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The Russian language is rich. There are many different words and expressions in it, and we, as a rule, do not think about where this or that phrase came from. Some people mistakenly believe that the expression “May you rest in peace” is absolutely identical to the wish for the “Kingdom of Heaven.”
“May you rest in peace” - this phrase is often said when addressing the deceased. However, people sometimes don’t even think about what these words mean and how they appeared in our speech.
Originally from Ancient Rome
When performing a burial, before the priest intersects the body, relatives or colleagues of the deceased sometimes, as if wanting to fulfill an obligation to the newly deceased that was not fulfilled on time, pronounce a funeral speech. And you rarely hear sincere words at the same time - as a rule, these are forced routine phrases, a set of verbal cliches. For some reason, the last phrase, which set one’s teeth on edge, “May the earth rest in peace to you” is especially annoying - as if the soul of a deceased sinner, in anticipation of the severity of the afterlife, is crying out with all its might to us, where those left behind:
No need! I ask, don’t do it yet, don’t bury me in the ground. Will I be able to find joy in that life Among the screams, pain, death and fire?
In fact, these words are an ancient Roman curse on the deceased - the pagans considered it the highest dishonor when the body does not rest in the ground:
The sentence “May the earth rest in peace” has quite ancient roots, dating back to the times when paganism dominated the earth. According to most historians, it came to us from Ancient Rome, where these words sounded in Latin as Sit tibi terra levis. The wish for a “land made of fluff” was used by some Roman poets and philosophers in their works.
Thus, in the poems of a certain Mark Valery Martial there are the following lines:
Sit tibi terra levis, mollique tegaris harena, Ne tua non possint eruere ossa canes
.
Mark Valery Martial (Martialis), ancient Roman poet (40-104)
In other words
May the earth rest in peace to you, And softly cover the sand so that dogs can dig up your bones.
What did this phrase mean for the Romans: a wish for good or, on the contrary, did it serve as a curse?
However, throwing coins into a freshly dug grave to “lie better” also came to us from paganism - then it was called “redemption of land”, and bone mounds, drinking vodka in “company” with the dead - from the same place...
I propose to consider the expression “may the earth rest in peace.” Alas, one only hears it during the most unpleasant hours. But still, where did this expression come from, does it have any meaning?
1.“The phrase is meaningless both in a religious sense and in a purely atheistic one. For a religious person, it doesn’t make much difference where the body lies: in “fluff”, in stones, in concrete or in a swamp. And even more so for an atheist (they buried it in accordance with hygienic standards - and at the table, to celebrate the event).”
2. “There is nothing “good” in wishing “rest in peace.” This is a politically correct curse on the deceased.”
3. “Rest in peace is a pagan expression.”
4. In fact, these words are an ancient Roman curse on the deceased - the pagans considered it the highest dishonor when the body does not rest in the ground.”
This is what we agreed on! According to the archdeacon, all people, when burying their loved ones, curse them! Nevertheless, from the heap of negativity, the idea is extracted that this phrase comes from ancient, “pagan” roots.
Then it becomes necessary to clarify what the word “pagan” means. From the Internet:
1.Paganism - (from the ancient Slavic pagans - peoples, foreigners, the modern concept - “nations”), the designation of national religions, that is, all non-Christian ones. The pagans themselves did not call themselves that. The gods of Paganism personified the elements of nature.
2. The term “paganism” comes from the Church Slavonic word “language”, meaning “people”. In the Old Testament era, Jews called all other peoples pagans, putting into this word a negative assessment of the peoples themselves and their religious beliefs, customs, morals, culture, etc. From the Jews the term “paganism” passed into Christian vocabulary.
3. The Slavic term comes from Church Slavic. “language”, that is, “people”, “tribe”, by which the Hebrew terms “goy” and “nokhri” are translated in the Slavic translation of the Bible.
Perhaps that's enough. It is clear that “ pagan” is “folk ”. For the purposes of ruling the world, the Semitic Arabs imposed their idea of the folk faith of other nations, making a scarecrow out of it.
