A Bit More on "The Greek"

From time to time people--usually younger people, I would guess--will reproach Touchstone editors for their ignorance of Greek, for obviously, anyone with a smattering of it (as one recent correspondent wrote) would recognize . . . .  and here one may fill in any of the many things we have been alleged not to know. From allied quarters have come arresting, unexpected citations to Church fathers, with the apparent assumption that we will take their word for it, not looking them up in the best available critical editions (in my case, necessitating a trip to the Marquette University Library)—or consulting Fr. Reardon, who may know the passage in question by heart.

When we take the time to answer them it results in needless embarrassment all around—for us because we must display their nakedness, and for them in having it displayed. A word to the wise: One should not assume ignorance of the classical languages on the part of any given Touchstone editor. It is far safer to assume we wouldn’t refer to them if we didn’t know them, that there is a real theological—not merely grammatical--disagreement involved, and that it would be advisable to begin with that at the outset instead of informing us that we don’t know Greek or Latin.   

And besides, no significant point of theology depends on the exegesis of a single, or even a few, biblical texts, any more than the pattern of a tapestry depends on a few of its threads. Each point is and must be undergirt—surrounded and defined--by the Whole. This is the reason, as the clearer-sighted feminists tell us, the Bible remains an indelibly patriarchal text despite all the egalitarian fiddling.

Comments

[Christopher Culver]

I assume this is in response to an earlier comment of mine. Well, my point was not a mere ignorance of Greek itself, but a mistaken view of how Greek with its own distinct typology would match to English which, whether one likes it or not, is moving away from the sexual system of Greek. If you want citations from reputable linguists, I'll provide them, provided that I'm not going to get cries of "Well, obviously those linguists are corrupted by feminism," "Christian-haters," "lost to our modern age," etc as is unfortunately common in such fora as these.

[Christopher Hathaway]

Christopher,
English isn't moving anywhere. It is English speakers who are moving away from one use to another. Should not orthodox Christian English speakers resist movements which move them away from uses shared by both the Greek and Hebrew of Scared Scripture? That "man" can represent both sexes and the entire race, is not just a passing lexical fad. It is also a critical Christian theological proposition: that one man actually does represent the entire race, both male and female.

You know, for one who goes on about Holy Tradition as you do, you argue like a liberal Protestant.

[Christopher Culver]

"English isn't moving anywhere. It is English speakers who are moving away from one use to another."

How do you think language changes if not through the slow process of individuals changing how they speak?

"Should not orthodox Christian English speakers resist movements which move them away from uses shared by both the Greek and Hebrew of Scared Scripture?"

Though divine truths may be communicated through it, there's nothing divine about the lexical typology of Greek and Hebrew. As I mentioned in the earlier post, there are plenty of languages on Earth that have a different set-up with regards to the words for "man" and "person". Should we say they are non-Christian? Should translating the Scriptures into them involve rearranging them to become something they never were?

"It is also a critical Christian theological proposition: that one man actually does represent the entire race, both male and female."

Nor is that disputed here. Even speakers of languages where "male" and "person" are related to each other in a different fashion from Greek can understand that.

[Christopher Culver]

The discussion was originally about the line "Peace, goodwill [anthropois]" with the Greek word being translated in a fashion other than "men". I've just checked the traditional Hungarian Bible (done by Karolyi Gaspar in time immemorial and no product of modern feminism) and Luke 2:14 is translated:

"Dicsõség a magasságos [mennyek]ben az Istennek, és e földön békesség, és az emberekhez jó akarat!"

As one can see, the sex-neutral term ember "person" is used instead of a male-specific term (which would be férfikhez). If the direction English is moving into is un-Christian, then Hungarian is un-Christian.

I'd like to ask the site moderators to permit use of the span tag in comments so that I can correctly mark up non-English phrases with the lang and xml:lang XHTML attributes. That is easily configurable on Wordpress and MovableType, and I can't imagine that Typepad is much different.

[Tony Esolen]

Christopher,

Mankowski's article (he is an expert on ancient and Biblical languages, including Hittite) pretty much settles the notion that there is any adequate substitute in English for "man" as signifying both the collective and the unity. He also makes the point that a language cannot simply lose a function without other words taking it up. What we are witnessing in academic femspeak is the refusal to allow English to do what all languages naturally do, that is, to refer to the human race both collectively and unitively in a singular word. Nor is the language changing in this respect -- please read the article. Again, I'm in a position to register the degree of the change: my students, who have had the politically correct neutering drummed into them for years and years, still naturally use words like "man" and "mankind," and still will use "he" (alternately with the awkward "he or she," when possible) to refer to an indefinite antecedent. And, as I have pointed out, even now those same female college students who OUGHT to be the standardbearers of the wonderful change are inventing generic uses of masculine words like "guy" and "man". When you grade several hundred papers and tests in a year, you start noticing these things -- particularly if you are curious about them and on the lookout.

It's probably worth nothing, but in my translations I have used no politically corrected nouns or pronouns, and nobody has even noticed, as far as I know. At least, it hasn't been brought up by any reader or any reviewer. Apparently it is not, linguistically, a big deal.

