Batman last rites is batman dead?

Answer 1

No.

There was a storyline called Batman R.I.P. which was the final stage of a plot to either corrupt or kill Bruce Wayne. It had been going on for years, every since a Silver Age Batman issue called Robin Dies at Dawn. The story in the issue had been re-vamped in a way to reveal that there was an ultimate mastermind villain out there, known as Dr. Simon Hurt, that had been preparing this moment for a long time. Hurt turns out to be the Devil.

Batman R.I.P. led into Final Crisis, where humanity is enslaved by the reincarnation of the evil alien God Darkseid. Darkseid's minions capture Bruce Wayne, where they intend to study and analyse his brain in order to create an army of mindless Batman clones. Obviously, he escapes, however he is zapped by Darkseid's Omega Beams, which sends him back in time. In spite of this, Superman finds what he believes to be Bruce Wayne's body, leading the whole DCU - besides Tim Drake a.k.a. 'Robin III'/Red Robin - to think that he is dead.

Dick Grayson, the original Robin, has now taken on the mantle of Batman, and Batman's twisted son Damian has become the new Robin (or 'Robin V'), leaving Tim Drake to become Red Robin.

The Batman corpse shown in the recent Blackest Night apparently ISN'T Bruce's body, but in fact someone elses, and we may or may not find out whose it is in the upcoming Blackest Knight storyline running in the Batman and Robin books.

One thing for sure though is that we will see how Bruce Wayne returns, as April sees the first issue of 'The Return of Bruce Wayne' released.

So to answer your question again, no, Batman is not dead.