Let’s Talk about Cremation–Theologically

you must embalm unless you can bury within 24 hours. So, that practically means you must embalm (or cremate) since no one will bury within 24 hours. So I ask, what is biblical about embalming?

My point is burial in 2021 America is in no way, shape, or form, “like” burial in OT or NT times. You must either embalm or cremate. One is not better than the other. One is not more natural than the other. What is natural about formaldehyde?

Therefore, let the people do what they prefer to do without any comments from you.

[Mark_Smith]

you must embalm unless you can bury within 24 hours. So, that practically means you must embalm (or cremate) since no one will bury within 24 hours. So I ask, what is biblical about embalming?

https://ksbma.ks.gov/resources/publications/facts-about-funerals

A body dead from any cause may be interred or cremated without embalming if interment or cremation is within 24 hours of death. A reasonable period of time beyond 24 hours may be permitted if: (a) Religious beliefs, laws or customs do not permit transportation or interments on Sabbath or holy days; and (b) No health hazard or nuisance will result from such delay. A body dead from any cause other than infectious or contagious disease may be interred or cremated without embalming if embalming would violate personal or religious beliefs and no health hazard or nuisance will result. An unembalmed body may be retained in storage at a constant temperature of less than 40 degrees fahrenheit. When that body is removed from storage and transported, the body shall reach its final destination within 24 hours following removal from storage. If the body is placed in a metal or metal-lined hermetically sealed container immediately after death, the body may be considered, for the purpose of transporting, an embalmed body.

Is no funeral home/graveyard will move fast enough to put a person in the ground in 24 hours. Maybe small ones, but not where I live.

[Mark_Smith]

Is no funeral home/graveyard will move fast enough to put a person in the ground in 24 hours. Maybe small ones, but not where I live.

I’m on record as … :

• Everyone has to make their own choice
• I regard it as adiaphora
• My choice is burial
• I know it’s expensive. I’ve paid about half the costs (gravesites and monument)
• I don’t think less of a person if he chooses cremation
• Really don’t care!
• I was a pastor for 17 years - never preached on it - never called cremation ‘pagan’ / sinful

The following is one of many biblical aspects of the importance of a proper burial. I have argued elsewhere,
“Burial is the proper ending of life”:

Ecc 6:3 If a man beget an hundred children, and live many years, so that the days of his years be many, and his soul be not filled with good, and also that he have no burial; I say, that an untimely birth is better than he.
“Without a life of goodness that fills one’s soul and is consummated with a burial as the proper ending of a long life where one has begotten many children, it would be better to be miscarried than to ever have been born and lived.”

[RajeshG]

The following is one of many biblical aspects of the importance of a proper burial. I have argued elsewhere,

“Burial is the proper ending of life”:

Ecc 6:3 If a man beget an hundred children, and live many years, so that the days of his years be many, and his soul be not filled with good, and also that he have no burial; I say, that an untimely birth is better than he.

“Without a life of goodness that fills one’s soul and is consummated with a burial as the proper ending of a long life where one has begotten many children, it would be better to be miscarried than to ever have been born and lived.”

[Kevin Miller]

RajeshG wrote:

The following is one of many biblical aspects of the importance of a proper burial. I have argued elsewhere,

“Burial is the proper ending of life”:

Ecc 6:3 If a man beget an hundred children, and live many years, so that the days of his years be many, and his soul be not filled with good, and also that he have no burial; I say, that an untimely birth is better than he.

“Without a life of goodness that fills one’s soul and is consummated with a burial as the proper ending of a long life where one has begotten many children, it would be better to be miscarried than to ever have been born and lived.”

I looked at some commentaries about this verse and it seems to me that the verse is not talking specifically about the actual disposement of the body, that is, being put intact into the ground as opposed to cremation. It’s talking about being honored after death as opposed to being forgotten or despised.

This is the kind of handling of the Bible that people do when they do not want to believe something so they have to explain away what is plainly said.

