Sit vitiorum meorum evacuatio
Concupiscentae et libidinis exterminatio,
Caritatis et patientiae,
Humilitatis et obedientiae,
Omniumque virtutum augmentatio.

from Prayer After Communion

BTW, Knox’s translation “and with you, his minister” only appears in his translation of the Easter Vigil. The Knox Missal, which really only contains his translations of Scripture, uses “and with you” as the prayers were translated by a committee.

You speak of “your Knox” group. What is this?

It is also humbling to note that, while Knox’s English prose is matched by few, and his knowledge of Latin extensive, he so often did a bad job of translating. In other words, it isn’t as easy as it sounds to get the perfect translation!

My remarks were intended to express my strong disapprobration of his offhand remarks about “et cum spiritu tuo” which I think were motivated not so much by Latin erudition as by his disapproval of the conservative agenda in the Church, an agenda which includes, among other things, an improved translation of the Novus Ordo Missae.

He said that day that all such wrangling about translations of the Mass is a waste of time - and there I agree with him heartily! only my alternative, far different than his, is that everyone return to the Latin. But that’s not a surprising view, if you’re at all familiar with this blog.

I’m FAR from defending the old ICEL - just reacting to Father Reginald’s remarks being called “a lot of garbage” or whatever other inelegant expression was used.

As you may have missed: I said I like “and with your spirit” better and “et cum spiritu tuo” even better than that!

A little observed/remarked upon but HUGE improvement in the revised ICEL - or at least the draft I saw in The Tablet (I think) - was the references to the Church with female pronouns (e.g. “watch over her and guide her” or something like that). Besides being more accurate in terms of the Latin, what an improvement not to refer to the Church with the neuter we would use for international corporations, but a PERSONAL PRONOUN - and a feminine one at that!

By the way, given your name (Iosephus), have you heard the Reggie story about Reggie noting that the Papal signature should be corrected from Joannes Paulus to Ioannes Paulus? As I heard the story, Reggie said to Don Stanislaus, “Tell your boss there’s no ‘J’ in Latin.”

Don Stanislaus came back with the signature unchanged and told Reggie, “My boss said to tell you: NOW THERE IS!”

Anyhow, it’s a chilly day in this part of the USA, and that reminds me of how appropriate the literal translation of THIS old proverb is:

SEMPER UBI SUB UBI.

You’re concerned, I take it, that while Reggie and the nice people who gave us the current translation of the Novus Ordo Missae were telling us what “Et cum spiritu tuo” means or, at least, were giving us a literary rendering of it, I and others who would spit all over the current translation are reverting to a barbarous literalism which, I guess is the implication, would be both unsavory in its sound and unfaithful to the true meaning of the Latin.

I’m sorry, my friend, but “Et cum spiritu tuo” does not mean “And also with you.” Nor is “and also with you” a literary or polished rendering of the expression. It is flat, insipid, and misses all of the theological nuance.

As Reggie said at his talk, we’ve gone with “And also with you” because “And with thy spirit” (these are Reggie’s words) sounds funny to us. It’s a question of our contemporary tastes and sensibilities and “And also with you” is what we’re left with.

Ronald Knox is an interesting character. Now notice that in his translation, though it’s extremely clunky, he doesn’t leave out the theologically important aspect of the greeting: “and with you, his minister.” That’s faithful to the Latin, though neither a literal nor an elegant rendering of it.

You want to talk about the Book of Common Prayer, that literary work, and of people who really knew the meaning of Latin? How do they translate “Et cum spiritu tuo”? “And with thy spirit.”

Now look at what Jungmann says about this greeting and exchange:

“Both the greeting and the reply are ancient, their origins hid in pre-Christian times. In the Book of Ruth (2:4) Booz greets his reapers with Dominus vobiscum. The salutation was thus a part of everyday life. . . . The reply of the reapers to Booz’s greeting was: Benedicat tibi Dominus. We employ in its place a phrase which means almost the same thing: Et cum spiritu tuo, a formula which betrays its Hebrew origin and has many parallels in St. Paul. We render its full meaning by saying simply, ‘And with you too.’”

