Next comes the Pisâcha, which, as we have seen, is by one account only a stage in the progress of the soul to…
- Date of account
- Second edition published 1896
- Source
- The Popular Religion and Folk-Lore of Northern India, Vol. 1 (of 2)
- Reference
- The Popular Religion and Folk-Lore of Northern India, Vol. 1 (of 2) · selected passage 93
- Rights
- public_domain
- Language
- English
- Record updated
- 2026-08-25
Record summary
Next comes the Pisâcha, which, as we have seen, is by one account only a stage in the progress of the soul to its final rest
Published source text
Read the available text below. Archive transcriptions may contain OCR errors; later context is labelled separately. A recorded claim is not a finding that it happened.
Source passage
Source text · mention onlyNext comes the Pisâcha, which, as we have seen, is by one account only a stage in the progress of the soul to its final rest. But more properly speaking it is an evil spirit produced by a man's vices, the ghost of a liar, adulterer, or criminal of any kind, or of one who has died insane. But his attributes and functions are not very clearly defined, and he merges into the general class of Bhûts. In some cases he seems to have the power to cure disease. Thus we read in Somadeva, "Rise up in the last watch of the night, and with dishevelled hair, and naked, and without rinsing your mouth, take two handfuls of rice as large as you can grasp with the two hands, and, uttering a form of words, go to a place where four roads meet and there place the two handfuls of rice, and return in silence without looking behind you.
Historical context
Contextual commentary · mention onlyThis material belongs to a folklore tradition. Story type, collector, community, transmission and literary editing matter when comparing it with other sources.
Modern context
Contextual commentary · mention onlyLattice compares motifs and reported features without assuming that a traditional being is a biological species or that similar stories document one external cause.
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