necessary conditions, or by showing
that it suffers from a fallacy that
renders it untenable.
Tarpana
(“satisfying”) Tarpana is a memorial rite
performed for the satisfaction of one’s
ancestors, in which one offers them
libations of waterto quench their thirst.
Tarpana satisfies the “sacrificeto the
ancestors,” which is one of the Five
Great Sacrifices. These five sacrifices are
mandatory daily religious observances
(nitya karma) for a “twice-born” house-
holder, that is, a householder who has
been born into one of the three “twice-
born” groups in Indian society—brah-
min, kshatriya, or vaishya—and who
has received the adolescent religious
initiationknown as the second birth.
Tarpana is also sometimes an occasional
religious act (naimittika karma), which
should be performed on occasions
when one is bathing (snana) at pilgrim-
age places (tirthas). The rite itself is
quite simple. The performer first bathes
to become ritually pure, scoops up
water in his joined hands, then tips his
fingers forward to let the water drain
out. Some sources also specify that the
water should be mixed with sesame
seeds, a substance associated with
offerings to the dead. Tarpana was
considered a companion rite to the
memorial ceremony known as shraddha,
although as an obligatory daily act,
tarpana was performed much more
frequently. In the shraddha ritual, one
symbolically feeds one’s ancestors to
satisfy their hunger, whereas in the
tarpana ritual, one gives them water to
quench their thirst.
Tat Tvam Asi
(“You are that”) In the Hindu philosophical
tradition, one of the “great utterances”
(mahavakyas) expressing the ultimate
truth. The truth referred to here is the
identity of atman(the individual Self )
and Brahman (Supreme Reality); this
identity is the heart of the speculative
texts called the Upanishads. This partic-
ular passage is found repeatedly in the
sixth book of the Chandogya
Upanishad, in which the boy
Shvetaketuis being instructed by his
father. The boy’s father uses a series
of analogies to convey his instruction
regarding the identical natures of the
atman and Brahman, ending every
such analogy with this concluding
phrase, which contains the wisdom
of the whole.
In addition to its textual importance,
this and three other mahavakyas—as
utterances that capsulize fundamental
truth—were appropriated as identifying
symbols by the four divisions of the
Dashanami Sanyasi ascetics. Each
division had a different mahavakya, just
as each had a different Veda, a different
primary sacred center, and a different
paradigmatic ascetic quality. Tat
tvam asi is the mahavakya associated
with the Kitawara division of the
Dashanami Sanyasis.Tat Tvam AsiBather performs the tarpana memorial rite in the
sacred Ganges River, Varanasi.