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bonnie knox |
| Did any of you read "The Cremation of Sam McGee" when you were in school? |
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9/4/16 1:19 pm
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Cojak |
| bonnie knox wrote: | | Did any of you read "The Cremation of Sam McGee" when you were in school? |
Bonnie, boy is that a reminder. When we were driving thru the Yukon (I believe) we passed Lake Labarge. I quoted all I could remember and as soon as we got access I located the words, because YES i remembered:
The Northern Lights have seen queer sights,
But the queerest they ever did see
Was that night on the marge of Lake Lebarge
I cremated Sam McGee.
WE drove over a bridge on the ALCAN called 'Sam McGee.
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9/4/16 7:33 pm
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| Patrick Harris wrote: | When Jesus said " let the dead bury the dead " it was not in reference to the proper mode of disposing the body.
It was not actual command to future believers. It was given for a specific time and situation.
In context it was an instruction on discipleship and the cost of following him.
Neither a command to bury or a prohibition of cremation. |
If Paul can use a verse about muzzling oxen's mouths to talk about paying preachers.... my argument is more literal to the text.
I suppose you could bury ashes, but the immediate audience buried bodies and bones (sometimes in sepulchers) and would have understood it that way.
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9/6/16 11:13 pm
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bonnie knox |
Literal? That would be something to see--a dead person burying another dead person. No, thanks.  |
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9/6/16 11:24 pm
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Literal--Maybe the wrong choice of words, if you think of the literal 'dead' as the physical 'dead' as opposed to the spiritual dead literally burying the physically dead.
I know that a lot of Christians and Jews have made theological arguments of such details of the text. Even Jesus' statements on the resurrection in Matthew 22 come to mind.
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9/6/16 11:26 pm
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Patrick Harris |
| Link wrote: | | Patrick Harris wrote: | When Jesus said " let the dead bury the dead " it was not in reference to the proper mode of disposing the body.
It was not actual command to future believers. It was given for a specific time and situation.
In context it was an instruction on discipleship and the cost of following him.
Neither a command to bury or a prohibition of cremation. |
If Paul can use a verse about muzzling oxen's mouths to talk about paying preachers.... my argument is more literal to the text.
I suppose you could bury ashes, but the immediate audience buried bodies and bones (sometimes in sepulchers) and would have understood it that way. |
Clear concise context means that this was about something other than cremation or an example of what should be done with the body when someone has died.
There is no literal context that implies Jesus said to bury the dead.
To take it literally would actually mean no Christians should have anything to do with our burials. Spiritually dead burying the dead.
Burial is a person choice and a Christian custom, but is not a command. |
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9/7/16 6:44 am
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bonnie knox |
| Link, you are right that the listeners would have understood it to mean burial, and it wouldn't have made sense to say cremated if that was not the current custom. However, it would be a mistake to say that therefore Jesus commanded burial as opposed to cremation. Patrick is dead on (no pun intended) about what the verse means. |
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9/7/16 7:18 am
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bonnie knox |
| Link wrote: | Literal--Maybe the wrong choice of words, if you think of the literal 'dead' as the physical 'dead' as opposed to the spiritual dead literally burying the physically dead.
I know that a lot of Christians and Jews have made theological arguments of such details of the text. Even Jesus' statements on the resurrection in Matthew 22 come to mind. |
What comes to my mind is 2 Peter 3:16. |
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9/7/16 8:03 am
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| And another thought about cremation |
bonnie knox |
| The fact that folks are spreading their ashes EVERYWHERE gives me the willies. I read a book about an organic gardener who noticed her husband's ashes looked like bone meal, so she spread them over her garden. Yuck! I wouldn't want to eat a carrot grown in soil with human ashes. I used to walk at a public park in the Raleigh area and noticed a little memorial plaque by the lake. I assume the ashes were spread over the lake. Man, I do not want to swim and accidentally swallow a bit of lake water with human ashes in it! Please folks, I don't want to be a cannibal. Mind where you put your ashes. |
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9/7/16 8:33 am
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Bonnie and Patrick,
How do you interpret 'let the dead bury their dead.' Do you think 'bury' has a metaphorical meaning?
I take it to mean this way. Let the dead (spiritually dead) bury (literally) their dead (literally).
Bonnie, it looks like you'd want to agree with that, since sprinkling ashes in the drinking water and on the food isn't going to happen if the dead get buried.
Jews, including some of the ones in the New Testament, historically squeezed a lot more out of a verse than some of the people on this forum are willing to do.
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9/7/16 9:10 am
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| Re: And another thought about cremation |
Cojak |
| bonnie knox wrote: | | The fact that folks are spreading their ashes EVERYWHERE gives me the willies. I read a book about an organic gardener who noticed her husband's ashes looked like bone meal, so she spread them over her garden. Yuck! I wouldn't want to eat a carrot grown in soil with human ashes. I used to walk at a public park in the Raleigh area and noticed a little memorial plaque by the lake. I assume the ashes were spread over the lake. Man, I do not want to swim and accidentally swallow a bit of lake water with human ashes in it! Please folks, I don't want to be a cannibal. Mind where you put your ashes. |
You are such a Pansy!   