[Christopher Culver]

"Mankowski's article (he is an expert on ancient and Biblical languages, including Hittite) pretty much settles the notion that there is any adequate substitute in English for "man" as signifying both the collective and the unity. He also makes the point that a language cannot simply lose a function without other words taking it up."

Let's assume that in the coming generations a substitute naturally arises in English which is sex-neutral, like in so many languages on Earth (whose speakers see nothing amiss in their Biblical translations). Such a change has happened innumerable times in the millennia human beings have lived on Earth and used language, and is entirely theologically neutral. Will then so many of the reactionaries here accept this, or will we still hear "but it's not like Greek or Hebrew!"? I swear, so much of the outcry I've heard in conversative blogdom is based not on the particular problem of feminist influence on Biblical translations, but on some unfortunate tendency for the heresy of the trilinguals to pop up again and again in history. Mr Hathaway's comment above, for example, sounds like something St Cyril's accusers would say in the Vita.

[Christopher Hathaway]

Christopher, Hungarian may have no word to express both a singualr man and mankind, but Greek and Hebrew do. God didn't reveal his word to a people who spoke Hungarian. The Providence of God's revelation should have precedence over other human circumstance.

It is relevant that English possesses the same linguistic concept that the Biblical languages do. Is it irrelevant that English could lose this? There is a difference between never having a good thing and having but giving it up. What if there were a language in which there were no word for God. Should we be indifferent to English moving in that direction?

Besides, the relevant factor when we are talking about translations is not what forms of meaning may be allowable for use now but what most accurately reflects the meaning and use of the words of the original languages. Since the singular can be generic in Hebrew and Greek, and since there still exists such a use in English, man would be the most accurate. If you translate it as human beings you restrict the possible meanings inherent in the text. Christians should work to preserve this things rather than letting them be lost.

You write as if this change is inevitable, outside the control of individuals. You may know something about Hungarian translation but you are utterly ignorant of the history of the changes in English. Most changes have been efected by a relatively small number of individuals. English as we know it has been largely shaped by the works of Shakespeare, the Book of Common Prayer, the Authorized Tarnslation. And look at the role of Dictionaries inthe 18th to 19th centuries in regulating proper English.

[luthien]

On the use of "guy" to describe a youngish male human: we (i.e. college girls) tend to use it because our male classmates aren't really boys and they're not really men yet either. Hence the use of "guys" to describe them. I would prefer the words "blokes" or "lads" myself, but one does get such weird looks when applying them. I still don't quite see how translating anthropoi as people is a theological issue. I do dislike the neutered version on aethetic grounds (and peace on earth to people of goodwill. Yuck!!!), but how does translating anthropoi as people imply that God isn't male or that Christ was not incarnate on Earth as a man? (Yes, I am a younger MC devotee. I'll be 17 on my next birthday, just got my driver's license 2 months ago, and am preparing to take my finals for the first semester of my junior year of college.)

[Christopher Culver]

Mr Hathaway, the argument that Greek and Hebrew are someone divine were rejected by the Church when Sts Cyril and Methodius, as well as St Stephen of Perm were glorified.

They also show a belief in the fallacy known as the Sapir-Whorf theory, a long-debunked notion that held that language influences thought. There would be no problem if the Scriptures were translated into a language without a word for God (though all languages have one), because all human languages are capable of expressing the same notions, some may simply use circumlocutions which, in any evident, ultimately become fossilized as distinct lexical items (cf. Proto-Slavonic "bogU", from an Iranian loan meaning "blessed one"). Translations of the Bible into languages different from Greek and Hebrew do not lessen God's word.

My goodness, it's like the Venice debate all over again.

[Christopher Culver]

"some may simply use circumlocutions which, in any evident..."

Err, that should read "...which, in any event..."

[Christopher Hathaway]

They also show a belief in the fallacy known as the Sapir-Whorf theory, a long-debunked notion that held that language influences thought.

Wow, you really do argue like a liberal. Exactly when was this idea "debunked" and by whom? Ever hear of lex orandi, lex credendi?

Luthien, translating anthropoi as people rather than man doesn't imply anything about the Incarnation. That wasn't what I meant. It is inaccurate if the Spirit meant for a word that could mean both. However, it is the ideology that claims that man can only mean a singular male and not the race which raises intelectual obstacles to understanding an actual man, Jesus, representing the whole race. The egalitarian ideology behind inclusive translations would hold the representation of the human race as necessarily being both a man and a woman.

[Christopher Culver]

"Wow, you really do argue like a liberal. Exactly when was this idea "debunked" and by whom?"

See David Crystal's "Language Myths" (Cambridge University Press, 2000). Might be wrong about the year but it's somewhere around there. In fact, any book on introductory linguistics would explain why it is a fallacy, as it is perhaps the most deeply entrenched urban myth among the public (Eskimo words for snow and all that). Linguists have stated for decades now that all human languages are essentially equal, as all are equally expressive.

As far as "lex orandi, lex credendi", many Orthodox people pray with the Church's sanction in a language that does not equate "male" and "person", therefore there is no theological imperative to claim that a language must encode the concepts the same way as Greek.