….actually addressing the argument, Rajesh. Unless it’s your desire to prove to this forum that you can or will not.

I think it’s a reasonable question; the word in question, Strong’s 6900, qeburah, can be translated as “burial”, but also in translation seems to refer to a grave or sepulchre. It’s a commentary primarily on another topic, so really even if it did refer primarily to “burial” (that’s debateable at best), it really functions pretty much as narrative—and getting prescriptions out of narrative is tricky business at best.

Rather reckless exegesis on your part, Rajesh, to put it mildly.

[Bert Perry]

….actually addressing the argument, Rajesh. Unless it’s your desire to prove to this forum that you can or will not.

I think it’s a reasonable question; the word in question, Strong’s 6900, qeburah, can be translated as “burial”, but also in translation seems to refer to a grave or sepulchre. It’s a commentary primarily on another topic, so really even if it did refer primarily to “burial” (that’s debateable at best), it really functions pretty much as narrative—and getting prescriptions out of narrative is tricky business at best.

Rather reckless exegesis on your part, Rajesh, to put it mildly.

Rajesh fleshes out his convictions that cremation is pagan. He’s going to be completely Biblical so …

James 5:20, “let him know that whoever brings back a sinner from his wandering will save his soul from death “

Galatians 6:1, “Brothers, if anyone is caught in any transgression, you who are spiritual should restore him in a spirit of gentleness.”

These are fellow members with Rajesh in their local church:

1. Case 1 … a grieving widow who has her husband’s ashes in an urn on her mantel. Rajesh is having tea in her living room. Rajesh says what?
2. Case 2 … a poor man who’s wife has just passed (yesterday). Rajesh knows him well. The man confides in Rajesh that he is weighing cremation because he can’t afford the $ 10,000 for a traditional burial. Rajesh does what?

Here’s the real ‘acid test’ Rajesh!

[RajeshG]

Furthermore, even if the word were to refer to a grave or a sepulchre, the same point would be made because graves and sepulchres are where people are buried.

[RajeshG]

Kevin Miller wrote:

I looked at some commentaries about this verse and it seems to me that the verse is not talking specifically about the actual disposement of the body, that is, being put intact into the ground as opposed to cremation. It’s talking about being honored after death as opposed to being forgotten or despised.

This is the kind of handling of the Bible that people do when they do not want to believe something so they have to explain away what is plainly said.

I found a paragraph from Coffman Commentaries on the Bible to be quite interesting. It said :

In the light of ancient concern regarding one’s proper burial, it would appear here that a man’s not being properly buried was considered as the ultimate disaster that could befall a human being. Christians, of course, reject this viewpoint out of hand. Some of the early Christians were fed to the lions in the Coliseum; but God’s people remembered the words of Jesus: “Fear not them that kill the body, but after that have no more that they can do” (Luke 12:4).

[Jim]

Rajesh fleshes out his convictions that cremation is pagan. He’s going to be completely Biblical so …

James 5:20, “let him know that whoever brings back a sinner from his wandering will save his soul from death “

Galatians 6:1, “Brothers, if anyone is caught in any transgression, you who are spiritual should restore him in a spirit of gentleness.”

These are fellow members with Rajesh in their local church:

1. Case 1 … a grieving widow who has her husband’s ashes in an urn on her mantel. Rajesh is having tea in her living room. Rajesh says what?
2. Case 2 … a poor man who’s wife has just passed (yesterday). Rajesh knows him well. The man confides in Rajesh that he is weighing cremation because he can’t afford the $ 10,000 for a traditional burial. Rajesh does what?

Here’s the real ‘acid test’ Rajesh!

You can keep your “acid test” to yourself. You have previously testified that you “really don’t care!” and yet you keep directing comments toward me. I really don’t care to interact with people who do not really care about the subject.

