FACING THE EAST

Hokitika Guardian, 17 June 1929, Page 8

FACING THE EAST

Tile celebration of Easter is closely com locked wfi’.th the ancient custom of burying the dead facing towards the East. Christ, according to legend, was interred in the sepulchre with his head to the west. Many suppose that Matthew xxiv, 27, means that when Jesus comes in judgment he will appear in the east. That verse reads:—

“For as the lightning oometh out of the east, and shineth even unto Hie west; so shall also file coming oi the son of. man he.”

Bodies, therefore, were buried with the feet towards the east, so that when they arise on the morning of resurrection they will face the east and can hurry in that direction to meet the Lord. Because of this custom, the east wind is known in Wale-' as “the wind of the dead man s feet.”

The custom' of burying the dead with the head pointing westward is much older than Christianity, for it can he traced hack to ancient pagan practices.

In fact there was a surprising um.ormity among the primitive peoples who buried their dead lying oast am< •west, although sometimes the head pointed west and sometimes cast. Such orientation is believed to lie a relic of the rites of the ancient sun-wor-shioners and their solar symbolism, i ne head of the corpse is/laid pointing to the east or to the west, depending on whether the dead are thought of in relation to the sunrise the home of the sun god, or in relation to the sunset, tlie destination of departed souls. The pagan Franks placed thfcir dead in the tombs with the loot to the east; and Walter Johnson, in “Byways in British Areliaelogy,” describes a cemetery at Charvaise dating back to the earliest iron age, in which all but two or three of the more than . - graves were so orientated that the heads lay towards the west. \ lii the early Christian cemeteries in Great Britain and Northern Europe the graves were carefully oriomnted. the bony being almost invariably laid with the feet pointing towards the last. This custom prevailed nuti? a century or two ago and is still widely observed. Even in the family burying grounds on the colonial estates of Maryland and Virginia. The bodies were often placed with , the heads pointing west.