ricoblog - Prayer in First Clement 59

Thursday, November 10, 2005

I was at Amy's last night, talking with her and her parents. Amy's mom has been reading up on early church history and had run into the prayer of Clement that starts in 1Cl 59.3. We read through it and talked about it a bit. I've been champing at the bit to look at the Greek ever since.

So I looked at the Greek of 1Cl 59.3-4 tonight. I like stuff like this for a few reasons. First off, it reminds me that I need to exercise my prayer muscle. Second, there are some repeated structures in here that drill grammar/syntax patterns into my head.

I decided to work through the text, looking at the patterns, and play around with translating it. With much help from my good friend BDAG and Ehrman's Apostolic Fathers edition, here's my stab:

[verse 3] Δὸς ἡμῖν, κύριε ἐλπίζειν ἐπὶ τὸ ἀρχεγόνον πάσης κτίσεως ὄνομά σου,	[verse 3] Grant us, Lord, to hope in the ultimate source of all creation, your name,
ἀνοίξας τοὺς ὀφθαλμοὺς τῆς καρδίας ἡμῶν εἰς τὸ γινώσκειν σε τὸν μόνον ὕψιστον ἐν ὑψίστοις,	open the eyes of our heart, to know you as the one who alone is highest among the highest,
ἅγιον ἐν ἀγίοις ἀναπαυόμενον·	holy one resting among the holy.
τὸν ταπεινοῦντα ὕβριν ὑπερηφάνων,	Who humbles the arrogance of the proud,
τὸν διαλύοντα λογισμοὺς ἐθνῶν,	who destroys the plans of nations,
τὸν ποιοῦντα ταπεινοὺς εἰς ὕψος καὶ τοὺς ὑψηλοὺς ταπεινοῦντα,	who lifts the humble to the heights and humbles the haughty,
τὸν πλουτίζοντα καὶ πτωχίζοντα,	who makes rich and makes poor,
τὸν ἀποκτείνοντα καὶ ζῆν ποιοῦντα,	who kills and makes life,
μόνον εὐεργέτην πνευμάτων καὶ θεὸν πάσης σαρκός·	the only [benefactor] of spirits and God of all flesh:
τὸν ἐπιβλέποντα ἐν τοῖς ἀβύσσοις,	who sees into the abyss,
τὸν ἐπόπτην ἀνθρωπίνων ἔργων,	the observer of the works of men,
τὸν τῶν κινδυνευόντων βοηθόν,	the helper of those in danger,
τὸν τῶν ἀπηλπισμένων σωτῆρα,	the savior of those in despair,
τὸν παντὸς πνεύματος κτίστην καὶ ἐπίσκοπον·	the creator and overseer of every spirit:
τὸν πληθύνοντα ἔθνη ἐπὶ γῆς καὶ ἐκ πάντων ἐκλεξάμενον τοὺς ἀγαπῶντάς σε διὰ Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ τοῦ ἠγαπημένου παιδός σου, δι ̓ οὗ ἡμᾶς ἐπαίδευσας, ἡγίασας, ἐτίμησας·	the multiplier of nations on earth and who from all has chosen those who love you through Jesus Christ your beloved child, through whom you have taught, made holy and honored us.
[verse 4] ἀξιοῦμέν σε, δέσποτα, βοηθὸν γενέσθαι καὶ ἀντιλήπτορα ἡμῶν.	[verse 4] We ask you, O Master, to be our helper and protector.
τοὺς ἐν θλίψει ἡμῶν σῶσον,	Save those of us in affliction,
τοὺς ταπεινοὺς ἐλέησον,	have compassion upon those who are lowly,
τοὺς πεπτωκότας ἔγειρον,	raise those who have fallen,
τοῖς δεομένοις ἐπιφάνηθι,	appear to those who are in need,
τοὺς ἀσθενεῖς ἴασαι,	cure those who are ill,
τοὺς πλανωμένους τοῦ λαοῦ σου ἐπίστρεψον·	straighten the ways of the wanderers among your people.
χόρτασον τοὺς πεινῶντας,	Feed the hungry,
λύτρωσαι τοὺς δεσμίους ἡμῶν,	ransom our prisoners,
ἐξανάστησον τοὺς ἀσθενοῦντας,	raise up the infirm,
παρακάλεσον τοὺς ὀλιγοψυχοῦντας·	encourage the faint-hearted.
γνώτωσάν σε ἅπαντα τὰ ἔθνη, ὅτι σὺ εἶ ὁ θεὸς μόνος καὶ Ἰησοῦς Χριστὸς ὁ παῖς σου καὶ ἡμεῖς λαός σου καὶ πρόβατα τῆς νομῆς σου.	Let all the nations know you, that you alone are God and that Jesus Christ is your son and that we are your people and the sheep of your pasture.

That's a lot of translation for me, for one night, even if it is heavily reliant on lexical sources such as BDAG. Maybe I'll do 1Cl 60 later.

That said, there are a couple of structures that are repeated and a couple of grammatical concepts that are driven home, at least for me. These include:

The second line of verse 3: ἀνοίξας τοὺς ὀφθαλμοὺς τῆς καρδίας ἡμῶν εἰς τὸ γινώσκειν σε τὸν μόνον ὕψιστον ἐν ὑψίστοις,. I've recently looked into James 1.19 which has this same structure twice -- infintive clause with article as object of a prepositional phrase -- so it was neat to spot it here too and think, "oh, yeah, like in James".

Verse 3 also has several instances where participles have articles. They match in case, number (singular) and gender. So, they're substantive; more like nouns than verbs (right?). Thus translations like "[the one] who humbles", "[the one] who destroys", "[the one] who lifts", etc.

Verse 4 has several instances of an accusative plural article followed by either an adjective or participle (that match the article in case, number and gender) followed by an imperative. Woodenly literal, then, something like "those infirm, restore". But just because this is in the imperative doesn't mean that it is a command. Could Clement be commanding God to do something in his prayer? Of course not. Just because commands are typically imperative (but let's not forget the hortatory subjunctive in 1 John!) doesn't mean that imperatives are typically commands. These are requests. Clement is praying for the needs of others, bringing them to God as requests or entreaties. He is passionate about them, but he is not "commanding".

I love stuff like this because it bangs these sorts of concepts home for me. And it is encouraging to read to boot.