Toward Attention

Empirical Fidelity vs. Faithful Translation

One of the ways in which our modern preoccupation with rendering empirically accurate models is inappropriately brought into the study of ancient texts related to history is the way that we tend to judge the text based on whether it can supply a correspondence or be verified by other correspondences. This may not be the best way to approach the meaning and intention of ancient texts.

I am reading Anna Silvas' The Asketikon of St Basil the Great (New York: Oxford, 2005) right now for a paper on St. Gregory of Nyssa, and she cites a large chunk from St. Rufinus on his intentions in translating a work of St. Gregory's about another St. Gregory:

When experienced teachers of the Sacred Scriptures try to convey something from the Greek language for Latin ears, they take care not to translate word for word, but sense for sense. And well they might. For if Latin discourse intended to imitate the Greek idiom, it would quite choke both the rhythm of speech and the sense of meaning. And this is also true for us in translating the life of Gregory Thaumaturgus from Attic speech. In recasting what the holy Gregory of Nyssa composed in a foreign, that is, in the Greek tongue, we have made many additions and many omissions, as the most suitable meaning required, attending to the sense while fittingly accomodating Latin readers.

Silvas continues: "Rufinus, in short, sought to refashion his Greek source document as a Latin work of art in its own right." This freedom simply wasn't necessarily seen as deceptive, but could be an honest effort at faithfully translating the meaning of a text.

Think of what this means for the Gospels: we should not read them imagining them as corresponding empirically to things as though they were camcorder reels. That doesn't mean we shouldn't deal with the very concrete images of the text, but we shouldn't confuse that with history unless it intends us to locate the meaning in history, or in relation to history.

How to Make a Failed Attempt at Voting Saints Off the Island

So I was looking for St. Ambrose of Milan's commentary On the Song of Songs in English, but couldn't find it: I did find this, however.

I challenge the reader to tell me what's wrong with this sentence on this particular web-page:

ANCIENT CHRISTIAN COMMENTARY ON SCRIPTURE. Edited by Thomas C. Oden and Christopher A. Hall. This will be a 27 volume series of Patristic Commentaries on the Old and New Testament. This series gives the commentaries of the Church Fathers, as well as ecclesiastical writers like Augustine, Origen, Clement of Alexandria, on the Holy Scriptures.

I get tired of seeing these little jabs. No one does this for St. Gregory of Nyssa. 

St. Prosper of Aquitaine on Predestination

How does the Augustinian view of salvation preserve the gratuitousness of grace and salvation against St John Cassian and St Vincent of Lerins? Doesn't a gift ordinarily require that it be received? If we give against, or without regard to, or forcing the consent of, another's freedom to receive, don't we talk about these gifts as gifts in a qualified way? A gift requires that it be received.

This is, I think, where I have to disagree with St. Prosper of Aquitaine, and others who make the assumption that the gratuitousness of divine grace absolutely requires that man have no role whatsoever in actually receiving this grace. Does a tilled field compel the sky to bestow rain, or generate seed on its own? --but they are necessary for the proper reception of these gifts, and do not contribute to the work of the rain and the seeds, they do not "add something" to these gifts: they are merely the proper preparation and reception. The Lord makes our cups overflow: but we must have these earthen vessels poised to receive what He pours. A cracked cup must be patched up before it can hold any liquid for long: patching it does not contribute to the gift of what is poured out, but simply receives it properly. The Giver of Wine may very well likely continue to fill the flask: that does not mean we are receiving properly. And if we do receive properly, that does not mean that we earned it. It just has to do with receiving a gift fittingly, in a manner "meet and right."

I'm only in the Introduction of The Call of All Nations, but the Translator's summary is what the above is in reply to (all parenthetical numbers refer to the chapters of Book 1 of this work):

God wills all men to be saved. Yet many are not saved and do not receive the grace that actually saves. Why? (1). From the threefold degree of man's will, animal, natural, and spiritual, it appears that all initiative for good comes from grace (2-8). But the universal salvific will as taught in Scripture can be understood in the sense of a specified or restricted totality (9-12); the mysterious reason of its restriction remains unknown to us (13f). Saving grace, however, is wholly gratuitous (15), as is clear in the case of children dying before the age of reason (16) and from death-bed conversions (17). It is given without any preceding merit (18) or any effective initiative of nature for good (19). Yet there is a divine salvific will for all (20), though the reason why God chose Israel and left aside the Gentiles, remains a mystery (21) This, however, is certain: the chosen ones are chosen without any merit of their own (22), for all gifts of grace are totally gratuitous (23f.). Why they are given to one and not to another is a mystery which we cannot fathom (25).

