I always find these discussions about English language interesting. From a historical perspective, the use of the words "thee" and "thou" was considered a more intimate form of language -- not a more sacral or hieratic. This is why the Quakers insisted on using "thee" and "thou" instead of the more formal "you" and "your". "Thee" and "thou" was more intimate and thus more eqalitarian.

Interesting points!

I am wondering if maybe everyone is just labeling this as the need for a more sacral English while at some gut level people are sensing a real intimacy in addressing the Lord with "Thee" and "Thou"?

I have never been a supporter of using Elizabethan English but neither do I condemn it. When I worship at the ROCOR parish (which uses some English) I am quite at home with it. If it was decided that the only way we could have common translations across all Byzantine Churches (Orthodox and Catholic) was to adopt Elizabethan English I could easily support it.

Amen! I would embrace it!

You know, as I consider this a bit more, John, I am thinking of the liturgy that I experience most Sundays and there is actually something of a mix of both the "yours" and the "thine".

Sometimes the text itself will indicate yours but thine will come out more often than not or thee will appear in lieu of you.

And that says to me that this has more to do with the "music" of the text itself, not just the poetics which is an artistic blend of sound and syntax.

"You" does not always make a pleasing sound to the ear and so one might tend to substitute "thee" in order to please the sense of sound and round out the need for elegance of sound rather than analysis of text.

What do you think?

I tend to be like you and have no hard and fast preference on principle.

Mary

Your comment reminded me of this poem by Blake:

The "mixed mode" works fine, depending on the context.

In the Latin Rite Holy Mass of Pentecost, there is a sequence called in Latin "Veni, Sancte Spiritus". It is ancient, being attributed to various authors, dating between 1000-1200 AD. The "youngster" of the three is Stephen Langdon Archbishop of Canterbury (d. 1228). It is one of the most beautiful Latin Hymns we possess.

The English translation used today was written by a poet from the 19th C., I think. He tried to maintan the same rhyme scheme as the original, which was AAX BBX CCX etc.

The 4th and 5th stanzas in English read as follows:

In our labour, rest most sweet;
Grateful coolness in the heat;
Solace in the midst of woe.

O Most blessed Light divine,
Shine within these hearts of [?????],
And our inmost being fill!

Can you guess what the original/substituted words above are?

I gave this test to my 15-year old daughter last year, who hadn't heard the Sequence before, and her immediate answer was "thine". I had to respond that no, the liturgico-Nazis had made it "yours". She was appalled.

Thank you for that poem lm. I have never seen it--it is beautiful. I have printed it and saved it.

Blessings to you,
Recluse

Yes. I don't even bother to try and twist my poor mouth around that breach of decency.

But this is the very sort of thing I am talking about, although the examples I encounter would be even less...what?...predictable than a rhyme scheme would be, so they are more fluid, but no less poetic or musical in driving force.

Mary

Our early liturgies were written in the Greek of the day--not archaic, nor artificially made so.
The first slavic translations were made into the language spoken at the time, albeit in only one corner of the slavic-speaking world.
When the Romans translated the Greek liturgies into Latin, they used the written Latin of the day, not that of Virgil or Cicero.
My own liturgies are in Arabic, and it is the written Arabic learnt by all at school; poetic where required by the underlying source, but not archaic.
Making a translation of the liturgy into archaic English seems to me to be less a translation than an interpretation. It brings to mind the Italian aphorism: "il traduttore e traditore" ('the translator is [always] a traitor'), although in this case perhaps intentionally so.

Well, yes and no. The Greek liturgical texts in some places is highly poetic in a way that was archaic for the period. Sometimes, particularly in canons, Homeric forms and constructions were used - these would have been archaic even in 5th C B.C. Athens, much less Constantinople of the 12th C A.D. - if that isn't archaising, I can't imagine what is!

As with the Greek texts, the Roman texts also vary in style from place to place. Much of the Roman liturgy is common colloquial Latin, and often very bad Latin at that, but one also sometimes finds rhetorical and archaic constructions equal to those of Cicero and Virgil. The Canon, for example, is written in very precise Roman legal language - not that of the street.

Writing prayers in Tudor English is certainly not archaising - Tudor English is very much part of the rich current store of the English language, unless one is culturally illiterate. I would object to putting the liturgy into the language of Chaucer, but not that of Shakespeare - the latter is still Modern English.

"The Greek liturgical texts in some places is highly poetic ..."

Thanks for clarifying for the forum. In an attempt at brevity, I left the poetic aspects as understood.

We may well classify the English of Shakespeare as being the beginning of the modern period of the English language, but it is hardly current. We may perhaps draw from some of its riches for poetic purposes, but for the bulk of liturgical expression ... I'm not so sure.

I'll have to leave it to the Americans on the forum to clarify, but I believe Shakespeare is not now often taught in schools in the US. At least some of my American colleagues were never taught it.