Musical BS: The Sin-Eaters

Subject: Musical BS: THE SIN-EATERS
From: JenEllen
Date: 20 Feb 01 - 10:25 PM

Okay Rick, here ya go...

"I didn't know what he meant, and when I asked, he couldn't or wouldn't tell me. Years later I read of the sin-eaters who were told to be common in the Appalachian Mountains. When there was a death in the family, food was laid out on the corpse and that night the sin-eater would eat it, consuming not just the food, but the deceased's earthly sins as well. I believe that he saw Hank as a sin-eater, taking on all of the trials and tribulations and burdens of his audience, all the broken hearts and burntup crops and empty bottles, all the broken promises and outright lies that life can deal up to you. Until they grew too heavy. Until he was taking up the slack with drugs and alcohol and then when that didn't work he just couldn't go on with it anymore. I'll never get out of this world alive, he had sung."

So you have a person of whom his own wife said, "I'd see him driving towards his house, he looked so lonesome, he looked like he'd rather go anyplace than home." A person who, after his death, made Johnny Horton say "That's Hank trying to get in touch." every time the windows would rattle. A person for whom MissAudrey, spina bifida, alcoholism, and even impotence, made quicksand of the ground he walked on. Not so much a Roy Head or a Tommy Tucker, where self-control took a backseat to talent. Just a man who happened to live what he sang.

Now, you can follow the academic line all the way back to Plato if you want, where these imaginings would only be considered the lowest rung on the ladder of knowledge, and supposedly would yeild the lowest degrees of truth. Regardless of the Tripartite Soul, these artists have little or no relevance when compared with others of their time.

So, in comparison, back to Johnny Horton. He would be a Williams contemporary. (Hell, they shared a woman, they might as well share this.) Listen to "All for the love of a Girl" or "The Mansion You Stole", then listen to "Alone and Forsaken" or "I Can't Escape From You". Somehow the academic rationale doesn't fit. You don't get the feeling that ol'Johhny has 'been there' even with the mocking and condescending tone of his "girl".

Dylan makes a step in that direction, but I'm not sure that he'll make the entire journey. Everybody gives a little sigh at "My Back Pages", but for sin-eater status, he's got a ways to go. (This may very well be a case of ignorance because I know virtually nothing of Dylan save what mainstream has spoonfed the radio) Another that comes to mind of late is Kurt Cobain, supposedly a voice of a generation that found the burden too great to bear. I'll leave the commensurate drug use up to someone else, but where Hank (and Kurt too, for that matter) seemed to be using to escape the sins, others used (not naming any names) called them on.

Okay. So I'll step back with the target on my ass to give you a clear shot, but I'm still happy to be absolved.

~JE

Subject: RE: Musical BS: THE SIN-EATERS
From: Rick Fielding
Date: 20 Feb 01 - 11:59 PM

Thanks Jen. I'm lookin' forward to hearin' if any others are familiar with this term.

Rick

Subject: RE: Musical BS: THE SIN-EATERS
From: katlaughing
Date: 21 Feb 01 - 12:04 AM

I read of it in some book a long time ago. Will try to remember where it was. I think there were some indigenous beliefs of this.

Subject: RE: Musical BS: THE SIN-EATERS
From: katlaughing
Date: 21 Feb 01 - 12:12 AM

Rick, do you mean specific to music, or in general society?

At any rate, here is a bit I found:

"According to Brewster's Dictionary of Phrase and Fable, sin-eaters were the poor persons hired at funerals in Medieval Times, to eat beside the corpse and so take upon themselves the sins of the diseased, that the soul might be delivered from Purgatory. This tradition of sin-eating has been recorded in England, Ireland, Wales, Eastern Europe and even in India. Though there may be cultural variation, a unifying theme of this job is that, the sin-eaters are poor persons, and because they take others' sins on to themselves, they are generally viewed as unclean and stand outside the general community."

Subject: RE: Musical BS: THE SIN-EATERS
From: MartinRyan
Date: 21 Feb 01 - 03:45 AM

kat

"stand outside the community" is probably a bit optimistic. As far as I know, they were generally driven out!

