Rest In Peace - Wikipedia

Epitaph or idiomatic expression to someone who has died This article is about a tombstone inscription. For The Walking Dead episode, see Rest in Peace (The Walking Dead). For the song by Extreme, see Rest in Peace (song). "RIP" redirects here. For other uses, see RIP (disambiguation). "Requiescat" redirects here. For the painting, see Requiescat (painting).

Rest in peace (R.I.P.),[1] a phrase from the Latin requiescat in pace (Ecclesiastical Latin: [rekwiˈeskatinˈpatʃe]), is sometimes used in traditional Christian services and prayers, such as in the Catholic,[2] Lutheran,[3] Anglican, and Methodist[4] denominations, to wish the soul of a decedent eternal rest and peace. It became ubiquitous on headstones in the 19th century, and is widely used today when mentioning someone's death. In other uses within the English language, it can be used to describe finality, in circumstances unrelated to death.[5]

Description

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The phrase dormit in pace (English: '[he] sleeps in peace') was found in the catacombs of the early Christians and indicated that "they died in the peace of the Church, that is, united in Christ."[6][7][8] The abbreviation R.I.P., meaning requiescat in pace, 'may he/she rest in peace' (present/subjunctive/active/3rd person/singular), continues to be engraved on the gravestones of Christians,[9] especially in the Catholic, Lutheran, and Anglican denominations.[10]

In the Tridentine Requiem Mass of the Catholic Church, the phrase appears several times.[11]

Other variations include "Requiescat in pace et in amore" for "May he/she rest in peace and love" and "In pace requiescat et in amore". The word order is variable because Latin syntactical relationships are indicated by the inflexional endings, not by word order. If "Rest in peace" is used in an imperative mood, it would be "Requiesce in pace" (acronym R.I.P.) in the second person singular, or "Requiescite in pace" in the second person plural.[12]

History

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Funerary texts with wishes for the deceased in the afterlife are as old as writing itself – the first known phonetic inscriptions were funerary texts from Ur thought to be wishes for an eternal life.[15] The phrase dormit in pace was first found on tombstones some time before the fifth century.[16][17][18] It became ubiquitous on the tombs of Christians in the 18th century,[10] and for High Church Anglicans, Methodists,[19] as well as Roman Catholics in particular, it was a prayerful request that their soul should find peace in the afterlife.[9] When the phrase became conventional, the absence of a reference to the soul led people to suppose that it was the physical body that was enjoined to lie peacefully in the grave.[20] This is associated with the Christian doctrine of the particular judgment; that is, that the soul is parted from the body upon death, but that the soul and body will be reunited on Judgment Day.[21]

Use in various religions

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Irish Protestantism

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In 2017, members of the Orange Order in Northern Ireland called on Protestants to stop using the phrase "RIP" or "Rest in Peace".[22] Wallace Thompson, the secretary of the Evangelical Protestant Society, said on a BBC Radio Ulster programme that he would encourage Protestants to refrain from using the term "RIP".[23] Thompson said that he regards "RIP" as a prayer for the dead, which he believes contradicts biblical doctrine.[24] In the same radio programme, Presbyterian Ken Newell disagreed that people are praying for the dead when they use the phrase.

Judaism

[edit] Main article: Honorifics for the dead in Judaism

The expression "rest in peace" is "not commonly used in Jewish contexts", though some commentators say that it is "consistent with Jewish practice".[25] The traditional Hebrew expression עליו השלום, literally 'may peace be upon him', is sometimes rendered in English as 'may he rest in peace'.[26][27] On the other hand, some Jews object to using the phrase for Jews, considering it to reflect a Christian perspective.[28][29]

Image gallery

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• This Lutheran Christian grave reads "Rest in Peace" in the local Cieszyn Silesian Polish dialect.
• The epitaph R.I.P. on a headstone in a churchyard of Donostia-San Sebastián
• Excerpt from gravestone in Święciechowa, showing R.I.P
• This cross from 1720 bears the complete Latin phrase in its plural form ("Requiescant in pace")
• This funerary tablet from 525 AD begins with the phrase
• Requiescat, oil on canvas painting by Briton Rivière, 1888, Art Gallery of New South Wales.

