman, "Look there beside the altar, and thou wilt see thy sons." The old woman looked there, and saw her two children, one hanging on the gallows, the other bound to the wheel. Then said the aunt, "Behold, so would it have been with them if they had lived, and if the good God had not taken them to himself when they were innocent children." The old woman went trembling home, and on her knees thanked God for having dealt with her more kindly than she had been able to understand, and on the third day she lay down and died.

The truth is we all are going to die, and we all have to deal with the death of loved ones and those we know. And any aesthetics of death will not really help in this. We have to face death. Any aesthetics is only a lie.

Seeing a dead body is somehow always a scare, but it is reality. I want you to show some sensitive photograpers` pics he made after speaking with the subjects:

http://www.noch-mal-leben.de/h/exponate_4_de.php

I kindly ask you to not rashly say, there is no death, and all is illusion. Of course we are all part of the immortal divine. But in our human experience there is death, and it is real. And it is always hard. And it does not really need any euphemizing aesthetics...