The alternatives are; a fast from ashes, a sprinkling of ashes, or ashes applied with a Q-tip. After much thought and prayer, theologically, I have chosen to offer a service with the sprinkling of Ashes.
Here is why:
I believe in the importance of Ash Wednesday. When the Church inculcates the tradition of ashes, this is an ancient, ancient, biblical sign of remembering our mortality, repenting for our sin, and of uniting our intense time of prayer to a period of fasting and supplication to God, drawing closer to God by detaching ourselves from the pleasures of this world. It is an Invitation to Lent. Therefore; I will offer a service, prayerfully in person at 6:30 pm on Ash Wednesday, February 17th.
Why the Sprinkle and NOT the Q-Tip?
There is no supportive theology of the imposition of ashes via Q-Tip. There is however plenty of biblical text and sound theology of the Sprinkling of ashes upon our heads that date back as far as ancient Greece and is still widely practiced throughout the world today.
Homer in the Illiad, Achilles expressing the grief of the death of his friend, grabbed a handful of ashes in both hands and showered them on his head. This meant a tremendous sadness and pain one suffers when grieving. In later times this custom was described among the Jewish people of the Old Testament.
The Jewish roots of the symbol of ashes:
In the study of ashes in the Bible, especially ashes in the Old Testament, there are a few consistent themes that point out the symbolism of ashes. In the book of Genesis 3:19, God says to Adam (after he falls after he commits a sin), “You are dust and to dust you shall return.” So this verse is one of the actual verses quoted during the Ash Wednesday service. So the first symbol that we use for dust and ashes — if you say someone is dust and ashes — is that it’s a symbol of mortality. It’s a symbol of the fact that after the fall, after the commission of the first sin, we are subject not just to suffering, but to suffering and death. So every human being is mortal and we go back (after our death) to a state of being dust and ashes.
In the book of Job, 42:6, as Job is standing before the Lord, he says this: “Therefore I despise myself, and repent in dust and ashes.” So now we have another layer of meaning. Not only does dust symbolize mortality, but ashes and dust symbolize mortality and repentance from sin. Repentance is the second meaning of the symbol of ashes. We’ll see that elsewhere in the book of Daniel, for example in Daniel 9:3, Daniel is praying and interceding for his people. And even though Daniel himself is a righteous man, he does penance for the sins of his people. And the way he expresses that penance is through fasting, sackcloth, and ashes. So this is what it says (chapter 9, verse 3): “I, Daniel, turned my face to the Lord, seeking him by prayer and supplications with fasting and sackcloth and ashes.”
So one of the things that ancient Jews would do is when they were entering into a particularly intense period of prayer, penitence for sin, and supplication, they would wear sackcloth, which was a (kind of) rough cloth that would actually be uncomfortable, it would scratch the skin, it would irritate the skin, so it would cause suffering, and it would be a kind of penance. They would also fast (so that would cause a kind of suffering), abstaining from food, abstaining from drink, and so they would suffer in that way. And then they would also cover themselves in ashes as a sign of their mortality and as a sign of repentance.
In 1 Maccabees 3:47 (this is very significant), we get an image, and it gives us the origin of ashes not just anywhere on the body but on the head in particular. It says when the Maccabees were interceding and entering into this time of prayer, “They fasted that day, and they put on sackcloth and sprinkled ashes on their heads, and rent their clothes.”
So all these things together were common practice in the Old Testament during intense periods of fasting and prayer and are still present in some customs and traditions throughout the world today.
Present-day Slavic traditions, for example, of the Latin Rite Catholicism continue the practice of Sprinkling Ashes on the head.
May the love and peace of God be with you+
Blessings,
Mo. Allison+
551-697-6133