Regards

Subject: RE: Musical BS: THE SIN-EATERS
From: katlaughing
Date: 21 Feb 01 - 09:33 AM

Thanks, Martin, that was my impression, too, I was only quoting in the above above.

kat

Subject: RE: Musical BS: THE SIN-EATERS
From: GUEST,Russ
Date: 21 Feb 01 - 01:04 PM

This summer at Augusta Sheila Kay Adams told us about sin-eaters and asked if we were familiar with the idea. My wife (Eastern KY) knew it but I (WV) didn't. The concept was apparently still alive in the southern mountains around the halfway mark of the 20th century. According to Sheila Kay, sin-eating was a family tradition and passed from father to son. She said that the sins of the dead person would enter bread that had been left in the same room as the deceased. The sin-eater would consume the bread and sins. When the sin-eater felt death approaching, he notified his son, and it was the duty of the son to perform the service for him.

Subject: RE: Musical BS: THE SIN-EATERS
From: SINSULL
Date: 21 Feb 01 - 04:08 PM

I was a bit nervous when I saw the title. Thought I was being royally flamed.

Subject: RE: Musical BS: THE SIN-EATERS
From: Hawker
Date: 21 Feb 01 - 04:14 PM

There is a diet club in the UK called Slimming world where you can eat up to 10 sins a day!!!! LOL Lucy

Subject: RE: Musical BS: THE SIN-EATERS
From: Bert
Date: 21 Feb 01 - 04:41 PM

SINSULL...If it had said SINS-EATERS...

Subject: RE: Musical BS: THE SIN-EATERS
From: Jeri
Date: 21 Feb 01 - 05:34 PM

There was an episode of Rod Serling's Night Gallery called "The Sin Eaters," and it was about the tradition.

There is a short story by Native American author Sherman Alexie called "The Sin Eater" in a book called The Toughest Indian in the World. (Looks interesting.)

Subject: RE: Musical BS: THE SIN-EATERS
From: Malcolm Douglas
Date: 21 Feb 01 - 07:48 PM

You might like to have a look at Fiona MacLeod (William Sharp)'s story,  The Sin-Eater.  This was first published in 1895, and deals -in fictional form; there can be no guarantee that the details of the custom are authentic- with Sin Eating in the Western Isles of Scotland.

Malcolm

Subject: RE: Musical BS: THE SIN-EATERS
From: Charcloth
Date: 22 Feb 01 - 05:59 PM

Highlander magazine did an article on sin eaters a few years back. The custom seems to have come over from Scotland to the Appalachian Mnts. There was also a mvie I think Lindsey Wagner played in it as a Lady Doc. who went to the Apalachins & saw the custom in practice

Subject: RE: Musical BS: THE SIN-EATERS
From: Matt_R
Date: 22 Feb 01 - 06:11 PM

I ate a sin once. It needed mustard.

Subject: RE: Musical BS: THE SIN-EATERS
From: katlaughing
Date: 22 Feb 01 - 06:25 PM

Jeri, Sherman Alexie's stuff os good. It was his stuff that the Native American indie film "Smoke Signals" was based on. He is a terrific writer.

Subject: RE: Musical BS: THE SIN-EATERS
From: Burke
Date: 22 Feb 01 - 06:47 PM

Interesting. I did a search in our catalog & found two short stories called The Sin Eater. One by Lewis Nordan is in the book Welcome to the Arrow-Catch Fair. It looks like it's set in the south. The other is by Margaret Atwod in Dancing Girls and Other stories. From the opening paragraphs I know it addressing a Welsh custom. I'll try to read & maybe be able to report back later.

Subject: RE: Musical BS: THE SIN-EATERS
From: Troll
Date: 22 Feb 01 - 08:44 PM

I never ran across it in western NC (Avery Co.) but it could have been a custom in some areas. The only contemporary of my father that is still alive is in his 80's. The next time I'm up home I'll have to ask him.

troll

Subject: RE: Musical BS: THE SIN-EATERS
From: GUEST,McHugh,Joe
Date: 22 Feb 01 - 10:17 PM

Coincidence being what it is, my wife and I somehow got on the subject of sin-eaters earlier this week. Sort of out-of-the-blue since we had never discussed it before. And my first visit to mudcat and I see there's a discussion going on about this custom. My wife had remembered the Night Gallery episode. Related to "scapegoat" and the symbol of Christ, poor, son of the Father, taking on the sins and being driven out for doing it? I'd be curious to hear an old-time southern mountain preacher get onto this subject.

