The Text    Et Nunc Redempti (And now the ransomed, Isaiah 35:10) The text is not included in the Latin liturgy of the Eucharist, but would have been appropriate as an Old Testament lesson in the liturgy of the Word at a funeral Mass. 

Brahms included the verse in the German Requiem.  For consistency of language, I include the verse in the Latin that would have been heard in the liturgical Requiem Mass prior to the introduction of vernacular translations of the Bible.

In the Requiem Mass, we pray for the repose of the dead.  But we also pray for our own salvation, as well as the salvation of the dead at the final judgement.  And so in the Requiem texts we acknowledge our sinfulness, we pray for forgiveness that we might not receive the punishment we deserve, and that, when the Lord returns to judge the world and separate the sheep from the goats, we may be among the sheep.

Significantly, Requiem texts also assure us of God’s mercy, that we might partake in the salvation offered by Christ, and join the saints in paradise.

I decided to order the sequence of the texts so that Et nunc redempti would be the first clear affirmation that salvation is assured.  To be sure, there will be more references to sin and our need for God’s mercy, but this is the turning point in the Requiem, pointing the way to paradise.