"However, it is the ideology that claims that man can only mean a singular male and not the race which raises intelectual obstacles to understanding an actual man, Jesus, representing the whole race. The egalitarian ideology behind inclusive translations would hold the representation of the human race as necessarily being both a man and a woman."

As I said, speakers of languages where "man" and "person" are distinct words do not have any difficulty understanding Jesus Christ as representative of the human race. You are talking as if speakers of non-Indo-European or non-Semitic languages have hobbled minds and can't understand concepts that come naturally to a Greek or Hebrew speaker. That's just wrong. One's language does not limit one's thought.

[Christopher Culver]

Oops, "Language Myths" is by Laurie Bauer and Peter Trudgill and was published by CUP in 1999. Got it confused with a David Crystal book published shortly thereafter. Crystal is a good writer to check out as well, he's made a career of explaining linguistics to laymen in a gentle and entertaining tone.

[David Gray]

Following this discussion bears witness to the truth of the original post by Mr. Hutchens.

[Christopher Culver]

Fine Mr Gray, let's agree with Mr Hutchens that a large amount of the world's languages prohibit their speakers from being good Christians, that St Stephen of Perm was a bad man, as were all the missionaries to speakers of languages mentioned by St Cyril in the "Vita", and that modern linguistics, which in no way conflicts with the truths of Christianity, is a falsehood just because some think it does and lack the academic training to see differently.

No one who only got to high school maths would write a treatise on mathematics, and a person without medical training practices medicine at the risk of prosecution, but apparently anyone can repeat the same eternal and long-debunked urban myths about how language works without fear, showing a good ignorance of how their very own faith has historically treated indigenous languages as well.

[David Gray]

Christopher do you still believe that the Orthodox Church is "led by misogynists so violent that women must cover their heads and cannot set foot on the altar"?

[Christopher Culver]

Obviously I would have not come to the Orthodox Church had I still believed that. There are some good materials out there that show that the situation is more complicated than that, such as Bishop Kallistos' paper in that booklet with Behr-Siegel on female ordination. A pity they aren't more easily available to outsiders.

Also, my only experience with Orthodoxy up to that point had been some truly dysfunctional churches in Ukraine where charges of misogyny may be fairly laid. Having afterward moved to Romania and visited a few Orthodox parishes when back in the U.S. I have seen that the Orthodox Church in general has an entirely reasonable treatment of the sexes.

[Christopher Culver]

Well, I guess so many professors of linguistics are right: it really is a waste of time to talk with laymen about the field. The provincial adage of wrestling a pig comes to mind. I know one advisor who would just laugh and say "I told you so", and probably mark me badly, if he knew I even bothered here.

The comments of Mr Hathaway et al. also show a pointless insecurity about the unassailable Faith, for there's nothing to fear about the intellectual pursuit. In the end it just proves the truths of the Church, I think Swinburne has made that nicely clear over the past few decades. However, people here seem to be afraid and quick to condemn just because this route, in spite of its end, leads through some territory is unfamiliar to them (but not to the Church), plus perpetuating urban myths and bashing academics (always assuming they have an anti-Christian agenda) is so fashionable among many anyway. I don't think I'll be posting or reading here anymore, and though I considered subscribing to Touchstone, I'll abandon that plan if the magazine condones even indirectly this backwardness, almost gnostic-like in its rejection of the glory of God's creation--for the permutations of human language, being mathematically describable, are just as part of the awesome natural course of events sparked by His hand as the sun rising and setting.

[David Gray]

>Obviously I would have not come to the Orthodox Church had I still believed that.

Given that you believed that just over a year ago and addressed that with the same sort of tone you adopt above might make you ponder the matter of how you approach discussion of such issues.

[David P.]

"Linguists have stated for decades now that all human languages are essentially equal, as all are equally expressive."

This is stupid on its face. Were it true, one corollary were, "All variations on a given language are essentially equal." Consequently, this conversation (about the relative merits of different forms of English) were obviated.

The claim is disproven by retorsion.

[Juli]

However, it is the ideology that claims that man can only mean a singular male and not the race which raises intelectual obstacles to understanding an actual man, Jesus, representing the whole race.

How is it that we also manage to believe that an actual woman represents all humanity - even though English doesn't equate "woman" and "humanity"?

[David Gray]

>How is it that we also manage to believe that an actual woman represents all humanity

We don't.

[dilys]

"explaining linguistics to laymen in a gentle and entertaining tone..."

Wow. What a concept.

[Juli]

>How is it that we also manage to believe that an actual woman represents all humanity

We don't.

What do you mean "we," Kemosabe? As an Orthodox Christian, I have been taught that the Theotokos is an icon of humanity, that her self-offering is an offering on our behalf, and that she is a model for all of us, even women.

[smh]

In the end, Mr. Culver and his authorities seem to be naturalists who believe in a sort of infinite freedom for languages to mutate and permutate as they will, to go wherever they are carried by the natural development. This is no less an ideological (and hence ultimately theological) proposition than the beliefs upon which our writings on the subject here at Touchstone have been based.

