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I have visited several holy cities: Rome, Jerusalem, and Kairouan in Tunisia. I could sense sacredness in Rome and Jerusalem, despite the noisy Vespas in the first and the high-rise apartment buildings in the second. In a fourth sacred place, Delphi, the impression of sacredness came through most strongly of all, perhaps because there are no noisy merchants at dawn or dusk to spoil one’s awe of the valley and the groves.

In Benares, a sacred city in India’s Uttar Pradesh, the impression was devastating in the negative sense of the word. It is a Hindu and Buddhist holy place. Tens of thousands of the faithful arrive here annually to cleanse themselves in the River Ganges, to spend their last days there, and to be cremated on funeral pyres on the shores of the river, so that their ashes can be sprinkled on its trash-filled waters. Hindus believe that he who dies in Benares will achieve salvation.

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I have visited several holy cities: Rome, Jerusalem, and Kairouan in Tunisia. I could sense sacredness in Rome and Jerusalem, despite the noisy Vespas in the first and the high-rise apartment buildings in the second. In a fourth sacred place, Delphi, the impression of sacredness came through most strongly of all, perhaps because there are no noisy merchants at dawn or dusk to spoil one’s awe of the valley and the groves.

In Benares, a sacred city in India’s Uttar Pradesh, the impression was devastating in the negative sense of the word. It is a Hindu and Buddhist holy place. Tens of thousands of the faithful arrive here annually to cleanse themselves in the River Ganges, to spend their last days there, and to be cremated on funeral pyres on the shores of the river, so that their ashes can be sprinkled on its trash-filled waters. Hindus believe that he who dies in Benares will achieve salvation.