Is it okay that they changed the Our Father?

  • Thread starter Thread starter LovelyLadybug
  • Start date Start date
Status
Not open for further replies.
DaveBj said:
40.png
JulianN:
Or when they wrote down what they heard in Aramaic into Greek in the first place …
Click to expand...
Beat me to it by one minute 😃

Yes, in order to avoid “changing the prayer that Jesus taught to His disciples,” you would have to take a time machine back to 28 A.D. or so, record the audio, and memorize it. As soon as there is translation from one language to another, there is the modification of words and meanings.

D
Click to expand...
We keep hearing of this hypothetical Aramaic/Hebrew original and yet no one can ever produce it. Yes, Jesus spoke Aramaic, but it’s also a fact that we do not have any authoritative text or source of Jesus’ words in Aramaic. Matthew and the rest of the Gospels come to us canonically in Greek, the Greek is authoritative, and the Greek does not say “do not let us fall.” The Greek says “do not bring (eisenegkes; bring; lead; carry) us”.

There are times when things are difficult to translate. This is not one of them.

And as for “God does not lead us to temptation,” well.

“Then Jesus was led by the Spirit into the desert to be tempted by the devil.” Matthew 4:1.

As I said. Man remolding God in man’s image and likeness.
 
Last edited:
I don’t mind it. Liturgical revisions have always required a balance between conservatism of language and theological clarification.

As another example, most people don’t realise that “full of grace” in the Hail Mary is certainly not what Gabriel says to Mary in the Greek text of Luke 1:28.
 
Only the Aramaic is the true prayer as Jesus spoke it. Man attempts to re-gain what was lost in translation. It is not a perfect science.
 
This is not the first thread on this kind of topic.

A similar change was implemented in French in 2018 (if memory serves ; I already feel like I’ve been saying the new translation forever). We went from “Ne nous soumets pas à la tentation” (literally “Submit us not to temptation”) to “Ne nous laisse pas entrer en tentation” (Let us not enter temptation"). One of the main arguments was faithfulness to the Greek text, and there are legitimate arguments for that position.

“They” who changed the text were the Conference of French Bishops, so yes, I would hope they have a right to make that decision.

We Protestants followed along, as a sign of unity.
 
porthos11 said:
yet no one can ever produce it.
Click to expand...
. . . which was the point of my statement about the time machine. We don’t have the original; all we have is a Greek translation of the writers heard, hopefully from someone who was actually there.

D
 
Jesus was led / driven into the desert by the Holy Spirit, TO BE TEMPTED by the Devil.
He was not led into the desert to ENTER INTO THE TEMPTATION (which means to do the activity of the sin tempted).
Being tempted means seeing and feeling hunger.
Entering into temptation means taking and eating to self-satisfy the appetite.

“Deliver us from evil” is part of the clause; when the LORD “delivered” Israel from Egypt, he “delivered them” by “Leading Them”.
Lead us not INTO SELF-FULFILLMENT, but
Lead us AWAY FROM DEFECTIVE SELF HELP.
 
Just pray it in Latin. Now you don’t have to worry about saying it wrong or heretically.
 
I don’t speak Latin. I could probably use an online translator, though. 🙂
 
DaveBj said:
40.png
porthos11:
yet no one can ever produce it.
Click to expand...
. . . which was the point of my statement about the time machine. We don’t have the original; all we have is a Greek translation of the writers heard, hopefully from someone who was actually there.

D
Click to expand...
A Greek which is canonical and inspired and authoritative.

We do not need to appeal to some unknown hypothetical Aramaic when we have the authoritative text right here.
 
I don’t either, but like any muscle skill, practice makes perfect!

Dr. Taylor Marshall has a pretty good tutorial to pray in Latin. It helped me out with my mispronunciations.

 
Just learn the meaning of induco. (to lead, bring or conduct into a place)

Et ne nos inducas in tentationem,
sed libera nos a malo
 
LovelyLadybug said:
they have any right to change it?
Click to expand...
Of course. The Church has the authority to bind and loose.
LovelyLadybug said:
Any thoughts on this?
Click to expand...
I find it more accurate. I’m not a native English speaker, and I had a huge question mark over the English version of the prayer. I thought it was saying that God is leading me to temptation. In my native tongue the line goes “do not allow us to be exposed to temptation”, which implies that God has the power to expose us to temptation but He does not directly lead us there.

I don’t quite understand the “big deal” surrounding the change in the Italian version of the Lord’s Prayer. It’s not in English, so it’s not going to affect most people here, and what’s more, I fail to understand people’s opposition to the Church exercising it’s authority (and sorta doing its job) to make the Italian version more accurate.
 
Last edited:
Salibi said:
40.png
LovelyLadybug:
they have any right to change it?
Click to expand...
Of course. The Church has the authority to bind and loose.
LovelyLadybug said:
Any thoughts on this?
Click to expand...
I find it more accurate. I’m not a native English speaker, and I had a huge question mark over the English version of the prayer. I thought it was saying that God is leading me to temptation. In my native tongue the line goes “do not allow us to be exposed to temptation”, which implies that God has the power to expose us to temptation but He does not directly lead us there.

I don’t quite understand the “big deal” surrounding the change in the Italian version of the Lord’s Prayer. It’s not in English, so it’s not going to affect most people here, and what’s more, I fail to understand people’s opposition to the Church exercising it’s authority (and sorta doing its job) to make the Italian version more accurate.
Click to expand...
The issue is that it’s not faithful to the Scriptures.

How can it be “more accurate” with neither the Greek nor the Latin support it?

The older English ICET translation probably captures it best: “Do not bring us to the test”.

Of course the liberal ELLC eventually butchered that to “Save us from the time of trial”.
 
Last edited:
OddBird said:
This is not the first thread on this kind of topic.

A similar change was implemented in French in 2018 (if memory serves ; I already feel like I’ve been saying the new translation forever). We went from “Ne nous soumets pas à la tentation” (literally “Submit us not to temptation”) to “Ne nous laisse pas entrer en tentation” (Let us not enter temptation"). One of the main arguments was faithfulness to the Greek text, and there are legitimate arguments for that position.

“They” who changed the text were the Conference of French Bishops, so yes, I would hope they have a right to make that decision.

We Protestants followed along, as a sign of unity.
Click to expand...
And as noted in that old thread, we had prayed “ne nous laissez pas succomber à la tentation” (let us not give in to temptation) for centuries before they changed it the late 60s. I can’t recall that anyone was particularly upset at the new translation at the time, we were too busy being upset at going from the second person plural to second person singular in talking to God.
 
As a general comment, it seems to me that change for the sake of “more accurate” can cause more harm than good. Speaking as a catechist, it’s obvious that for most people the Our Father (and other prayers) need additional explanation to be understood regardless of the translation, and will continue to need explanation after the newest best translation is implemented.

The harm that comes is that now we have older generations who knew and memorized the Nicene Creed, Gloria, Our Father, Hail Mary, and so forth, with younger generations getting taught both old and new translations depending on the teacher. Even simple things like Thy Will be Done versus Your Will be Done. Or “blessed art thou amongst women” versus" blessed are you among women".

The constant changes lead to confusion, disharmony, and even a lack of trust at Mass or during other group prayers.

We have lots of prayer booklets used to teach school children prayers, and zillions of versions of what should be the same prayer being taught based on if you’re using last years prayer booklet or this years booklet, or if you memorized it 10 , 20 , 30 years ago.

And all of the versions need to be explained anyway.

Who is really benefiting from the changes?
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top