Daily Archives: March 13, 2013

Language Comprehension Check

I need to level-set on what’s considered normally comprehensible English.

Here’s the question… Given the samples below, where do we reach the point where an intelligent, literate person would benefit from having a modern language paraphrase? Or, conversely, at what point would the same person have difficulties given archaicisms and technical terms that would be unfamiliar?

Sample 1

Say fyst this psalme with loke dyrecte to heuen
Iudica me deus with hole herte entere
Theyr conscyence purge fro the synnes seuen
Or they presume to go to the awtere
The same psalme sette in the sawtere
For a memoryall of the captyuyte
How Iherusalem stode in grete daunger
At Babylon that frowarde fell cyte.

Sample 2

After Ite missa est. the prest stondeith in the mydes of the Awter . and so blyssyd the people.

Then call to your remembrance thys holly medytatyon . how owr sauyour standyng in the mydes of hys disciples at the movnte of Olyveite . blyssing thaym . dyd ascend to hewyn . where he ys now resydent . and euer more schall be . syttyng on the ryght hond of hys father this Ascensyon of our Lord . ys signefyed by the wordes . which [fo. 25.b.] the prest saith at the end of the masse . that ys to say Ite missa est which wordes doith sovnd after thys Exposytyon of Doctoures . Goo and departt, for our Lord ys send and offerd vp to hys Eternall Father In oblatyon and sacryfyce.

Sample 3

when þo auter is al dight,
& þo preste is reuysht right,
þen he takes in bothe his hende
a clothe o-pon þo auter ende,
and comes obac a litel doune,
dos hit o-pon him al a-boune.
alle men knelen, bot he stondes,
and haldes to god vp bothe his hondes;
þere, or he þo messe bi-gynne,
wil he meke him for his synne;
til alle þo folk he shryues him þare
of alle his synnes lesse & mare:
so dos þo clerk a-gayn to him
shryuen hom þere of all hor synn,
and askes god forgyuenes,
or þai bigynne to here þo mes.

Where do things break down as far as your concerned for the average reader–so, not just did you have problems with it, but where do you think a normal college level English speaker would?

Liturgy as Language

I haven’t been online a whole lot since around the beginning of Lent. The computer dying was part of it as was general busy-ness. In any case, I’m trying to get caught up on things, including interesting things that were happening online while I was away.

One of these things was this talk from Fr. Bosco Peters. Now, if you read this blog, you probably also ought to be reading his blog anyway. I don’t always agree with everything that he says or suggests, but he is a good, thoughtful voice on Anglican liturgy grounded in the history and ecumenical aspects of it. (He’s also a Kiwi so it’s interesting to have his perspective on a book greatly beloved but little understood by many American liberal-types…)

The general approach that Fr. Peters takes in this talk should be fairly familiar. I see him operating within the sphere of the post-liberal/Yale School perspective pioneered by Frei and Lindbeck that understands religion generally to be a linguistic-cultural phenomenon into which one is enculturated. (This is in opposition to, among others, a perspective of religion as a body of ideas to which one does or does not give assent.) Fr. Peters sees liturgy as a fundamental language of the Christian culture. I heartily agree and have used this perspective myself in some of my own presentations.

What I find most interesting here is the way that Fr. Peters pushes this perspective/metaphor. Making the logical next step, he gives us some very interesting thoughts about fluency. This is a very intriguing way to think about liturgy and the church, how we reach out to the non/un/de-churched, and also how we think about clergy and leaders within our own church and their facility (or lack thereof) in the liturgy.

Do take some time to read over the presentation or to watch it.