Ego sum vitis, vos palmites. I am the vine, you are the branches. (John 15:5)
My apologies for not posting last week! If you read the Bestiaria Latina blog round-ups, you know that I've been working on harvesting all the Latin Aesopic fables I could find at Google Books and other online sources... finally telling myself to stop when I reached 4000 fables! You can see the results of those efforts at the Latin Aesopus wiki. I'm going to try to get back to my regular blogging schedule this week! :-)
As I did last week, I wanted to say something about the way Latin is able to rely on parallel structures to reinforce the meaning conveyed by the words themselves. In this verse, the parallelism is very strict: subject pronoun - verb - predicate noun. Precisely because of the close parallelism, it is possible for a word to be omitted in one of the two statements, because the presence of that missing word can be clearly supplied by the parallel structure itself. In this verse, it is a form of the verb "to be" which is omitted: Ego sum vitis, vos [estis] palmites, "I am the vine, you [are] the branches."
The Greek version of this verse is word-for-word the same as the Latin: ἐγώ (I) εἰμι (am) ἡ ἄμπελος (the vine), ὑμεῖς (you) τὰ κλήματα (the branches). In the Greek, just as in the Vulgate Latin, there is a verb in the first statement, but the verb is omitted in the second part of the statement, while being clearly implied by the parallel structure.
In the King James version, however, the verb is stated in both parts of the verb: "I am the vine, ye are the branches." Of course, we can leave out words that are implied by parallel structures in English, too, but the effect is strongly poetic, sometimes disconcertingly so: "I am the vine, you the branches." If you read that out loud in English, you will see that we rely very heavily on a pause between the word "you" and "branches" which takes the place of the missing word; without that pause in English, we don't realize that we've reached the end of the statement. Was there a corresponding pause in the Latin? That is a tantalizing question, and one to which we will never know the answer, alas (barring the development of time travel!). The written record provides all kind of evidence, direct and indirect, for Latin pronunciation, but for something as subtle as pauses between words in a sentence, we don't have any solid evidence to go with at all.
Yet even without solid evidence for the pronunciation in the ancient world, I do still think it is valuable both to read Latin aloud and to listen to it, so here is today's verse read aloud: 365. Ego sum vitis, vos palmites.
Speciosa misericordia Dei in tempore tribulationis, quasi nubes pluviae in tempore siccitatis. Beautiful is the mercy of God in a time of trouble, just as a cloud of rain in a time of drought. (Sirach 35:20)
One of the most common stylistic features of Latin is its use of parallel structure, so I thought I would do a series of posts in this blog focusing on verses which feature a strongly parallel structure. That is why I chose today's verse, which is from the apocryphal wisdom book sometimes called The Wisdom of Jesus son of Sirach, The Wisdom of Ben Sirach, or simply Sirach. In Latin, it is often referred to as Ecclesiasticus - not to be confused with the canonical book of Ecclesiastes!
The verse has two distinct parts which are parallel in structure. The first part is about the mercy of God:
Speciosa (est) misericordia Dei in tempore tribulationis. Beautiful is the mercy of God in a time of trouble.
The second part is about a cloud of rain:
(Speciosa est) nubes pluviae in tempore siccitatis. (Beautiful is) a cloud of rain in a time of drought.
The word quasi, "as if" or "like," is used to provide the explicit link between the two statements.
The parallelism is reinforced by the word order and by the grammatical structures, with misericordia Dei (noun+genitive) parallel to nubes pluviae (noun+genitive), and in tempore tribulationis parallel to in tempore siccitatis.
The word speciosa, "beautiful," is not stated in the second clause, but carries over from the parallel with the first clause. It is often the case with parallel structures that words or phrases which apply to both clauses can be omitted in one of the clauses, which adds to the poetic quality of the statement. Especially when you are a beginning a Latin student, it can be a big help to write out the missing words in a parallel construction, just to make sure you see how it all fits together grammatically!
Meanwhile, as you listen to the audio, see if you can let your mind "hear" the parallelism of the two statements here: 157. Speciosa misericordia Dei in tempore tribulationis, quasi nubes pluviae in tempore siccitatis.
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In English: Father, all things are possible for you. (Mark 14:36)
In the previous posts at this blog, I've been looking at the flexible options for Latin word order. What you see in this verse is a great example of how you need to identify the subject of the sentence correctly in order to see just what is going on here. The words omnia and possibilia COULD be a single noun phrase ("all possibilities"), but that is not what is going on in this verse. Instead, the word omnia stands as the subject, while the word possibilia is part of the predicate: "all things (omnia) are possible for you (possibilia tibi sunt)."
