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After the Reformation, English clergymen debated the efficacy of funeral eulogies. Some believed they flattered the deceased and might be seen as prayers for the dead. Because the bereaved wanted to hear about the goodness of their beloved, most preachers gave eulogies, some in a generalized form for Godly imitation, not expressing the deceased's individuality. Samuel Hieron, a Puritan preacher, refused to give eulogies. In two that were printed, he used Biblical texts lauding the lives of Paul and Dorcas, making it possible for the grief-stricken to believe he was comparing the deceased to them. In the third, he used a text about a Worldling, angering the deceased's daughters, who believed he claimed their father had died a wicked man. Hieron prepared the sermon for publication to deny their charges but died before it appeared. His experience indicates parishioners expected to participate in decisions about how funeral services were conducted.

From the magnificent to the mundane to the sublime, grave inscriptions serve as remembrances of the dead and provide concrete evidence of the thoughts and values of the day. In this study, 1,214 grave inscriptions (N = 1,214) dated 1900 to 2009 were examined for evidence of secularization and changes in attitude toward death. Using set criteria, the researchers categorized grave inscriptions in terms of language used (sacred/secular) and acceptance of death (acceptance/other). Binary logistic regression models revealed significantly more use of sacred language and significantly less acceptance of death over the past 110 years. Findings from these analyses suggest that: (a) secularization may not be as pervasive as thought, particularly with respect to death; and (b) as death has become increasingly medicalized and marginalized, society has grown less accepting of the finitude of life. These findings are further discussed in light of the continued evolution of death memorials.

During the summer of 1849-50, a yellow fever epidemic hit the city of Rio de Janeeiro. In analyzing the epidemic's impact on local funeral customs, the article asked to what extent the subsequent high mortality rate was a catalyst that changed people's attitudes towards death and the deceased. The central hypothesis is that the epidemic was the final argument physicians needed to convince the imperial government and the population to implement these doctors' project, one which would medicalize death and standardize funeral customs.

In Palestine the Neanderthal men and fossil contemporary men treated the dead kinsmen in a special way which can be observed in his intentional burials. They are the evidence of the belief in life after death that probably was imagined as a continuation of earthly life. In the Bible thanatology issues do not assume the crucial importance; the descriptions of dying and posthumous continuance of a man are brief and subject to a certain development. Death is not glorified, the dead cult is forbidden, the corps are treated in a ritual context as impure objects, contaminating people and environment. Death was not considered as boundary, temporary phenomen but as a gradual outflow of life. Only in the later fragments of the Old Testament there appears the concept that in death there takes place the ultimate separation between two constituent elements of a man i.e. between body that turns into dust and soul that goes back to God. The Bible distinguishes various types of death and its causes; but it is God who is the ultimate master of life and death. The other life is considered to be a manifestation of God's blessing. The Holy Scriptures pays special attention to the words spoken by the dying man, occasionally ascribing a prophetic sense to them. Although the funeral ceremony was not ostentatious it was most of the time excessive. The funeral was organized immediately after death, usually after 8 hours and the same day if it was possible. The corpse was wrapped up in linen and buried in hewn in the rock caves or terrestrial graves; bodies were neither burnt nor mummified. "Weeping" and mourning for the deceased lasted quite short - 7 days, seldom longer. Any forms of communicating with the soul of the dead person were severely forbidden and prosecuted; they were considered as discordant with the Jahweh cult. Some of the texts seem to reveal personification of death; it is never considered, however, as a being or power independent of God.