We will note in passing that this is where the swear word “outcast” comes from. That is, if you are not an Arab-Semite, then you are already automatically an “outcast”, because you are one of the “goyim”. Remember, from S. Yesenin: “Go you, my dear Rus'...”
So, the roots of the expression “rest in peace” have an ancient, folk, non-Christian origin. There is no religious background here.
Let's dig further into where this phrase comes from among the people. Can the earth really be like fluff? After all, it is usually heavy, much heavier than water, whatever fluff there is. So, were the ancients wrong?
But no. Anyone who knows well the properties of certain phenomena or objects (and the ancients were exactly like this) has probably already answered that the earth can be downy, much lighter than water. The name of this land is an ancient and familiar word - il. Westerners presented it to us as a discovery, under the fashionable word - sapropel. The wonderful properties of silt were well known in ancient times. If you dry the sludge, you get a very light mass that feels like fluff, soft to the touch, very light. It is much lighter than water and contains a lot of useful substances. Here's what sludge is used for:
“In medicine: sapropel is used in medical (physiotherapeutic) practice for applications, baths for mud therapy. In agriculture, sapropel is used as fertilizer. Sapropel fertilizer helps to mobilize the soil composition, leading to self-cleaning from pathogenic plants, fungi and harmful microorganisms. The mineral part of sapropels contains a large number of trace elements, rich in vitamins, and many enzymes.
Sapropel fertilizers are a unique product, the only organic fertilizer used for radical improvement (reclamation) and sanitation of soil. In animal husbandry: sapropel, rich in salts of calcium, iron, phosphorus, without admixture of sand and poor in clay, is added to the diets of farm animals as a mineral supplement (pigs up to 1.5 kg, cows up to 1.5 kg, chickens 10-15 g per day)."
What do you think of the above?
Due to its excellent properties, silt in ancient times was considered very useful and was highly valued by our ancestors - Aryan farmers. That is why the phrase “may the earth rest in peace” arose.
Alternatives
In addition to STTL, similar sayings were also often used in Roman culture:
- SETL - Sit Ei Terral Levis
- May the earth be easy for him. - OTBQ - Ossa Tibi Bene Quiescant
- Bones, you have the opportunity to rest. Mostly found in Roman Africa. - DMS - Dis Manibus Sacrum
- To the Holy Gods Mans. Manas are the deified souls of deceased ancestors in the Italic religion. It is curious that the word manis (spirits of the dead) has a common root with the word manus (hand). Thus DMS can also be translated as “in the hands of the holy gods.” - HSE - Hic Situs (sita) est
- He (she) is here. As a rule, this inscription was accompanied by the name of the deceased.
Atheism or paganism?
Nowadays you can often hear, even from priests, that this phrase is atheistic, has nothing to do with the church, with Christian doctrine, and, on the contrary, absolutely contradicts it.
But in fact, this phrase has nothing to do with atheism. She's pagan. In ancient times, people's religious ideas differed from those accepted today. People believed that a person's soul remains with the body after death. They honored the body and sought to provide it with maximum comfort in the afterlife. They provided a person with various attributes of secular life, put weapons, utensils, and jewelry in the graves. There was even a custom of burying his servants and wives, horses, and dogs with the deceased.
A whole ship could be placed in a pharaoh’s tomb to make it more convenient for him to travel along the river of death.
Origin of the phrase “May the world rest in peace”
The tradition of funeral speeches and inscriptions on monuments arose among the ancient Greeks; epitaphs originated from the ancient Greek funeral traditions. The phrase “May the earth rest in peace” is no exception. The source of these words can be found in Euripides' tragedy Alcestes, staged in Athens in 438 BC.
“κούφα σοι χθὼν ἐπὰνωθε πέσοι!” (may the earth be easy for you!) - exclaim the heroes of the tragedy, saying goodbye to the heroine Alcesta, who sacrificed her life to save her husband.
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The Kingdom of heaven
According to Christian doctrine, the body is the seat of the soul, a temple that should be maintained in proper order. Including after death. Resurrection is one of the main dogmas of the church. And after the Resurrection, the soul will again be reunited with the body, wherever it is, and in whatever state it is.
