CONCISE ENCYCLOPEDIA OF LANGUAGEAND RELIGION
This page intentionally left blank
CONCISE ENCYCLOPEDIA OF LANGUAGEAND...
853 downloads
2513 Views
62MB Size
Report
This content was uploaded by our users and we assume good faith they have the permission to share this book. If you own the copyright to this book and it is wrongfully on our website, we offer a simple DMCA procedure to remove your content from our site. Start by pressing the button below!
Report copyright / DMCA form
CONCISE ENCYCLOPEDIA OF LANGUAGEAND RELIGION
This page intentionally left blank
CONCISE ENCYCLOPEDIA OF LANGUAGEAND RELIGION
Editedby JOHN F. A. SAWYER Lancaster University, UK
J.M.Y.SIMPSpN
StateUniversity of Ceard, Brazil
Consulting Editor R. E. ASHER University of Edinburgh
2001 ELSEVIER AMSTERDAM - NEW YORK - OXFORD - SHANNON - SINGAPORE - TOKYO
Elsevier Science Ltd, The Boulevard, Langford Lane, Kidlington, Oxford OX5 1GB, UK
Copyright © 2001 Elsevier Science Ltd All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in any retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means: electronic, electrostatic, magnetic tape, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without permission in writing from the publishers. Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data Concise encyclopedia of language and religion / edited by John F.A. Sawyer, J.M.Y. Simpson ; consulting editor, R.E. Asher. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and indexes. ISBN 0-08-043167-4 (alk. paper) 1. Language and languages—Religious aspectsEncyclopedias. I. Sawyer, John F. A. II. Simpson, J. M. Y. III. Asher, R. E.
P41 .C65 2001 403-dc21 2001031550 British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. ISBN 0-08-043167-4 (HC)
@™ The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of the American National Standard for Information Sciences—Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI Z39.48-I984.
Typeset by MacMillan India, Bangalore, India. Printed and bound in Great Britain by Polestar Wheatons, UK.
Dedicated to the memory of Ninian Smart (1927-2001), world authority on the study of religion
kalydna mitra 'beneficent friend'
This page intentionally left blank
Contents Editor's Preface General Introduction
xxxi 1
Section I. Language in the Context of Particular Religions Introduction J. F. A. SAWYER
3
African Traditional Religions I. A. PHIRI
4
Ancient Near Eastern Religions W. G. E. WATSON
6
Australian Aboriginal Religions C. H. BERNDT & R. M. BERNDT
9
Baha'ism S. LAMBDEN & G. LAMBDEN
11
British Israelites W. L. INGRAM
12
Buddhism, Chinese D. LANCASHIRE
13
Buddhism, Indian S. COLLINS
15
Buddhism, Japanese I. READER
16
Buddhism in Southeast Asia G. CONDOMINAS
17
Buddhism, Tibetan P. M. WILLIAMS
18 vii
Contents Buddhism in the West J. CRESSWELL
19
Candomble
20
C. H. RffiEiRO DOS SANTOS Cargo Cults
21
K. O. L. BURRIDGE Caribbean Syncretistic Religions 1: Cuban Santeria and Haitian Voodoo C. H. RIBEIRO DOS SANTOS
22
Caribbean Syncretistic Religions 2: Jamaican Cumina and Trinidadian Shango C. H. RIBEIRO DOS SANTOS
23
Cao Dai C. T. NGUYEN
24
Celtic Religion H. MOISL
25
Christian Science D. TREACY-COLE
27
Christianity in Africa
27
A. HASTINGS Christianity in East Asia J. H. GRAYSON
30
Christianity in Europe J. F. A. SAWYER
33
Christianity in Iran and Central Asia
35
N. SlMS-WlLLIAMS
Christianity in the Near East J. N. BIRDSALL
37
Christianity in South Asia C. SHACKLE
39
Christianity in Southeast Asia E. U. KRATZ
41
viii
Contents Confucianism
42
L. PFISTER Ecstatic Religion
46
W. S. BAINBRIDGE Etruscan Religion
48
L. AlGNER-FORESTI
The Family (Children of God)
49
W. S. BAINBRIDGE Gnosticism
49
A. CRISLIP Greek Religion
50
R. C. T. PARKER Hare Krishna Movement
51
K. R. VALPEY Hinduism
52
D. H. KlLLINGLEY
Islam in Africa
55
L.SANNEH Islam in Central Asia
57
S. AKINER Islam in East Asia
59
J. H. GRAYSON Islam in the Near East
60
J. N. MATTOCK Islam in South Asia C. SHACKLE
62
