Once the contemporary psychological approach to grief is recognized as culture-bound, where do we go from here? The authors of this innovative work base their investigations of grief on the theme of continuing bonds between the living and the dead. From ancestor veneration to the destruction of saints' graves, religious traditions structure and re-structure these ties. How they do this, and how new ties such as those with religious teachers are formed to endure beyond death, is the subject of this adventuresome and wide-ranging book. For those interested in moving beyond a psychological model of grief, this volume raises important questions about the roles of death, loss and meaning within a new model of grief and a new set of questions about persons, families, societies and transcendence.