Subject: RE: Musical BS: THE SIN-EATERS
From: sian, west wales
Date: 23 Feb 01 - 11:16 AM

It is said to have been a custom in Wales, certainly. I wonder if it is related to the similar custom of laying a corpse out with a small dish of salt on its chest ... albeit for other-world appetites.

I also wonder if the Rod Sterling Night Gallery episode was the same one as The Sin Eater in which Richard (John Boy Walton) Thomas appeared in the title role. I had some idea that Thomas wrote the episode as well ... and was interested because of his Welsh connections.

sian

Subject: RE: Musical BS: THE SIN-EATERS
From: IanC
Date: 23 Feb 01 - 11:37 AM

I'm sure it's mentioned as being practiced in the last century in Edith Porter's "Cambridgeshire Customs and Folklore", probably in the East Anglain fens. To my knowledge it's no longer done.

Cheers!
Ian

Subject: RE: Musical BS: THE SIN-EATERS
From: Allan C.
Date: 17 Mar 20 - 11:10 AM

This articleis where this description came from:

The mountain people especially those of Irish decent believed that the sin eater could come just before a person died or just after and they would be able to take the sins of the person about to die or the person who had just died upon themselves. The sin eater would do this by requesting a plate of food to be prepared and the plate of food would be set on the chest of the person who was soon to die or who had just died.

The Sin Eater would then say a ritual of words and then he or she would take the plate of food over into a corner of the room and eat it taking the sins of the dying or dead person away from them and placing them on the sin eater.

Quite often especially in western North Carolina the identity of the sin eater was kept hidden so that no one in the community knew who the sin eater was. And my grandmother told that in her community when she was a young girl the sin eater wore a costume[a hooded, ragged-edged, black robe.] She said that the sin eater that came to her community also went to other communities around in the same area where she lived as a young girl. She told us that she remembered seeing the sin eater come up until the time she married at age 19.

My Grandmother said that the sin eater would be sent for when someone was near death or when someone was killed or died suddenly and the sin eater would come at sundown on the day before the person was to be buried and he would place a white handkerchief on the ground in front of the door of the house where the person had passed away and the man of the house or the closest living male relative would place a money payment on the handkerchief. My Grandmother said that when she was a girl the payment was usually $2.

She said that the sin eater brought a wooden plate , a wooden cup , and his own fork and spoon and it was these that he would use when he performed the ritual of eating the deceased persons sins up on himself. My Grandmother used to say that at that time $2 was a good sum of money. She always told us the sin eater would carry his eating utensils tied up in a brown cloth and that he also carried a big black bible.

She told us that to the best of her memory that the sin eater would ask for his plate to be filled with food and his cup with what ever beverage was around and that then after placing his wooden plate on a dead persons chest that the sin eater would say. " I pledge my soul for your sins and ask that God Almighty remove those sins from you and place them up on me and I eat this food and drink from this cup to show that I have taken your sins upon me. If I lie may God strike me dead before I eat from this plate or drink from this cup " And with that the sin eater would go over in the corner and eat everything on the plate and drink everything in the cup and then the sin eater would tie his eating utensils back up in the brown cloth and with that he was gone never speaking to anyone in the house again that night.

Subject: RE: Musical BS: THE SIN-EATERS
From: Allan C.
Date: 17 Mar 20 - 11:28 AM

It seems as though there should be some songs about this.

Subject: RE: Musical BS: THE SIN-EATERS
From: GUEST,Starship
Date: 17 Mar 20 - 12:30 PM

The link doesn't work, Allan C. Is it from here?

http://www.fayettevillebaptist.org/sermons/120205am.htm

Subject: RE: Musical BS: THE SIN-EATERS
From: GUEST,Starship
Date: 17 Mar 20 - 12:39 PM

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sin-eater

Wales (and bordering areas) seems to be where to look for such songs.

Subject: RE: Musical BS: The Sin-Eaters
From: Mo the caller
Date: 19 Mar 20 - 06:02 PM

Did Thomas Hardy write a story about it - ah no, the story I've heard broadcast must have been
Precious Bane by Mary Webb.