sacred thread

American  

noun

Hinduism.

1. a cord worn by Hindus of the three upper castes as a sign of being twice-born or initiated into the Vedas.

---

Example Sentences

Of the three, the last one, “Sacred Thread,” featuring the guitarist Julian Lage and the tabla icon Zakir Hussain, packs the wiliest punch.

From New York Times

Other tests include patting an Indian man on the back to see whether he is wearing a “sacred thread” worn by some Brahmins, the highest-ranked caste.

From Seattle Times

In one piece, a naked man bound by barbed wire sports a defiant smile - a sacred thread strung across his torso is the only indication that he is a Kashmiri Hindu.

From BBC

No one in my family seemed to know about this, though it should not have been a surprise: we had all heard the stories of how our beautiful, dark-eyed, Calcutta-born great-great-grandmother, Sophia Pattle, with whom the painter Sir Edward Burne-Jones had fallen in love, used to speak Bengali with her sisters and was painted by Frederick Watts with a rakhi - a Hindu sacred thread - tied around her wrist.

From BBC

In a ceremony in the temple town of Tirunelveli, family friends said, a sacred thread was tied around Srinivasan’s body.

From Los Angeles Times