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9/7/16 9:42 am
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Link |
I think I watched just a few episodes of 'Married with Children' back in the '80's. In one of them, the husband thought the ashes on the grill from last year made the burgers taste good, so one of the holidays, the 4th of July or whatever it was, he wanted to grill burgers. But his wife had cleaned the grill. She went looking for ashes to put on the grill to cover for throwing the old ones out. She found some in a pot on her neighbor's hearth. Then she found out who the ashes were and refused to eat the burgers.
Would you eat the burgers Cojak?
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9/7/16 10:33 am
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| Re: And another thought about cremation |
bonnie knox |
I needed that.
| Cojak wrote: | | bonnie knox wrote: | | The fact that folks are spreading their ashes EVERYWHERE gives me the willies. I read a book about an organic gardener who noticed her husband's ashes looked like bone meal, so she spread them over her garden. Yuck! I wouldn't want to eat a carrot grown in soil with human ashes. I used to walk at a public park in the Raleigh area and noticed a little memorial plaque by the lake. I assume the ashes were spread over the lake. Man, I do not want to swim and accidentally swallow a bit of lake water with human ashes in it! Please folks, I don't want to be a cannibal. Mind where you put your ashes. |
You are such a Pansy! |
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9/7/16 10:46 am
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bonnie knox |
| Quote: | | Bonnie, it looks like you'd want to agree with that, since sprinkling ashes in the drinking water and on the food isn't going to happen if the dead get buried. |
The church I grew up in is probably over 140 years old. Folks have been in that cemetery from back when pine boxes were used as coffins. The well water there tastes mighty strange. |
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9/7/16 10:49 am
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Cojak |
| bonnie knox wrote: |
The church I grew up in is probably over 140 years old. Folks have been in that cemetery from back when pine boxes were used as coffins. The well water there tastes mighty strange. |
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9/7/16 10:54 am
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bonnie knox |
Link, I agree with what Patrick said here. I don't think it is sound exegesis to use this as a commentary on whether burial is morally superior to cremation.
Matthew 8
21 And another of his disciples said unto him, Lord, suffer me first to go and bury my father.
22 But Jesus said unto him, Follow me; and let the dead bury their dead.
| Patrick Harris wrote: | When Jesus said " let the dead bury the dead " it was not in reference to the proper mode of disposing the body.
It was not actual command to future believers. It was given for a specific time and situation.
In context it was an instruction on discipleship and the cost of following him.
Neither a command to bury or a prohibition of cremation. |
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9/7/16 11:05 am
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roughridercog |
Make sure I'm dead first 
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9/7/16 11:23 am
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Patrick Harris |
| Link wrote: | Bonnie and Patrick,
How do you interpret 'let the dead bury their dead.' Do you think 'bury' has a metaphorical meaning?
I take it to mean this way. Let the dead (spiritually dead) bury (literally) their dead (literally).
Bonnie, it looks like you'd want to agree with that, since sprinkling ashes in the drinking water and on the food isn't going to happen if the dead get buried.
Jews, including some of the ones in the New Testament, historically squeezed a lot more out of a verse than some of the people on this forum are willing to do. |
It's not a literal command, it was not intended to be a command, instruction or a guideline. Not everything is scripture has to be taken literally or as a command. Jesus used a lot of examples, analogy and even hyperbole.
Burial was a traditional mode of disposing of the body they understood. However, it was nothing more giving them an analogy they would understand....not to be taken as a literal command. |
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9/7/16 11:51 am
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| Patrick Harris wrote: | | Link wrote: | Bonnie and Patrick,
How do you interpret 'let the dead bury their dead.' Do you think 'bury' has a metaphorical meaning?
I take it to mean this way. Let the dead (spiritually dead) bury (literally) their dead (literally).
Bonnie, it looks like you'd want to agree with that, since sprinkling ashes in the drinking water and on the food isn't going to happen if the dead get buried.
Jews, including some of the ones in the New Testament, historically squeezed a lot more out of a verse than some of the people on this forum are willing to do. |
It's not a literal command, it was not intended to be a command, instruction or a guideline. Not everything is scripture has to be taken literally or as a command. Jesus used a lot of examples, analogy and even hyperbole.
Burial was a traditional mode of disposing of the body they understood. However, it was nothing more giving them an analogy they would understand....not to be taken as a literal command. |
It was an actual command to that man who gave burying (not creamating) his father as a reason not to follow Jesus. Jesus said, "Follow me, and let the dead bury their dead."
Looking at the way Jesus used scriptures, is Jesus a 'big theme like the kind you get in the NIV' kind of guy, or a jot and tittle kind of guy? What about Paul? Paul argued off of the singular use of 'seed.'
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9/8/16 11:14 am
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bonnie knox |
Link, even if Jesus approved of cremating (and I'm not saying he did or didn't), he wouldn't have told the guy to let the dead "bury or cremate" their dead because it wouldn't have made sense, given that the custom of the time was burying.
Paul did indeed point out that seed was singular, but the end of his argument was a very BIG picture thing indeed--that righteousness comes through faith in Christ. Everything else in scripture lines up with that. |
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9/8/16 1:36 pm
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