Burial and Mourning in Early Judaism

Jews in the Hellenistic and Roman periods practiced secondary burial. Initially, the corpse was placed on a shelf or niche carved into the wall of a cave or stone tomb and plastered shut. After some length of time, perhaps around a year, the remains, presumably decomposed, were reburied in an ossuary, a small stone or earthenware box, often modestly decorated. The box was left on the floor of the cave, and the burial niche could be reused (see TOMBS). Only the very elite appear to have sometimes been interred in stone sarcophagi. Cave burial was a practical solution to the problem of corpse disposal in a physical environment where soil was precious and needed to be preserved for agriculture. Burial in shaft graves was less common and seems to have been most common among poorer people or ascetic groups like the Qumran community. Cremation was never a popular option in the area because it too squandered a precious commodity: trees.

Ensuring proper burial of the dead was an important duty that typically fell to the children of the deceased. Comforting mourners was likewise considered an important commandment. Literature from the Second Temple and rabbinic periods attests to a variety of funeral and mourning practices, including funeral processions, ceremonialized lamentation, and eulogies. Because a human corpse was the highest source of impurity, purification was necessary after tending to the dead, and some burial places from the Second Temple period had accompanying mikvaot, or ritual baths. On beliefs about death and the afterlife, see DEATH AND THE NEXT WORLD.