By REV. JAMES MACLEOD, Greenock.
BURIAL is applied to the method used among civilised nations of disposing of the dead by hiding them in the earth. The term burial comes from the Anglo-Saxon word “birgan,” to conceal. There is hardly anything among the living that greater interest is taken in than disposing of those whom they loved in the world. There is nothing else so distinctive of the condition and character of a people as the method in which they treat their dead. The general tendency of all nations has been to bury their dead out of the sight of the living. The simple closing of the body in earth is the method referred to in the earliest Biblical account. We have a record of the embalming of Joseph, but that was done for a very specific purpose. We have a divine record of the touching scene in which Abraham buries Sarah in the cave of Machpelah which belonged to Ephron, but which, after a solemn and courteous negotiation was secured to Abraham for a possession to bury his dead (Gen. xxlll.).
It was considered a severe judgment to be buried with the burial of an ass which would indicate that the body was left exposed in the open field for the birds of prey to feed upon. The bones would lie scattered on the ground ever after. Whatever method may be used in closing the body in the earth, embalming, or burning, the human dust shall return to its dust again. It is very remarkable, however solemn the lamentation or mourning might be, that at the burial of the saints of the Old, and New Testaments; there is not any reference made that the living conducted religious services going to or at the place of interment. See Abraham and the burial of his beloved Sarah: Jacob’s burial, Joseph’s burial, David’s burial, John the Baptist’s burial, and when Joseph of Arimathea laid the human body of the Saviour in his own grave there was no religious service conducted at His grave-side although Joseph was a disciple of Jesus. The solemn occasion of interring the dead should be a sufficient religious service to men to remind them of their latter end if duly and properly exercised in their minds; and, if not, rites, prayers, and ceremonies shall only tend to aggravate their guilt, harden their hearts, and fortify them in their obduracy against the claims of God and conscience. Instances of persons desiring to be buried in some favourite spot are too numerous to be specified. Some of the grandest buildings in the world have been tombs. Low barbarous nations began religious services at the burial of their dead as far back as we can trace. It was different with the disciples of the Saviour in the early history of the Christian Church we find no trace of praying at the grave side for the living or for the dead. The Christians continued to bury their dead after the Patriarchal, and Jewish manner of burying—no prayers nor rites at the grave. When Stephen, the first martyr in the Christian Church, was put to death for the witness of Jesus “devout men carried Stephen to his burial, and made great lamentation for him.” We read of no prayers at the grave, nor “of dust to dust, and ashes to ashes,” nor of one of the “devout” men casting a handful of soil on the corpse after lowering it into the grave. No, for Popery was as yet in its embryonic state. When the Christian Church began to back-slide from her original, and scriptural attitude towards God and man she inaugurated forms of worship, church government, rules, and pagan rites, and ceremonies which were utterly alien to the spirit of the gospel, and contrary to the express command of God. Men rose who paid far more attention to man-made ceremonies than to the gospel of Jesus Christ. When relatives, and friends died, especially, if they were looked upon as great personages in the church or state, fires were kindled, wine was poured out, and often much blood would be shed on such occasions; prayers offered, singing hymns, music and dancing were all freely indulged in to commemorate the death of the departed. The religious devotees would repair to the grave to weep, to howl, to pray, and dance in the Red Indian fashion. Popery was developing out of its foetus state. If the departed person was considered a pious man the church and relatives would consecrate his place of interment by sprinkling “holy water” on the spot where the remains lay, and deify his person to the rank of a god. Men and women would watch to see apparitions of angels coming down to visit the tomb of the dead; and in their delirious posture the devotees would see strange and un-natural lights, hear un-earthly voices, groans, weeping, and crying. The tombs of such pious men and women would be consecrated by the parish clergyman and adorned by the community of the faithful; hence the castle of St. Angelo in Italy, and innumerable shrines scattered all over Europe in memory of the dead. The superstitious orgies that took place burying the dead are too barbarous to be related here. It was out of this horrible practice that the purgatorial fires of Romanism originated: to wit: praying with and for the dead. Let us not forget that the weapon the devil used for his own end and purpose was religion. When God raised up Luther in the 16th century it was at this vile practice that Luther thundered his first thesis against that Roman Catholic villain Tetzel. The Reformers warned the benighted people against praying with or for the dead. The Church of Rome became alarmed and poured forth her serpentine fumes on the Reformers. If her people were to obey the Word of God, and the Reformers, the revenue derived from the traffic done by the Church in praying at the grave of the dead and for the dead was lost to the Pope and his Cardinals. The imaginary purgatory of Rome was a lucrative investment for the Popes. One can trace all these orgies to the superstitious respect paid to the burial of the dead. We need not enlarge on this subject for volumes have been written by competent writers exposing the pagan practice of praying at the tombs of the dead. We merely wish to draw the attention of Free Presbyterians to the danger of paying unwarrantable homage to the burying of our dead. One wrong step leads to another. The Reformed Church strictly prohibited praying for the dead or at the place of interment of the dead. The Roman Catholics continued the practice of praying at the grave