THE UNDERWORLD
I. SHEOL
2. THE GRAVE AND SURVIVAL IN THE GRAVE
Consequently the survival of the dead person depends to a certain extent on the fate of his corpse. This is somewhat surprising in associa- tion with a belief in distant Sheol and its shadowy images; but it would at once become understandable if it were the grave which had 1 Cf. also I Sam. 17.44, 46, and A. Bertholet, Die isruelitischn Vorstellungen uom
&stande nach dem rode, 1899; G. Beer, ‘Der biblische Hades’ (Tbol. Abhandlungen zu Ehren H. J. Holtzmanns, 1902) ; Aubrey R. Johnson, The Vitality of the Individual in the Thought of Ancient Israel, 1949, pp. 88ff. ; E. Ebeling, Tod und Leben nach den Vorstellungen der Babylonier I, I 93 I ; A. Heidel, The Gilgamesh Epic and 0 T Parallels, 1945. On the subject of the judgment of the dead cf. ch. XXIV below.
T H E G R A V E 213
originally counted as the dwelling-place of the dead. In fact, side by side with the Sheol conception we do find another-and to all appearance older-view, according to which the dead dwell in the grave. Not only is the grave called the habitation of the dead (Isa.
22.16), but great importance is attached to being buried alongside the members of one’s family (cf. II Sam. 17.23; 19.38, Gen. 47.30;
50.25). This explains why to bury someone among the common people, as Jehoiakim did the prophet Uriah, is to dishonour him (Jer. 26.23). This, too, is the origin of the fairly common expressions
‘to be gathered to one’s fathers’ and ‘to go to or sleep with one’s fathers’: ne’esap ‘el-‘ammcw; hikab cim-‘ab&iw.l To see one of the bench-type graves, which were the sort in most common use in ancient Israel, is to realize that such phrases are to be taken literally.
The family dead were simply laid on rock shelves extending along the walls in the burial cave; later the bones were collected in an artificial cavity. Thus even in death the family remained united. As a natural result the phraseology became generalized, and could be used in cases where there was no question of an ancestral grave, as with Abraham, Moses and Aaron.
This concern to be united with one’s fathers and the other members of the family clearly derives from a belief that the dead still survive in some way or other in the grave. This is, in fact, the oldest form of belief in survival, being found even among primitive peoples. Strictly understood it is incompatible with the idea of Sheol, the general gathering-place of the dead; but it is perverse to seek to iron out this contradiction by assuming a line of development: one grave-many graves-great burial cave-underworld. For the same contradiction is found among primitives. The idea of Sheol, deriving as it does from the exercise of the imagination, was manifestly never able to efface entirely belief in the presence of the dead in the grave, and this for the quite simple reason that the latter had appearances on its side. The custom of giving food to the dead, which even though taboo con- tinued in Israel down to the very latest period (cf. Deut. 26.14;
Ecclus 30.18; Tobit 4.17), indicates the toughness of this belief. To this day little pans of water can be seen on Muslim graves, placed there for the dead to drink from, though people do not like to talk about the practice. And something of the same kind underlies the custom still carried on in Europe today of placing little Christmas trees on the graves of children, In this last-named instance no one
1 Gen. 25.8; 35.29; 4941, 33; Deut. 32.50; Judg. 2.10; I Kings 2.10.
214 ‘1’iIE UNL)EKWOKLL)
would, of course, speak of a cult of the dead; and the term is equally inappropriate to the leaving of food for the dead in ancient Israel.
That, however, which lives on in the grave is not a soul which had once been present in the living person but the whole man. Hence the dead are called neither nepeS nor nefi&t nor rtia!z but me’tim or r”@‘im, the ‘dead’ or the ‘weak’.1 Israel fully shared the primitive belief that a shadowy image of the dead person detached itself from him and continued to eke out a bare existence; and we only confuse this idea if we mix it up with our own concept of the soul. For death results from God’s withdrawing the breath of life, the r&h, whereupon Man expires and once more becomes dust, that is, inanimate matter (Gen.
3.19; Job 34.14f.; Eccles. 12.7). In this respect Man is like the animals (Ps. 104.29) ; hence the Preacher asks despairingly (Eccles. 3.18-2 I)
whether after death there is any difference between the two. Equally the nep& the life or individual existence, comes to an end. If it is sometimes said that the nepe.f goes down into Sheol, or is rescued from it, this does not refer to actual death, but is poetic diction for mortal danger, nepeS signifying either the life which already seemed to have succumbed to death, or simply standing for the personal pronoun:
‘my soul’ = ‘I’ (cf. Pss. 16.10; 30.4; 49.16; 86.13; 89.49; Prov.
