Enochian; Christianhood and conlanging

"H. S. Teoh" <hsteoh@...> writes:

> On Sat, Feb 03, 2001 at 01:42:27AM +0100, J?rg Rhiemeier wrote:
> > [snip]
> > terminology, judging by the word-lists I have seen on the Net.  The
> > language gave rise to an occult tradition of "Enochian magick", and it
> > is perhaps the reason why some Christian fundamentalists look upon
> > conlanging with such vile disgust.  Personally, I find the Enochian
>
> Well, I'm a devout Christian, and I don't see what's wrong with
> conlanging, except perhaps taking up way too much of my time ;-)
Neither Jesus Christ nor the Bible ever said "Thou shalt not create
conlangs" ;-) ...in fact, JRRT was as devout a Christian as he could
have been.

Those people who claim that conlanging (or worldbuilding, or whatever)
was blasphemous usually aren't devout Christians, but only think they
are.  They are just right-wing bigots with an inferiority complex - they
are usually entirely uncreative people who can't stand that some others
possess gifts they don't have.

> But to me, a language is a language -- what it's used for is another
> matter totally. I've seen occult things expressed in ancient Greek for the
> foreign-ness value, I suppose. But that in no way makes ancient Greek a
> "vile" language :-)
Sure.  Just about any language can be put to horrible abuse, or to noble
use.
And merely because someone invented a language once for a purpose one
finds detestable, is hardly a reason to object against conlanging in
general - not even against the study of that particular language!  After
all, linguists study the abuses the Nazis inflicted on German as well.
And what Dee did might have been crazed, and perhaps dangerous to some
emotionally unstable and superstitious minds, but far from what some
other figures in history perpetrated.

> > language interesting (*as a conlang*, that is, I have no business with
> > any kind of magick and occultism!!!) and worth exploring; reconstructing
> > its grammar, if there is one, would be a challenge!
>
> It does sound interesting, esp. the part about words appearing in
> different forms depending on the context. I'd love to know if it has any
> innovative grammatical features :-)
I'd love so, too!  Though I consider it more likely that Dee patterned
his grammar after Latin, Greek, Hebrew or a mixture of all three (which
would certainly yield something interesting).  But who knows?

Jörg.