www.byzcath.org Forums Mysteries: The Life of Worship Vespers, Matins & the Divine Liturgy The Revised Divine Liturgy Is "always and everywhere" in the RDL a good translation?

Father Louis Ligier, S.J was a notable scholar but his idea on “always and everywhere” has not found support by later scholarship. The use of “always and everywhere” in the RDL is simply a desire to be ahead of the curve. Unfortunately for the RDL good scholarship has stayed with the traditional understanding. If it is ambiguous in Slavonic and Greek it should remain ambiguous in English.

The best translation is: Offering you your own, from your own, on behalf of all and for all.

This, surprisingly, seems to be the explanation and regrettable conclusion. Fr. Ligier was a noted scholar and his valid scholarly conjectures are to be expected and appreciated. That such a conjecture, however, be taken up by, presumably, a majority of the IELC, approved by Rome and then promulgated as our liturgy by our bishops is, based on the little we have been told, to me a rather cavalier approach to translating.

As an example of meticulous methodology and thoroughness in translating our sacred liturgy, please, someone, tell me there is more here (and what that is) than just Fr. Ligier opines.

The Armenian* Catholics translate it:

"And from us who belong to you we offer to you what is yours to fulfill everything and for all."

*While not of the Byzantine tadition the Armenian and Byzantine Liturgies share many elements.

The Armenians translate “Tvoja ot Tvojich Teb’I prinosim, o vs’ich I za vsja”?

Wow!

I didn’t know that their normative liturgical texts were in Slavonic and matched ours.

In the end we need to translate accurately and literally. Perhaps someday scholarship will support the change and, if it does, all Byzantines should change together (liturgical unity is important!). The official Ruthenian Liturgical text in Slavonic translates best as others have noted: “Offering you your own, from your own, on behalf of all and for all.” As Father Serge points out in his excellent review of the RDL the bit more eloquent ending is: “in all and for all”.

Interestingly, I just happened to pick up the little prayer book prepared by Fr. Julias Grigassy in 1944. It has: “Thine own of Thine own, to Thee we offer in behalf of all and for all.”

There are two things that ought to be examined here:

1. Whether "Offering to you..." is justifiable

2. Whether "always and everywhere" is a good translation.

To point 1: I frankly do not know where the textual amendment that uses the participle prospherontes originated. Perhaps Fr. Serge could enlighten us on this? What I know is that all four Greek Liturgicons that I have use the 1st person plural verb, prospheromen. Three of these are authorized by the Greek Archdiocese of America. The other, the Robertson text published by ECP, reflects the authorized Constantinopolitan use. Hence I must assume that the verb form is the authorized text of the Church of Constantinople. Why then would an unauthorized reading from an unused source be preferred to the reading authorized by the Church? Is this not precisely the sort of "liturgical archeologism" condemned by Pope Pius XII in Mediator Dei?

To point 2: Kata panta kai dia panta strikes me as deliberately ambiguous, what my exegesis professors used to call the "pregnant phrase." A literal rendering of this would be, as Fr Serge has pointed out, "in all and for all." Deliciously vague, yet containing many possibilities. Could that range of meaning include "at all times and in all places" = always and everywhere? I don't think so. If the Church had wanted to say that, why did she not say, pantote kai pantachou? The traditional English translations used in the GOA, AOA, OCA, BCC, render it "in behalf of all and for all." This relates the phrase to the sacrifice of Christ now made present and offered by the Church in the Holy Spirit. This translation may be slightly interpretive, but it at least focuses our thought where it ought to be in the Eucharist - on the sacrifice of Christ. The RDL version seems to focus attention on what we are doing, especially as there is no verb until "We praise you..."

My opinion is that "always and everywhere" is not only a bad and confusing translation, it is impossible.

"Offering" is not only justifiable but quite generally acknowledged to be the more pristine reading in both the Greek and Slavonic.

Regarding the RDL, the participle (and not the now commonly found 2nd person plural verb) is the reading given in OUR received text, the Ruthenian Recension, even though it is not the reading given in Rome's Greek version used by the IELC as the primary text (or Rome's Volgata version of the Slavonic). For us, it is not, therefore a "textual amendment." Our Recension text was researched, and approved and disseminated in 1941 (during the Pontificate of Pius XII) by Rome, as communicated by Card. Tisserant.

