Hungry Ghosts

[Neeranam]

Does anyone have any information on these creatures in Thailand. I heard about some in Tibetan Buddhism - mouths sewn up so as they can't eat

What is the Thai name for these?

[lannarebirth]

Does anyone have any information on these creatures in Thailand. I heard about some in Tibetan Buddhism - mouths sewn up so as they can't eat

What is the Thai name for these?

"Phi Peta - A hungry ghost. Everyone who is preoccupied with material attachments to the exclusion of the spiritual will be reborn as a Peta, having a giant belly and an mouth as small as the eye of a needle. Peta may sometimes be heard whistling at night, looking for people to make merit for them. This ghost is relatively harmless."

http://www.thailandvoice.com/content/view/202/44/

[Neeranam]

Does anyone have any information on these creatures in Thailand. I heard about some in Tibetan Buddhism - mouths sewn up so as they can't eat

What is the Thai name for these?

"Phi Peta - A hungry ghost. Everyone who is preoccupied with material attachments to the exclusion of the spiritual will be reborn as a Peta, having a giant belly and an mouth as small as the eye of a needle. Peta may sometimes be heard whistling at night, looking for people to make merit for them. This ghost is relatively harmless."

http://www.thailandvoice.com/content/view/202/44/

Interesting link - thanks

Any idea how to write it in Thai?

[britmaveric]

Phi Pop

The phi Pop are fearsome ghosts from Thai folklore. They can possess a human being and feed on the intestines. They can be expelled by a spirit doctor who performs a "whirlpool dance." The ghost, watching the dance, is sucked into the whirlpool and is thus removed from the body.

The legend of this ghost originated with a prince who found a magical way to enter the body of another living person or animal. When he performed this feat and entered the body of an animal, his servant, who had been listening to the magic words, repeated the incantation and entered the body of the prince. The prince, unable to return to his own body, transferred to that of a bird and flew to his wife to tell her what had happened. She immediately had the servant's body destroyed and challenged the false prince to enter the body of an animal. When he did, the real prince quickly re-entered his own body. The servant, unable to return to his body, is since then forced to going from one body to the next, eating the intestines.

The phi Pop is also said to be a female ogre who feeds on human intestines and/or the blood of animals at night.

http://www.pantheon.org/articles/p/pop.html

[camerata]

It's pronounced "pret" in Thai. And here they are, courtesy of a medieval Japanese scroll:

[Virin]

Camerata: thanks for the photo, but Thai bpret (เปรต) is very tall, very thin and its mouth is tiny, same as Phi Peta in lannarebirth's post.

I don't know how to reduce the size of this photo, sorry.

[camerata]

Camerata: thanks for the photo, but Thai bpret (เปรต) is very tall, very thin and its mouth is tiny, same as Phi Peta in lannarebirth's post.

But lannarebirth's post says "having a giant belly and a mouth as small as the eye of a needle," rather than being tall and thin, and AFAIK that is the most well-known description. It relates to the hungry ghost having been greedy in a former life, so the karmic result is that they have a huge stomach (and craving for food) but only a tiny mouth to eat with. Perhaps hungry ghosts are sometimes depicted as thin to emphasize that they never get enough food.

In the Japanese belief, hungry ghosts "have been cursed with an insatiable hunger for a particular substance or object. Traditionally, this is something repugnant or humiliating, such as human corpses or feces, though in more recent legends, it may be virtually anything, no matter how bizarre. Jikininki ("man-eating ghosts") are the spirits of greedy, selfish or impious individuals who are cursed after death to seek out and eat human corpses. They do this at night, scavenging for newly dead bodies and food offerings left for the dead." These are the ones you can see in the picture.

[Virin]

Camerata: Sorry my statement is not clear, Thai Bpret could be slicely different from Phi Peta, I am not sure about a giant belly (it might be) but the size of their mouths are described the same thing - as small as the eyes of the needle, also "sometimes be heard whistling at night, looking for people to make merit for them. This ghost is relatively harmless." (from lannarebirth's post).

The stories that I've heard about Thai Bpret since I was young, its height is compared to the top of coconut tree , and as Camerata's post: "It relates to the hungry ghost having been greedy in a former life,". Not only greed, but also stealing, the belief is they are lurking at night hoping someone to consign merit to them (if someone consign merit to living things without specific name, they will get that merit), this merit is like a divined food for them, they will be full without eating, that's my memory about bpret .

We have metaphors to condemn some greedy politicians or others as "tam dtua bpen bprèt - acting like a bpret", "bprèt kŏr sùan boon - bpret asks for merit".

[lannarebirth]

Then there's the "phi dtoo yen", which I have been accused of being. Being hungry is definitely an aspect of it, as is a belly larger than it ought to be.

[camerata]

We have metaphors to condemn some greedy politicians or others as "tam dtua bpen bprèt - acting like a bpret"

I haven't heard that one before, but I like it.

[Donleavy]

My wife says that Phi Bret are thin.

She also told me about Phi Gasu (spelling); this charming creature takes the form of a woman's head with the intestines dangling from it. It floats in the air at night looking for awful things to eat.

Kind of like a fearsome jellyfish thing

Makes the blood run cold.

Then there's the "phi dtoo yen"

The refrigerator ghost? Thats a new one on me

Edited January 30, 2008 by Donleavy