I am currently reading the excellent book by Archbishop Raya, (of blessed repose and eternal memory), “CELEBRATION! Reflections on the Divine and Holy Liturgy”.

The Archbishop states:

In “Byzantine Daily Worship” I was enticed to use the second person plural form in addressing our God for the fallacious reason that people would be better served. The pretext was “Everybody does it.” Everybody says “You” so I abandoned the formal “Thee” and “Thou” and replaced them by “You”.

He goes on to say:

This substitution proved to be a step in the wrong direction, a spiritual disaster that added fuel in the laicization of our religion. It re-enforced our carelessness and unconcern before the awesomeness of our God. We already were engulfed in confusion before the sacred and holy. We came to treat God as a next door neighbor. “Hey, you do this…You do that…” The “you” is too casual, too simple and easy. The use of the “Thee” and the “Thou” is more difficult. It requires attention and care and the form of verbs requires, sometimes, a challenge for a tongue twister. But the elegance of it all and the respectability are worth every effort in using them properly. They might open a path for the recovery of sacredness in our relationship with God. We are now so “laicized” that Christ, our Lord and God, became some kind of pragmatic prophet. He became simply “Jesus.” So now we have Buddha, Aristotle, Mohammed, Jesus, Martin Luther King, or any other benefactor of humanity. If the world does not know that “That Jesus” is our Lord and God where would they go to find out if they do not hear it from us? Besides, the “Thee” and the “Thou” have an elegance worth the effort they demand.

Can you imagine if the Archbishop were alive today---what he would think of the reformed new order Ruthenian Liturgy with all its theological ambiguousness and inclusive language!!!

Archbishop Joseph Raya, pray for us!

As an RC, I wish that our (Western) Bishops had consulted men such as the good Bishop when doing liturgical translations.

I hear many complaints about "poor translations" of the Divine Liturgy. I have yet to read one that can match the poor translations done in the Latin Rite into English. Even the much improved versions to be promulgated soon (I hope) steadfastly adopt the "you". A tragedy for Latins? Probably not; but probably a missed opportunity, especially in light of your quote.

I think a lot of the problem we're facing is that we no long understand the English pronoun system.

The Good Archbishop is right that we have to pay attention when we use "thee"... but only if we know why. The average Joe in the pew doesn't know the old pronoun verbal system.

We've made "thee" "thou" "thy" and "thine" out to be something special, but they are simply archaic. We've made them formal when they are, in fact, the old informal words.

Here's the former pronoun system:

Nominative
Singular Plural
I we
thee you
he/she it they


Accusative
Sg Pl
me us
thou you
him/her/it them

Possessive pronoun
Sg Pl
mine ours
thine yours
his/hers/its theirs

Possessive Adjective
Sg Pl
my our
thy your
his/her/its their


As we can easily see, "thee" etc is actually the singular and INFORMAL pronoun/adjective. I have a feeling "you" became the standard because we're a democractic society -- it's an equalizing thing. Unlike French, etc, who have a "tu" sg/informal but "vous" as plural AND Formal -- we just took "you" and made it everyday, thus it became informal.

While I agree that using modern English slang in Liturgy would be terrible, we should use modern English, in my opinion. The use of King James English is ridicullous to me. "Who hath holpen me" ? HOLPEN? Sittith?

I can see a time in the not-too-distant future when our "Church English" is just as indecipherable to the masses as Church Slavonic or Latin. We should make our Liturgy accessible to the people.

That being said, I think our translations need to be formal English and well-done, clean, polished. But we shouldn't use archaic forms because we thing they sound more formal or elegant (when they're not) or because we think they're more appropriate for addressing God (simply because the KJV uses it).

I'm just saying that our view of archiac English as more formal is misinformed. It's simply archaic English.

I should note first that I don't have a particular preference here but I think I understand the sense of what is expressed.

I think Bishop Raya might have been being more evocative than analytic.

Wordsmiths must know the technicalities of their trade, but an artistic bit of smithing goes beyond the technical, and sometimes confronts and contradicts the technical.

And there is that sense of artistry in liturgy, just as we notice the artistry of creation as well as tracking its technical elements, times and spaces.

