Az Eszterházy Károly Tanárképző Főiskola Tudományos Közleményei. 1996. Vol. 1. Eger Journal of English Studies.(Acta Academiae Paedagogicae Agriensis : Nova series ; Tom. 24)

Lajos Szőke: Aspects of liturgical languages in Europe

According to Muslim theologians there cannot be any right for man before Allah. Man should renounce all his personal freedom and obey the Almighty (Thivollier, 1963:31). The language of the Koran, therefore, has been preserved in its original form. Christian liturgies - at least in the early times - did not restrict the use of vernaculars; therefore, in the early centuries we have Greek, Latin, Armenian, Syriac, Coptic, Gothic and later Slavic in liturgical use (Csanádi, 1992:70). In the following centuries, however, this tendency changed, Catholic church-authorities got more cautious, afraid of the herecies and distortions of the dogma. The use of vernaculars was restricted to the explanation of the tenets and to religious teaching. The existence of a large number of biblical quotations in medieval chronicles all over Europe testify to the fact that if not the whole Bible, at least its most important parts were translated into local languages well before the Reformation (Nemesktirty, 1990:16). It was a common tradition - and it is even now a missionaric practice - to read out passages from the Bible before sermons in the language of the believers. It should be pointed out that behind the linguistic conservatism of the Latin and Greek Churches lay theological considerations as well, and not simply concern about the inadequacy of local languages to express the sacred thoughts of the canonical works. The differences concerning liturgical languages between the Latin and Greek Churches came to be felt more distinctly only at the time of Reformation. Luther's Bible-translation and his introducing vernacular into the church service called forth such a prompt reaction from the Catholic Church that in a short time there appeared as many Catholic translations as there were Protestant. Bible-translations published decades earlier than Luther's (in Italy, France, Bohemia, see: Vogel, 1962) also show that the need for understanding the Bible was a common European cultural demand. The Trient-Council (1542), however, did not change the Catholic Church's position to the liturgical language. The Orthodox Church both in Greece and Russia was to a certain degree - at least geographically - protected from the innovations of Reformation. In Byzantium the struggle for the purity of the liturgical (and literary) language can be connected with the influence 144