This appears to me contrary to the Christian Faith at the profoundest level. Christianity believes in the prescription of language, and everything else, in obedience to divine revelation, in bringing all human activities, including the development and use of language, whether developing truly naturally or by artifice (as in the case of feminism's own iron prescriptons) into judgment.

This sort of thinking is completely opaque, utterly nonsensical, to secular science of any kind, and makes the Christian who has adopted the prevailing view of the academy in his own field of endeavor (as it stands at any given time) a severely divided man, perhaps even leading him in his frustration to identify those who oppose those views as ignorant, backwards, reactionary, and even as filthy swine--along with the patronizing laugh and reference to lay ignorance.

On one hand, as a professing Christian in (it appears) the Orthodox Church, one hopes he will own that there are certain words that are proper and irreplaceable to certain matters that have to do with religion--that must be translated correctly so that they bear as close as possible to the meanings expressed in the original languages. One can't, for example, say, that Christ was made "like man," since that's the Arian heresy. But that is where it stops. There is no concept that prescriptions may go beyond this to express truths about nature as well, that there might be anthropological heresies too, and certainly no recognition to the insane proposition that a particular language at some point in its development could be chosen to serve as a witness to any divine prescription on the natural development of others. Or is modern linguistics a blessed exception to the general scientific rule of operating remoto Deo?

Wherever the Word of God is heard, human language, along with everything else human, is confirmed in the light it already has and changes where necessary to conform to its doctrine, thus growing toward the universality of the language of heaven. (There may be no need to translate "anthropois" as the Hungarian equivalent of "men" where the Hungarian translation as a whole is not governed by feminist ideology. The objection is not to using the equivalent of "people" where both men and women are in view, but in a doctrine that uses the doctrine of human equality to erase the doctrine of male headship, and translates consistently toward that end. When one cooperates in THAT project, as one would when accepting the TNIV, one betrays the Christian faith.) The "language of heaven" is something else in which Christians believe as part of the telos of their communion with Christ. It is hard to see where this end is served by the free development of languages, which appear to fissiparate, and in which Christians see the curse of Babel.

Somewhere along the line one must decide where one's allegiance lies. Tell your academic gods, Mr. Culver, that you as a Christian believe, as I suppose you do, that at least in some instances Almighty God has told us how we should speak and thus limited the free and natural development of language. I'm sure they will understand perfectly well, and you, with your obvious intelligence, may expect a fine reputation and a bright future in academic circles.

[David Gray]

>What do you mean "we," Kemosabe?

Mere Christians.

>As an Orthodox Christian, I have been taught that the Theotokos is an icon of humanity, that her self-offering is an offering on our behalf, and that she is a model for all of us, even women.

Even that, which is not commonly held throughout Christianity, is not exactly the same as saying that "an actual woman represents all humanity."

[Brad]

I'm becoming increasingly confused as to what the purpose of this site is. The contributors seem to be quick to accuse others of breaking with the historic faith -- of not being 'mere Christians'-- over all sorts of things not mentioned by Lewis in MERE CHRISTIANITY. Apparently, for instance, one must believe in the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis and the superiority of Greek and Hebrew over Hungarian, oppose contraception, oppose evolution, and so forth. At the same time, it is apparently quite all right to embrace beliefs about baptism, alcohol, etc. that are quite contrary to Lewis's description of 'mere Christianity' (see the previous post, 'Why I'm a Happy Evangelical').

[Juli]

Even that, which is not commonly held throughout Christianity, is not exactly the same as saying that "an actual woman represents all humanity."

Doesn't an icon of something represent that thing? I agree that not all "mere Christians" assent to all Orthodox Christian beliefs regarding the role of Mary, but for those of us who do, she is certainly seen as both representative and exemplar.

[GL]

Brad,

As to contraception, the author of Mere Christianity had grave doubts about its appropriateness. See, e.g., The Abolition of Man in which he wrote:

And as regards contraceptives, there is a paradoxical, negative sense in which all possible future generations are the patients or subjects of a power wielded by those already alive. By contraception simply, they are denied existence; by contraception used as a means of selective breeding, they are, without their concurring voice, made to be what one generation, for its own reasons, may choose to prefer. From this point of view, what we call Man's power over Nature turns out to be a power exercised by some men over other men with Nature as its instrument.

In a letter which he wrote in the late 1940s, if memory serves me (I do not have it readily at hand), he refused to state categorically that contraception was sinful when he, then still a bachelor, was not immediately concerned with the matter. He did state, however, that he would hate to defend contraception in light of the nearly universal prohibition among all Christians until his own Church, the Anglican Communion, voted to permit it at its 1930s Lambeth Conference.

I would not make an historical understanding of contraception a test for whether one is a "Mere Christian." I would, however, refrain from defending what Lewis explicitly would not defend in light of the nearly universal teaching of the Church for its first 19 centuries and at the same time claim the mantle of "Mere Christianity."

