Lost in liturgical translation
June 13, 2006, 1:49 pm
Posted by Grant Gallicho
The bishops are meeting later this week to vote on the new translation of the Order of Mass. Many thanks to Rocco Palmo of Whispers in the Loggia, who bumped two articles we ran on the liturgical translation debates last year: John Wilkins’s “Lost in Translation” and Kevin Eckstrom’s “Reforming the Reform.” See what all the fuss is about, then come back here to talk about it.
To any U.S. bishop reading this blog:
Reject the translation in the name of subsidiarity.
Eckstrom writes, “On the whole, the bishops found more things to dislike than to praise.”
This strikes me as misleading when compared to what he wrote earlier, “the summer survey found that 52 percent of bishops favored the changes, while 47 percent judged them ‘fair or poor.’”
Perhaps among the bishops that took time to make specific comments negative comments outnumbered positive but that is to be expected. (Ask any customer service agent how often he hears positive comments versus negative comments.) The fact is that more than half the bishops support the new translation and some portion of 47 percents of bishops liked it enough to give it a fair rating. So to imply that the sentiment of the bishops is in opposition to the new translation is wrong.
To any bishops still reading these notes:
Please approve this translation just as the other conferences have already done in the interest of justice.
Give us a translation worthy of the Roman liturgy.
Deus vult.
I will not be surprised if the bishops vote yes. I will be surprised if they do not, but the result is likely to be the same in either case. The bishops dropped the ball when they did not reject, with learned and convincing arguments, the strictures laid down in Liturgiam Authenticam and when they did not refuse changes in the ICEL.
Sooner or later the breezy and somewhat colloquial, here and there seriously inacccurate, texts we now have will metamorphose into a set of pedantic and obscurantist “new and improved” ones.
Posting as someone who has said “begotten of the father before all ages” rather than the drecky “eternally begotten of the father” for nigh on thirty-five years, I would object to Joseph Gannon’s post as follows:
(a) For “breezy,” I would say speakable. The new translation shows signs of not sitting easily in the English speaking mouth. Strikes me that it needs more parataxis and less “literal” translation of ablative absolutes and participles.
(b) Is “inaccurate” a casual concession to the critics or something that makes a difference in our mass participation?
So…suddenly the bishops are worried about showing ‘pastoral concern’.
Is this the same concern they showed by forcing this contrived Mass down our throats in 1973 with little catechesis or warning?
Is this the same concern that they were showing when the Paul Shanleys of the clergy were busy sodomizing young men?
Is this the same concern they are showing when the priests are busy ad-libbing the Mass and they sit there dumb and commatose while it’s happening?
Is this the same concern they exhibit when, in the guise of the USCCB, they issue meaningless statements touching on political issues they have no competence addressing?
Is this the same concern they show when they show their lack of spine and give in to any loud, post-modern pressure group that can trot out the old canards from the protest era and appeal to some misplaced sense of social (rather than divine) justice?
Bah. A pox on all (well, I can think of two who are exempt, but, I’ll leave that to the immagination) of them. They’ve shown that they are incapable of earning (yes, earning) the respect of the butts in the pews through their Caspar Milquetoast approach to stewarding their little empires in the Church. You can have respect for their office; there is no requirement to respect the person of the weakling that occupies it.
Their continued posturing and preening over incidental issues to satisfy some vocal minority with an axe to grind only serves as a proof of their incompetence.
God save us from our own bishops.
I would prefer it if this thread didn’t devolve into an attack on “the bishops.” Sweeping, unsubstantiated condemnations should be eschewed, along with petulant tit-for-tats.
Agreed.
Dispute all you want. It’s still a free country.
It’s my observation, after all, as just a dues-paying member of a parish who is sick of the hypocrisy.
How else would you charactize it?
Time will tell, as it will heal all wounds.
I think some bishops, even when a minority, have been speaking out from the beginning of the post V2 period, e. g. Cardinal McIntyre.
I wonder if anyone else can agree that the new translation, once implemented, can give us a new beginning, a fresh start toward legitimate renewal?
The Maid
Maid:
As I recall it was Pope Urban II who notoriously said “Deus vult” as he was urging the Christians of Europe to engage in a war to save the Holy Land.. Thus began about two centuries of warfare leading to many deaths of Christians, Jews, and Muslims, for little gain. I gather you are more sanguine about the new translation’s prospects, although the crusaders were also fairly sanguine too.
Gene:
I concede nothing to anyone unless I believe she/he is right. When I said “breezy” I was thinking above all of the some of the translations in the lectionary. Recently I noted a request to the Almighty to “bend his ear”, if you want an example. Certainly speakable but not felicitous. As for “inaccurate” I was thinking of the replacement of the incarnation with the birth of Jesus in the current version of the “Nicene” Creed. I have commented on this point earlier. Does it make a difference to the participants that they are reciting a textually altered version of the Creed. Or should it? I would like to think so. If you read the Apostles’ Creed you will note that it too has suffered some nips and tucks. Tinkering with creedal statements is grave business–no, I am not thinking of the filioque clause
If it’s not too late to reply to the reply to my earlier post (trying to stay calm), I agree that the lectionary translations are not very good. I’m still not sure that “breezy” is the right term. I think they are poor from the standpoint of diction and word choice, often unclear (I’ve had to check the Greek on occasion to try to figure out what Paul really was trying to say), and not very easy to speak — too many small words, and not much attention to sounds. I do, however, (although I guess I ought to say did) find most of the non-changing mass texts very good for speaking in a group.
I don’t understand the point about incarnate vs. born. But then maybe I’m a born outsider — thirty five years of resisting “one in being” (on the grounds of imprecision) and now I get to resist “consubstantial” (on the grounds of pretention, and not being a meaningful English word).
One genuine question — is the use of words from medieval French like “deign” and “vouchsafe” due to the French exile influence on early modern Bible translation?
Gene:
I thnk we are pretty much in agreement about the lectionary. I wouldn’t quite say a howler a day, but usually two or three outstanding infelicities each week.
The Divine Word took flesh (became incarnate) and so became man when the event that Luke has the angel Gabriel announce to the Virgin Mary took place. The result was Jesus in Mary’s womb. Jesus was born probably about nine months later.
In the Greek text “became man” reiterates and explains “took flesh”. The Greek uses aorist passive participles for both. Substituting “was born” has a strange effect, because the incarnation or taking flesh preceded the birth by, say. nine months, and the divine Word did not become man by being born, if you see what I mean.