265. Houses of the Dead

From: Manners and Customs of the Bible By: James M. Freeman

• 1 min. read • grade level: 9

1 Samuel 25:1¹And Samuel died; and all the Israelites were gathered together, and lamented him, and buried him in his house at Ramah. And David arose, and went down to the wilderness of Paran. (1 Samuel 25:1). Samuel died; and all the Israelites were gathered together, and lamented him, and buried him in his house at Ramah.

Some commentators assert that Samuel was placed in a tomb erected in the house he occupied during his life, or in its court. Of this, however, there is no evidence. Long before Samuel’s time the grave was spoken of as “the house appointed for all living.” See Job 30:23²³For I know that thou wilt bring me to death, and to the house appointed for all living. (Job 30:23). So afterward Joab “was buried in his own house in the wilderness” (1 Kings 2:34³⁴So Benaiah the son of Jehoiada went up, and fell upon him, and slew him: and he was buried in his own house in the wilderness. (1 Kings 2:34)). It is much more probable that a tomb for the dead should be called a house than that a dwelling-place built for the living should be used as a tomb. An American missionary in Syria says that at Deir el Kamr, on Mount Lebanon, he found a number of small solid stone buildings, having neither doors nor windows. These were the “houses of the dead.” It was necessary to open the dead walls every time an interment took place.—Jowett's Researches, p. 207.

In India it is quite common to build a house in a retired place over the remains of the dead, where also the rest of the family, when they die, are interred. In some of these houses the funeral car, or palanquin in which the body was borne to its burial, is suspended from the ceiling. Great pains are taken to keep these houses of the dead in good repair, and some of them are built in a most magnificent manner.

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