[Gabriel Sanchez]

I'll be honest--I have only a cursory understanding of linguistics and from there, only a cursory understanding of the linguistic disputes that have arisen concerning translations of Holy Scripture itself. The fact I have a wife currently engaged in that field of study allows me to keep abreast on a few points, but really, I stand in complete deference to authorities far beyond my league.

However, that being said, I do know something about the art of argument or even polemic; one could say I am engrossed in it every single day. That being said, it is impossible for me to believe that Mr. Culver has not succeeded in making his point over and against a certain Touchstone editor and his fellow apologists. If Mr. Culver is factually incorrect on some point or another, the demonstration is lacking. Even if I accepted "all things as equal" and held at the very least that a response to Mr. Culver served the minimal purpose of neutralizing his position even if the argument itself might lack merit in fact, a majority of what Mr. Culver has stated here and in the other thread has been left untouched.

What astounds and upsets me greatly is how quickly certain editors of Touchstone turn to invective and not-so-subtle insults of Mr. Culver's intelligence just to avoid conceding that maybe, just maybe, they missed something in their blanket analysis and condemnation. It's almost impossible to sympathize or even agree with individuals so bent out of shape over the possibility their initial statements were not as crisp and well-thought-out as their ego has intoxicated them to believe that they turn to the lowest forms of "intellectual" bullying.

If Mr. Culver is gravely mistaken on many of his points, I would never know it from reading either this thread or the previous one. I suspect that what I and others are supposed to take from Mr. Hutchens' statement is that Touchstone--by the decree of God Almighty--is now in place as the final arbiter of truth on all matters without regard for the annoying details of facts, source citing, or the construction of a coherent argument as opposed to banal polemics. For every carefully crafted point made against Mr. Culver (and there have been sadly few of those) has come a torrent of venom the likes of which I last saw when "Stone Cold" Steve Austin and The Rock chewed each other out before their Wrestlemania XIX sub-main event.

The fact that Touchstone has now taken to imitating pro-wrestling promos probably should have been anticipated by anyone who has watched Mr. Hutchens & Co. skip merrily down the road to complete self-parody. Amazing.

[Tony Esolen]

Gosh, I wish I knew Hungarian right now.

1. Luthien: my point was that your female classmates are now using "guy" to mean "young person," irrespective of sex. "Guys" now serves as "guys and gals" or even "gals", without embarrassment. In other words, at the same time that they say they can't abide "peace on earth, good will to men," they walk into a room and greet the "guys," of both sexes.

2. There are languages that have a third term for "human being, generally," but, as I've said before, it is misleading in Greek and Latin (and German, and Swedish) to say that the third term is not conceived as masculine. It's a pseudo-neutral term: as "anthropos" is built, probably, from "aner" + "ops". As "homo" is the same as male "guma," and male "vir" is the same as pseudo-neutral "wer". And eventually the masculine term can be adopted as the third term, or vice versa: Plato uses "pys aner" to mean "everyone," indefinitely.

3. The only appropriate translation of "homo" in English now is "man," in most contexts. Same thing with "anthropos". I'm speaking as a translator, not as a theologian. When you can be accurate, why not be accurate?

4. A "man-eating" tiger eats men, women, and children, irrespective of sex and irrespective of age. A "woman-eating" tiger eats women; the term is marked for both sex and age. Even the international pictograms, meant for safety's sake to be immediately understood by everyone, even children, use the male figure for "person in general," under certain circumstances. That bespeaks a deep truth about the sexes and their relationship, as revealed also in the story of man's creation in Genesis.

5. The "change" has not taken place except, artificially, among a certain class of writers. Even they will forget once in a while and lapse back into natural use.

I'm not a professional theologian, but I think there's a danger of Docetism here, if we say that the incarnation of Christ was important only insofar as he assumed flesh -- that the particularities are of no consequence, for our salvation. (The Docetists, if I remember, denied the full humanity of Christ's body; here we would be denying the significance of that body, except insofar as it was a human body.) So, for instance, we might claim that the Messiah "could have" been born at some other time, or in some other place, or to some other race of people, or as a female. This line of thinking begins to call the Fatherhood of God into question, too, because God's nature "might have" been revealed another way, by someone else.

I'm not claiming anything about the Hungarian soul -- but why should we not rest content with the fact that English usage is happily set up to reflect the Church's teachings on salvation?

When Christendom comes to be threatened by alternate understandings of the effectiveness of the sacraments, then I'll join that fray. But right now Christendom is threatened by secularists and pansexualists (and those latter gain an assist from feminists). Hence we talk about birth control, divorce, abortion, homosexuality, and so on. That's where the battle happens to be. But if you read Touchstone, you will find that we write about many things that have nothing to do with the issues we've been batting around in the last few blogs. Indeed, Steve's initial blog was intended to castigate evangelicals who stray far from the ancient creeds. My blog of a week ago was a tribute to a fallen soldier and to the soldierly virtue of honor.