Here, the RDL got it right, correcting both the 1965 liturgicon and the Levkulic Pew book.

The "always and everywhere" and the repunctuation found in the RDL text at this point is another matter, and the question.

Interesting points. From a somewhat paradoxical phrase, especially in its context, there emerges very clear and simple adverbs in the RDL translation. Perhaps clarity in a translation can go too far in providing a narrower interprtation that can defeat the intended meaningS.

Your reverse translation pantote kai pantachou especially caught my eye. It was noted by Ligier that his analysis gave the semper et ubique as in the Latin Liturgy. Since scriptural phrasing can influence liturgical language, I had wondered -- just as another datum, and not some definitive interpretation -- if semper et ubique occurred in the old vulgate and if so what it translated. I found one occurrence, Acts 24:3, translating pantē(i) te kai pantachou.

My original post is an inquire and a gripe that I see as related issues. The inquiry is discussing the details of the translation; the gripe, as stated in the original post is:

So the committee works for 12 years in secret so as not to be inundated and influenced by outside forces and agendas. Fine. And then there's the great weight of authority giving approval. Acknowledged and respected. And now there's legitimate questions and concerns. How about some detailed answers?

For that matter, how about even acknowledging that there are questions and even legitimate questions? So we do well to dig into the issue but can only hope in vain, it seems, that the findings that produced the translation would be revealed to us.

I have encountered in various instances and on this forum those who begin to answer a question by first relating their credentials and expertise. And I have no problem with that, and even appreciate it, but then one darn good answer had better follow.

--End of Gripe

This is an old topic -- and gripe -- revived, but I was thinking about the obligation of a translator to convey not just the meaning but the rhythm and style of the original source, as much as possible, in the receptor language.

Based on the discussion in this thread there are reasonable doubts that "always and everywhere" is even an accurate translation. Yet we hear it in every Divine Liturgy in the BCC. It’s not that it is saying something wrong, it’s allegedly saying what the Latins say as two adverbs semper et ubique . But as noted above, if one checks where that Latin phrase occurs in scripture, the corresponding Greek is two adverbs as might be expected and not the two prepositional phrases as found in the Greek and Slavonic of the Liturgy.

Also, if Greek scripture, LXX & NT, is checked for the two prepositional phrases in the liturgy one finds many instances (105) of kata panta; there is only one instance of dia panta. Using those occurrences in scripture as a guide, and noting that in both instances panta is a neuter plural (substantive) adjective, that is, it must refer to things, the usual renderings are:

kata panta – in all things/ways/manners; in every way (104 verses, e.g. Gen 24:1, ); according to all (KJV Ruth 3:6)

dia panta – because of all (Exek 33:29)

There is no time sense that is found in these examples, no sense of “always”; and in all ways does not mean always. And there is no indication of a spacial sense that would lead to a translation as the everywhere of the RDL. Thus it is also noted (in even an older thread), link:


[As an aside, I want to note how much is covered -- the many good points made, the many warning flags that were raised -- on the forum well before the RDL was promulgated. It is too bad those concerns were not recognized and heeded.]

So there is a question of meaning. Is it right, good, proper for the BCC to be praying so differently in this phrase; for those who worship using the RDL to be praying – not improper words but – different words that also convey a different meaning? And then, not just meaning but style: adverbs instead of prepositional phrases; the RDL’s “always and everywhere” instead of a literal in all (things) and because of all (things) or the common “in behalf of all and for all”? In terms of rhythm and style the RDL’s “always and everywhere” is like taking Lincoln’s sonorous concluding words of the Gettysburg Address “of the people, by the people, for the people” – prepositional phrases – and replacing them with the equivalent and clear meaning single adjective, democratic. Sure it may be technically correct, but why would anyone want to do it? So then, judge for yourself –

Actual: “...and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.”

RDL-like: and that democratic government, shall not perish from the earth.

How would you like to hear it every Sunday?

We could cut to the chase and simply say it is not a translation, it is not even a paraphrase: it is simply an invention that is not supported by the original text in any way, shape or form.

If this were a translation test, the grade would be FAIL!

A few years ago, I had some e-mail contact with a monk at New Skete. They had pioneered, and had been using, the "always and everywhere" phrase, but this was discontinued because "it was found to be problematic".

Dn. Robert

"Too problematic", as in "incorrect". They could simply have employed the "past passive exculpatory"; i.e., "Mistakes were made".