What is Tripindi Shraddh?
Tripindi Shraddh is a rite performed at Trimbakeshwar, with a purohit officiating. This page says what a shraddh is, where the bath before it was taken, and the round a shraddh there followed in the 1880s.
त्रिपिण्डी श्राद्धTripindi Shraddh
a rite performed at Trimbakeshwar, by a purohit of the town
Table of contents
Section I
What is Tripindi Shraddh?
A rite performed at Trimbakeshwar. A श्राद्ध shraddh is the rite for a family’s dead, in which offerings are made in the names of the departed. It is the rite that holds the other ancestral rites. A पुरोहित purohit is the priest who performs a rite for a family and makes the offerings in the family’s name. At Trimbakeshwar a purohit of the town performs it. Who the purohits of Trimbakeshwar are, and how the arrangement came about, is on the page on the purohits of Trimbakeshwar.
Section II
Where was the bath before the shraddh taken?
At Kushavarta, the kund in the middle of the town, in the round of the 1880s. A कुण्ड kund is a pool with stone sides and steps, fed by a river or a spring. कुश kusha is the stiff grass also called darbha. Tradition holds that the sage Gautama stirred the river with kusha when he brought it down, and that Kushavarta is named for it.
Section III
What round did a shraddh at Trimbakeshwar follow in the 1880s?
A bath at Kushavarta, the offering, and then worship at the temple. In the 1880s the round for a pilgrim who came to Trimbakeshwar to perform a shraddh was this. He shaved, and the hair went into the small square pool called Gangala. He bathed in Kushavarta. After the bath he made the पिण्ड pinda, the balls pressed by hand and offered to the named dead. The shraddh was performed in the usual way, with a purohit officiating and reciting the texts. When it was done the pinda were given to the water, in one of two small pools, the Kanchan pool or the Gangala pool. Then he went to the temple to worship Trimbakeshwar. Today the purohit who performs the rite sets its order, as with any shraddh.
Section IV
Do you arrange Tripindi Shraddh?
No. We do not arrange it. What we arrange is the ancestral rites at Ramkund.
Section V
Explore more guides
The ancestral rites
What the ancestral rites are — shraddh, tarpan and pind daan, and Pitru Paksha, the fortnight kept for the ancestors — and which page to read first.
Narayan Nagbali
A rite performed by a purohit at Trimbakeshwar and at Ramkund in Nashik, and what Narayan bali is for as the old texts give it.
Who performs the rites at Trimbakeshwar?
The temple's pujaris, the purohits of the town and their Purohit Sangh, and where the arrangement came from.