I blogged several weeks ago about praying to the dead. In a newspaper recently I read the following obituary "Today is the first year death anniversary of Mr. .... On the occasion all are requested to pray for eternal peace and rest for his soul."

After a conversation with a friend about the blog a few weeks ago, I committed to adding a bit more to the discussion about prayers for the dead and why I blogged on it, so here's part of our discussion:

I was actually surprised to find prayers for the dead functioning within a Muslim worldview. I'm still learning about Islam, but was under the impression that death is perceived somewhat similarly to the Christian worldview, in that after death one meets judgment (see Hebrews 9:27 and surrounding context) and the time for mediation has already come and gone, but perhaps I was wrong about this impression. Some have described Bangladeshi Islam as "folk Islam" (I haven't been here long enough to say, although the mainstream here is definitely a moderate, "liberal" Islam), which implies some incorporations of pagan (and/or Hindu) practices from earlier times before Islam was on the scene here. Many Bangladeshi Muslims are also nominal, not truly trying to practice Islam. There are also many nominal Muslims who freely say that faith in general is the most important factor, whether Christian or Muslim it doesn’t matter.

I’m not yet sure where prayers for the dead fit in—are they mentioned in the Quran or are they part of this “folk Islam”? In other words, is this a Bangladeshi thing or is it an Islamic thing? For example, there is a common practice among Filipino Catholics holding parties in the graveyard (seriously, for two nights a year the graveyards are packed out all night with whole families hanging out, eating, burning candles, drinking, etc on their family's graves) on All Saints Days. The purpose is for praying to and for their relatives who are now "closer to God" and can pray to God on their behalf. (Another interesting one among the Filipino Catholics is the practice sometimes observed of putting a bucket with water and certain leaves outside the door of house in which there is a dead body (in the house rather than using a funeral home). As I understood it, visitors’ hands are dipped into this bucket before entering the house so as to ward off any evil spirits that may be attracted by the dead body. Although these people would say that they are Christian, this practice is clearly not a true Christian practice). Although the practice of praying to the dead is incorporated by many Catholic "Christians" it is nevertheless a false practice, that is, it is inconsistent with the true biblical worldview (for ex., see Isaiah 8:19; 19:3; 1 Timothy 2:5). In other words, the problem for this practice is that it simply doesn't fit into the biblical worldview, namely because Christ is the only mediator between God and humanity, and he reserves the exclusivity of his mediation—(incidentally, this exclusivity therefore also excludes the Virgin Mary from being a valid mediator, contrary to popular Catholic teaching). So, the choice is like this: one can either have a paganist worldview and pray to the dead asking for help and not have the Bible, or one can have the Bible and be a Christian and not pray to the dead, but one can't truly be and have both at the same time, even though they may claim to.

While I was visiting with some of the people in the graveyard during one of these occasions, I asked them if they were Christians and they said “yes.” I asked them if they believed the Bible is true and they said “yes.” I asked them if they knew that the Bible teaches that praying to the dead is wrong and they said “no.” They nevertheless insisted that because praying to the dead was their “tradition” they were right to do it as well as claim to believe that the Bible is true.

For some reason, the attractiveness of praying to the dead has widespread appeal and in many Christian traditions is practiced with reference to the "saints." This practice is also errant, however, and is not a valid Christian practice even though it is widely popular in many places throughout the world. In addition to the texts mentioned above and many others that disqualify the possibility of some other mediator in addition to Christ (namely, dead relatives or “saints”), something should be said about the Catholic and Eastern Orthodox et al distortion of the biblical concept of "saints." (I'm not saying that Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox concept is exactly the same). The Greek word that is often translated "saints" in the New Testament literally translated would be "holy ones." This is not an adjective for “elite” Christians, rather, it is the biblical description of believers in general, which flows logically/ and theologically out of the meaning of conversion—that is, Christ is holy and his holiness is given to believers when they believe/ are born again in the Holy Spirit, and as such become "holy ones" and therefore, have the calling to be holy. If someone is a follower of Christ, they are one of the saints/holy ones. I'm quite certain that every single instance of the word "saints" in the New Testament is in the plural form. The consistent use of the plural form further emphasizes that the concept is not an adjective for describing the individual Mother Thereasas of the world who manage to get to “sainthood.” Rather it simply refers to believers in general. (The implication is of course that a believer should act like a saint, because after all, they are one). Furthermore, no provision whatsoever is made in the New Testament that leaves any room for praying to the saints in any way, but the Bible throughout entirely disqualifies praying to humans, and even angels (see Acts 14:13-17ff; Revelation 22:9). I'm carrying on about this point just to say that many of the practices of "Christianity" that have to do with the dead mean a lot more than just remembering dead relatives and friends, and are in fact paganistic practices that are incompatible with the biblical worldview, and not merely other legitimate ways of practicing Christianity.

So when I first observed this praying for the dead among Muslims I was surprised by it, thinking that it would be incompatible with the Islamic worldview. And maybe it is, properly understood; but this I still need to discover as time goes on.

But your comments spurred some additional thoughts about my reflections. While it is inconsistent within the biblical worldview to pray to or for the dead, Christians have perhaps not allowed enough reflection and recognition of those who have died. In the United States in general, our culture is quite dead to the dead—sorry about the lame pun:-). In general, we don't really know what to do with, or how to remember those who have gone before us and as a result, we often don't do anything more than perhaps mention something in passing about someone who has passed (another lame pun!) Americans tend to be deathly afraid of death, even talking about it or mentioning someone who has died. It's a society that focuses on the youth and on vitality. It would be good for our culture to perhaps have death anniversaries when we can actively remember those we love, their life, their love, and their example of faith without this practice degenerating into prayers to them.

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