Hence the careful, reverent attitude in church rites towards the body of the deceased. Hence the various funeral rites. But the soul is immortal.
The phrase “May he rest in peace” was inherited from paganism. But if many pagan rituals were quite successfully assimilated by the church, then this phrase contradicts faith, does not bring any benefit to the deceased and cannot be used. Instead, one should wish the deceased the Kingdom of Heaven .
Blessing or Curse?
The Roman poet Marcus Valerius Martial is credited with the following stanza:
“Sit tibi terra levis,
mollique tegaris harena, Ne tua non possint eruere ossa canes”
“May the earth be light for you,
And softly cover the sand, So that it cannot protect the bones from dogs”
Based on these lines, it was assumed that the formula “May you rest in peace” could be a veiled curse addressed to the deceased. In Roman culture, it was believed that the well-being of a person’s afterlife also depended on the correct burial (or cremation) of the remains. The Romans assumed that desecrating a grave could cause harm to the deceased.
However, this interpretation cannot be considered the only correct one: the phrase was often used before Martial without any obvious negative connotations. Some researchers, also citing the reverent attitude of the Romans towards the body of the deceased, associate the phrase “May the earth rest in peace” with the wish that the earth would not put pressure on the remains of the deceased.
When did the expression “rest in peace” appear?
The invention of the phrase “May you rest in peace,” which expresses more of a curse than wishes for a good life in the afterlife, was born a long time ago. The ancient Roman poet Marcus Valerius Martial lived from 40 to 104 AD. AD, so the epitaph was born somewhere in this period of time.
It turns out that it is useful to study dictionaries, among them there are popular expressions. Reading dictionaries is the only way to somehow broaden your horizons. And the best way to do this is to work with paper, writing out interesting points by hand. Clicking and poking on a smartphone does not work when learning something new, since the memory does not record new knowledge for a long time.
The expression “rest in peace” is just one of the misused phrases; it is useful to dig up something new from time to time: learning borrowed words and expressions automatically expands the vocabulary of your native language. By the way, Orthodox priests condemn the use of the phrase “May the earth rest in peace,” pointing to its pagan roots and negative initial connotations.
In Christianity
For Christian culture, such a wish is alien: the soul of a person after death and before the Last Judgment is in no way connected with the body, therefore, any wishes addressed to the body have nothing to do with the state of the soul of the deceased.
Some Orthodox priests advise against using the phrase “May the earth rest in peace” at a Christian funeral because of its pagan origin. Many others do not consider this question to be of any importance and do not prevent it from being uttered at the funeral.
You might be interested:
- What they say at funerals and wakes
- Funeral service
- What is an epitaph
March 14, 2019
In Orthodoxy
You will never hear this phrase in the mouth of an Orthodox minister. After all, it is customary for Christians to wish the Kingdom of Heaven for the deceased. However, among Russians it is customary not only to often use this phraseological unit, but also to combine it with the wish for bliss in Heaven. However, this is not entirely true.
Why don’t clergymen use the words “May the earth rest in peace” in their speeches? Because this is a pagan parting word that has nothing to do with Christianity and God. People who do not know the origins of this phrase often make the mistake of believing that it is synonymous with the desire for the Kingdom of Heaven. But that's not true. Let's look at where the epitaph came from and what it means.
Peace to dust
“Peace be upon his ashes” or “Peace be with him” is a phrase that is appropriate when bidding farewell to a Jewish deceased. In Hebrew it sounds like “alav-ha-shalom” and, as follows from the book of Mishley by King Shlomo, it is pronounced every time to glorify the righteous and righteous life as such. The fact is that one of the names of the Almighty is Shalom, and it literally means “perfection” or “peace.” Therefore, when saying “Peace be upon your ashes” to a righteous person, it is meant that he has reached such a level of spiritual perfection at which, after his death, he will rest next to “peace,” with the Almighty. Those who hear “alav-ha-shalom” should follow the example of the mentioned righteous Jew and walk the righteous path through life.