23.14). What survives, therefore, is not apart of the living man but a shadowy image of the whole man. There is no need here to discuss the
1 This translation explains the word in terms of the root r+h, ‘to become slack’.
In Late Phoenician inscriptions the word is used to mean ‘shades’ or ‘spirits’. The problem of the Old Testament usage lies in the fact that the same word concur- rently denotes a people of the primal age (Gen. x4.5; Deut. 2.11, 20; 3.11, 13;
Josh. 12.4; 13.12; 17.15), but that we cannot assume two different roots for the two meanings (as L. Kahler does, LVir). The interpretation is still further compli- cated by the presence of the word in the Ugaritic texts, where it denotes a group of (7 or 8?) servants either of the sun-goddess Shepesh or of the dying and rising Baal. They are also called ‘Znm, probably ‘the divine ones’, so that explanations oscillate between genuine divine beings (so Ch. Virolleaud, ‘Les Rephaim: frag- ments der potmes de Ras Shamra’, Syria XXII, 1941, pp. 1-30; Dussaud, et al.) and human cultic officials who as attendants of the god-king possessed divine authority for carrying out the fertility rites (so esp. J. Gray, ‘The Rephaim’, Palest&w Expl. Quarterly 21, 1949, pp. 27ff., and i%e Legacy of Canaan, 1957, pp.
153f.). The signification of the word might in both cases be ‘healers’ or ‘possessors of healing powers’; but other interpretations are also possible: cf. the list in G. R.
Driver, Canaanite Myths and Legends, 1956, p. 155, cf. pp. gf. How from this starting- point the word could come to denote both the spirits of the dead (possibly originally chthonic deities who would be related both to the world of the dead and to the fertility of the earth) and peoples of the primal age (here the favoured explanation is in terms of an euhemeristic deviation) is as yet completely unclear. I am in- debted to Walter Baumgartner for several references; for further information the reader is directed to his provisional account in TR 13, 1941, p. 89.
T H E G R A V E 215
origins of this remarkable belief; in all probability it has something to do with the experience, in itself inexplicable, of the reuenant.
Among non-Israelite peoples this belief often exerted a strong influence on their religious life. That the potential for such a develop- ment was also present in Israel may be seen from the designation of the dead as Whim, divine beings (I Sam. 28.13), to whom a know- ledge of the future is attributed. There are also necromancers, yidde’o’ni, that is, ‘knowing ones’1 (Isa. 8.19; Lev. 19.31; 20.6; Deut.
18.1 I; I Sam. 28.3, g, etc.), who understand the art of causing the dead to appear and speak. The dead person in this case is termed an
‘a6 (Lev. 19.31; 20.6, 27; Deut. 18.1 I), a word which may simply mean a reuenant (cf. the Arabic root ‘-ter-b, to return; Sabaeany-‘-b).
According to Lev. 20.27 the dead may also enter a man or woman, take possession of them and speak through them. This is an animistic elaboration of belief in the returning dead.
Furthermore, the mourning customs practised in Israel, partly forbidden, partly tolerated by the Law, point in some degree to an influence of the dead upon the living and vice versa. When as a sign of mourning people tear their clothes, sit in ashes, scatter earth upon their heads, and wear sackcloth in place of their ordinary clothing, the origin of this custom, agreeing as it does with the .practice of primitive peoples, can hardly be interpreted as anything other than an attempt to make oneself unrecognizable to the dead from fear of their envy or malice. The legal prescription (Num. 19.15) that every open vessel which does not have a covering secured with a cord
,
becomes unclean as a result of the proximity of a dead body must likewise derive from the fear that the spirit of the dead may try to hide itself in the house in order to avoid having to enter the grave with the corpse. Among the Batak of Sumatra it is the custom for this reason to make a loud clamour at the interment, and also for prefer- ence to remove the body through a hole broken in the wall of the hut rather than through the door, in order that the spirit of the dead may not find its way back agAin.
This is not, of course, to say that the original meaning of these various practices was at all periods consciously present to the 1 Many also see in this word a term for the actual spirit of the dead. The attractive explanation of both expressions as referring to certain implements with which the interrogation of the dead spirit was carried out, namely the bull-roarer, well known from primitive religion, a view which has been put forward by H.
S c h m i d t (Marti-Festschrift, BZAW 41, 1925, pp. 253ff.), will not bear closer examination (cf. K. Budde, Jesajas Erleben, 1928, p. 92, n. 2, and <A W46, pp, 75f.).