    What, then, is the answer of Book One to the first aspect of the problem: how is it that, in spite of God's universal salvific will, not all men are saved? Because they do not all receive the grace that actually saves. For this, however, no one can rightly blame God, since grace is a gratuitous gift. We cannot know why it is given to some and not to some others. 

I don't like this dodge that poses as an answer, this "we cannot fathom the mind of God" dance. That's not answering the question: the question has to do with the coherence of propositions, and then the muddy connections and the bad assumptions are excused by an appeal to what is legitimately true (i.e., that the Mind of God is unfathomable). If you question these rhetorical tactics, you volunteer to play their game, and so they will accuse you of effectively making an assault on heaven by purportedly saying that God's Mind is in fact fathomable, which is not at all what our objection is.

 

St. Jerome on the Communion of the Saints

I've had the occasion to go through St. Jerome's Letter to Vigilantius again. It's a good read. Very vitriolic, but a good read. Vigilantius was a tavern-keeper who took issue with many things in the Church, and accused St. Jerome of being an Origenist, even after receiving his hospitality. Here is an excerpt on the relevant topic:

Among other blasphemies, he may be heard to say, What need is there for you not only to pay such honour, not to say adoration, to the thing, whatever it may be, which you carry about in a little vessel and worship? And again, in the same book, Why do you kiss and adore a bit of powder wrapped up in a cloth? And again, in the same book, Under the cloak of religion we see what is all but a heathen ceremony introduced into the churches: while the sun is still shining, heaps of tapers are lighted, and everywhere a paltry bit of powder, wrapped up in a costly cloth, is kissed and worshipped. Great honour do men of this sort pay to the blessed martyrs, who, they think, are to be made glorious by trumpery tapers, when the Lamb who is in the midst of the throne, with all the brightness of His majesty, gives them light?

5. Madman, who in the world ever adored the martyrs? Who ever thought man was God? Did not Acts 14:11 Paul and Barnabas, when the people of Lycaonia thought them to be Jupiter and Mercury, and would have offered sacrifices to them, rend their clothes and declare they were men? Not that they were not better than Jupiter and Mercury, who were but men long ago dead, but because, under the mistaken ideas of the Gentiles, the honour due to God was being paid to them. And we read the same respecting Peter, who, when Cornelius wished to adore him, raised him by the hand, and said, Acts 10:26 Stand up, for I also am a man. And have you the audacity to speak of the mysterious something or other which you carry about in a little vessel and worship? I want to know what it is that you call something or other. Tell us more clearly (that there may be no restraint on your blasphemy) what you mean by the phrase a bit of powder wrapped up in a costly cloth in a tiny vessel. It is nothing less than the relics of the martyrs which he is vexed to see covered with a costly veil, and not bound up with rags or hair-cloth, or thrown on the midden, so that Vigilantius alone in his drunken slumber may be worshipped. Are we, therefore guilty of sacrilege when we enter the basilicas of the Apostles? Was the Emperor Constantius I. guilty of sacrilege when he transferred the sacred relics of Andrew, Luke, and Timothy to Constantinople? In their presence the demons cry out, and the devils who dwell in Vigilantius confess that they feel the influence of the saints. And at the present day is the Emperor Arcadius guilty of sacrilege, who after so long a time has conveyed the bones of the blessed Samuel from Judea to Thrace? Are all the bishops to be considered not only sacrilegious, but silly into the bargain, because they carried that most worthless thing, dust and ashes, wrapped in silk in golden vessel? Are the people of all the Churches fools, because they went to meet the sacred relics, and welcomed them with as much joy as if they beheld a living prophet in the midst of them, so that there was one great swarm of people from Palestine to Chalcedon with one voice re-echoing the praises of Christ? They were forsooth, adoring Samuel and not Christ, whose Levite and prophet Samuel was. You show mistrust because you think only of the dead body, and therefore blaspheme. Read the Gospel— Matthew 22:32 The God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, the God of Jacob: He is not the God of the dead, but of the living. If then they are alive, they are not, to use your expression, kept in honourable confinement.

