"Unam Sanctam." The Church of Peter in London

L'Espresso ^ | 9/17/2010 | Sandro Magister

[markomalley]

ROME, September 17, 2010 – Benedict XVI spent the second day of his trip to the United Kingdom in London. With six appointments. And as many speeches:

– to three hundred men and women religious educators, at St. Mary's University in Twickenham, also attended by British education minister Nick Gibb;

– to four thousand students on the athletic field of the same college, linked via internet with all of the Catholic schools of England, Scotland, and Wales;

– to Jewish leaders and leaders of the religions most present in the United Kingdom - Islam, Hinduism, Sikhism - in the Walgrave Drawing Room of Twickenham;

– to Anglican archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams, at Lambeth Palace;

– to politicians, diplomats, businessmen, men of culture, and religious leaders, at Westminster Hall, also attended by the speakers of the House of Lords and the House of Commons;

– to representatives of the Christian confessions, gathered for an ecumenical celebration at Westminster Abbey.

Two of the six speeches stand out. The one to the students in Twickenham, and the one to the representatives of civil and political society at Westminster Hall.

The first of these also stands apart from the rest stylistically. The pope speaks to the students without formality. He asks them, candidly, to become saints. And he compares the journey of sanctity to a man and woman falling in love.

The second speech reprises the classic features of Joseph Ratzinger's vision of the reciprocal "purification" between reason and faith, and of the public dialogue between them that is necessary "for the good of our civilization."

The following is an anthology of the salient passages from the six papal speeches on September 17.

[kosta50]

An unmarried woman or a virgin is anxious about the things of the Lord, so that she may be holy in both body and spirit.

And married people are doing what God told them to do: "be fruitful and multiply." Why is that unholy? Why would God make a beautiful flower only to see it wilt away without fulfilling its purpose on earth? If God wanted virgins he wold have figured out another way for humans to have offspring without "defiling" each other. Paul had major issues.

[Kolokotronis]

“I have pinged Kolo because he is a Greek speaker and is familiar with koine Greek. Kolo: how do you read the mood of 1 Peter 1:15-16. verses? As advisory (counseling) or as imperative (commanding)?”

In great haste as I am preparing for a hearing; it has never occurred to me that 1 Peter 1:15-16 is an order. It strikes me as something a spiritual father would say to his spiritual child in the nature of good counsel.

Perhaps tonight I can dig a bit deeper.

[kosta50]

In great haste as I am preparing for a hearing; it has never occurred to me that 1 Peter 1:15-16 is an order. It strikes me as something a spiritual father would say to his spiritual child in the nature of good counsel

Thank you Kolo. It reads that way in Slavonic. I am looking forward to your followup. Perhaps there is more to it, but you know what they say: you can't lean a language from a book.

[Petrosius]

I have pinged Kolo because he is a Greek speaker and is familiar with koine Greek. Kolo: how do you read the mood of 1 Peter 1:15-16. verses? As advisory (counseling) or as imperative (commanding)?

I would appreciate Kolo's input. As for whether they are advisory (counseling) or imperative (commanding), if you wish to choose the former over the latter, very well. As noted, the jussive future is more familiar than the imperative proper. Even as merely advisory they would still advocate one to be holy (And this is all the pope was doing). Either way, it is not a simple future.

There is no question here that the "mood" of 1 Peter 1:15 and 16 is advisory in Slavonic, as if a father were advising his children: "be wise in all things, as I am wise." There is, of course, nothing imperative in it, a tinge maybe—all vector, no force.

I would take no exception with this. But does this not match what Pope Benedict said? There was nothing imperative or forceful in his words, just the counsel of a loving father.

As for the English translations, "shall" is imperative in legal usage but otherwise is no different from the non-imperative "will be."

It is true that American English generally does not maintain the distinction between "shall" and "will". British usage would have the simple future with "shall" in the 1st person and "will" in the 2nd person. "Will" in the 1st person and "shall" in the 2nd person is more than just a legal imperative:

shall, will Shall and will have attracted a great deal of attention from usage commentators. Let us begin with a clear expression of present-day American use:

The old distinction between these words is no longer observed by most people. Shall, which was once considered the only correct form for the expression of the simple future in the first person, has been replaced by will in the speech and writing of most people.… In a few expressions shall is the only form ever used and so presents no usage problem: Shall we go? Shall I help you? To use will in these expressions would change the meaning. With the exception of these special uses, will is as correct as shall — Warriner 1986

   And let us contrast that with the traditional rule, as expressed in a British usage book:

In its simplest form, the rule governing the use of shall and will is as follows: to express a simple future tense, use shall with I or we, will with you, he, they, etc.; to express permission, obligation, determination, compulsion, etc., use will with I and we, shall elsewhere —Chambers 1985

… As for shall, it has become a bit fashionable in recent years to disparage its use in American English. Its critics allow that it is entrenched in legal usage and in the questions mentioned at the beginning of this article, but in other uses they tend to regard it as affected or precious. Some allowance is made for the expression of determination or resolve, in which it is used with pronouns or all persons…
   Our conclusion is that the traditional rules about shall and will do not appear to have described real usage of these words very precisely at any time, although there is no question that they do describe the usage of some people some of the time and that they are more applicable in England than elsewhere. The historical tendency described by Strang toward the the use of will only has developed further in America than in England …
(Merriam-Webster's Dictionary of English Usage. Springfield, Massachusetts: Merriam-Webser,1994, pp. 842-843.)

I have used an expanded quotation for the sake of thoroughness. Since these are formal translation we would expect a greater care for the distinction between "shall" and "will." If we were to posit that the translators have adopted the American tendency to erase the distinction then we should see a tendency for the use of "will" rather than the use of "shall" that we find. Thus I can only conclude that the use of "shall" in the second person is deliberate to indicate some sense of obligation as opposed to a simple future.

In my opinion, this is an inaccurate rendition of the mood with respect to the non-legalistic Hellenistic phronema of the early and Eastern Church, and is the major cause of the theological chasm between the East and West.

There is nothing here about legalism, just the counsel: be holy, be a saint. I think that you are reading more into the pope's words and my explanation of the translation of 1 Peter 1:15,16 than are really there. Not everything that a Latin says is a code for legalism. : )

[Petrosius]

Not getting into the whole question of celibacy and dedicated virginity, the point is that St. Paul is commending the desire of unmarried women and virgins to seek to be holy.