216 T H E U N D E R W O R L D
Israelites. Instead in most cases the same process will have taken place as may be observed with many of our own customs, namely that the original meaning is quite forgotten. Hence such practices are not properly of interest either for religion or for biblical theology, but only for the archaeologist.1
3. T H E P R O B L E M O F A N C E S T O R W O R S H I P
It would, however, be quite a different matter if on the basis of these customs the existence of ancestor worship could be proved, as in particular J. C. Matthess and Fr. Schwallys believed. In that case the practice, for example, of wounding oneself by incisions, of cutting off and tearing out the hair of the head and the beard respectively, and of veiling the head or at least the lower part of the face, would be a ritual of dedication to the service of the dead by which one declared oneself a slave of the ancestral spirit now venerated as a god. It is, however, precisely the comparison with primitive ideas which shows this interpretation to be in error., For the incisions that draw blood and the offering of the hair do not originally have a sacrificial signifi- cance, but are methods of resuscitation applied to those who have just died in an attempt to transfer to them the life-force present in these things.4 This interpretation is supported by the evidence of the practice of sprinkling the sick with blood in order to endue them with fresh strength. It was, moreover, precisely these mourning customs which Israelite law strictly forbade,5 not indeed so much because they had been tenaciously rooted from earlier times as because they were constantly trying to force their way in from the Canaanites and other neighbouring peoples.
1 Rightly stressed by E. Kautzsch, Bibl. Theologie des AT, p. 13.
2 ‘Rouw en doodenvereering in Israel’, Iheol. Tjdschr. xgoo, pp. g7ff., r ggff.
a Das Leben nach dem lode nach den Vorstellungen des alten Israel und des Judentums, x892. Cf. also J. Lippert, Der Seelenkult in seinen Beziehungen zur althebriiischen Reli- gion, 1881; P. Torge, Seelenglauben und Unsterblichkeitshofiung im AT, Igog.
4 Less probable is the explanation in terms of a prophylactic rite designed to
make the mourner unrecognizable to the spirit of the dead person. The earlier over-valuation of animism as a principle of interpretation has today been overcome by the recognition that belief in mana represents a more original and much more comprehensive element in the world of primitive ideas: cf., e.g., N. Soderblom, Dar Werden des Gottesglaubens2, 1926; K. Beth, Religion und Magie bei den Naturv&
kem2, 1927; C. H. Ratschow, Magie und Religion, 1947; G. van der Leeuw, Phiino- menologie der Religions, I 956.
6 Deut. r4.xf.; Lev. rg.27f.; 21.5.
r
I
A N C E S T O R W O R S H I P 217
It is for the same reason that the Law draws so sharp a line of separation between the dead and the religion of Yahweh. Any contact with, even indeed the mere proximity of, a corpse is enough to render one unclean.1 The lawgiver was plainly aware of the danger which, in view of the persistent influence of the religious environment, any suggestion of tolerance toward these widespread mourning customs was bound to bring with it. But we have no right whatever to derive the pollution proclaimed in the Law from some special holiness attaching to the worship of the dead in ancient Israel.
Just as little has the custom of leaving food for the dead2 anything to do with a sacrificial meal in honour of the divinized ancestors; nor is there any evidence to be found elsewhere in the Old Testament which can be adduced in support of such a supposition. Ps. 106.28 mentions ,$&m~tim, which were eaten in connection with the cult of Baa1 Peor, and were therefore a foreign importation. The custom of handing the mourner food and a cup of consolation, with which he may end his fast, is, of course, something entirely different from a sacrificial meal, and implies no more than a simple expression of sympathy with one’s friend.
If any circumstance at all can be pressed into service to provide some sort of effective proof of the existence of ancestor worship, then the only one worthy of real consideration is the strikingly high regard in which the ancestral graves were held. Genesis in particular is absolutely full of traditions about the graves of the patriarchs and their families, and attaches palpable importance to the fact that all the forebears of the nation found their last resting-place in Canaan, and that their graves are still known right down to the writer’s own time. Thus we are given a most circumstantial account of the way in which Abraham purchased the cave of Machpelah near Hebron (Gen. 23), and how by Sarah’s side he himself (25.g), and later Isaac and Rebekah (35.29; 49.31) and Jacob and Leah (4g.2gff.; 5o.r2f.), were buried there. In addition we know of the grave of Rachel on the road from Bethel to Ephrata (35. I g), and that of Deborah, Rebekah’s nurse, by the oak of Bethel (35.8). Tradition has also handed down to us the burial-places of Aaron (Deut. 10.6), Miriam (Num. 20.1), Joseph (Josh. 2+32), Joshua (Josh. 24.30), Gideon (Judg. 8.32), Jephthah (Judg. 12.7), Samson (Judg. 16.31) and the so-called Minor Judges, though the first two in this list are admittedly outside Canaan.
