A Latin Question For Those Who Actually Speak It

[futureKC123]

I need a translation please:
Holy father, cast thy mind
On the work thy hands designed;
In the Judge’s presence stand
For thy poor and lowly band.

God, whose property it is always to have mercy and to spare, we humbly beseech Thee, that we, who spoil the works of Thy glory by our sins and are justly afflicted for what we have done, may, by the merits and intercession of blessed Dominic, Thy confessor and our father, be comforted in our trials, and ever obey Thy divine will. Through Jesus Christ, Thy Son. Amen.

 

[MarkThompson]

God, whose property it is always to have mercy and to spare, we humbly beseech Thee, that we, who spoil the works of Thy glory by our sins and are justly afflicted for what we have done, may, by the merits and intercession of blessed Dominic, Thy confessor and our father, be comforted in our trials, and ever obey Thy divine will. Through Jesus Christ, Thy Son. Amen.

Deus, cui semper est misereri et parcere, summisse qaesumus ut nos, qui opera gloriae tuae vitiamus peccatis nostris, per merita ac intercessionem beati Dominici confessoris tui patrisque nostri, in tribulationibus consolemur et semper numinem obsequamur tuum. Per Jesum Christum, filium tuum. Amen.

I need a translation please:
Holy father, cast thy mind
On the work thy hands designed;
In the Judge’s presence stand
For thy poor and lowly band.

I’m not capable of translating this into a poem. What are you going to use this for? Also, how could God the Father stand in the presence of the Judge? He is the judge. Prayer fail.

EDIT: P.S., I’ll gladly accept suggestions and corrections on the translation above. I don’t get to do too much translation English → Latin.

 

[floresco]

Deus, cui semper est misereri et parcere, summisse qaesumus ut nos, qui opera gloriae tuae vitiamus peccatis nostris, per merita ac intercessionem beati Dominici confessoris tui patrisque nostri, in tribulationibus consolemur et semper numinem obsequamur tuum. Per Jesum Christum, filium tuum. Amen.

I’m not capable of translating this into a poem. What are you going to use this for? Also, how could God the Father stand in the presence of the Judge? He is the judge. Prayer fail.

EDIT: P.S., I’ll gladly accept suggestions and corrections on the translation above. I don’t get to do too much translation English → Latin.

You left out a translation for the phrase “and are justly afflicted for what we have done”. I think the poem is addressed to Saint Dominic (by a Dominican) rather than to God.

 

[MarkThompson]

-]Oh , duh, obsequi more appropriately takes a dative object. Fixed:/-]

-]Deus, cui semper est misereri et parcere, summisse quaesumus ut nos, qui opera gloriae tuae vitiamus peccatis nostris, per merita ac intercessionem beati Dominici confessoris tui patrisque nostri, in tribulationibus consolemur et semper tuo numini obsequamur. Per Jesum Christum, filium tuum. Amen./-]
EDIT: Oh, good call Floresco, I’ll fix that.

 

[MarkThompson]

This should be better:

Deus, cui semper est misereri et parcere, summisse quaesumus ut nos, qui opera gloriae tuae peccatis vitiamus ideoque iuste contribulamur, per merita ac intercessionem beati Dominici confessoris tui patrisque nostri, in tribulationibus consolemur et semper tuo numini obsequamur. Per Jesum Christum, filium tuum. Amen.

As you’ll see, I’ve elided “for what we have done” and connected the concepts with ideoque.

 

[Warrenton]

I need a translation please:
Holy father, cast thy mind
On the work thy hands designed;
In the Judge’s presence stand
For thy poor and lowly band.

I’ll give it a try, although in light of Mark’s comments, I have tried to “revise” it so that God the Father is not in His own presence.

Pater Sanctissime
Memora opera digitorum tuorum
In die judiciae
Tunc, terram et gentes judicabis
Tuos populos humiles custodibis.

(Most Holy Father,
Remember the works of thy fingers
(and) In the day of judgment
When you shall judge the earth and the nations,
Save thy humble people.

Mark - if you could double check my syntax on “humiles” I would be grateful. I was not certain how to make the noun into an adjective, or even if “humiles” was the right word to convey the sense of “poor and humble.”