On Lewis and birth control: in That Hideous Strength, Merlin is about to slay Jane Studdock as "the falsest woman alive" for having practiced contraception -- and thus thwarting the birth of a child that had been preparing for centuries. I know you can't do an end-run around Providence -- but that is because Providence takes into account our sins, too. But you can by your sin thwart a good that might have been -- even a good that should otherwise have played a critical part in the history of salvation. That condemnation by Lewis is not merely theoretical or tentative. Indeed, no Catholic I know sets the stakes so high.

[Christopher Hathaway]

Does the Mother of God represent all of us in the sam way that Christ does? No.

She does represent the Church in her actions, becoming a model of Christian humility and obedience, and as being the first of the Church. But this role is only possible because she is in Christ and He has made possible the existence of the Church, and therefore her representation of it. It is Christ's summation of all humanity in himself that gives birth to Mary's iconic power. Jesus himself assumes all humanity and carries it to the cross. Even those outside the Church are represented by him, even if they refuse his gift.

So in answer: Mary can represent us because Christ does it first. If the male can't represent the female it would be impossible for the female to include the male. I think 1 Cor. 11:8-12 touches on this.

[David Gray]

>She does represent the Church in her actions, becoming a model of Christian humility and obedience, and as being the first of the Church.

Christ is the representative head, Mary a model of Christian virtues. I think all orhtodox Christians should be able to agree on that.

I see a distinction between being a representative and being a model.

[luthien]

Dr. Esolen, point about the use of "guys" taken. My mother and I have perceived the shift in exactly the opposite manner; when she was in school in the 70s and 80s, she used "guys" to mean any young ppl, and still does. My friends and I use it mostly for the male of the species, as in "Dr. P. likes the guys better although she's a rabid feminist". Maybe it's more a regional thing? On a slight tangent, Mr. Sanchez is right about the tone certain Touchstone editors use in arguments. It's been evident before, but seems to be getting worse. Charity is as much a virtue as is correct translation, you know.

[Dcn. Michael D. Harmon]

I wanted to make a comment about the ''tone of some editors' comments'' observation. Yes, some comments are sharp. I find they usually occur when a correspondent runs up against something that the person in question thinks is crucial to the faith, not option equipment, as it were. Touchstone is, above all, a magazine of Christian orthodoxy. In that, it appeals to orthodox believers in many traditions. I often find the breadth of its contributors surprising. But I would venture to say that they are all at the centers of their traditions, not on its fringes. (C.S. Lewis had something to say about even that.) So when a person ventures to support an innovation such as, say, women's ordination, they do tend to get unloaded on in no uncertain terms. Aphorisms about heat and kitchens come to mind.

Funny thing is, even though I am in significant disagreement with many of the individual theological stands taken by many of the editors and contributors, they are faithful Christians to a man (including the women). I can stand to hear infant baptism condemned. It did not stop me from having my children baptized as infants. But when the central truths of the faith are called into question, I want the editors to defend them as forcefully and effectively as possible. Not everything is to be called into question, and not all questions are open. (cf. the current "Openness of God" heresy currently popular in some evangelical circles.)

[Juli]

Yes, Mary is an icon of the Church, but I've also heard her called an icon of humanity (and an icon of Creation), and Fr Georges Florovsky is one who has called her a representative of the human race:

Quoting Florovsky:

[Mary] was at once a representative of the human race, and set apart....

The initiative was of course divine. Yet, as the means of salvation chosen by God was to be an assumption of true human nature by a divine Person, man had to have his active share in the mystery. Mary was voicing this obedient response of man to the redeeming decree of the love divine, and so she was representative of the whole race. She exemplified in her person, as it were, the whole of humanity. This obedient and joyful acceptance of the redeeming purpose of God, so beautifully expressed in the Magnificat, was an act of freedom....

The Blessed Virgin was representative of the race, i.e. of the fallen human race, of the
"old Adam." But she was also the second Eve....

http://www.fatheralexander.org/booklets/english/maria_florovsky_e.htm

I'm not assuming all Christians have to agree on that language, but it's certainly within Orthodox tradition. I *am* questioning the contention that a woman cannot represent humanity to God, in all its fullness. Mary's self-offering was made on our behalf.

[Christopher Hathaway]

Mary does not represent all of humanity, for the one she does not represent is Jesus, who is very much a member of the human race, the foundational member. Jesus, on the other hand represents all of the new humanity just as Adam represented all the old humanity.

This fact is why the expansive use of the masculine ought to be preferred. It is why it is natural. Hungarian may not possess it, but can anyone show a language in which the feminine is used for humanity?

[Daniel]

Surely I'm not the only one bored of Hutchens's prickly defensiveness? He had an even worse hissy fit a few weeks ago, which mercifully disappeared after a few days on this site.

[David P.]

I like prickly defensiveness. The man says what he believes and believes what he says, and is willing to argue for it. God bless him. I'm sick of sensitive types who try to transcend or otherwise deny every misunderstanding and malice.

[joe]

Fr. Georges might have replied to Christopher thusly:

Mary holds her unique position and has a "category of her own" not as a mere Virgin, but as the Virgin-Mother, parthenomitir, as the predestined Mother of the Lord.

