The Sin Eaters Because there is a life in the body and the hope of a hereafter, taking a life is a sin, a term meaning “denied God’s grace,” the condition of human aloneness and separation before redemption. Of course “taking a life” can mean forcing generations to work in the coal mines of Kentucky because no other job promises anything like a living wage. Maybe the body is what the owner class in America uses against the worker class, let’s go ahead and put it in those terms, and say that sinners come in all shapes and sizes, though we’re a lot quicker to judge the transgressions of the poor as weaknesses or flaws, than, say, the Satan who shows up with lawyers and bodyguards. In Appalachia, they called those who came to the deathbed to perform rites of purification the “sin eater”—because these accepted the transgressions of the dying who could then rest in peace. The sin eater’s last task was to eat the crust of bread placed on the chest. The life-and-death world was in the bread. I guess, the act arose from looking hard at a death, any death, and thinking, I’m afraid too. They could hardly be blamed for believing we require help to shovel and load the forlorn coal of self, the unusable portion, so that we might leave this body unburdened by our failures. My grandfather worked in a mine until he got up one morning, dressed, breakfasted on biscuits and gravy, and started up the hollow to where a Red-shouldered Hawk sat. Stone-still. When it lifted off, the hawk, he told anyone who’d listen “That was all she wrote,” meaning he turned and walked back to their row house as one converted, all his unrighteousness exploded in a fit of wings at firstlight. I guess a man walking to a mine might look at anything beautiful and rare happening to his left or right and think that. Copyright (c) 2013 by Roy Bentley. All rights reserved.
Posted on: Wed, 07 Aug 2013 05:22:24 +0000
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