Why is the phrase “Peace be upon your ashes” often found as an epitaph on the gravestones of not only Jews? It is permissible to use it on tombstones and when bidding farewell to Orthodox Christians, if we remember the biblical episode of the Lord’s creation of man “from the dust of the earth.” This phrase, on the one hand, contains the idea of the kinship of man with everything that exists that was created by God (earth, creatures, etc.). On the other hand, the physical nature of man is emphasized, which is “destroyable” and mortal. According to John Chrysostom, this phrase “and the Lord God created man from the dust of the ground” helps to remember the humility and inevitability of physical death, which is contrasted with the immortality of the soul.
Pagan wish
In the years before the baptism of Rus', the Eastern Slavs were pagans and followed other traditions, often completely different from Christian ones. They believed that the soul and body of the deceased remain unified after his death, so it is important to take care of the convenience of the “outer shell” of the deceased. That is why in ancient times jewelry, furs, clothes, useful household items and even weapons were placed in a person’s grave. Sacrifice was also performed, and this custom also had a logical explanation for the pagans. They believed that killing birds and animals was necessary so that the deceased would have livestock and pets in the afterlife. Some tribes and peoples went further, sacrificing people. This would allow the deceased “in the next world” to have servants, slaves and wives. Cases where women were killed, or even buried alive, along with their once noble spouses, were also found in pagan societies. That is why the wish “may the earth rest in peace” has much more ancient roots than Christianity. Christians, on the contrary, believe that the soul is more important than the body and is immortal. According to them, there is no need to take care of the body after death. As for the phrase “may the earth rest in peace,” it was preserved in written form in Latin in many ancient Roman tombs. It sounded like “Sit tibi terra levis”.
Everlasting memory
Any memorial service for the deceased ends with the exclamations of “Eternal memory,” so it is logical to say this phrase when saying goodbye to a baptized deceased. A memorial service, a special prayer remembering the deceased, asking for forgiveness and granting him the Kingdom of Heaven, is read not only on the day of the funeral. In a church or at a grave, a priest can read it on the 9th and 40th day, on the year of death, on the birthday or name day of the deceased. At home or when visiting a grave, everyone can read the litiya - a shortened version of the memorial service. And on Parental Saturdays, parastases are held - a special type of funeral service, when all dead Christians are remembered.
The rite of requiem ends with the request: “In the blessed dormition, grant eternal rest, O Lord, to your departed servants, and create for them eternal memory.” Then “Eternal Memory” is repeated three times. In the rite of the memorial service there is also the phrase “Save and rest the soul of Thy servant,” which is also appropriate at the funeral and wake of an Orthodox Christian.
Curses in Rus'
At the same time, since antiquity this phrase could have been used as a curse. In this case, it meant the wish that loved ones would forget their deceased relative, and that the earth would not preserve his bones. The words “may you rest in peace” were used in relation to a living person when they wanted to seriously harm him. Abandoned in the hearts, they can turn out to be very dangerous and not only bring psychological discomfort to a person, but also physical harm. In Rus' they cursed in other words. The strength of the curse varied and depended not only on the content, but also on who pronounced it, to whom it was addressed and at what time. The fact is that our ancestors had the concepts of “good” and “bad” hours. Therefore, it was important whether the curse was pronounced in the morning or in the evening, on a weekend or a weekday. In everyday life they used simple and short curses like: “Damn you!”, “May you go blind/deaf/choked!”, that is, they wished a person very specific ailments and problems. The expression “May you be empty!” was often encountered. After this, a person could be haunted by failure, ruin and poverty. If such words were addressed to a girl, she would not be able to get married; if to a woman, she would quickly become a widow. In addition, in Rus' they believed that this curse threatened a woman with infertility or the death of young children. Other common curses sounded like this: “Go to hell!”, “Damn you!”, “Thunder you!” After them, a person could get sick or get lost. Protecting yourself from curses was not easy, but it was possible. The most effective way after the spread of Orthodox Christianity was prayer services. If they did not help, believers could go on a pilgrimage to shrines or turn to elders and healers. And the simplest way to protect yourself from a curse immediately after it was pronounced was to pronounce the phrase: “From your mouth and on your own head.” So the evil wish was redirected to the one who uttered it.
