Grammatically, to whom is the "Glory be" Addressed?

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ProVobis said:
How were “I” or “we” or “us” ever in the third person? Are you perhaps confusing person with usage in a sentence?

By the way, here is a question for you. If we address the Deity in the second person “you” is it singular or plural?
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Clearly I have corrected that - not third BUT plural first person. You need to pay attention to the correction as you did very well when you noticed the original mistske. 😃 👍

I would say, ‘You’ for the second person God, indeed has to be singular, since there’s only One God, the three persons in the Trinity notwithstanding. 🙂

As an aside, when we proclaim Glory be to the Holy Trinity, anytime anywhere, and how beautiful it is when we do it on earth ccorporately in the mass, we are actually in chorus with all the angels and saints in heaven. We know that because they are saying it, worshipping God unceasingly day and night in heaven (ref Rev.).
 
ProVobis said:
By the way, here is a question for you. If we address the Deity in the second person “you” is it singular or plural?
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But that’s an interesting question. I guess it depends on the usage. There’s one God but three persons. So it depends on how and to whom we are addressing the triune God.

If we address the differdnt persons individually then of course it is plural. “Thank you Jesus for sending us the Holy Spirit” or “Thank you Father for have given us your Son . …”, which in thjs case is plural second person.
 
ProVobis said:
How were “I” or “we” or “us” ever in the third person? Are you perhaps confusing person with usage in a sentence?

By the way, here is a question for you. If we address the Deity in the second person “you” is it singular or plural?
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This is interesting we don’t use Thee and thou much anymore. BUT we do read “THout art holy” SO I vote singular.
 
I would agree with the singular in general (“Te igitur clementissime Pater” in the Canon, te being singular) but I noticed the OP used as an example, or non-example, “We give you glory, O Father, Son, and Holy Ghost.” Singular or plural you?
 
Even though the word " you" is not used , it is still in the 2nd person mode. In many languages it is considered extremely impolite to use the 2nd person or even to imply it. So we might say:" Does Mister want more coffee?" Rather than " Do you want more coffee." I still hear this today from my Polish acquaintances but not from my family. Voice and address really comes alive at Mass when you hear the propers sung. Text like “I am wonderfully made,” or " blessed is the man" are really about Jesus and not me. " During many, many of the introits who is saying " Rescue me from my enemies"? If it’s us then we are calling that guy next us as the enemy. But realize it is Jesus saying these words as he is really about to be sacrificed.
 
ProVobis said:
I would agree with the singular in general (“Te igitur clementissime Pater” in the Canon, te being singular) but I noticed the OP used as an example, or non-example, “We give you glory, O Father, Son, and Holy Ghost.” Singular or plural you?
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I guess it matters if we are addressing TRINITYas one God or the three persons. It would be interesting what they used in the oldest writings.
 
Enim said:
Even though the word " you" is not used , it is still in the 2nd person mode. In many languages it is considered extremely impolite to use the 2nd person or even to imply it.
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Interesting point. Do you have more examples (besides the minor doxology)? Is there evidence that such is the case (implied “you” = reverence) with ancient Greek and/or Latin?
 
Enim said:
I still hear this today from my Polish acquaintances but not from my family.
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True. I’m very careful in using the second person when conversing with my Polish relatives. “Pan” or “Pani” is used otherwise; a “ty” is considered rude.
 
I read with interest and hope that all this is just an exercise of the intellect and does not mean anything.

It is a doxology guys, an act of adoration. Does a “Wow” have to be directed to anyone?
 
ProVobis said:
True. I’m very careful in using the second person when conversing with my Polish relatives. “Pan” or “Pani” is used otherwise; a “ty” is considered rude.
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Yeah, but that’s only in the Polish. Other Slavic languages use the 2nd person plural to denote respect.
 
edward_george said:
The verb “be” would be in the subjunctive as it is used in English; we might also say “May glory be to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Spirit” if we think of it this way. In Latin, there is no verb, but “Patri,” “Filio,” and “Spiritui Sancto” are in the dative, and thus this indicates “to” or “for.” Latin is tricky like that, not necessarily requiring a verb in order to make a sentence intelligible (Semitic languages do this too). The “be” is added in English as a sort of helping verb, although it isn’t strictly necessary; the version of the doxology found in the Liturgy of the Hours does not have “be” in it.

-Fr ACEGC
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Yes, that. Subjunctive.

Or, either that or some sort of 3rd person or even 2nd person imperative, which in English (unlike some other languages) would take the same form externally, i.e. same morphology, and only differ in intent, leaving the audience to guess. Third-person imperatives aren’t addressed to anyone or anything particular (in which they are similar to general statements), but 2nd person imperatives are obviously addressed to whomever or whatever they refer to. Hence an imperative could be addressed to glory, technically, as is the case in some Slavic translations.

My inclination is to regard ‘glory be’ as a 2nd person imperative technically addressed to glory. Hence the speaker is technically telling glory to ‘be to God’ (which is obviously not the most modern English syntax out there).
Gorgias said:
Yeah, but that’s only in the Polish. Other Slavic languages use the 2nd person plural to denote respect.
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It’s worth remembering that ‘you’ was originally the plural form, not the singular. The singular fell into disuse, and the plural took over. It’s technically the same form as the French vous. Hence, Polish ‘ty’ is not really a good translation of ‘you’, as ‘ty’ is technically ‘thou’. Interestingly, 2nd sg is preserved in prayer in both languages and is not considered disrespectful in that case, being reminiscent of how differently honorifics worked in the past, where you’d have used ‘thou’ or ‘ty’ as the pronoun of choice but used other words to convey respect.

Modern Polish basically uses the 3rd person to convey respect, similarly to Italian. ‘Pan’ and ‘Pani’ predate the custom but are only used this way now, except for nonstandard usage (dialect, comic relief, archaisms etc.). This formalized 3rd person usage is never referred to God.
 
[ASIDE: I have skimmed much of this thread, apologies if I am repeating anyone else’s points – You may consider me agreeing with them]
Ad_Orientem said:
Argh, did no one read my post?

I know it is an act of worship to God. Note the word “grammatically” in the thread title. This is a language question!

Yes, but this doesn’t change the fact that the Divine Persons are mentioned in the third person rather than in the first person. (Referring there not to the identity of the Divine Persons as such, but to grammatical person.)

This is closer to what I’m looking for, Father, but still doesn’t answer my question. Why is the third person case used, or according to the English rendering you give (which I also gave above), why the passive voice? Does this mean it is not addressed directly to God, but to, e.g., the worshiping community?
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There no verb in the Latin (:)), but there is a nominative/subjective-case: Gloria.

Grammatically, I would say the prayer is addressed to Glory as the personification of an abstract and the subject of an implied imperative or hortative subjunctive mood: Glory, be thou applied to the Father…"

(Much like the verbless *Sursum corda *may be grammatically addressing “hearts” as the subject)

:twocents:
tee
 
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