1 Lev. 21; Num. 5.2; rg.rrff., 14ff.
2 Cf. p. 2 I 3 above.
,, ,, ,, ,, I, .
218 T H E U N D E R W O R L D
It is, however, a striking fact that precisely in the case of the graves of the patriarchs the source which gives such detailed information about them should be the latest, namely the Priestly stratum, the clear and sober monotheism of which must from the outset protect it against any suspicion that it wished to show reverence for the sites of an ancient cult of the dead. Only as regards the graves of Rachel and Deborah does our information come from an older source, the Elohist;
but these are just the instances in which ancestor-worship is as good as excluded. For if normally only male ancestors have a claim to adoration, then this certainly rules out the nurse of the tribal mother!
Attempts have indeed been made to educe from the Priestly narrative a polemic against the cult of the dead, and to say that the writer, precisely because he makes no mention of any kind of cult at the graves, is seeking to bring out the absurdity of the grave cultus: a grave is a grave- a n d nothing more! But such a method of polemic, consisting of a detailed account of the purchase of the graves, is so ineffectual as to be simply unbelievable, If this had been his intention, P is much more likely to have followed the example of the older sources, and said nothing at all about the ancestral burial-places. Far more probably he had a positive interest in them, related to rights of possession. Either he was particularly interested in the change of the legal position of Abraham in Canaan when by his purchase of real estate his status was raised from that of a client without legal rights to that of a landowner of equal standing with the native-born, or it is a question of the right to ownership of ‘Hebron after the Edomites had settled there in the sixth century. In either case, of course, Gen. 23 and the passages dependent upon it would] have to be regarded as a later side interest in the Priestly historical narrative.
The problem is more complicated in the case of the graves of the Judges, which are mentioned in the older sources and especially in the Elohistic. Here certainly there can be no question of simple ancestor-worship, but there is a suggestion of a hero-cult. Now Wundtl has drawn attention to the fact that those heroes who stand half-way between gods and men have, as a result of the fusion of ancestors venerated as divine with local nature deities, acquired their character partly because the ancestral line was traced back to God as its originator or because a political leader proclaimed himself directly as a god, leaving out the generations in between. The nature myth
1 W. Wundt, Vdkerpyhologie 4. I, pp. 452ff.
A N C E S T O R W O R S H I P 219
then absorbs the elements of ancestor-worship by anthropomorphiz- ing its own divine figures, and turning them into bringers of culture and founders of states. This modification was given its classical expression among the Greeks. Now, if these conditions for the emergence of a hero-cult are borne in mind, then on the basis of our knowledge of both the Canaanite and the Israelite religions it must be said that in Canaan such a cult is extremely unlikely. Not only are the local nature deities there already closely bound up with the Baa1 as the sky-god, a relationship which is bound to obstruct their demotion to the status of human bringers of culture, but a prime requisite for this religious development is lacking, namely that of ancestor-worship.
Two last arguments for the existence of ancestor-worship must be mentioned-the cultic importance of the family unit, and the institu- tion of levirate marriage. Both, however, are very weak, and affect nothing of what has already been established. Certainly it is notice- able that in Israel right up to a late period the family forms not just a social but also a cultic group. Thus David, according to I Sam. 20.6, 29, has his absence from the royal court excused on the grounds that he has had to go to an annual sacrificial feast of his clan at Bethlehem.
But we also find the same kind of seba!z hayya’mim being offered by a family at prominent sanctuaries such as Shiloh (cf. I Sam. I .2 I ; 2. I g),
with the implication that the family as a cultic group was felt to be the normal unit in the Yahweh cultus. To assert that this custom could only have arisen as a result of an earlier veneration of common ancestors, and could not be based on the importance of the family as the primary social group, is pure petitio principii.
Finally, the institution oflevirate marriage is much better explained in terms of ancient belief in mana than of ancestor-worship. Deut.
25.7ff. requires that the brother of a husband who has died childless should marry his widow, and then have the first son of this marriage entered in the family records as the son of the dead man. Gen. 38 affords evidence that this custom is ancient. Now, there is no need to deny that it is in many ways attractive to explain levirate marriage in terms of the desire to guarantee the dead man the cultus that is his due, all the more so as this marriage with the brother-in-law occurs precisely among those people with whom ancestor-worship is indi- genous, namely Indians, Persians, Afghans and others. Nevertheless too much should not be built on this fact. If one is not prepared to regard as original the motive given in the Israelite Law, namely the