Reference: Ancestor-worship
Hastings
Every people whose religious beliefs have been investigated appears to have passed through the stage of Animism, the stage in which it was believed that the spirits of those recently dead were potent to hurt those they had left behind on earth. The rites observed to-day at an Irish wake have their origin in this fear that the spirit of the dead may injure the living. There are several traces of a similar belief in the OT. When a death took place in a tent or house, every vessel which happened to be open at the time was counted unclean (Nu 19:15). It remained clean only if it had a covering tied over it. The idea was that the spirit of the dead person, escaping from the body, might take up its abode in some open vessel instead of entering the gloomy realms of Sheol. Many mourning customs find their explanation in this same dread of the spirit but lately set free from its human home. The shaving of the head and beard, the cutting of the face and breast, the tearing of the garments
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And every open vessel, which hath no covering bound upon it, shall be unclean.
If brethren dwell together, and one of them die, and have no son, the wife of the dead shall not marry a stranger abroad: her husband's brother shall go in unto her, and take her to him as wife, and perform the duty of a husband's brother unto her. And it shall be, that the firstborn that she beareth shall stand in the name of his brother who is dead, that his name be not blotted out from Israel.
I have not eaten thereof in my mourning, neither have I brought away thereof in uncleanness, nor given thereof for a dead person; I have hearkened to the voice of Jehovah my God; I have done according to all that thou hast commanded me.
And Michal took the image, and laid it in the bed, and put the net of goats' hair at its head, and covered it with the coverlet.
And Michal took the image, and laid it in the bed, and put the net of goats' hair at its head, and covered it with the coverlet.
And the messengers came in, and behold, the image was in the bed, and the net of goats' hair at its head.
And the messengers came in, and behold, the image was in the bed, and the net of goats' hair at its head.
And the king said to her, Be not afraid; but what didst thou see? And the woman said to Saul, I saw a god ascending out of the earth.
And they took their bones, and buried them under the tamarisk at Jabesh, and fasted seven days.
Then David took hold of his garments and rent them; and all the men that were with him did likewise.
And David said to Joab, and to all the people that were with him, Rend your garments, and gird yourselves with sackcloth, and mourn before Abner. And king David followed the bier.
Then Rizpah the daughter of Aiah took sackcloth, and spread it for her upon the rock, from the beginning of harvest until water poured on them out of the heavens, and suffered neither the fowl of the heavens to rest on them by day, nor the beasts of the field by night.
In their streets they are girded with sackcloth; on their roofs, and in their broadways, every one howleth, melted into tears.
And their nobles send their little ones for water: they come to the pits, they find no water; they return with their vessels empty; they are ashamed, they are confounded, and have covered their heads.
Both great and small shall die in this land: they shall not be buried; and none shall lament for them, or cut themselves, nor make themselves bald for them. Nor shall they break bread for them in mourning, to comfort them for the dead; neither shall they give them the cup of consolations to drink for their father or for their mother.
that there came men from Shechem, from Shiloh, and from Samaria, eighty men, having their beards shaven and their clothes rent, and having cut themselves; with oblations and incense in their hand, to bring them to the house of Jehovah.
For the king of Babylon standeth at the parting of the way, at the head of the two ways, to use divination: he shaketh his arrows, he inquireth of the teraphim, he looketh in the liver.
Sigh in silence, make no mourning for the dead; bind thy turban upon thee, and put thy sandals upon thy feet, and cover not the beard, and eat not the bread of men.
They shall pour out no offerings of wine to Jehovah, neither shall their sacrifices be pleasing unto him: they shall be unto them as the bread of mourners; all that eat thereof shall be defiled: for their bread shall be for themselves; it shall not come into the house of Jehovah.