Re: Sensible passives (was: confession: roots)

Raymond Brown wrote:


> who......was incarnate by the Holy Ghost of the Virgin Mary
This reads almost like horse-breeding records, which are of
the form "Foobiscuit by Baratariat out of Bazwozzle", meaning
that Baratariat is the sire, Bazwozzle the dam.

> ".....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.
"Begotten" is archaic already, although I suppose "fathered by the Father"
would be a bit over the top!

And "incarnate from" still seems very strange; it seems to assign Source
to a verb that doesn't seem to need it.

Being both theologically correct and properly modern in language can be
an insuperable problem: consider JRRT's attempt to rewrite King Theoden's
declaration to Gandalf in ModE.
--
There is / one art             || John Cowan <jcowan@...>
no more / no less              || http://www.reutershealth.com
to do / all things             || http://www.ccil.org/~cowan
with art- / lessness           \\ -- Piet Hein

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