[Jim]

These are fellow members with Rajesh in their local church:

1. Case 1 … a grieving widow who has her husband’s ashes in an urn on her mantel. Rajesh is having tea in her living room. Rajesh says what?
2. Case 2 … a poor man who’s wife has just passed (yesterday). Rajesh knows him well. The man confides in Rajesh that he is weighing cremation because he can’t afford the $ 10,000 for a traditional burial. Rajesh does what?

Here’s the real ‘acid test’ Rajesh!

Jim, first I need to say that I’m not convinced that Rajesh is right about cremation being necessarily pagan, and therefore a sin. I would definitely understand the actions of the fictional members in your example. HOWEVER, for one who believes cremation to be a sin, your test isn’t really the acid test as much as it is the pragmatism test. If we believe something to be sin, then the expense shouldn’t figure in to right action, nor does there need to be condoning of the “sin” that has already happened. We need to act in concert with our consciences on issues like these, even if it is difficult.

I would say that people who are convinced that cremation is a grievous sin should attempt to find or put together ways to help those who need to cover the expense. As previously mentioned, maybe churches should maintain a fund for this if they are as convinced as Rajesh is. In any case, since it’s obvious that there are at least two sides on this issue, like any issue where the scripture seems to leave some room, and that neither is likely to convince the other, people will need to learn to deal with this just as they deal with other issues with believers over doctrine they consider to be wrong like e.g. paedo- vs. credobaptism, or which music to use in church.

[RajeshG]

Bert Perry wrote:

….actually addressing the argument, Rajesh. Unless it’s your desire to prove to this forum that you can or will not.

I think it’s a reasonable question; the word in question, Strong’s 6900, qeburah, can be translated as “burial”, but also in translation seems to refer to a grave or sepulchre. It’s a commentary primarily on another topic, so really even if it did refer primarily to “burial” (that’s debateable at best), it really functions pretty much as narrative—and getting prescriptions out of narrative is tricky business at best.

Rather reckless exegesis on your part, Rajesh, to put it mildly.

No, Ecclesiastes is a wisdom book as much as or more than it is a narrative, and this particular statement is not a narrative statement. Just because you claim that something “functions pretty much as narrative” does not make it so. That is merely your claim.

As for your pronouncement about what that Hebrew word signifies, it is telling that the vast majority of the major translations render the word in that verse as “burial” (KJV, NAU, NKJV, CSB, ESV, RSV, ASV, NIV, and others). That evidence refutes your assertion that it is “debatable at best” how that Hebrew word should be translated and understood in that verse.

Furthermore, even if the word were to refer to a grave or a sepulchre, the same point would be made because graves and sepulchres are where people are buried.

Well, I don’t ever remember claiming to be an expert in the ancient languages, but one thing I can say is that when I read my references by world renowned experts like Kittel, Moody, Brown-Driver-Briggs, and the like, what they do to establish the sense of a word is to look at its usage in a range of settings. Simply “taking a poll of the translators of a single word in a single use”, as Rajesh proposes, pretty much violates the most basic principle in linguistics, that “usage determines meaning”—meaning “usage in a variety of settings”, of course. Kittel will use extraBiblical use, OT, NT, and the like to determine the sense of a word, for example.

(I was led to Christ by a linguistics major who’s now a professor, for reference, and was taught a touch of Hebrew by a now retired professor who taught me the same principle)

Since my method is a somewhat truncated version of what the actual experts do, I think I’ll follow their example, not Rajesh’s.

Regarding the sense of Ecclesiastes, yes, whether you like it or not, it’s a narrative, as the author, presumably Solomon, is telling his story of going through life trying to figure out its meaning. That’s called a “narrative”, and there are any number of things in Ecclesiastes that you don’t want to apply directly because of this.

For my part, I’ll stand with my analysis, and remind the forum of what Jim noted; if cremation were a huge “no-no”, Biblically speaking, we should see a specific prohibition in the Epistles, as well as other hints that the practice is condemned. Since we don’t, it’s clearly adiaphora.