Dictionnaire Biblique de Top Bible

CENDRE

Résidu de la combustion (Ex 9:8), en particulier des sacrifices par le feu (1Ro 13:3) ; on l'enlevait avec soin (Le 1:16, No 4:13) ; tout un quartier des murs du S. de Jérusalem était à la fin de la royauté le lieu des cendres et des décombres (Jer 31:40). A cette poussière grise est une fois comparé le givre (Ps 147:16).

--Le supplice de la cendre, d'origine perse, est décrit dans 2Ma 13:5,8 : on jetait le condamné dans une tour pleine de cendre qu'une roue ramenait autour de lui jusqu'à ce qu'il fût étouffé ; ainsi Ménélas, « qui s'était rendu très coupable contre l'autel, dont le feu et la cendre sont sacrés, trouva la mort dans la cendre ».

--Dans le rituel de la vache rousse brûlée, sa cendre jouait un certain rôle ; voir (No 19:9,17) Vache rousse. --Les cités réduites en cendres (Eze 28:18,2Pi 2:6) deviennent naturellement le symbole du néant (Ge 18:27, Job 30:19) ; d'où les expressions énergiques : « des sentences de cendre » (Job 13:12, Vers. Syn., poussière) ; l'idolâtre « se repaît de cendres » (Esa 44:20).

--Dès l'antiquité les cendres étaient l'emblème du deuil et de la pénitence : la prostration dans la poussière est un geste de douleur, et c'est clamer publiquement son humiliation que de ramasser la poussière et la cendre pour s'en souiller le visage (Homère, II, liv. 18). Les Israélites portaient ainsi leurs deuils privés (2Sa 13:19), nationaux (1Ma 3:47 4:39) ou religieux (Job 42:6, Da 9:3, Mt 11:21-23), en joignant ordinairement le sac à la cendre (voir Deuil). Dans la cendre on s'asseyait (Job 2:8, Jon 3:6), se couchait (Est 4:3), se roulait (Jer 6:26, Eze 27:30), se plongeait (La 3:16) ; la cendre devenait comme la nourriture du malheureux (Ps 102:10). Le second Ésaïe proteste contre les gestes d'un deuil purement formaliste (Esa 58:5 et suivant) --thème que Jésus reprendra (Mt 6:16,18) --et il annonce la bonne nouvelle du salut de l'Éternel, qui remplacera sur les fronts les cendres du deuil par le diadème de l'allégresse (Esa 61:3).

--Mais l'Église s'est laissé à son tour (Esa 61:3) envahir par le rite : dans la pénitence publique des premiers siècles, l'évêque répandait les cendres sur la tête des pénitents ; depuis 1091 tous les fidèles catholiques doivent, pour faire acte d'humiliation, se soumettre à cette « imposition des cendres » le premier jour du carême, « jour de cendre et de cilice », aujourd'hui appelé pour cette raison le Mercredi des Cendres. Il s'agit des cendres des buis bénits des Rameaux de l'année précédente, que l'officiant impose sur la tête des assistants en disant en latin : « Homme, souviens-toi que tu es poussière et que tu retourneras en poussière (ou cendre) » (Ge 3:19). Jn L.

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