6. For you say that the souls of Apostles and martyrs have their abode either in the bosom of Abraham, or in the place of refreshment, or under the altar of God, and that they cannot leave their own tombs, and be present where they will. They are, it seems, of senatorial rank, and are not subjected to the worst kind of prison and the society of murderers, but are kept apart in liberal and honourable custody in the isles of the blessed and the Elysian fields. Will you lay down the law for God? Will you put the Apostles into chains? So that to the day of judgment they are to be kept in confinement, and are not with their Lord, although it is written concerning them, Revelation 14:4 They follow the Lamb, wherever he goes. If the Lamb is present everywhere, the same must be believed respecting those who are with the Lamb. And while the devil and the demons wander through the whole world, and with only too great speed present themselves everywhere; are martyrs, after the shedding of their blood, to be kept out of sight shut up in a coffin, from whence they cannot escape? You say, in your pamphlet, that so long as we are alive we can pray for one another; but once we die, the prayer of no person for another can be heard, and all the more because the martyrs, though they Revelation 6:10 cry for the avenging of their blood, have never been able to obtain their request. If Apostles and martyrs while still in the body can pray for others, when they ought still to be anxious for themselves, how much more must they do so when once they have won their crowns, overcome, and triumphed? A single man, Moses, oft wins pardon from God for six hundred thousand armed men; and Acts 7:59-60 Stephen, the follower of his Lord and the first Christian martyr, entreats pardon for his persecutors; and when once they have entered on their life with Christ, shall they have less power than before? The Apostle Paul Acts 27:37 says that two hundred and seventy-six souls were given to him in the ship; and when, after his dissolution, he has begun to be with Christ, must he shut his mouth, and be unable to say a word for those who throughout the whole world have believed in his Gospel? Shall Vigilantius the live dog be better than Paul the dead lion? I should be right in saying so after Ecclesiastes, if I admitted that Paul is dead in spirit. The truth is that the saints are not called dead, but are said to be asleep. Wherefore John 11:11 Lazarus, who was about to rise again, is said to have slept. And the Apostle 1 Thessalonians 4:13 forbids the Thessalonians to be sorry for those who were asleep. As for you, when wide awake you are asleep, and asleep when you write, and you bring before me an apocryphal book which, under the name of Esdras, is read by you and those of your feather, and in this book it is written that after death no one dares pray for others. I have never read the book: for what need is there to take up what the Church does not receive? It can hardly be your intention to confront me with Balsamus, and Barbelus, and the Thesaurus of Manichæus, and the ludicrous name of Leusiboras; though possibly because you live at the foot of the Pyrenees, and border on Iberia, you follow the incredible marvels of the ancient heretic Basilides and his so-called knowledge, which is mere ignorance, and set forth what is condemned by the authority of the whole world. I say this because in your short treatise you quote Solomon as if he were on your side, though Solomon never wrote the words in question at all; so that, as you have a second Esdras you may have a second Solomon. And, if you like, you may read the imaginary revelations of all the patriarchs and prophets, and, when you have learned them, you may sing them among the women in their weaving-shops, or rather order them to be read in your taverns, the more easily by these melancholy ditties to stimulate the ignorant mob to replenish their cups.

St. Augustine and St. Nikolai on Charity, Love

Following up on the last post regarding "The Church as Public," I thought I would add a note on the substance of our faith (a note that is not exhaustive, but not false), which faith defines us as a people, rather than the concrete practices that express, receive, and prepare for the reception of that faith, which is the very stuff of God's own intra-Trinitarian Life: Love, Charity.

Hear now the Holy Augustine:

"At that time, Jesus said unto his disciples: 'This is my commandment, that ye love one another, as I have loved you.'"

A Homily by St. Augustine the Bishop (Tractatus 83 in Joann.)

    What think ye, my brethren? Is this his only commandment, this, namely, that we love one another? Is there not another and a greater, the commandment to love God? Or hath God commanded us only to love, so that we need seek to do no more? Surely the Apostle commendeth three things, saying: Now abideth faith, hope, charity, these three, but the greatest of these is charity. And although in charity, that is, in love, he included the two first and great commandments, and charity he called the greatest, yet is charity not said to be alone. Concerning faith, concerning, hope, how much is commanded us? Who can gather them all together? Who can reckon them all? And yet let us consider how the same Apostle saith: Love is the fulfilling of the Law.

    Therefore, what can be lacking if charity be present? Or where charity is not, what can profit? The devil believeth and loveth not. But no one loveth who doth not believe. Yet for one who doth not love, it is possible nevertheless to hope for pardon, though such hope is indeed a vain thing. But no man who doth love can despair. Therefore, where love is, there also is both faith and hope; and where there is love toward our neighbour, there also is love toward God. For one who loveth not God, how can he love his neighbour as himself, seeing he hateth himself? For he is a blasphemous, wicked wretch. And the lover of wickedness is not the lover but the deadly enemy of his own self.

    If we hold fast to this commandment of the Lord which biddeth us to love one another, we shall do whatsoever else he commandeth us, for all else is included in this. A difference is shewn between this love and the earthly love wherewith men do love one another, where it is added: "As I have loved you." To what end did Christ love us, but that we may be able to reign with him? To this end then let us also love one another; and let us love with a love different from the love of those who love not one another to such an end as this, for in this sense they love not at all. But they that love one another in order to possess God do verily love one another. And for this reason they love God first, so that they may thus love one another. This love have not all men: for few love one another that God may be all in all.

