Collect of the Week - 34
Dominica in Sexagesima
Deus, qui conspicis quia ex nulla nostra actione confidimus; concede
propitius, ut contra omnia adversa doctoris gentium protectione muniamur. Per.
BCP translation:
O Lord God, who seest that we put not our trust in any thing that we do;
Mercifully grant that by thy power we may be defended against all adversity;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.
The most obvious difference between the Latin and the Reformers' translation
is the substitution of "by thy power" for "doctoris gentium protectione",
"by the protection of the Teacher of the Nations". Now the Teacher of the
Nations, or Apostle to the Gentiles, is St Paul, and the Epistle for
Sexagesima, 2 Corinthians 11:19 ff., lists the "adversa" with which Paul was
afflicted: " . . . in labours more abundant; in stripes above measure; in
prisons more frequent; in deaths oft. Of the Jews five times received I
forty stripes save one; thrice was I beaten with rods; once I was stoned;
thrice I suffered shipwreck; a night and a day I have been in the deep . .
. [etc., etc.]"
This gives point to the mention of "adversa"; but the Reformers did not
believe in the intercession of the saints, or at least not in the invocation
of their intercessions, and so excised the phrase from the collect; no
doubt the more readily, as there is a certain antithesis in the Latin
between our own actions (not reliable) and those of St Paul (much more
trustworthy).
Otherwise it's not a bad translation. I commented last week on the
Reformers' over-use of the word "merciful". Here it is used to render
"propitius" - better translated as "favourable, kind, gracious". I don't
think the Reformers believed in a kind God; rather, in a stern one who was
nonetheless merciful to our sins. The notion of sin, and consequently of
the necessity of mercy, is not actually raised in the Latin.
One doesn't wish to labour the point. The Collector certainly believed in
sin, and punishment; but he isn't always harping on that string. But
wherever he talks about a kind God, or a loving God, or a mild God, the
Reformers seem to talk about a merciful God; and likewise wherever the
Collector talks about our afflictions or difficulties, they become our sins;
whenever he talks about our sufferings, they become our punishments. The
Reformers came up with a more judgmental, and a more penal, religion than
they found in the Latin.
Oriens.
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