History of Ash Wednesday

Like so many practices in Christianity, pinpointing the exact beginning of the practice can be difficult. Ash Wednesday ashes is one such tradition. We know Ash Wednesday was originally called dies cinerum which means “day of ashes.” And we know the first known mention of dies cinerum is found in a early copy of the Gregorian Sacramentary from at least the 8^th century. This is the book used by the priest at the altar which not only contains the words of the liturgy, but notes of various kinds useful to the clergy. Our priests use one each Sunday. 

A mention is one thing, a description is another. The mention in the Sacramentary tells us the custom was well established by the time the book was compiled, which was sometime around 781 and 791. The service book of the Roman Church was the nucleus of this book which was ordered by Charlemagne for his kingdom. Gregory, for whom the book is named, was the first Pope of the Middle Ages whose reign was 590-604. It is a fact that Gregory, one of the few Popes who is called the Great, did a good deal of liturgical reform. Consequently, the practice might be at least a century older than the service book.

Before this time, ashes had been used in a ritual with the Order of Penitents as early as the 6^th century. A Spanish rite called for the sign of the cross to be made on a gravely ill person when admitting that person to the Order. The Order of Penitents were laity who had committed grave sins, who confessed their sins to the bishop and were assigned a penance that was to be carried out over time. While they worked out their penance, they had special places in church and wore special clothes to indicate their status of penitent sinners. Likely ashes were used at the beginning of the ritual for more than just the ill.

As I said above, a mention is one thing, but how was the day of ashes observed? The earliest record we have is by an Anglo-Saxon abbot, Aelfric (955-1020). In his Lives of the Saints he wrote, “We read in the books both in the Old Law and the New that the men who repented of their sins bestrewed themselves with ashes and clothed their bodies with sackcloth. Now let us do this little at the beginning of our Lent that we strew ashes upon our heads to signify that we ought to repent of our sins during the Lenten fast.” 

We can easily assume Aelfric is describing, not our small sign of the cross in ashes on the forehead, but ashes poured or strewn on the head--which would have been the ancient practice in Judaism. The historical record indicates that originally, only men had ashes poured on their heads while women had the sign of the cross made on theirs. Of course, at some point, this became the universal practice. Ash Wednesday slowly became widespread and by the end of the 11^th century, Pope Urban II called for the custom to be practiced throughout Christendom.

The words that are spoken as the ashes are imposed, “dust you are and to dust you shall return” are the words of God spoken to Adam and Eve after they disobeyed. The ashes are to remind us of our sinful tendencies and our need to repent.

You might wonder about the source of the ashes. Tradition requires that the palms from Palm Sunday of the year previous be burned and their ashes used.

Holy Lent, Jerry