12 November 2023
This week's Radix Fidem community Bible lesson points out something that most Christians today just don't get.
First, you should understand that the current series of Bible lessons are aimed at showing the continuity between the Old and New Testament. Jesus came to correct and complete Moses. He showed how some parts of Moses were eternal in nature, not just for "that people, that time, that place". In like manner, the New Testament apostles were pulling an awful lot of Moses with them, even as they carved off wholesale stuff that didn't belong with the Covenant of Christ. That's what Paul meant by "rightly dividing the Word" -- their "Word" at that time was the Old Testament. It required a conscientious effort to use the Sword of the Spirit to recognize what still applied, and how.
The Bible lesson notes that "baptism for the dead" should be obvious: It refers to the Old Testament handling of human remains. He is not talking about baptism as a ritual of allegiance to Christ, but baptism as a routine cleansing ritual in Old Testament law. The reason Jews go through the hassle of handling dead bodies in the first place is because of they expect to see them again in Eternity. They are willing to make that sacrifice of ritual cleansing because they loved those who died.
Why did Joseph insist his bones be carried back to the Promised Land during the Exodus? He didn't pass through the Egyptian embalming process. He wanted his body to rot according to Hebrew burial practices so he could resurrect from the new homeland. The original Hebrew concept was not unique to them. Even Job, long before Israel existed, knew about the doctrine of the Resurrection (Job 19:25-27). He was convinced that his flesh would be reconstituted from the grave, and that he would meet his Lord face to face. Someone had to care enough to move his body and then go through the ritual cleansing.
This was an ancient paradox. The body would rot and become dust, since that was whence we came. And yet, when we are raised on the Day of Judgment into our eternal forms, the material used for this new body will be taken from our mortal remains. Thus, Jesus did not leave His mortal flesh in the grave, but it was transformed for His eternal use.
Paul says the same will happen with us. Should a believer be standing alive on this earth when the Lord Returns, their bodies will be transformed where they stand (1 Corinthians 15:52). Meanwhile, they will wait until the dead are reconstituted first, and then join them in the air (1 Thessalonians 4:13-18).
You'll notice that only human remains are treated this way. Israel could leave animals to be eaten and to decompose away from the camp. The business of ritual purification applied to touching several different kinds of things like blood or other body fluids, human or otherwise. While the issue of blood as sacred does count, the main idea included protecting the community from health threats. However, we treat human bodies with compassion and we are willing to take upon ourselves the necessity of ritual cleansing as a part of the last respects.
Granted, the task often defaulted to young men (teens) who were not yet adult "men of Israel" and whose social obligations could not be expected to need the same level of ritual cleansing. Thus, it was such young men in the New Testament church that carried out the scandalous Ananias and Sapphira. By contrast, Joseph of Arimathea didn't hesitate to do the honors for Jesus. It meant missing the Passover rituals the next day (Jesus was executed on the Day of Preparation). It really depended on how much honor was deemed appropriate.
Once the appropriate honor or dishonor is given, there doesn't seem to be a lot of directions given in the Torah. As with so many things, it appears the Law of Moses assumes certain customs and gives directions about things that aren't so obvious. The Law was much about doing things different from the pagan neighbors, when there was something in those pagan practices that would have hindered the message God wanted Israel to portray. It's not hard to discern that Jehovah was distancing His people from certain annoying guidance the elohim council had given other nations.
So, we would expect Israel to avoid some Egyptian customs as a matter of principle -- such as embalming and all the expensive burial accouterments -- but they simply stuck with common practices of the nomad tribes. They would seek out natural caves or places where it was easy to carve out a tomb that remained accessible. The body was laid on a flat surface with only external embalming. Once the softer fleshy parts dried and went away, the bones were moved to a container in the wall and the "bed" was open for the next incoming dead body. The bones became sacred; Ezekiel 37 should make some sense here.
Cremation was generally viewed as some kind of sacrifice to gods. Any incinerated human remains are defiling. Such ashes are still human remains, and those ashes defile everything they touch. Thus, the one thing we know for certain is that the modern practice of tossing someone's ashes somewhere would be forbidden in the Bible unless you intentionally defiled some place. Keeping the ashes in the home would also be forbidden. Scripture requires burial.
Blood is a much bigger issue that I've addressed elsewhere. The mystical symbolism of blood is the most ancient, going all the way back to Eden. I'm not making rules for anyone; I'm just relating the biblical viewpoint.
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