Buddhist funerals are the tradition's busiest professional service and the moment its doctrine and its practice sit most visibly apart. Nothing permanent transmigrates, and yet merit is generated on behalf of the dead and formally transferred to them, usually by pouring water while it is dedicated. In Japan the seven-day intervals run to forty-nine, the traditional maximum length of the bardo, and the temple economy has depended so heavily on death rites that the phrase "funeral Buddhism" is used inside Japan as a criticism. Teachers asked how merit can transfer to a being with no fixed self generally answer at the conventional level and leave the ultimate one alone.