ASPECTS OF CREMATION

Southland Times, Issue 20641, 13 November 1928, Page 3

ASPECTS OF CREMATION

A SPIRITUALIST VIEW. POSSIBLE EFFECT ON SOUL. London, September 13. The question of whether cremation produces suffering for the person whose body is cremated was discussed by Mr. R. Montandon, at the International Spiritualist Congress. In many districts, said Mr. Montandon, there were crematoriums, and the number of people who demanded the purification of fire after death was increasing. Many scientists favoured cremation. Were they right or wrong ? The question had to be considered from the sentimental and hygienic standpoints, and hitherto doctors had neglected the occult side of the problem. They reasoned from a materialistic point of view, ignoring all the things of the soul and of the after life. Man was both spirit and matter, immortal and mortal, divine and earthly. Spiritualists admitted that the physical body, which was the only one officially known to science, Mr. Montandon went on to say, had subtle bodies which interpenetrated the material body. After the adventure of death, decomposition and disintegration of the material elements occurred. What were the advantages or dangers of cremation ? Cremation should be avoided during the first three days after death, because it caused disintegration of the vital body, and if destruction of the body by fire was carried out too soon after death the spirit, which had just been liberated, might suffer. Except in cases in which the body was absolutely dead cremation, as practised in Europe, in a sealed vessel, and a short time after the appearance of the first symptoms of death occurred, might, in the speaker’s opinion, cause suffering. It was wiser to avoid the means of destroying the physical body unless a number of days had elapsed after death. It was a greater shock to the soul if death was accidental instead of natural. The time necessary for the physical dissolution varied according to the evolution of the individual.