Learn Latin's banner
Learn Latin's profile picture

Learn Latin

@latinedisce187,079 subscribers

Learn Latin with Magister Iācōbus (PhD). A complete, structured course with clear grammar and progressive readings for beginners.

Shorts

🔥 Stoic Wisdom 🔥 10 Latin Proverbs You Should Know. (Epic REEL!)

🔥 Stoic Wisdom 🔥 10 Latin Proverbs You Should Know. (Epic REEL!)

26,580 görüntüleme

Videos

latinedisce's profile picture

A conspiracy by the Catholic Church surrounding the Latin translation of μετάνοιαν to control Christians? Time to intervene. I am Catholic, but I am also a Latinist. 'Resipiscentia' is a better term than 'poenitentia' to translate the Greek μετάνοιαν. This is a linguistic fact known by Erasmus of Rotterdam and Luther. But, above all, it was known by Lactantius (250-325)—the “Christian Cicero”—who knew both Latin and Greek better than either of them (Div. Inst., lib. 6, cap. 24, 6): ...quem enim facti sui paenitet, errorem suum pristinum intellegit, ideoque Graeci melius et significantius μετάνοιαν dicunt quam nos Latine possumus resipiscentiam dicere. resipiscit enim ac mentem suam quasi ab insania recipit quem errati piget, castigatque se ipsum dementiae et confirmat animum suum ad rectius uiuendum: tum illud ipsum maxime cavet, ne rursus in eosdem laqueos induatur. (“...For he who repents of what he has done understands his former error; and for this reason the Greeks better and more significantly use the word metanoia than we can express in Latin with resipiscentia. For one who is grieved for his error returns to his right mind, as if recovering it from madness; he reproves himself for his foolishness, and strengthens his mind to live more rightly: and then, he is especially careful not to fall again into the same snares.”) Another distinguished Catholic Latinist, Egidio Forcellini (1688–1768), commenting on the word poenitentia, seems to agree with Lactantius and glosses: Monet Lactant. 6. 24. quum de dolore peccatorum apud Christianos sermo est, aptius Graece μετάνοιαν, et Latine resipiscentiam dici, quam poenitentiam: haec enim solum respicit factum praeteritum, de quo dolet; μετάνοια, et resipiscentia et praeteritum factum dolet, et correctionem futurae vitae respicit, confirmans animum suum ad rectius vivendum. Nihilominus et poenitentia hoc sensu usurpatur a Tertull. Poenit., Augustin. et Hieronym. (“Lactantius warns in Book 6, Chapter 24, that when speaking of the sorrow for sins among Christians, it is more fitting in Greek to say μετάνοιαν, and in Latin to say resipiscentia, rather than poenitentia. For poenitentia only concerns the past act about which one grieves; metanoia and resipiscentia both grieve the past act and look toward the correction of future life, confirming the mind to live more rightly. Nonetheless, poenitentia is also used in this sense by Tertullian in Poenitentiæ, Augustine, and Jerome.”) The key point is that poenitentia (and poenitentiam agite) has the same meaning as resipiscentia in relation to the Greek μετάνοιαν in terms of the common usage of the expression in Jerome’s time. In other words, this is how the everyday Christian Latin speaker spoke, and this was the traditional use of the expression poenitentiam agite. I am no expert in the Bible or the Vulgate translation, but it’s possible that this is why Jerome translated it this way. Or, rather, it’s likely that Jerome preserved the use of the term poenitentia, which was already common among people, for the meaning of metanoia (although we’d need to see what was written in the Vetus Latina). The common Christians who spoke Latin were not philologists or expert translators, and we cannot blame them for not translating μετάνοιαν with the best possible Latin term, “according to Cicero”. In this sense, Erasmus and Luther had a huge advantage over the early Latin Christians who made a huge effort to understand the Christian message originally in Greek. In this regard, Saint Jerome proves to be not only a superior philologist and translator to the humanists, but also an excellent psychologist and anthropologist. And this, in my opinion, was the mistake of some humanists and remains a mistake today: excessive linguistic pretension, which ignores the usage and evolution of language. It is a mistake similar to assuming that the Vulgate should align with Cicero’s Latin. It may be an intellectually stimulating exercise to find the best classical term for the Greek of the Septuagint; we could say, “Cicero and Lactantius would have translated μετάνοιαν with resipiscentia”—but nothing more. The message is the same, and it is perfectly understandable. No one denies that it is possible to twist the meaning of words to commit abuses, and I am sure that over two thousand years of history this has happened with greater or lesser intensity at different stages of Church history. But it is unsustainable to claim that there is a Catholic conspiracy surrounding metanoia to control the faithful. Trying to bring down the Catholic edifice over a mere linguistic issue borders on the ridiculous. And honestly, I don’t believe that this is Wes Huff's intent, as he seems to appreciate the complexity of ancient languages. But I leave this issue open to all of you. Resipisciste! My message is very simple: just as Lactantius, Erasmus, and Forcellini, we too can be both Catholics AND Latinists.

Learn Latin

203,242 görüntüleme • 1 yıl önce

Daha fazla içerik yok.