Death and Lament

Part 3, The Living Should Take This to Heart

When I say, as I have over the last two posts, that our existential relationship with death has changed, I'm making a contrast with a certain degree of stoical equanimity that characterized past generations. To be clear, this isn't to say that death didn't devastate our forbears. But for most of human history, a common cultural and personal way of dealing with death was to face and meditate upon human mortality. 

For example, Abraham Lincoln's favorite poem was entitled "Mortality," written by the Scotsman William Knox. Here are the opening lines: 

Oh, why should the spirit of mortal be proud?
Like a swift-fleeting meteor, a fast-flying cloud,
A flash of the lightning, a break of the wave,
He passes from life to his rest in the grave.

The leaves of the oak and the willow shall fade,
Be scattered around, and together be laid;
And the young and the old, the low and the high,
Shall molder to dust, and together shall lie.

The infant a mother attended and loved;
The mother that infant's affection who proved;
The husband, that mother and infant who blessed;
Each, all, are away to their dwelling of rest.

Lincoln memorized this poem, and would often quote it aloud to acquaintances and at social gatherings. Historians have argued that Lincoln came to use such stoical reflections to cope with the depression that plagued him in his early adulthood, and that this stoicism allowed him to keep his emotional footing during the dark years of the Civil War.

When we turn to the Wisdom books of the Bible, we find something similar to Lincoln's favorite poem. Consider some representative passages from Job, Ecclesiastes and the Psalms:

While he was still speaking, yet another messenger came and said, “Your sons and daughters were feasting and drinking wine at the oldest brother’s house, when suddenly a mighty wind swept in from the desert and struck the four corners of the house. It collapsed on them and they are dead, and I am the only one who has escaped to tell you!”

At this, Job got up and tore his robe and shaved his head. Then he fell to the ground in worship and said:

“Naked I came from my mother’s womb,
and naked I will depart.
The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away;
may the name of the Lord be praised.” (Job 1.18-21)

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There is a time for everything,
and a season for every activity under the heavens:
a time to be born and a time to die... (Ecclesiastes 3.1-2)

It is better to go to a house of mourning than to go to a house of feasting, for death is the destiny of everyone; the living should take this to heart. (Ecclesiastes 7.2)

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Lord, you have been our dwelling place
throughout all generations.
Before the mountains were born
or you brought forth the whole world,
from everlasting to everlasting you are God.

You turn people back to dust,
saying, “Return to dust, you mortals.”
A thousand years in your sight
are like a day that has just gone by,
or like a watch in the night.
Yet you sweep people away in the sleep of death—
they are like the new grass of the morning:
In the morning it springs up new,
but by evening it is dry and withered.

We are consumed by your anger
and terrified by your indignation.
You have set our iniquities before you,
our secret sins in the light of your presence.
All our days pass away under your wrath;
we finish our years with a moan.
Our days may come to seventy years,
or eighty, if our strength endures;
yet the best of them are but trouble and sorrow,
for they quickly pass, and we fly away. (Psalm 90.1-10)

I've made the argument over the last two posts that our existential relationship with death has changed. And if you disagree with that view, or are struggling to understand what I'm talking about, I'd ask that you read the passages above and ask a few questions.

First, to what degree has this theme in the Wisdom literature--the brevity of human life--featured in churches you've been a part of? 

For my part, I used to hear these themes as a child, growing up in the Churches of Christ. Growing up, I heard my church use these texts to make the same point as the poem "Mortality," that death humbles human vanity and pride. Meditation on death was used as spiritual formation. And to this day, I cherish that upbringing. Since college, however, I have rarely heard this theme--death humbling human pride--from the pulpit. Modern Christian messaging tends toward affirmation--"God loves you"--than toward "Memento mori, you vainglorious creature of dust."

(BTW, I need to make a sticker saying "Memento mori, you vainglorious creature of dust" for my laptop and car bumper. Maybe a t-shirt...)

Second, reflecting on the texts I shared above, how consoling versus triggering do you find them? Or your church?  For example, how appropriate and consoling would it be, in the face of death, to meditate upon a line like "the Lord gives and the Lord takes away"? If, standing at a graveside, you feel that such a line is offensive, harsh, hurtful, or outrageous, you're appreciating my point how our existential relationship with death has changed, how far we've come from a Lincolnesque and Joblike posture in the face of grief. It is very hard to find progressive Christians characterized by this sort of stoical resignation. We no longer console ourselves like Job.  

Lastly, consider the memento mori of Psalm 90: "Our days may come to seventy years, or eighty, if our strength endures; yet the best of them are but trouble and sorrow, for they quickly pass, and we fly away." To what degree do you see American culture, and American Christianity, reflecting upon such themes? To what degree is the memento mori of Psalm 90 penetrating a culture characterized by the denial of and the pornography of death?

In conclusion, I think Ecclesiastes 7.2 makes the point crystal clear. It is better to go to a house of mourning than to go to a house of feasting, for death is the destiny of everyone. The living should take this to heart.

The question is: Do we?