Life After Death_ A History of the Afterlife in Western Religion - Alan Segal [86]
This may suggest that kings who died in battle were often buried where they fell, if their bodies could be recovered at all, whereas kings who died in “a good old age” were gathered to their ancestors, attaining the blessing of their bodies being available for proper burial near the capital. The burial of Josiah, arguably the best king that Judah enjoyed and the equal of David and Solomon, represents an interesting and more complicated case: Although he died in battle against the Egyptians at Megiddo (2 Kgs 23:29), the prophet Huldah had already prophesied that he would “be gathered to his fathers and be buried in peace” (2 Kgs 22:20). But there was nothing “peaceful” about his death, since he died in battle. After his death, his body was recovered and brought back to Jerusalem for burial in his own tomb (2 Kgs 23:30). And perhaps this is the sole consolation which the phrase “in peace” implies in this case.36
To make matters even more complicated, there is some evidence that “being gathered with one’s ancestors” was a more generalized Canaanite conception as well. In Ugarit, the “gathered ones” (qabuṣi, KTU 1.161) represent the group of dead, divinized royal figures who are called upon with sacrifices to ensure peace for the land.37 It may well be that the Ugaritic terminology sheds light on the later usage in the Hebrew narrative, especially as the patriarchs seem to have been especially remembered cultically in the various places where the narrative places them. The resulting conclusion about the Bible’s turn of phrase is that we cannot entirely tell what the Bible means when it says that a person was “gathered to his ancestors.” It is obvious that we will need to look at Israelite burial practices, but the archeological record contains enough variation to prevent many sure conclusions.
Material Evidence for the Disposition of the Israelite Dead
THUS FAR, we have been investigating the texts of the Hebrew Bible until the Babylonian exile. But, as has been suggested all along, the texts are not the only way in which to study the religion of a people; there was a popular side in which Canaanite religious practices held more importance, in spite of the objection of Biblical writers and prophets. This side is not easy to find, as all our texts come down to us from the cult of YHWH, which viewed itself as victorious but only after terrible penalties of destruction and exile were paid.
Archeological evidence gives us a less tendentious view of ordinary Israelite life. Israelite burial locations and styles, as everywhere, depended on the deceased’s station in life. There is also a great deal of variation in types of burial, including jar burials, individual burials in coffins (wood or ceramic) or without, cist tombs, pit burials, bench or niche burials, and communal or family tombs. Grave goods were very common. In the Late Bronze Age for Israel, during the settlement period (1200-1000 BCE), there is a distinct difference between lowland and highland patterns of burial, suggesting that the Israelite and Judahite patterns are more often seen in the hills, the strongholds of early Israelite tribal life.38 The lowland patterns are considerably more sophisticated, as one would expect, since that is where the civilized Canaanite cities were.
Later on, Biblical cemeteries were often placed outside but near cities. In the Iron Age, they might contain fifty to one hundred tombs, with perhaps twice that many occupants, as tombs could be shared, often many times over. The tombs themselves ranged from rock-hewn to masonry-constructed to pits, and most commonly were composed of shafts with niche-like chambers, known to the Greeks as arcosolia (Hebrew: Kukhim). These niches were used for primary inhumation but afforded easy enough entry for collection of the bones afterwards. Quite often in the First Temple period