If the transition from love as charity to this charity being the means of possessing God, reigning with Christ and God being all in all confuses others, I should add a note from St. Nikolai Velimirovich of Zhicha and Ochrid, who labored in North America:

    Love makes me God, and You, O God, man.

    Where there is one, there is no love. Where there are two united there is only a semblance of love. Where three are united, there is love. Your name is Love because Your name is trinity in Unity.

    If You were solitary, You would not be love but hatred.

    If You were a duality, You would be an alternation of love and hatred. But You are a trinity, and therefore You are love and in You there is neither darkness nor alternation.

    Love knows neither time nor space. It is outside of time and outside of space. For love one day is like a thousand years and a thousand years like one day.

    When I am united with You in love, neither heaven nor earth exists -- only God exists. No "you" or "I" exists -- only God exists.

    Love has three hypostases: chastity, knowledge, and light. Without chastity love is not affection but selfishness and passion. Without knowledge love is not affection but selfishness and passion. Without knowledge love is not wisdom but foolishness. Without light love is not power but weakness. When passion, foolishness, and weakness combine, they become hell, which is what Satan likes to call "love."

    When my soul is a most pure virgin, and my conscience is keen-sighted wisdom, and my spirit is life-giving light, I am a love that coincides with Your love. Through love I see You in myself, and You see me in Yourself.

    Through love I do not see myself but only You. Through love You do not see Yourself but only me.

    Love sacrifices itself, and does not feel that the sacrifice is giving but rather receiving.

    My worldly children: the word "love" is the deepest prayer of all.

    "Does worldly love not exist?" my neighbors ask me. "To the same extent that a worldly God exists," I answer. "Worldly love burns and burns out, Heavenly love burns without burning out. Worldly love, like everything worldly, is only a dream and semblance of Love. Your love resembles divine love the way smoke resembles flames.

    "When you exchange a gold coin for copper pennies, you do not call the pennies a gold coin but copper pennies. Why then do you call divine love that has been broken and ground into ashes by time and space 'love' and not 'ashes'?"

    O Lord, make me worthy of the love, but which You live and give life.

    Make me worthy of Your love, O Lord, and I shall be free of all laws.

    Move Your love into me, and love will move me into You.

That is from Prayers by the Lake, #34 (XXXIV). #37 continues the theme of love:

    Martyrs of great love, pray to God for us.

    You who have known a love stronger than death, pray to Love for us.

    You who in this life luckily escaped from the snare of transitory love, which is like a little color on a boulder, which the rain washes away;

    You who have preached that love is more mysterious than the flesh, and more eternal than the stars in heaven;

    You who through love have understood both wood and stone, both the beast in the forest and the fish in the water (for love breaks the seals of all mysteries, and all things appear naked to their lover);

    You who with love have fulfilled all the prophets, satisfied all religions, and surpassed all laws;

    You are the greatest of conquerors -- who is stronger than you?

    You are the greatest of wise men -- who is wiser than you?

    You are the greatest of precious stones -- who is scarcer than you?

    You are gods, who have seen yourselves in God and God in yourselves.

    You have an honor greater than the angels, for the angels became angels without torment and martyrdom.

    To you we bow down and pray, pray to God fur us.

    That we too may cleanse ourselves of the illusory love, that ends in hatred.

    That we too may crown our faith and hope with a crown in which even suns have little value.

    That we too may begin to see, and know, and rejoice with the joy, with which only the angels can rejoice.

    That our life may also become a triradiate splendor, like the One from whom all splendor, unmixed with darkness, comes.

    That we too may recognize in ourselves the eternal virgin, and the pre-eternal Son fo the Virgin [i.e., Son of the Virginal Father], and the dove-like Spirit.

    Martyrs of great love, only your suffering is less than your love. Every worldly love brings suffering greater than its love. But you have loved what is deeper than time and wider than space.

    When your mortal brothers hear about your sufferings they consider them unbelievable and unbearable. For they can really imagine themselves only in your sufferings and not in your love, in the meaning of your sufferings. Oh, if they could only imagine themselves in your love also! All your sufferings would seem like nothing to them, just as they seemed to you. Just as the cold rain and the howling of the wind seem like nothing to a mother as she hurries home to her child.

    To one who has a goal greater than the world, the world can do nothing.

    One who hurries to a home wider than space, space cannot contain.

    One who has a love more precious than temporal creations, can neither be impeded nor trampled by time.

    Across all rugged terrain and through all stormy tempests Love leads His beloved ones and draws them to Himself. 

    Martyrs of great love, pray to God for us.