Her function in the Incarnation is twofold. On the one hand, she secures the continuity of the human race. Her Son is, in virtue of his "second nativity," the Son of David, the Son of Abraham and of all the "forefathers" (this is emphasized by the genealogies of Jesus, in both versions).

In the phrase of St. Irenaeus, he "recapitulated in himself the long roll of humanity" (Adv. Haeres., 3, 18, 1: longam hominum expositionem in se ipso recapitulavit), "gathered up in himself all nations, dispersed as they were even from Adam" (3, 22, 3) and "took upon himself the old way of creation" (4, 23, 4). But, on the other hand, he "exhibited a new sort of generation" (5, 1, 3). He was the New Adam. This was the most drastic break in the continuity, the true reversal of the previous process. And this "reversal" begins precisely with the Incarnation, with the Nativity of the "Second Man."

St. Irenaeus speaks of a recirculation — from Mary to Eve (3, 22, 4). As the Mother of the New Man, Mary has her anticipated share in this very newness.

Of course, Jesus the Christ is the only Lord and Saviour. But Mary is his mother.

She is the morning star that announces the sunrise, the rise of the true Sol salutis: astir emfenon ton Ilion. She is "the dawn of the mystic day," (both phrases are from the Akathist hymn). And in a certain sense even the Nativity of our Lady itself belongs to the mystery of salvation. "Thy birth, O Mother of God and Virgin, hath declared joy to all the universe — for from thee arose the Sun of Righteousness, Christ our God" (Troparion of the Feast of the Nativity of our Lady).

Christian thought moves always in the dimension of personalities, not in the realm of general ideas. It apprehends the mystery of the Incarnation as a mystery of the Mother and the Child. This is the ultimate safeguard against any abstract docetism. It is a safeguard of the evangelical concreteness.

The traditional icon of the Blessed Virgin, in the Eastern tradition, is precisely an icon of the Incarnation: the Virgin is always with the Babe. And surely no icon, i.e. no image of the Incarnation, is ever possible without the Virgin Mother.

[luthien]

There's a difference between sharply defending the essentials of the faith and throwing a hissy fit, and both are known to happen here. While disagreeing sharply with people is often a good thing, refusing to even answer their points weakens one's own argument. Unfortunately, certain editors are known to totally ignore points in other people's arguments. Arguing for what you believe in is right, but for goodness' sake argue properly for what you believe!

Juli and especially Joe, thank you for your postings on the Theotokos!!!

[Gabriel Sanchez]

I've said it once and I'll say it again: Hutchens is a liability to the integrity of the magazine. If my ears aren't ringing from his aptly labeled "hissy fits," I find there is little room for me to breath as he attempts to suffocate reasoned discussion with elegantly stated, yet maddenigly empty, assertions of his own righteousness. I'm shocked else has been barreled over by the monster truck sized irony of the fact he constantly rants n' raves about "tradition" when he is a man willfully unmoored from any formal tradition himself. I can't even begin to fathom what he is referring to when he talks about "the Church." Perhaps he's started his own and I am unaware of it.

On the other hand, perhaps Hutchens serves an important function for the magazine; perhaps he "moves units" as they say because he is so delightfully unrestrained by tradition, logic, and manners. There's a market for that after all. When I referenced "Stone Cold" Steve Austin earlier, I did so with Hutchens in mind. There should be no surprise that Austin became the biggest star within pro-wrestling, outselling the "immortal" Hulk Hogan in merchandise and tickets. Austin got over on the fact he ran his mouth off incessantly and flipped the bird to everyone, friend or foe. Like Hutchens, Austin had no real tradition, even if outsiders could ocassionally find that his style and antics came from a long line of men such as Dick the Bruiser, Bad News Allen (Brown), and Stan Hansen. Still, the points of substantial convergence with the tradition were few and any appeal to the connect had to be made under the firm reservation that the end of the day, Austin was on his own; and so too is ol' S.M. Hutchens.

As long as there are "fans" out there to eat up what Steve-o (Austin or Hutchens) has to say, he'll serve a purpose. I suppose when cooler heads or those who may glance at the archives five, ten, fifteen years from now look back, they'll be able to evaluate whether either did more harm than good or if the sacrifice of integrity was worth the gain of a few angry trolls who will quickly forget about all of this silliness.

[Christopher Hathaway]

yeah Gabe, I think 15 years from now Hutchen's arguments will stand well. The whinings of those complaining about his being mean or bullying or of being suffocated by his arguments (a little over the top, that), well, the less said the better.

[Tom Austin]

Where I grew up in Northern Georgia, Mr. Hutchens' post would be summarized thus,"Don't try and teach your grandmother how to suck eggs."

[SUM]

"What astounds and upsets me greatly is how quickly certain editors of Touchstone turn to invective and not-so-subtle insults of [a disagreeing writer's] intelligence..."

"For every carefully crafted point made against [the writer] (and there have been sadly few of those) has come a torrent of venom the likes of which I last saw when "Stone Cold" Steve Austin and The Rock chewed each other out before their Wrestlemania XIX sub-main event."

Having read many other comments by the writer of the above, I can't help thinking of eyes and planks.

