Saturday, July 14, 2012

PG001(col. 219-222): First Epistle of Clement to the Corinthians: Chapter 6.


(From the 1765 Venice edition of  André Galland's "Library of the Ancient Fathers", Tome 1, folio-size, p. 9)
Author:  André Galland
Googlebooks PDF: PG001

Chapter 6

     To these men hallowedly[[41]] governing were gathered together a great multitude of elect, who having suffered with many outrages and tortures[[42]] because of envy, became among us a most beautiful example.  Having been persecuted because of envy, [women Danaids and Dirces][[43]], having suffered terrible and unholy outrages they arrive[{d} at the steady course of faith[[44]], and they weak in body obtained the noble prize.  Envy estranged wives from <their> men, and altered the <thing said> by our father Adam: 'Thi{s} now <is> bone from my bones and flesh from my flesh.'[[60c]]  Envy and strife overturned great cities and uprooted great peoples.


Citations
60c. Genesis 2:23


Notes
41. "Hallowedly": Thus <is> the manuscript here and in chapter 5 of the other epistle <sc. of Clement>. The editions in both places <have>, "divinely".  Wotton confirms this reading with many <words?>--Gallandi

42. "with many outrages and tortures": Others read, "many outrages and tortures"[[A]].--The same

43. "Danaids and Dirces":  Thus Wotton <reads> from the manuscript.  <Other> editions <have> '...Dirce'.  This passage has fixed a cross[[B]] for learned men.  Some judge that it was interpolated from Clement of Alexandria's "Miscellanies", book 4, chapter 19.  Others straightaway expunge <it>.  Others read otherwise.  Now, <Antoine> Birr demonstrates that they are deceived who think that those <words> were transferred here from the Alexandrian: since there is no "Dirce" there.  Whereas the "Danaids" are proposed as an example not of patience, but of womanly audacity in taking up arms.--Gallandi


     "Danaids and Dirce": <It> should perhaps be read, "Danae and Dirce".--Cotelier


     See the things which we wrote about this matter on page 3, section 11, chapters 5 and 14 of "The critical art".--Leclerc


     "Danaids and Dirce": There is no one who does not at first sight see that these things are foreign <to> this passage and plainly against the mind of the author, who has, if you will, lightly weighed out  his words which <appear> shortly above; where <having> abandoned ancient examples, he promises to bring out in public also newer (that I might use the word of Demosthenes) <examples> of his own century.  Now,  if <there is> place for conjecture, it <seems true> that a reading of Clement of Alexandria has provided the opportunity for this error, who <Clem. Alex.> in book 4 of the "Miscellanies", when he repeats the things which <appear> below near the end of this epistle and are explanatory of this passage, after the examples of Judith and Esther he adds from secular history and the tales of the poets several deeds of strong women, who scorned swords, fires, and the sufferings of torments with a constant and manly spirit (which it is discovered was also done by Tertullian in the "Book to the Martyrs"), among whom he mentions the daughters of Danaus and the author of "The Danaids", who composed in heroic song their history.  Whence it happened that since these words were first written in the margin of some ancient copy, they later crept into the text <due to> some inexperience librarian; however, <those words> which  enclosed in brackets we for that reason have separated from the remaining, are able to be retained not inappropriately if the particle "as" is prefixed, but the previous opinion is more favorable.--Young


     The conjectures of different <men> on this passage are various.  Cotelier suspects that in Greek "Danae and Dirce" are to be read.  But Jean Leclerc in "The Critical Art", page 3, section 2, chpater 6, note 15, conjectures that for the words "Danaids and Dirce" should be restored "without reverence and justice" [[Lat. Trans. Om.]], that is, irreverently [insofar as the weaker sex is considered] and against justice and right.  But I think no one with easily subscribe to his conjecture, since the sequence of speech demands that, in the manner that he most recently exhibited <examples> of men, so now he propose particular and individual examples of women.  It will far less please anyone that the Greek word "jealousy" [[Lat. Trans. Om.]][[C]] be understood.  For here it does not sound other than <it does> earlier, where Paul, Peter, David, etc., are mentioned as troubled "because of jealousy".  Nor does it seem more <likely to be heard>, since he established that about this passage, that "unless an error crept into it, there cannot be doubt that it is owed to a semi-pagan librarian," who united the tale of the daughters of Danaus with true histories.  Yet, as if it could not have happened around that time at which Peter and Paul suffered on account of the jealousy of the gentiles, that for the same cause two women named "Danaides and Dirce" were harassed, which <women> are elsewhere unknown to us.  Certainly the sequence of speech, as we were just saying, demands that singular examples of distinguished women be submitted: nor does it lead into error anything more than from the resemblance of names to attribute to one that which we know from another.  On account of which neither does their opinion seems acceptable, who by the fact that Clement of Alexandria in book 4 of the "Miscellanies" among the gentile women who begot for themselves praise for their own virtues, reckons the aforementioned daughters of Danaus, and mentions that they were celebrated by a certain poet with an encomium the title to which was "The Danaids", from which passage of the Alexandrian argue that that had been rashly stitched on by a certain librarian.--Coustant

44. "Towards the <course> of faith":  From Wotton thus <reads> the manuscript without the article "the"[[D]], which the editions add.--Gallandi

     "Arrived at the course":  Perhaps "to" <sc. instead of "at">[[E]], as below, "arrived to <maturity>".  Thus Paul at Ephesians 4:13 : "Until we all arrive to the unity of the faith"; and at Philippians 3:11 : "If somehow I will arrive to the resurrection of the dead".  I would prefer, however, <with> the preposition deleted, to read, "they accomplished", alluding to that <passage> of Paul <in> 2 Timothy 4:7  : "I have contended the good contest, I have finished the race, I have maintained the faith".--Young


My Notes
A. The difference is in one letter in the inflected suffixes which changes the dative instrument in to the accusative direct object.

B.  The "cross" seems to refer to an obelus, a cross-shaped mark used in textual criticism to indicate an unresolved corruption in the text.


C. The Latin word listed here is a Greek cognate, "zelotypia".  This differs from the common Latin translations  "aemulatio" and "invidia".  
     Also, I should note this somewhere in general remarks, but there is a difficulty in translating the two Greek words that are commonly rendered "jealousy" and "envy".  I'm not quite sure what the exact sense of each is supposed to be, since I doubt the proper English distinction (which if even recognized is often obscured in common speech) doesn't map cleanly on to them.  I suspect from the various Latin renderings that others have had similar difficulties with the precise sense of these words.


D. The point here is that the addition of the article would literally render this phrase as, "the course of the faith".  But Greek idiom is such that there is not necessarily a distinction between "course of faith" and "course of the faith", as there would be in English, where the former suggests the non-specific notion of belief, whereas the latter implies a specific creed, which is presumably what Clement intends.



E.  Another point about proper Greek idiom.  It would be smoother to render "come to" instead of "arrive to", but I want to preserve the same word.


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