Only known & Confirmed case: The Imperishable Body

Hello ATS,

This is the story of a very special person... His name was Hambo Lama Itigelov, and he was exhumed in the 21st century.
Neither mummified nor embalmed, this Buddhist and scholar has allegedly shown zero signs of decay: whole muscles, inner tissues, soft joints & skin.

Can this be possible? I had to share this with the class.

The most exciting aspect of this is that he intended to be exhumed, he literally was applying his philosophy of emptiness. It would seem that his body never stopped meditation.

Itigelov left a testament where he asked to bury him as he was, sitting in lotus pose in the cedar box on traditional cemetery. It was done. There was also a statement, where he asked other monks to exhume him after several years.

(This is the exciting point – this means he knew that his body would be preserved). This was done in 1955 and in 1973 by Buddhist monks but they were scared to tell everybody about this, since communist regime did not leave any space for religion in society. Only in 2002 the body was finally exhumed and transferred to Ivolginsky Datsan (a residence of today’s Hambo Lama) where it was closely examined by monks and, which is now more important, by scientists and pathologists.
The official statement was issued about the body – very well preserved, without any signs of decay, whole muscles and inner tissue, soft joints and skin. The interesting thing is that the body was never embalmed or mummified.

Two years passed. Itigelov’s body is now kept open air, in contact with other people, without any temperature or humidity regimes. How Itigelov keeps this condition, nobody knows.

This is the ONLY KNOWN AND CONFIRMED CASE OF IMPERISHABLE BODY throughout the whole world. Embalming and mummifying is well known among different nations and peoples – Chili (Chinchora), Egypt mummies, Christian Saints, communist leaders and others. Some bodies were found in permafrost, however when they contacted with oxygen atmosphere they perished within several hours.

Source: Please read.

It looks like he is still meditating!


That's kinda spooky awesome!

For two years after the exhumation of Itigilov’s body it does not perish nor decay, no fungus, no negative things happen to it. Itigelov said before he died that he left a message to all peoples on Earth. This message contains no words. Now it is our turn to understand it.

Meditation is good for the soul and apparently the body!

reply to post by ThinkingCap


Only known and confirmed case? What about my man Paramahansa Yogananda? He was a true-to-life yogi who predicted his own death and didn't exhibit normal patterns of biological decay.

The absence of any visual signs of decay in the dead body of Paramhansa Yogananda offers the most extraordinary case in our experience. Had the muscle protein and blood stream of the deceased not been comparatively free of bacteria, deterioration of the body could have set in as early as six hours after life had departed. No physical disintegration was visible in Paramhansa Yogananda's body even twenty days after death.

During this period no indication of mold was visible on Paramhansa Yogananda's skin, and no visible desiccation (drying up) took place in the bodily tissues. This state of perfect preservation of a body is, so far as we know from mortuary annals, an unparalleled one.

oaks.nvg.org...

I'de have to poke him with something, like a stick.
To see if he was pretending

Are tbeir any scientific journals that confirm this

Debunked here.

This guy is mummified, not incorruptible. You can even see evidence of degeneration on his face.

reply to post by Sankari


Your link is broken, please fix.

And Narco's? Also debunked I'm guessing? Very interested in that link you've got there.

No signs of decay? Look at his face it looks badly decayed...am I not looking at the right picture?

reply to post by ThinkingCap


Link is fixed now, thanks for the pickup.

reply to post by Sankari


Hmmm, thanks for the blog. I'm definitely going to dig into this more. Japanese buddhist ritual fits smugly in with the overall story; but I wonder of what real evidence there is of bromine salt being used. And can it really preserve someone for 75 years?

One hell of a ritual, either way. I doubt he used the Japanese Buddhist ritual, rather maybe used aspects of it. He did write an encyclopedia on pharmacology- meaning he would have the means and knowhow to do said ritual.

Remind me the story of my grandpa when he was going to prepare the new land for school, and have to move some old graves.
When he dig one with his friends he found a body but still fresh like just been buried a day before. This guy wearing an old style chlotes of a low rank officer from local kingdom that banish about 300-400 years ago. I heard a lot story like that but only heard 2 cases from direct witness.
They believe that if someone had a black magic with anti sharp weapon and bullet proof and had not release it before they die, this is what will happen.

Interesting case and thanks for posting it.

His face certainly looks very decayed. If he were imperishable, why did his face perish? I'm not trying to be a smart ass, I just sincerely wonder why people overlook his face when saying he is imperishable.

