Lost in Translation (from Latin)?

Lost in Translation (from Latin)?
| Christopher S. Morrissey | Catholic World Report

Pope Benedict XVI sent out his first tweet in Latin today. Lessons in Latin now follow.

The Pope finally sent out his first tweet in Latin from his
Twitter account @Pontifex_ln on
Sunday, January 20, 2013: “Unitati christifidelium integre studentes quid iubet
Dominus? Orare semper, iustitiam factitare, amare probitatem, humiles Secum
ambulare.”

The Pope immediately followed it up with translations into
the languages of his other Twitter accounts. He translated the Latin via his
English language account @Pontifex this
way: “What does the Lord ask of us as we work for Christian unity? To pray
constantly, do justice, love goodness, and walk humbly with Him.”

But the news service Reuters performed a valuable service by
quoting the University of Cambridge scholar Tamer Nawar, who teased out a more
nuanced translation of the Latin: “What does the Lord command to those wholly
eager for the unity of those following Christ? To always pray, to continually
do justice, to love uprightness, to walk humbly with Him.”

True, Nawar’s translation sounds more clunky in English than
the Pope’s English tweet. But it certainly exhibits an appreciation of all the
subtlety packed into the Latin tweet. For me, it demonstrates why knowledge of
Latin is indispensable. Namely, that it can help one become attuned to
subtleties and nuances of thought that would otherwise be missed.

Perhaps my favorite part of the Pope’s inaugural Latin tweet
is his use of the verb “factitare” in relation to “justice”, since “factitare”
has the connotation of “to make or do frequently; to be wont to make or do; to
practice.”

Indeed, I’m very happy with the Pope’s first Latin tweet,
but I was in a bit of a sour mood because of the press coverage leading up to
it. That coverage had me wishing for the impossible, that the Pope’s
first Latin tweet would be a sarcastic: “ROMANES EUNT DOMUS”.

If you don’t get the joke, then Google the phrase and watch Monty Python’s famous
Latin lesson, in which a Roman soldier corrects the graffiti of an empire
rebel. 

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