Burial or Cremation?

The question not infrequently comes to me: “What about cremation?”

This is an inherently difficult question because it touches a very personal and private decision, what to do with the remains of a loved one or what should be done with one’s own remains (it doesn’t get much more personal).

It’s also difficult because these are emotional decisions often made is a very difficult time.

Nevertheless, there are biblical patterns and doctrines from which we can learn and apply to this situation.

There is a consistent biblical pattern of burial of human remains. Perhaps the most outstanding OT example is Abraham’s quest to bury Sarah (Gen 23) as a sojourner in a foreign land. Other significant examples could be cited (e.g., Jacob, Joseph and others). This is clearly the biblical pattern, carrying right through the care given to the deceased body of our Lord himself.

According to the Apostle Paul, the biblical pattern was not grounded in sentiment but in a conviction: the resurrection. In 1 Cor 15 the Apostle Paul used an agrarian metaphor to explain the hope of the resurrection. According to Paul, our bodies are like seeds planted in hope, in the expectation of a glorious (if unusual!) harvest: the resurrection body, i.e., a glorified human body.

As my dear friend and colleague Steve Baugh graciously pointed out to me in 1985 or so, the act of cremation is at odds with the act of planting a body in the soil. For one thing, the imagery is not the same at all. Burial is done with regard to the body’s status as part of the image of God. We don’t just have a body. We are body and soul. That is who we are as image-bearers.