See also

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• Allhallowtide
• Eternal Rest
• From God We Came, From God We Return
• Honorifics for the dead in Judaism
• Maa Kheru
• Rest in power
• Sit tibi terra levis
• List of Latin phrases

References

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1. ^ "RIP Full Form - What Is RIP?". Full Form Dunia. 15 May 2021. Archived from the original on 2021-05-15. Retrieved 2021-05-29.
2. ^ Catholic Prayers in Spanish and English. Harvard University Press. 1900. p. 45.
3. ^ Kurtz, Benjamin (1860). Lutheran Prayer Book. T. Newton Kurtz. p. 124.
4. ^ Langford, Andy (1 December 2010). Christian Funerals. Abingdon Press. p. 56. ISBN 9781426730146.
5. ^ Rigg, Lisa. "Workshops by Stillman Eastwick-Field, Morning Lane | RIP: demolition begins before English Heritage decides on listing | Older Campaigns & Projects | Projects & Campaigns | Hackney Society". www.hackneysociety.org. Retrieved 2025-07-30.
6. ^ Yaggy, Levi W.; Haines, Thomas Louis (1886). Museum of Antiquity: A Description of Ancient Life—the Employments, Amusements, Customs and Habits, the Cities, Places, Monuments and Tombs, the Literature and Fine Arts of 3,000 Years Ago. Law, King & Law. p. 885.
7. ^ Tuker, Mildred Anna Rosalie; Malleson, Hope (1900). "Introduction to the Catacombs". Handbook to Christian and Ecclesiastical Rome: The Christian monuments of Rome. A. and C. Black. p. 411. Dormit, he sleeps, as an expression for death is proper to Christianity. Dormitio, in somno pacis, dormivit are therefore very frequently found. These and the expression Dormierit in Domino (may he sleep in the Lord) are to be seen especially in loculi of the II. and II. centuries, and occur in S. Agnese.
8. ^ Leahy, Brendan (2012). His Mass and Ours: Meditations on Living Eucharistically. New City Press. p. 53. ISBN 9781565484481. Signs such as "RIP" (Rest in Peace) on the tombs of the early Christians did not just mean they died "peacefully" but that they died in the peace of the Church, that is, united in Christ in the Church and not apart from it.
9. ^ a b Mytum, H. C. (31 December 2003). "Christian Denominations". Mortuary Monuments and Burial Grounds of the Historic Period. Springer Science & Business Media. p. 139. ISBN 9780306480768.
10. ^ a b Tarling, Nicholas (16 May 2014). Choral Masterpieces: Major and Minor. Rowman & Littlefield Publishers. p. 87. ISBN 9781442234536.
11. ^ Holy See (1961), Graduale Romanum, 1961 Edition by the Benedictines of the Solesmes Monastery, Desclée, pp. 94*–112*, archived from the original on 2019-08-30, retrieved 2012-10-29
12. ^ Expert: Maria – 7/31/2009 (2009-07-31). "Experts on Latin phrase". En.allexperts.com. Archived from the original on 2012-07-13. Retrieved 2014-04-17.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
13. ^ Broydé, Isaac Luria; et al. (1906). "France". In Funk, Isaac Kaufmann; Singer, Isidore; Vizetelly, Frank Horace (eds.). The Jewish Encyclopedia. Vol. V. New York and London: Funk and Wagnalls Company. p. 445. hdl:2027/mdp.39015064245445. OCLC 61956716.
14. ^ Fellous, Sonia (May 3, 2018). "Les noms des juifs à Paris (XIIe-XIVe siècle)". In Nadiras, Sébastien (ed.). Noms de lieux, noms de personnes: la question des sources (in French). doi:10.4000/books.pan.951. ISBN 9791036512308. OCLC 1193020908. Archived from the original on May 29, 2020. Retrieved September 26, 2020. Mais la date du décès est calculée en fonction du calendrier local, ici celui du règne du roi Egica, et non en fonction du calendrier juif comme au bas Moyen Âge.
15. ^ "The Evolution of Writing | Denise Schmandt-Besserat". Retrieved 2025-09-11.
16. ^ Spencer Northcote (1878). Epitaphs of the Catacombs During the First Four Centuries. London: Longmans, Green. p. 79.
17. ^ The Church of England magazine. Church Pastoral-aid Society. 1842. p. 208.
18. ^ Robert Jefferson Breckinridge, Andrew Boyd Cross (1837). "Antiquity of the Religion". The Baltimore literary and religious magazine. Vol. 3. p. 206.
19. ^ Gould, James B. (2016-08-04). Understanding Prayer for the Dead: Its Foundation in History and Logic. Wipf and Stock. p. 58. ISBN 9781620329887. Retrieved 2017-07-25.
20. ^ Joshua Scodel (1991), The English poetic epitaph, Cornell University Press, p. 269, ISBN 978-0-8014-2482-3
21. ^ Karl Siegfried Guthke (2003), Epitaph culture in the West, p. 336
22. ^ Edwards, Rodney (2017-07-20). "Orangemen warned to 'reject Rome' and not use RIP on social media". The Impartial Reporter. Retrieved 2017-07-25.
23. ^ William Crawley (2017-07-24). "Protestants should not use the phrase 'RIP', Orange Order says". BBC Radio Ulster (Podcast). Talkback. Retrieved 2017-07-24. Segment begins at 42:20 into the podcast, and ends at 1:00:11.
24. ^ "Orange Order calls on Protestants not to use the phrase 'RIP'". BBC News. 2017-07-24. Retrieved 2017-07-24.
25. ^ Rabbi Julie Zupan, "What is the Jewish expression to refer to someone who has died?", ReformJudaism.org [1]
26. ^ Lewis Glinert, The Joys of Hebrew, ISBN 0190282177, 1993, s.v. 'Aláv/aléha ha-shalóm'
27. ^ Jewish Language Project, Jewish English Lexicon, [https://jel.jewish-languages.org/words/421 s.v. 'olav ha-sholom'
28. ^ David Ian Klein, "Jewish Twitter claps back at Christian-inflected condolences for RBG", Forward, September 21, 2020
29. ^ Shlomo Zuckier, "What Ruth Bader Ginsburg's Online Mourners Got Right and Wrong about Jews, Death, and the Afterlife", Mosaic: Advancing Jewish Thought, September 25, 2020

