Re: Sensible passives (was: confession: roots)

At 2:59 pm -0400 9/5/01, John Cowan wrote:
>Raymond Brown scripsit:
>
>> >The English historical evidence strongly suggests "agent" as the correct
>> >role.  Consider the Apostle's Creed:  "Jesus Christ [...] who was [...]
>> >born of the Virgin Mary."  Now in modern language we'd expect "born to",
>> >so what is that "of" doing?
>>
>> 16th cent. literal translation of Latin, I assume:
>> ..qui natus est ex Maria Virgine.
>
>Eh?  If the Reformers had been that literal, I'd expect "born from".
No - one of the earlier meanings of _of_ was 'from'.  The traditional
translations derive from Tudor English, not 20th/21st cent. English.

Cf. the traditional translation of the Nicene Creed:

[credo] in Jesum Christum.......ex Patre natum...
   .....in Jesus Christ.........born of the Father.....

qui......incarnatus est de Spiritu Sancto ex Maria Virgine
who......was incarnate by the Holy Ghost of the Virgin Mary

The latter used to puzzle me as a young Anglican long years ago.  In what
way was Mary's Holy Ghost different from the Holy Ghost?  I.e. I took 'of'
in its 20th cent. use!

In the modern translation used in the Roman Church is these post-Latin days
it's clearer:

".....in Jesus Christ...........begotten of the Father...;

by the power of the Holy Spirit he became incarnate from the Virgin Mary..."

Interesting that the old Tudor 'of' stuck in there with the phrase
"begotten of" - I'd have thought "begotten by" or "begotten from" would've
been better.

Ray.

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A mind which thinks at its own expense
will always interfere with language.
                   [J.G. Hamann 1760]
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