 

[floresco]

Holy father, cast thy mind
On the work thy hands designed;
In the Judge’s presence stand
For thy poor and lowly band.

I’ll give it a try, although in light of Mark’s comments, I have tried to “revise” it so that God the Father is not in His own presence.

Note that the word “father” is not capitalized. Dominicans call St. Dominic their father. In this poem they are asking their founder to pray for them.

 

[floresco]

This should be better:

Deus, cui semper est misereri et parcere, summisse quaesumus ut nos, qui opera gloriae tuae peccatis vitiamus ideoque iuste contribulamur, per merita ac intercessionem beati Dominici confessoris tui patrisque nostri, in tribulationibus consolemur et semper tuo numini obsequamur. Per Jesum Christum, filium tuum. Amen.

As you’ll see, I’ve elided “for what we have done” and connected the concepts with ideoque.

I like how that flows, but the OP might want something more literal. It depends on what the translation is for.

 

[MarkThompson]

Warrenton, humiles is correct, humilis declines as a 3rd declension adjective. Iudiciae is incorrect because “judgment” is iudicium, a neuter noun. Custodibis is incorrect because custodio is a fourth conjugation verb, which form their futures not by inserting -bi- but by changing the stem to -ie-. Also, in die . . . tunc falls strangely on me. I don’t think that’s what you want.

In any event, let me try a verse translation. I disagree with the theology of the poem, but what the heck, let’s have fun. The practice is good for me.

 

[floresco]

I think somebody needs to translate it into English first:

St. Dominic, remember the order you have founded
You are now in the presence of God our Judge
Pray for us your followers

There is nothing wrong with the theology of this.

 

[MarkThompson]

Floresco, “Holy father . . . the work thy hands designed” has a pretty darned clear implication in Catholic prayer. I’m not saying it can’t be directed at St. Dominic, but I am saying that if this prayer had been composed by Archbishop Bugnini or ICEL the accusations of heresy would be think in the air.

I think that conveys what I mean. Moving along –

Holy father, cast thy mind
On the work thy hands designed;
In the Judge’s presence stand
For thy poor and lowly band.

Sancte pater, respice
Cuncta tua opera;
Disputa prae Iudice
Pro humile caterva.
Not hugely satisfying work, I confess, but probably the best I can do here. (That’s a capital-i iudice there, btw; in sans-serif ludice and Iudice look identical.)

 

[Warrenton]

“respice” that was the word I was looking for!!!
You pegged it, Mark.

And cuncta, another great word.

I back slowly out of your chamber, bowing periodically

 

[floresco]

Floresco, “Holy father . . . the work thy hands designed” has a pretty darned clear implication in Catholic prayer. I’m not saying it can’t be directed at St. Dominic, but I am saying that if this prayer had been composed by Archbishop Bugnini or ICEL the accusations of heresy would be think in the air.

If the prayer had come from those sources, I too would expect bad theology. However, given that there is a possible interpretation of this poem that makes sense and another that does not really make sense, it seems likely the interpretation that makes sense is correct.

I think that conveys what I mean. Moving along –

Holy father, cast thy mind
On the work thy hands designed;
In the Judge’s presence stand
For thy poor and lowly band.

Sancte pater, respice
Cuncta tua opera;
Disputa prae Iudice
Pro humile caterva.
Not hugely satisfying work, I confess, but probably the best I can do here. (That’s a capital-i iudice there, btw; in sans-serif ludice and Iudice look identical.)

Well I don’t like how the cuncto tua opera does not work for how I am understanding it. No problems with the Latin are jumping out at me.

 

[MarkThompson]

If the prayer had come from those sources, I too would expect bad theology. However, given that there is a possible interpretation of this poem that makes sense and another that does not really make sense, it seems likely the interpretation that makes sense is correct.

In fairness, it’s not like I saw that the prayer was to St. Dominic and decided to look for problems and be contrarian; it genuinely had me confused.

Well I don’t like how the cuncto tua opera does not work for how I am understanding it. No problems with the Latin are jumping out at me.

I’m not sure what your first sentence is saying there, but cuncta tua opera would mean, pretty much, “all your works together.” I thought it correlated appropriately with caterva, “troop, band, throng,” perhaps implying that each member of the Order is a “work” of St. Dominic. Obviously any translation of this sort, retaining the meter and rhyme of the original, will lose some concepts (“poor” had to go, for instance) and gain others. The goal is for the end product to, at minimum, not objectively suck as a stand-alone piece (paging ICEL!).