Regardless of the level of decay he has or doesn't have, I am curious to know what the significance of this is supposed to be. Is it supposed to be some divine communication? I don't understand how having a body that decays at a rate that is different than expected is spiritual, especially since my understanding of spirituality is very separate from our flesh. Why would we care what happens to our bodies after death? Could someone shed some light on this for me? Why is an unusually preserved body meaningful - especially in the context of the various religions that like to hold up these examples?

reply to post by VegHead


I suppose the theory would be, that one meditates to heal & preserve the mind and body. Though our minds leave us when we die, our bodies become worm food. But this suggests to me, that through meditation he was able to retain "chi" or energy- keeping his body 'alive' after death, or rather slowing the process of decay dramatically (75 years).

There's a blog on the first page claiming that bromine salts was used, but I still feel 75 years is quite a long time, for any preservative. Yeah, his face definitely seems to have decayed- but the rest of his body? The claim is that soft tissue, full muscles- are all still intact; and that people have not found any trace of preservative.

reply to post by ThinkingCap


Thank you, that helps in my understanding.

In reading a bit more online, I found this about "sokushinbutsu" --- a now-banned practice of Japanese Buddhist monks to self-mummify. Not exactly what the monk in this post did, but it is interesting anyway...

For 1,000 days the priests would eat a special diet consisting only of nuts and seeds, while taking part in a regimen of rigorous physical activity that stripped them of their body fat. They then ate only bark and roots for another thousand days and began drinking a poisonous tea made from the sap of the Urushi tree, normally used to lacquer bowls.[1]

This caused vomiting and a rapid loss of bodily fluids, and most importantly, it made the body too poisonous to be eaten by maggots. Finally, a self-mummifying monk would lock himself in a stone tomb barely larger than his body, where he would not move from the lotus position. His only connection to the outside world was an air tube and a bell. Each day he rang a bell to let those outside know that he was still alive.

When the bell stopped ringing, the tube was removed and the tomb sealed. After the tomb was sealed, the other monks in the temple would wait another 1,000 days, and open the tomb to see if the mummification was successful.

If the monk had been successfully mummified, he or she was immediately seen as a Buddha and put in the temple for viewing. Usually, though, there was just a decomposed body. Although they were not viewed as a true Buddha if they were not mummified, they were still admired and revered for their dedication and spirit.[2]

source: en.wikipedia.org...

reply to post by VegHead


No, it isn't exactly imperishable forever. I think Yogananda eventually started showing signs of decay after a certain amount of weeks/ months.

The supposed reason this happens is because the body is purified through meditation to the point where infectious disease and foreign bodies do not enter. In effect, the body becomes a purely cleansed temple! Even after the soul exits the body, it continues to resound with its former holiness for a time.

Imperishable? No such thing. But the bodies of saints tend to exhibit unusually slow rates of biological decay.

Originally posted by NarcolepticBuddha
reply to post by VegHead

 

No, it isn't exactly imperishable forever. I think Yogananda eventually started showing signs of decay after a certain amount of weeks/ months.

The supposed reason this happens is because the body is purified through meditation to the point where infectious disease and foreign bodies do not enter. In effect, the body becomes a purely cleansed temple! Even after the soul exits the body, it continues to resound with its former holiness for a time.

Imperishable? No such thing. But the bodies of saints tend to exhibit unusually slow rates of biological decay.

edit on 24-5-2013 by NarcolepticBuddha because: (no reason given)

OK - that explanation makes sense in terms of why monks want to achieve this. Thanks for the help!

An interesting thing to add about Dashi-Dorzho Itigilov from Wikipedia:

As of 2005, Itigilov's body was kept outdoors, in contact with other people, without preserving any temperature or humidity regimens.

Images of the mummified monk outdoors can be found here and here.

Regardless of the discussion about the state of his preservation or how it was done, the fact that this is an 80-plus year old body sitting outdoors with enough undecomposed tissue to shake hands with is in itself amazing. I would be intensely curious if I found myself before him.

Hmm, perhaps the imperishable monk is rather perishable after all.

See this picture below, I don't know when it was taken, but it clearly shows a more complete face. Those eyes don't look right to me in this pic - it looks like they have completely gone already.




Either accident damage or deterioration has caused the good monk to lose part of his face as he does not look much like this in the OP. So, obviously not the world's only incorruptibe body after all.

Oh, wow... That is some creepy stuff right there.

It's pretty impressive that his body hasn't decayed more than that over all these years.