Why do we value the bodies of the dead?

[Rev. Rye]

My guess was that it has something to do with adding the ritual to the utilitarian process of disposing a body. I know that, at least for the Ancient Greeks, it was a taboo to let a body not be buried through the story of Antigone, because it helped them get into the afterlife, which Creon really wanted to deny to Polynices, which led to Antigone getting executed.