[GL]

For those who assert that all languages are equally able to convey the meaning of a given word or phrase in another language, I offer a top-of-the-fold article from page A1 of the December 7, 2005 issue of the Wall Street Journal tilted Untranslatable Word in U.S. Aide's Speech Leaves Beijing Baffled: Zoellick Chanlleges China to Become 'Stakeholder'; What Does Than Mean?. Seems that real life experience refutes academic speculation, but as a current academic who spent a considerable number of years in the private sector before joining the academy, this comes as no surprise to me.

[Steve Nicoloso]

Not that Touchstone is a democracy, very far from it indeed, but I'll vote to keep Hutchens. I think 15 years from now it may well be shown that he influenced not a few people to either:

1) reject with disgust or prejudice his warnings, become truer to their modernist, rationalist selves, and drive the "evangelical movement" further in the direction he warns against (which will eventually, say in maybe a generation, be indistinguishible from mainline liberal protestantism);

2) accept his translations of the writing on the wall, and thus reform themselves and help either to turn their respective "evangelical" communities back to historical purposes and particularist distinctives or (where still possible) help keep them that way; or

3) accept his translations of the writing on the wall, and thus reject evangelicalism entirely for a more stable, well-rooted, perhaps better innoculated Christian expression.

In every case some sort of Rising from the Fat Comfy Arse is required, and therefore each proves a net gain (in the long run) for Christ's kingdom. Hutchens' jeremiads are at minimum a winnowing fan, and therefore (IMO) indispensable.

So I admit to a certain morbid fascination with Steve Hutchens' writing. It was my very agreement with him that, at least in part, prompted my recent (category 3) exit from "evangelicalism" (I know... whatever that is, but whatever it is, I was in it). Yet he remains, apparently more steadfast if not more curmudgeonly than ever, a part of it. Go figure. In the end, though, nothing could be more noble than to reject the schismatic impulse to go off and do one's own thing, and instead stay flatly in the middle of the thing one has chosen to love, and continue to love and desire the perfection of that thing irrespective of how ugly, banal, self-destructive, or deformed it may be.

[David P.]

If Mr. Hutchens were the recklessly intolerant fellow described above, then why does he tolerate these blogs?

[David Gray]

>If Mr. Hutchens were the recklessly intolerant fellow described above, then why does he tolerate these blogs?

Apparently that is how he demonstrates that he is reckless...

[Scott Walker]

I'm for Hutchens. Strong opinions strongly expressed are a good thing, and vastly preferable, IMHO, to some of the carping of his rhetorical foes. Those who don't like his stuff can choose not to read it. Those who don't like his stuff, yet read it anyway and choose to do battle should have at it. What they should not do is snivel. Watch more pro wrestling instead, and be edified thereby.

[luthien]

GL, certainly Chinese can't convey certain English terms particularly well (I read the WSJ article), but then English can't convey terms from other languages all that well either. Why, for instance, do we say "déja vu" and "je ne sais quoi" instead of using "already seen" and "I know not what" instead, which are the literal translations? There are such phrases in any language which translation will never properly manage. (The French have officially sanctioned the use of happy ending because there is no French equivalent, check the University Laval Music faculty website for this. http://www.mus.ulaval.ca/roberge/gdrm/04-angli.htm) A better solution to the inevitable lexical failures of every language than trying to claim that some languages are better than others would be to seek to learn, and maybe borrow, from other languages. All languages equally share the creative capacity of human language, or more accurately all speakers of every human language share that capacity. No one language is superior to another, because all have their strengths and weaknesses and speakers of any language have the same innate human capacity for language.

Scott, David, David, Steve, et al., I think the problem people have with some of Mr. Hutchens' posts is his tendency to not actually engage all of one's points. He has been known to simply dismiss people as relativists, feminists, or modernists for disagreeing with him. That does not constitute an argument (how can you rebut it?). On the other hand, his other posts are very brilliant and often funny (Cherchezing the Homme in particular, although why the 2nd person plural/formal in the title?) and he is quite right to be prickly when need be. I wish I could manage to get that prickly...it would be useful :)

[GL]

Luthien,

I agree with your comments. Chinese almost certainly has words and phrases which are not easily translated into English just as English has words and phrases not easily translated into Chinese. The issue is not whether one language is superior to another, but whether a receptor language, whatever it may be, can capture precisely the same meaning as the source language.

Because I cannot read Hebrew, Aramaic or Greek, I am certain that I do not have as good a grasp on the meanings of sacred Scripture as those who can. I am also certain that 21st century readers of Scripture in the original languages cannot have as good as grasp of their meaning as could those who were contemporaries of the inspired writers. The latter observation is one reason why those of us alived today should give greater weight to the Church Fathers than to contemporary commentators.

[Rev Michael Butler]

Popular English seems already to have found a substitute word for "man" that is used collectively, namely, "guy." Listen for it & you will see, er, hear. I don't think it serves adequately, but the collective use of it does lend support to Mankowski's thesis. Moreover, it is worth pointing out that "guy," like "man," is a term for a male that has been pressed into collective service. Political correctness may win the battle over "man," but it hasn't won the war.