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The Palgrave Handbook of the AfterlifeThe Afterlife in Early Civilizations

The Palgrave Handbook of the Afterlife: The Afterlife in Early Civilizations [This article reviews afterlife beliefs as found in the texts of the world’s earliest civilizations: Old and Middle Kingdom Egypt, Sumer, Vedic India, pre-Buddhist China, and Maya and Nahua Mesoamerica. Despite the fact that these civilizations had little or no cultural contact with the others during these periods, there are a number of similarities between their afterlife beliefs. As well as presenting overviews of beliefs in each civilization, this chapter discusses ways of understanding the reasons for these similarities by reference to certain universal factors (cognitive psychology and near-death experience); and of understanding the differences by reference to various culture-specific factors (social structure, environment, and wider religious/ritual contexts).] http://www.deepdyve.com/assets/images/DeepDyve-Logo-lg.png

The Palgrave Handbook of the AfterlifeThe Afterlife in Early Civilizations

Part of the Palgrave Frontiers in Philosophy of Religion Book Series
Editors: Nagasawa, Yujin; Matheson, Benjamin
Shushan, Gregory
The Palgrave Handbook of the Afterlife — Aug 15, 2017
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19 pages

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Publisher
Palgrave Macmillan UK
Copyright
© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s) 2017. The author(s) has/have asserted their right(s) to be identified as the author(s) of this work in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
ISBN
978-1-137-48608-0
Pages
21 –40
DOI
10.1057/978-1-137-48609-7_2
Publisher site
See Chapter on Publisher Site

Abstract

[This article reviews afterlife beliefs as found in the texts of the world’s earliest civilizations: Old and Middle Kingdom Egypt, Sumer, Vedic India, pre-Buddhist China, and Maya and Nahua Mesoamerica. Despite the fact that these civilizations had little or no cultural contact with the others during these periods, there are a number of similarities between their afterlife beliefs. As well as presenting overviews of beliefs in each civilization, this chapter discusses ways of understanding the reasons for these similarities by reference to certain universal factors (cognitive psychology and near-death experience); and of understanding the differences by reference to various culture-specific factors (social structure, environment, and wider religious/ritual contexts).]

Published: Aug 15, 2017

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