“What is the first
business of one who practices philosophy? To get rid of self-conceit.For it is impossible for anyone to begin to
learn that which he thinks he already knows.”
Epictetus [c. 50-120]
in
Discourses # 17.
Saturday, December 1, 2018
LEAD US NOT INTO TEMPTATION
INTRODUCTION
The title of my homily is, “Lead Us Not Into Temptation.”
Last night when I read today’s gospel I thought of the
part of the Our Father where we prayabout temptations.
Jesus warns us about avoiding the sand traps in the game
of life.
Jesus doesn’t give the message of a golf game, but he
does say watch about from being trapped by drowsiness, carousing, drunkenness
and the anxieties of life.
So we pray in the Our Father, “Lead Us Not Into
Temptation.”
CHANGING THE TRANSLATION
In the last century or so - I’m not sure of the numbers -
there has been a move on to change that translation.
They could have made that move, but they didn’t.
The Our Father would be one of the first things that
would be translated into a language of folks becoming Christian - so we have in
the Our Father ancient words like “art”instead of are - as in “are inheaven.’
So too the ancient words of “Hallowed”,“Thy” and “Trespassers”.
But there is another movement to change the words “Lead
us not into temptation” - into something different.
TOMORROW
So in Rome, Italy, tomorrow there is a new translation of
that part of the Our Father. It will go like this in Italian, “Do not abandon
us into temptation.”
Tomorrow in French Canada the new translation for will be, "Do not let us enter into
temptation."
Pope Francis lead the way by saying that, “Lead us not
into temptation” implies that God does that.Pope Francis said that is flawed. God is not the source of temptation.
We are. Others are. Not God.
That translation goes back to St. Jerome who translated
the Our Father from the Greek into Latin with these words “ne nos inducas in tentationem”
Alain Gignac, director of the University of Montreal's
Institute of Religious Studies, explained that the phrase, found in the Gospels
of Matthew and Luke, can be translated literally by "let us not go in the
direction of temptation."
Looking at today’s first reading - the call would be to
walk where there is life giving water - where we can pick and eat good fruit -
instead of walking into temptations.
CONCLUSION
At the Bishops Meeting in Baltimore two weeks back they
were supposed to address a major redoing of the translation of the whole Mass.
I don’t know if they did that - with the great interruption of the problems
with sexual abuse cases and situations.
I’m glad - that this is still pending - because many
priests and liturgists - were dissatisfied with the present translation which
was made to be as close to the Latin as possible - especially at the urging of
John Paul II.