External links

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Media related to Requiescat in pace at Wikimedia Commons

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Order	Pre-Mass Vesting prayers Asperges me Vidi aquam in Eastertide Processional hymn Mass of the Catechumens Iudica me Confiteor mea culpa Introit Kyrie Gloria in excelsis Deo Collect Lection Gradual Alleluia or Tract Sequentia Gospel Homily Mass of the Faithful Credo Niceno-Constantinopolitan Creed Offertory Lavabo Orate fratres Secret Preface Sursum corda Sanctus Hosanna Roman Canon Oblation Epiclesis Words of Institution Anamnesis Elevation Doxology Pater Noster Embolism Pax Agnus Dei Dona nobis pacem Fraction Holy Communion Communion antiphon Ablutions Postcommunio Dismissal Ite, missa est or Benedicamus Domino Last Gospel Post-Mass Leonine prayers Recessional hymn For funeral Mass Dies irae Lacrimosa Pie Iesu Libera Me Requiescant in pace Absolution of the dead In paradisum De profundis
Participants	Acolyte altar server Bishop Boat boy Cantor or schola Crucifer Deacon Laity Lector Master of ceremonies Porter Priest Subdeacon
Altar	Altar cards Altar crucifix Altar rails Ambo Antependium Credence table Kneeler Lavabo Misericord Piscina Sacristy Tabernacle
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