Rest in peace

"[5][6][7] 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,[8] especially in the Catholic, Lutheran, and Anglican denominations.

[14][15][16] It became ubiquitous on the tombs of Christians in the 18th century,[9] and for High Church Anglicans, Methodists,[17] as well as Roman Catholics in particular, it was a prayerful request that their soul should find peace in the afterlife.

[8] 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.

[19] In 2017, members of the Orange Order in Northern Ireland called on Protestants to stop using the phrase "RIP" or "Rest in Peace".

[22] In the same radio programme, Presbyterian Ken Newell disagreed that people are praying for the dead when they use the phrase.

A 7th-century gravestone from Narbonne beginning with requiescunt in pace and includes the Hebrew phrase "שלום על שראל" (peace be upon Israel). It has been interpreted variously as an "inscription relating to the Jews of France", [ 12 ] or as a Jewish inscription. [ 13 ]