For English speakers, however, it is difficult to realize at first that there is a pause between omnia and possibilia - although those two words are sitting right next to each other, they belong to completely different parts of the sentence, the subject (omnia) and the predicate (possibilia). Notice that we use a little comma to offset the vocative Pater at the beginning of the sentence. How handy it would be if we had a punctuation mark, such as a virgule, to indicate the pause between subject and predicate, just as the comma is used to mark off a part of the sentence: Pater, omnia | possibilia tibi sunt.
In Greek, the word order follows the same pattern as the Latin, the only difference being that the verb is not expressed, and the Greek includes the Hebrew word Abba together with the Greek word for father: αββα ὁ πατήρ, πάντα δυνατά σοι. Just as in the Latin, the subject πάντα stands next to the predicate adjective, δυνατά, leaving it up to the reader to recognize that while the two words stand next to each other, they belong to different parts of the sentence.
In King James, the verse reads: "Abba, Father, all things are possible unto thee." As you can see, the verb "are" marks a clear division between the subject, "all things" and the predicate adjective, "possible."
So, as you listen to the audio recording of the verse in Latin, see if you can feel what's going on in your brain as you experience the flow of the words, with the subject coming first, and the predicate coming after the subject... but without a verb to signal that division, as it does in English: 355. Pater, omnia possibilia tibi sunt.
In English: Poor people are the feeding grounds of the rich people. (Sirach 13:19)
In my comments about the past several verses, I've focused on examples of "wrapped" word order where a noun phrase is wrapped around a verb or around another noun phrase. This artful word order can produce some strong rhetorical effects, which is certainly the case here in this saying from the apocryphal book known as "The Wisdom of Ben Sira by Yeshua ben Sira" ("The Wisdom of Jesus son of Sirach") or simply "Sirach." In the Latin tradition this book is often referred to as "Ecclesiasticus," not to be confused with the canonical book of "Ecclesiastes."
As you begin this sentence, you get the word pascua, "pasture lands" or "feeding grounds." Because it is a neuter noun, you cannot be sure if it is in the nominative or the accusative case, but the next word, sunt, strongly suggests that the word is nominative, serving either as the subject of the sentence, or the predicate. Although in English we expect the subject to come first in the sentence, there is no reason to expect the subject to come first in Latin. Very often it is the predicate of the sentence which comes first, not the subject.
The next word is a bit unexpected: divitum. This genitive plural can certainly be taken with pascua, and could form a complete sentence already as it is: Pascua sunt divitum, "They are the feeding grounds of the rich people." I have said "they" here, because we do not know what the subject is yet - although that question will be answered unambiguously by the last word.
Pauperes. With this last word, the statement is revealed to be a powerful metaphor indeed and a defiant bit of social criticism. Now we know what the subject of the sentence is - pauperes, "poor people" - and the sentence now reads, Pascua sunt divitum pauperes, "Poor people are the feeding grounds of the rich people."
Now, since Latin word is completely free, there are in fact 24 different ways in which these words can be arranged, each and every one of them grammatically correct. Try it out just to see what you discover! (Mathematically, this is referred to as 4!, a factorial expression, which is 4*3*2*1, or 24.) The question then is what is the special quality of this combination, the rhetorical features that let it rise to the top of those twenty-four possible combinations.
Here are some impressions I have of why this word order is especially expressive. First, it keeps the uninteresting verb sunt inside, not occupying the strong first or final positions. If we posit that the verb needs to go in second or in third position, that eliminates half of all the possibilities, bringing us down from 24 options, to just 12.
Next: word wrapping. If you decide that it is more powerful to wrap the predicate phrase around the verb or around the entire subject and verb, you can eliminate four more possibilities, leaving you with eight: four possibilities where the predicate phrase wraps around the verb (1-2-3-4), and four possibilities where the predicate phrase wraps around the entire sentence (5-6-7-8).
1. Pascua sunt divitum pauperes. 2. Divitum sunt pascua pauperes. 3. Pauperes divitum sunt pascua. 4. Pauperes pascua sunt divitum.
5. Pascua sunt pauperes divitum. 6. Divitum sunt pauperes pascua. 7. Divitum pauperes sunt pascua. 8. Pascua pauperes sunt divitum.
Now, keep in mind that this is a statement where the metaphorical level is already pretty high. Remember that the core sentence here is absolutely a metaphor: pascua sunt pauperes, "poor people are feeding grounds." That is a simple statement, but highly metaphorical. Metaphorical statements such as this already make some serious demands on your audience, and syntactic displacement also demands a high level of attentiveness from your audience. So, in order to avoid the extreme displacement of wrapping the predicate around the entire sentence, I would opt for a more limited displacement, wrapping the predicate around the verb.