Indeed? That’s the full meaning, Jungmann? But look at the helpful footnote he gives us:

“This is a Semitism: Spiritus tuus = your person = you. Still it is to be remarked that even St. John Chrysostom . . . had already referred ‘thy spirit’ to the indwelling Holy Spirit. In fact, in his first Whitsun sermon, he sees in the word ’spirit’ in this counter-greeting an allusion to the fact that the bishop performs the sacrifice in the power of the Holy Spirit. That is the reason the Dominus vobiscum was even at an early age restricted to those endowed with major orders, bishops, priests and deacons, and not given to subdeacons who were numbered among the higher orders only since the 13th century.”

Okay, so you want to stand with Foster on that one? Though he’s no Hebraist? And you think that Jungmann provides all the support we need to translate confidently, “And also with you”?

You see, though were an ass about it, you’d have a small point: you might say, with Foster, sure, yeah, it means “and also with you” - if everyone already understands that the YOU involved is only someone in major orders. The expresion has come along way since the days of Booz and it’s the theological significance which we’re worried about losing. You’ll hear know-nothing lay people saying it to each other all the time, “Dominus vobiscum” because they don’t understand what it’s all about, but they know a few Latin words.

So the translators of the new Mass, having neither literary taste nor theological erudition, said, yeah, “and also with you,” that gets at the idea. And so that’s good enough, right?

The expression is a theologial one, a liturgical one, and Reggie does no one any favors by saying that it just means “and also with you”, because it doesn’t. It means, “and with your breath or wind.” What it really means is going to depend on the context, right? It’s a meaningful Latin expression, it’s just that it’s probably not something anyone before the Christians would have said.

If you want to pick a fight with literalistic renderings - “spiritus” is a literalistic Latin translation of a Hebrew word, roo-ach. The Latin word is perferct for translating “roo-ach” and one can see a similar progression of meanings for these two words. But if, as according to Jungmann’s suggestion, it just means “and with you, too” the Latin failed the Hebrew; why didn’t they just say, “Dominus vobiscum. Et tecum.” Which Reggie would have translated, “The Lord be with you. And back at ya, jack!” Which greeting I would enjoy exchanging far more than the current meaningless, bland drivel.

Now look at some of the development in meaning that the Hebrew word, roo-ach - if we’re safe taking that as the original of our expression - goes through. First of all, it means, wind, spirit, breath. Jungmann stopped at the point where we find it means the spirit of the living, breathing, being in animals and men. But it goes on to have these other significations: the moral or prophetic character in a person; then, the Spirit of God as inspiring an ecstatic state of prophecy; spirit as impelling prophecy to utter instruction or warning; imparting warlike energy, executive and administrative power; the spirit resting upon the Messianic king - need I go on?? Oh, okay, I will, “the prophets of restoration conceive of the divine spirit [still roo-ach] as standing in their midst and about to fulfil all divine promises.”

Does this sound at all like the “spirit” with a Prophet, Priest and King, i.e. a bishop? You know, anon, those Church Fathers and early liturgists weren’t all complete idiots. So the Latin translates roo-ach as “spiritus” to bring in all of these rich significations, which are completely lost if we say, ploop bloop, “and also with you.”

No, anon, Reggie and Jungmann and whoever else you want to lump with them are WRONG if they say that “Et cum spiritu tuo” means, especially in the context of the liturgy, “And with you, jack.”

Have you taken Reggie’s course, anonymous?

As their Grandma I’ll admit to an inclination to boast, still, I think that’s quite remarkable!

Amazon.com has used Lewis & Short’s from $130, $70 off the list price.

Also, you might want to scope out the used bookstores in the Ithaca, I think, especially that Bookery place, near the organic store near the episcopalian church. Stuff like that will go through there from time to time.

By the way, while we’re on the topic of Lewis and Short, does anyone happen to know the cheapest way to acquire one? I really want to buy one, but they’re so expensive, and it’s about the worst time of year to be piling on extra expenses…

I’ll fix it around here . . . .

I must commend you, Iosephe, it is unlikely that I could have fit anything into a dactylic hexameter in the first place!