Saturday, May 12, 2012

Decomposition of the Flesh Atoned for the Sins of the Dead Person

Now, I may change my mind back to my EASIER pollyanna, rose-colored glasses, over-the-whole-thing, ways.
For now though...am sensing many, many walking dead!
Am again, now, almost as sensitively aware of these creatures, in the supra-sensitive ways I was in my youth and much of my life.
These perception & emitting faculties, these abilities were muted for a while. I had tried to make this so, in a good way.
I perhaps, experimented with the ways of the world: it was /is easier to overlook certain things.
Many things.It is more my nature to be quietly FIERCELY, loving, accepting,  kind, easy and comfortable.
But comfort of this sort gives way to a living death.
The dear-seeming zombies, as self-appointed sheriff's of the state & state religions, the Rx pharmaceuticalized, psychologized, proudly-hypnotized, do  prey upon this layer of of life blood and energy that they can sap from certain vulnerable- looking naive creatures.

Now, even the US systems-educated youth traipse along and mix easily among angry, feisty, lumbering dinosaurs. All rather unpleasant smelling entities. They sing pretty, look pretty, sometimes smell pretty, yet, they are not. And that is why they try so hard. And, even the ones who catch on and decide to not try...well...NO.
They rise up like scary winged-crones, with pretty faces, if one dare to shake the politicly correct fabric of the local culture.
They are proudly vulturous toward anyone who eschews the state-learned, psycho-social judeo-christian-muslim-hindu syncretized T.V and school-learned truth.
They may prettily parade around as yogis, and free-birds, but, they are attached, quite attached to the god-corpse.
 
Especially in South Florida USA, people abound who are walking dead.
There are pacemakers and other life-extending devices embedded in people who are actually DEAD.
Yet, to give many of these souls, if you believe such entity exists, or their life energy any reason to stay in the body longer, is not, so far proving to bring any perceptibly finer creatures.
They lumber, roar and fill the atmosphere with foul emmisions, sounds, airs and more.

As I walk among people, and live among people, I am reminded again of the saying:
often quoted as "Let the dead bury their own."
This came to me a strong and deep truth some years back.
Again it comes today:
I, perhaps, have more I can or should express of my experiences and perceptions of this state.
Or not.
Craving mountains, and fresh air...so,
perhaps, best that I simply live quietly alone.

Live within as much humor, liberty, Truth, Beauty, Love,  as possible,
and let the dead bury their own.

Let the Dead Bury Their Dead
http://www.ldolphin.org/deaddead.html


An Interpretation Based on First-Century Jewish Burial Practices
            McCane suggests an interpretation that is consistent with first-century Jewish burial practices (1990:40-41).  After a body was placed in a burial cave, it was left to decompose.  The family mourned for seven days.  This initial mourning period was followed by a less intense 30-day period of mourning, called shloshim.  However, the entire mourning period was not fully over until the flesh of the deceased had decomposed, usually about a year later.  The Jerusalem Talmud states: When the flesh had wasted away, the bones were collected and placed in chests (ossuaries).  On that day (the son) mourned, but the following day he was glad, because his forebears rested from judgment (Moed Qatan 1:5).
            The final act of mourning, the gathering of the bones into a bone box called an ossuary, was called �ossilegium,� or �secondary burial.�  It is this act, I believe, that is in view in our Lord�s response.  [For a good discussion of secondary burials, see Meyers 1971; Rahmani 1981.  On ossuaries, see Rahmani 1982b].  The disciples� request and Jesus� response makes good sense in light of the Jewish custom of secondary burial.  When the disciples requested time to bury their fathers they were actually asking for time to finish the rite of secondary burial.  Their father had died, been placed in the family burial cave, and the sons had sat shiv�ah and most likely shloshim. They had requested anywhere from a few weeks to up to 11 months to finish the ritual of ossilegium before they returned to Jesus.
            Jesus� sharp answer also fits well with secondary burial.  The fathers had been buried in the family burial caves and their bodies were slowly decomposing.  In the tombs, along with the fathers, were other family members who had died, some awaiting secondary burial, others already placed in ossuaries.  When Jesus stated: �Let the dead bury their own dead,� He was referring to two different kinds of dead in the tomb: the bones of the deceased which had already been neatly placed in ossuaries and the fathers who had yet to be reburied.  The phrase �own dead� indicates that the fathers were included among the dead.
 .....

 The concept of gathering the bones of one�s ancestors is deeply embedded in the Hebrew Scriptures and reflected in Israelite burial practices (Gen. 49:29; Judges 2:10; 16:31; I Kings 11:21, 43, etc.).  However, by New Testament times, the concept had taken on a new meaning.  According to the Rabbinic sources, the decomposition of the flesh atoned for the sins of the dead person (a kind of purgatory) and the final stage of this process was gathering the bones and placing them in an ossuary (Meyers 1971: 80-85).  Jesus confronts this contrary theology.
http://www.ldolphin.org/deaddead.html

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