Warrenton: Thanks! Yeah, respice jumped out at me immediately, the trick was how to get iudex in the ablative – normally I would have had ante (or possibly coram) iudicem. And cuncta is so redolent of medieval Latin poetry, rather than classical Latin or prose, that, obviously, I couldn’t resist it.

 

[floresco]

I’m not sure what your first sentence is saying there, but cuncta tua opera would mean, pretty much, “all your works together.” I thought it correlated appropriately with caterva, “troop, band, throng,” perhaps implying that each member of the Order is a “work” of St. Dominic. Obviously any translation of this sort, retaining the meter and rhyme of the original, will lose some concepts (“poor” had to go, for instance) and gain others. The goal is for the end product to, at minimum, not objectively suck as a stand-alone piece (paging ICEL!).

I’m not up for the challenge of a verse translation myself, so I don’t mean to be picky. It’s just that cuncta tua opera evoked for me a reference to the entire creation. But I see how it could work as you are saying.

Warrenton: Thanks! Yeah, respice jumped out at me immediately, the trick was how to get iudex in the ablative – normally I would have had ante (or possibly coram) iudicem. And cuncta is so redolent of medieval Latin poetry, rather than classical Latin or prose, that, obviously, I couldn’t resist it.

According to my dictionary coram takes ablative.

 

[MarkThompson]

I’m not up for the challenge of a verse translation myself, so I don’t mean to be picky. It’s just that cuncta tua opera evoked for me a reference to the entire creation. But I see how it could work as you are saying.

Maybe, but – to me, at least – no more so than “the work thy hands designed.”

According to my dictionary coram takes ablative.

Whoops, you’re right, thanks. Wasn’t thinking there, though I had actually dismissed coram because it did not fit the meter. I was never really able to come up with a word for the “stand / For” of the English poem (which doesn’t work very well in the English either, mind you). Disputa serves the meaning pretty well, I think, but if someone wanted to insist on Nunc sta coram iudice or something like that, I suppose it would work with coram.

 

[floresco]

Maybe, but – to me, at least – no more so than “the work thy hands designed.”

I agree. It’s the same problem really. The restrictions of the form are interfering with the clarity. So maybe it’s a good thing that you captured that in your translation.

Whoops, you’re right, thanks. Wasn’t thinking there, though I had actually dismissed coram because it did not fit the meter. I was never really able to come up with a word for the “stand / For” of the English poem (which doesn’t work very well in the English either, mind you). Disputa serves the meaning pretty well, I think, but if someone wanted to insist on Nunc sta coram iudice or something like that, I suppose it would work with coram.

I like the option with coram better.

 

[MarkThompson]

I agree. It’s the same problem really. The restrictions of the form are interfering with the clarity. So maybe it’s a good thing that you captured that in your translation.

That’s actually what I was shooting for, believe it or not. Since the English portrays Dominic as a quasi-Godlike figure, I was trying to sound roughly the same note.

Incidentally, one option is to change Sancte pater to Beate pater. In Latin it doesn’t carry the connotation that he is a “mere” Blessed rather than a full-fledged Saint, but it would make clear that it is not God who’s being spoken to. Again, though, since the English calls him “Holy father,” I opted for the more divine terminology.

I like the option with coram better.

I don’t. For one thing, I don’t think “stare” agrees with “pro someone” in a sense that implies advocacy or intercession, and I don’t know of another one-syllable imperative that could go there. “Sta pro me”? I’m not sure what that means. So you’d probably have to figure out something else for the last line, and, really, I’m afraid there’s only so much you can do with four lines of seven syllables apiece. I contemplated going to a trochaic pentameter or something, but decided to try and match the meter of the original. In that regard I was also kind of roped in by the fact that “Sancte pater, respice” worked so well.

 

[floresco]

I don’t. For one thing, I don’t think “stare” agrees with “pro someone” in a sense that implies advocacy or intercession, and I don’t know of another one-syllable imperative that could go there. “Sta pro me”? I’m not sure what that means.

You’re right. I was thinking of the line in isolation. It doesn’t work with the rest of it.