Carryings over

 

Trans/lations are "carryings over" in Latin. Some things carry over better than others. When my Canadian friend was in town, I got to fall back into my old world and we had some discussions about translating sacred Latin texts into English. After having had to endure the kindergarten collectivism in a lot of the 1970 text, I was in favor of the update. Or backdate, as the case may be.

But some things are really hard to carry over. The introductory lines before the Lordsprayer are ancient.

Oremus: praeceptis salutaribus moniti et divina institutione formati audemus dicere: Pater noster...

This is formal stuff. And in Latin it is both formal, elegant and flowing, especially when sung.

Let us pray: reminded/warned by saving commands and formed by the divine education we dare to say: Our Father

Does not carry over well in the literal!


The 1970 version is just a riff: Let us pray with confidence to the Father in the words our Savior gave us.  But it flows well, even if it avoids any notion of command, formation or daring. Loses the sense of the Latin "audemus" "we dare" --which reflects something unique in Jesus' prayer-- that it is cheeky to call God your Father.

There was one version I remember but can't find in print and it works pretty well: Taught by our Savior's command and formed by the Word of God, we dare to say:


The new one, well, not so great:  

At the Savior's command, and formed by divine teaching, we dare to say: Our Father...