Consider, then those remaining four possibilities:
1. Pascua sunt divitum pauperes. 2. Divitum sunt pascua pauperes. 3. Pauperes divitum sunt pascua. 4. Pauperes pascua sunt divitum.
As you can see, one of the main choices that you then have to make is whether you want to have the subject, pauperes, come first - or whether you want to save it for the end, as a dramatic surprise. That would be my preference, which leaves us with two possibilities:
1. Pascua sunt divitum pauperes. 2. Divitum sunt pascua pauperes.
Between these two options, the stylistic choice is then how you want to emphasize the paradoxical presence of two opposite words, rich and poor, divitum and pauperes, in the sentence. You can either put them in first and last position, as you see in possibility number two: Divitum sunt pascua pauperes. That is definitely a sentence with strong rhetorical force.
To my way of thinking, however, it is better to concentrate the force of the surprise at the end. You already have the surprise of pauperes at the end of the sentence, and you can heighten that sense of surprise by having the word divitum as the word immediately preceding pauperes.
That is the version of the saying we find in Sirach: Pascua sunt divitum pauperes. The sentence starts off innocuously, but also a bit mysteriously - something about feeding grounds. Then we find out these are the feeding grounds of the rich. Okay: but what is going on here exactly? We need to know more for the sentence to really make sense. And then - enter the poor. The poor are the feeding grounds of the rich, the very grass on which they feed, the food they consume. Those who are already richly fed are feeding on those without food to eat.
That is the paradox which the Latin word order drives home - and likewise in the Greek: νομαὶ πλουσίων πτωχοί.
So, with a bow to the author of this apocryphal wisdom book of the Bible - a book which is a joy to read, in Latin or English or Greek - here is today's verse read out loud: 160. Pascua sunt divitum pauperes.
In English: They are blind leaders of the blind. (Matt. 15:14)
As in the previous verse I posted about - Deus cordis scrutator est verus - we are dealing again here with a split predicate phrase, although this time the displaced adjective is in the first position, rather than in last position. To make matters more puzzling, at least for English speakers, the subject of the sentence is not expressed, but is implied by the verb: sunt, "they are."
So, as you read through this verse, what you have is caeci, a predicate adjective, followed by the verb, sunt, "Blind they are," or in more natural English word order, "They are blind." That could be a complete sentence, and could stand on its own.
Yet there is more to come, duces. So they are caeci duces, blind leaders - a predicate phrase, wrapped around the verb. You've already got a bizarre situation: someone who is not able to see is not likely to be someone who would be in the lead.
Then, with the last word, the situation becomes even more unexpected: caecorum. It is not just that they are blind men who are in the lead, but the people they are leading are blind as well. If you want to render the gradual unfolding of the situation as the Latin word order has it, you would have to say in English: "Blind they are, blind leaders, and those they are leading are blind, too." Latin, however, is able to develop that same progression of ideas in four simple words, artfully arranged: Caeci sunt duces caecorum.
You find the same word order in the Greek: τυφλοί εἰσιν ὁδηγοί τυφλῶν, "Blind are they, leaders of the blind." Yet there is some variation in the Greek text, and you can find a quite different word order for this verse, but still with a split predicate: ὁδηγοί εἰσι τυφλοὶ τυφλῶν, "leaders they are, blind, of the blind." In this version, the rhetorical power comes from the juxtaposition of the nominative plural τυφλοὶ (Latin caeci) and the genitive plural τυφλῶν (Latin caecorum). Both arrangements are powerful - you can either have the two parallel words standing at the beginning and end of the sentence (τυφλοί εἰσιν ὁδηγοί τυφλῶν), or you can juxtapose them unexpectedly at the end of the sentence (ὁδηγοί εἰσι τυφλοὶ τυφλῶν).
There is some variation in the Latin text as well: in some versions, you can find an et inserted as follows: Caeci sunt, et duces caecorum, "Blind they are, and they are even leaders of the blind." If you choose the reading with et you have a compound predicate, rather than a single predicate phrase which is wrapped around the verb. The rhetorical force in either case is still the same, however, with caeci in the strong first position, and the unexpected caecorum in final position, creating a double-whammy of surprise, with or without the et introduced to make explicit the double nature of the paradox - blind leaders, and their followers are blind, too!
So, hoping the grammar commentary here has done better than to lead you into a syntactic ditch, here is today's verse read out loud: 145. Caeci sunt duces caecorum.