of the dead. The corrupt nature and carnal inclination of men will argue that they pray for the living and not for the dead. The deceit of men shall not stand at the judgment-seat of Christ. The throne of iniquity shall not be established there. Men who daringly oppose the will of God now shall be dumb-founded at the great White Throne of God at the Day of Judgment. It is a modern habit in the Protestant Churches to pray at the burial of the dead. We have heard men praying or rather using flattering words and phrases in church-yards and cemeteries in order to please the ears of drunkards, Sabbath desecrators, and unregenerated persons, but we have never heard a man of God praying in such places. We do not expect to hear a man of God praying at the burial of the dead in the cemetery. The less that is done of that the better for the living and it will do no good for the dead. In the Church of Scotland they have what is called the “Committal Burial Service.” After the coffin is lowered into the grave the clergyman bends over the tomb and the attendant officer takes up a handful of soil as the clergyman repeats parrot-like the words “dust to dust and ashes to ashes” and the attendant throws the dust upon the coffin. When this part of the Popish ceremonies is done the clergyman prays, and praises the departed brother, or sister whether he knew them in the flesh or not. God said long ago “dust thou art and unto dust thou shalt return” because of sin; but men would be as gods at the burial of the dead. The Church of Scotland (of to-day) has her Committal Service apeing the Anglo-Catholics of England, and the Scottish Episcopalians; and both of these branches of the Protestant Churches are apeing Romanism. Let our people realise and understand that the present Church of Scotland is not the “Established Church of Scotland” at all. The present Church of Scotland is “established” by law, viz, established by the law of the realm in her property. She has some of the most modern men in Europe. She calls herself Protestant and Trinitarian but her clergymen can preach and teach anything they like. The Word of God is not her court of appeal, nor the Confession of Faith her creed. Her Courts accept without protest the most Satanic destructive Higher Criticism on the Word of God. Lord Salvesen at her last General Assembly thanked God that their Church was a Protestant Church. Let the “Church of Scotland” return to the Word of God, to the Confession of Faith, to the mode of worship, practice, and discipline of the Reformed Church of John Knox, Henderson, Thomas Chalmers, and Donald Macfarlane, and then, and not until then shall we accept his Lordship’s claim. It was the Moderator of this Church that the Moderator of the Free Church “welcomed for his own sake and as Moderator of the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland,” when the latter visited the General Assembly of the Free Church. Solomon says in Proverbs: “As in water face answereth to face, so the heart of man to man. Hell and destruction are never full; so the eyes of man are never satisfied.” The majority of the clergymen of the Free Church pray at the burial of the dead in church-yard and cemetery. It is popular to do so and surely Free Church men should not be behind the times. As the Church of Scotland “recognises the existence of a little sister church seeking to do what you are doing, within its own restricted province.” They can’t be daubed “exclusionists” even for the sake of a good scriptural testimony. Free Churchmen must be popular! It is not done officially in the Free Church and her Confessional doctrines are against this modern custom of praying at the grave of the dead, so that her people should demand of their clergymen to stop this Popish practice of praying at the burial of the dead.
We hope that Free Presbyterians at home and abroad will set their faces against this evil that has developed in the Protestant Churches in modern times. Let us witness against it by our conduct in burying our dead respectably without rites, or popish ceremonies at the grave-side. Let the family worship be conducted in the family of the bereaved by one of the men present whether he be one of the ministers of the Church, an elder, missionary, deacon, or male member. Let us avoid the error of thinking that the worship of God in the bereaved family is not properly conducted if a minister is not present. God is not a respecter of persons. If the minister of the congregation is not present any one of the male members of the said congregation is quite suitable to conduct the family worship.
In the Directory for the Public Worship of God we read: “Concerning burial of the dead. When any person departeth this life, let the dead body, upon the day of burial, be decently attended from the house to the place appointed for public burial, and there immediately interred, without any ceremony. And because the custom of kneeling down, and praying by or towards the dead corpse,* and other such usages, in the place where it lies before it be carried to burial are superstitious; and for that praying, reading, and singing, both in going to and at the grave, have been grossly abused, are no way beneficial to the dead, and have proved many ways hurtful to the living; therefore let all such things be laid aside. Howbeit, we judge it very convenient, that the Christian friends, which accompany the dead body to the place of public burial, do apply themselves to meditations and conferences suitable to the occasion; and that the minister, as upon other occasions, so at this time, if he be present, may put them in remembrance of their duty. That this shall not extend to deny any civil respects or deferences at the burial suitable to the rank and condition of the party deceased, while he was living.”
*It has been argued that this prohibition strikes at prayer in the house before the body is removed for burial but a careful reading of the words makes it plain that what is condemned is not prayer in the house where the dead body is, for that would mean that no family worship could be held in the house while the dead body was there. What is condemned is the custom of kneeling down, and praying by or towards the dead corpse.
“Let love be without dissimulation. Abhor that which is evil; cleave to that which is good.” Romans, xii. 9.