Pitri
पितृ pitṛAn ancestor; the honoured forebears remembered and offered to across generations. Through shraddha rites the newly dead pass from the unsettled preta state into the settled community of the pitris, who are fed and revered, especially during the annual ancestral period.
Where this term appears
- What happens after death in Hinduism? Essentials
…from the unsettled preta state to the settled and honoured state of a pitri , an ancestor, one of the benevolent forebears who are remembered and fed across generations.
- Why do Hindus cremate their dead? Essentials
… ancestors: the moment the preta is at last knit into the body of the pitris , the forefathers, and given a settled place among them.
- The Navagraha: The Nine Planetary Powers Deities
… debt to the sages, repaid by study, and a debt to the ancestors, the pitris , repaid by raising a child and by the offerings of shraddha that sustain the departed.
- Runanubandha, the debts we are born into Treatise
It is the pitri-rina , the debt to the ancestors, the dead who gave you a body and a line and to whom the living remain bound.
- The Beings of the Dark Treatise
The bhutas, pretas, pisachas, rakshasas and vetalas are the feared 'shadow classes' of the Hindu cosmos — ghosts, hungry dead, flesh-eaters, demons and…
- The debt to the dead Treatise
…aid by the study of the sacred word; and a debt to the ancestors, the pitri-rina , repaid by continuing the line, by begetting the next generation, and by faithfully performing the rites for those who have died…
- The debt to the dead Treatise
The last chapter named the pitri-rina , the debt to the fathers, as one of the three debts a person is born owing.