page_title: Animal worship
section_title: Dog
hierarchical_section_title: Animal worship / Domesticated mammals / Dog
caption_attribution_description: A dog being worshiped in Kukur Tihar, A Hindu festival to mark the significance of a dog in one's life and after life.
context_page_description: Animal worship is rituals involving animals, such as the glorification of animal deities or animal sacrifice. When a god is respected or worshipped by means of a representative animal, an animal cult is formed. Animal cults may be classified according to their outward form or according to their inward meaning, which may of course undergo transformations.
  The classical author Diodorus explained the origin of animal worship by recalling the myth in which the gods, supposedly threatened by giants, hid under the guise of animals. The people then naturally began to worship the animals that their gods had disguised themselves as and continued this act even after the gods returned to their normal state. In 1906, Weissenborn suggested that animal worship resulted from man's natural curiosity. Primitive man would observe an animal that had a unique trait and the inexplicability of this trait would appeal to man's curiosity. Wonder resulted from primitive man's observations of this distinctive trait and this wonder eventually induced adoration. Thus, primitive man worshipped animals that had inimitable traits. Lubbock put forward a more recent view.
context_section_description: Dogs have a major religious significance among the Hindus in Nepal and some parts of India. The dogs are worshipped as a part of a five-day Tihar festival that falls roughly in November every year. In Hinduism, it is believed that the dog is a messenger of Yama, the god of death, and dogs guard the doors of Heaven. Socially, they are believed to be the protectors of our homes and lives. So, in order to please the dogs they are going to meet at Heaven's doors after death, so they would be allowed in Heaven, people mark the 14th day of the lunar cycle in November as Kukur-tihar, as known in Nepali language for the dog's day. This is a day when the dog is worshipped by applying tika (the holy vermilion dot), incense sticks and garlanded generally with marigold flower.
  Actual dog worship is uncommon. The Nosarii of western Asia are said to worship a dog. The Karang of Java had a cult of the red dog, each family keeping one in the house. According to one authority the dogs are images of wood which are worshipped after the death of a member of the family and burnt after a thousand days. In Nepal it is said that dogs are worshipped at the festival called Khicha Puja. Among the Harranians dogs were sacred, but this was rather as brothers of the mystae (Thomas 1911, p. 51).
caption: A dog after being decorated in the Kukur tihar festival in Nepal.
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