Study Guide: Group 1

Here is a Study Guide for Group 1 of the verses! I have not provided English translations, since those are easy enough to find by consulting versions of the Bible in English. Instead, I have tried to call attention to the various grammatical features of the verses, along with interesting vocabulary items, the importance of a specific Biblical context, etc.

These verses contain only first declension nouns and adjectives.

1. Sapientia, "wisdom," is strongly personified as feminine in Latin, as you can see here. This verse comes from the apocryphal book of the Bible which is commonly known as the book of "Wisdom." The Latin adjective clarus can mean "clear, bright, shining," but it also has the wider, metaphorical connotations of "illustrious, glorious," etc. This is of course where we get the English names Clara, Claire, and so on. The original meaning of the Latin word was closer to something like "clear-sounding," related to the verb clamare, "to shout out."

2. The verb es already conveys the subject of the verb, "you," so no pronoun is needed in Latin. Compare Matthew 16:18, ego dico tibi quia tu es Petrus et super hanc petram aedificabo ecclesiam meam.

3. Here the adjective tua is being used predicatively. To keep the same word order as in Latin, you could say: "Yours is the earth."

4. Notice that here the verb is implied, not stated: Magna (est) misericordia tua. The sentence structure is the same as in Verse #3, but with the verb omitted.

5. Here again the verb is implied: Viae tuae (sunt) rectae. Notice also the freedom of the Latin word order: the predicate can come at the end of the sentence, as here, or first in the sentence, as in the preceding two verses. This verse comes from the Prayer of Azariah, an apocryphal supplement to the Book of Daniel.

6. The verb is again implied: Non (sunt) viae vestrae viae meae. Try to get used to reading these Latin sentences out loud and letting them convey their meaning without a stated verb of being.

7. This verse has a parallel structure. In one portion, the verb is omitted, tuae (sunt) divitiae, while the verb is supplied in the second portion: tua est gloria.

8. This beautiful verse comes from the book of Revelation. The verb shows that the subject is ego, "I" - and the speaker's identity is revealed in the complete verse as Jesus: Ego Iesus misi angelum meum testificari vobis haec in ecclesiis; ego sum radix et genus David stella splendida et matutina, "I, Jesus, have sent my angel to testify to you these things in the churches; I am the root and tribe of David, the bright and morning star."

9. In this verse, Jesus is addressing Martha, the sister of Mary. The name Martha is here in the vocative case.

10. In this verse from the Song of Songs, the noun phrase amica mea is in the vocative case.

11. This verse shows how in Latin an adjective can agree with the nearest noun. You can understand that as a form of implied parallelism: Tua est magnificentia et (tua est) potentia.

Latin Bible Resources Online

In addition to providing information about the Vulgate Verses book here at the blog, I'll also be including information about valuable resources that might be of help as you study Latin in general, and the Latin Bible in particular.

Here are two great basic resources:

New Advent Latin-English Bible: If you are looking for an online interlinear Bible, the presenation at the New Advent (Catholic Encyclopedia) website is really excellent. Each chapter of each book is on its own page, with good navigation throughout. You can also do a specialized Google search of this site simply by adding site:newadvent.org/bible to your Google search. For example: lapides site:newadvent.org/bible

King James Bible, including Apocrypha: If you want to consult the King James Bible online, including the apocryphal books, this University of Michigan website is excellent. It features each book on a single page, rather than chapter by chapter, which makes it easy to search through a single book of the Bible just by using the search feature of your browser.

Sacred Texts Polyglot Bible: This presents an easy-to-read layout of the King James, Hebrew, Greek and Latin texts, with hyperlinks from the King James version to entries from Strong's Bible Concordance. It's a fantastic online resource!

Vulgate Verses Wiki Now Available

I have expanded my existing wiki for Latin Via Proverbs in order to accommodate all the materials from Vulgate Verses! With a consolidated search for both books, I think the wiki will now be extremely useful for Latin students and teachers alike.

Latin Via Proverbs and Vulgate Verses: The Wiki

The wiki allows you to search the contents of the book, so if there is a particular word or phrase you are looking for, you can find it easily. Digital searching online is so much more effective than trying to use a printed index for a book! Just one click, and "you are there," looking at the passage in the book that is of interest to you.

I am also using the wiki as a place to accumulate Study Guides and other materials of use to Latin students and teachers using these books. In the case of Latin Via Proverbs, I am providing English translations of the proverbs and information about the sources. For the Vulgate Verses, the emphasis will be on grammatical commentary and notes about any non-classical features of the Latin.

Subscribe to this blog in order to keep up with new materials as they are added to the wiki! I will be posting information here at this blog about the Study Guides and other materials as they are added. It's going to be a busy year in 2008 for the wiki! :-)

Vulgate Verses Available from Lulu.com

I've just released the Vulgate Verses book for sale from Lulu.com. You can find the book page at Lulu here:

Vulgate Verses: 4000 Sayings from the Bible for Teachers and Students of Latin

I've had good luck using Lulu for my previous book, Latin Via Proverbs: 4000 Proverbs, Mottoes and Sayings for Students of Latin. You might notice a slight change in the style of title between this book and the previous one. I had so many people write me about Latin Via Proverbs, asking for the "teacher's edition," that I decided to include the phrase "for teachers" in the title of this new book, so that people would not think there was a separate teacher's edition somewhere.

And now, fingers crossed! I spent a lot of time putting this together and I really hope it will find an audience out there of people who want to learn more about the Vulgate Bible while also working on their Latin at the same time!