Sasha and Zamani, and Three Deaths

In his book African Religions and Philosophy, Kenyan-born philosopher John Samuel Mbiti describes the East and Central African concepts of sasha, those ancestors who remain alive in human memory, and zamani, the vast ocean of time into which everything is eventually absorbed. In this sense, we are all moving toward the past. Author David Eagleman suggests another way of thinking about the passage of time. He identifies three deaths: When the body ceases to function, when it is buried, and that moment in the future when one’s name is spoken for the last time. This is part of a complete episode.