The people dream, or the people die. That is a spiritual truth as well as a material one.

Mary

I do understand the grammatical place of "thou", etc. And I do appreciate that in terms of everyday speech in most Anglophone places, but not all, it is archaic. Lancaster, PA, comes to mind.

However, archaic forms in English, as well as other languages, are of valid use in poetry, and to some degree, liturgical language is poetic (as well as based on Scripture).

I don't model my thinking on the KJV (I am Roman Catholic, and have mostly seen KJV passages in quotes from others). I'm thinking of the translations of the Roman Missal which were made before the reforms of VCII, as well as various Englished translations of the Divine Liturgy I have read over the Internet. There is a warmth, and humility there, not simply a function of the use of the "thou" forms, but also somewhat do to that; "thou" being, as you say, the form of intimate address.

I also don't think one need go overboard. "Who hath holpen me" might simply be rendered as "who hath helped me". One need not adopt the entire early modern English grammar?

This is your opinion and I respect it. And I am not proposing that we should return to the formal style of "Thee" and "Thou". I would be jubilant if we did (that is my opinion) but I am a realist. But could there be a correlation between adopting "formal" language in the Liturgy and the current "inclusivist" language and the theological ambiguity in the new order Ruthenian reformed Liturgy? It is food for thought.

Having said that, could you imagine this:

Our Father who is in heaven, holy be Your Name. Your Kingdom come, Your Will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.....

Language is an interesting bugger. I agree wholeheartedly with all the comments about poetry. I posted what I did to bring up the point that we should understand (and not misunderstand) our language -- I'm an English language instructor (ESL) and a Linguist, and I'm pretty sure my Korean students know English (formally) much better than most of the folks on the streets of Pittsburgh (don't get me wrong, I love dialect as well). It's a sad statement. Imagine how the English teacher feels when he reads "I should of went with my brother last night."

Anyway, in Liturgy, I agree it should sound beautiful. However, you're right, my opinion is that archaic English doesn't sound too beautiful. I think modern English can be just as beautiful, but we need our liturgists trained in poetry or our poets trained in liturgy, I suppose. I was singing the new Ruthenian "The Angel Exclaimed" during Pascha... wow, that one is just terrible.

On a side note, I get a tickle during Liturgy at my parish (ACROD) when suddenly a tropar or something shows up in archaic English. This happens with the psalms during vespers and Presanctified Liturgy all the time -- the litanies, etc are all pretty nice modern English, then the psalms are archaic. I smile, at any rate. That Leviathan! oh, how he sports!

Actually, your use of the optative subjunctive ('may the thought perish!') has spoiled the rendition, which should be:

Our father, who are in heaven, may your name be holy. May your kingdom come, may your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven....



Also, watch that un-Republican punctuation!

Thanks for the correction Michael.

From another post I knew you were a linguist. I think you have hit the nail on the head with this statement about poets/liturgists.

Where is Tolkien when you really need him?

He's inside those of us whom he influenced.

I'll admit that Tolkien inspired me to learn more about everything than any one other person.

Have you read his letters? I've always admired the way he wove so many Christian images into his works. But when I read his letters and his biography I came to believe that he may have been a saint.

Apparently, he too suffered with the English of the liturgical translations, and when asked why he didn't look to the Anglican Church, he answered that "only the Catholic Church has the Virgin and the Holy Eucharist"!

BTW, in his essay introducing a modern English translation of Beowulf, he makes the point about archaic language I did, so I was simply paraphrasing Tolkien. I think he would have agreed with you, and not insisted on "thou".

Out of curiosity, have most of the Orthodox Churches retained "Thee" and "Thou", or does it vary?

Archbishop Raya, in reference to his translation of the Holy Liturgy of our Father among the Saints, John Chrysostom for the Melkite synod of the three Patriarchates of Antioch, Alexandria, and Jerusalem he says:

"If there is any change of a word or two it will be explained and justified."

After years of secrecy, there was an attempt to explain the Ruthenian new order reformed Liturgy AFTER it was promulgated. But has it been justified?

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.