Islam in Southeast Asia E. U. KRATZ
65
Jainism P. DUNDAS
66 ix
Contents Jehovah's Witnesses W. S. BAINBRIDGE
67
Judaism M. WEITZMAN
68
Kwanzaa
72
W. S. BAINBRIDGE Macumba
73
C. H. RIBEIRO DOS SANTOS Manichaeism S. N. C. LIEU
74
Melanesian Religions G. W. TROMPF
75
Native American Religions, North
77
A. HULTKRANTZ
Native American Religions, South P. P. ARNOLD
78
New Religions, Japan I. READER
80
New Religious Movements W. S. BAINBRIDGE
81
Quakerism M. P. GRAVES
83
Rastafarianism J. C. BEAL
85
Roman Religion J. G. F. POWELL
86
Scientology W. S. BAINBRIDGE
87
Seventh Day Adventist Church W. S. BAINBRIDGE
88
Contents Shamanism
89
C. E. HARDMAN Shinto I. READER
89
Sikhism C.SHACKLE
91
Spiritualism J. ALGEO
92
Taoism
93
D. LANCASHIRE Theosophy J. ALGEO
95
Zoroastrianism
95
A. V. WILLIAMS Section II. Sacred Texts and Translations Introduction
99
J. F. A. SAWYER Apocrypha, Buddhist L. LANCASTER
100
Apocrypha, Christian J. F. A. SAWYER
100
Bible J. C. L. GIBSON
101
Bible Translations, Ancient Versions T. MURAOKA
104
Bible Translations, Modern Period P. C. STEINE
106
Buddhist Canons: Translations L. R. LANCASTER
115
xi
Contents
Cairo Genizah S. C. REIF
118
Chinese: Translation of Theological Terms L. PFISTER
118
Dead Sea Scrolls T. H. LIM
122
EnglishBible G.HAMMOND
122
Granth C. SHACKLE
125
Hindu Sacred Texts J. L. BROCKINGTON
126
Mormon, Book of A. CUNNINGHAM
127
Nag Hammadi Texts A. CRISLIP
128
Pali Canon I. ONIANS
129
Panjabi (Gurmukhi) Sacred Texts C. SHACKLE
129
Peshitta A. G. SALVESEN
130
Pseudepigrapha J. F. A. SAWYER
131
Qur'an I. R. NETTON
131
Qur' an: Translations T. J. WINTER
133
Qur'an: Versions T. J. WINTER
134
xii
Contents Rosetta Stone J. D. RAY
134
Septuagint T. MURAOKA
136
Talmud G.KHAN
137
Targum G.KHAN
138
Translation: History L. G. KELLY
138
Vulgate
150
T. O'LOUGHLIN
Section III. Religious Languages and Scripts Introduction J. F. A. SAWYER
153
Akkadian J. G. MACQUEEN
154
Alphabet: Development J. F. HEALY
154
Ancient Egyptian and Coptic J. D. RAY
161
Arabic C. HOLES
162
Arabic and Spanish: Linguistic Contacts L. P. HARVEY
166
Arabic Script: Adaptation for Other Languages J. N. MATTOCK
168
Aramaic, Jewish
169
M. SOKOLOFF
xiii
Contents Armenian B. G. HEWITT
171
Avestan P. G. KREYENBROEK
172
Buddhist Hybrid Sanskrit
173
P. DUNDAS Byzantine Greek ARCHIMANDRITE EPHREM
173
Chinese B. ARENDRUP
174
Church Latin
179
B. I. KNOTT Church Slavonic C. M. MACROBERT
180
Devanagari C. SHACKLE
181
Egyptian Hieroglyphs J. D. RAY
183
Garshuni
186
J. F. COAKLEY
Ge'ez S. UHLIG
187
Georgian B. G. HEWITT
188
Gothic J. M. Y. SIMPSON
189
Gurmukhi C. SHACKLE
190
Hebrew, Biblical and Jewish J. F. ELWODE
191
xiv
Contents Korean
194
J. H. GRAYSON Ogam
196
J. M. Y. SIMPSON Old Church Slavonic
197
C. M. MACROBERT
Pahlavi
198
A. V. WILLIAMS Palaeography
199
K. A. LOWE Pali
206
K. R. NORMAN Panjabi
207
C. SHACKLE Pashto
208
P. G. KREYENBROEK Persian
209
J. ARDEHALI Phoenician/Punic
210
W. G. E. WATSON Runes
211
A. KING Samaritan
214
A. D. CROWN Sanskrit
215
J. L. BROCKINGTON Semitic Languages W. G. E. WATSON
218
Semitic Scripts
220
A. GAUR xv
Contents Syriac, Christian S. P. BROCK
226
Tamil
228
R. E. ASHER Tibetan
*
231
P. DENWOOD Ugaritic W. G. E. WATSON
233
Yiddish
234
D. KATZ Section IV. Special Language Uses Introduction J. F. A. SAWYER
237
Allegory J. F. A. SAWYER
238
American Spirituals W. BEST
238
Archaism
239
K. WALES Blasphemy
240
W. S. F. PICKERING Blessings B. G. SZUCHEWYCZ
241
Channeling
242
J. ALGEO Copying I. READER
243
Cursing P. J. COLLINS
244
xvi
Contents Dharam (root dhr, 'to hold')
244
I. ASTLEY
Euphemism
245
W. D. REDFERN Evangelism
246
W. S. BAINBRIDGE Feminism
248
D. SAWYER Glossolalia
249
C. G. WILLIAMS Hwyl
250
D. D. MORGAN Hymns J. F. A. SAWYER
251
Incantations
252
J. PEARSON Islamic Calligraphy
252
S. AULD Language and Power
254
N. FAIRCLOUGH Magic
260
C. MclNTOSH
Mantra D. SMITH
262
Masoretic Tradition
264
G. KHAN Meditation
264
G. HOUTMAN Metaphor V. SAGE
266 xvii
Contents Metrical Psalms and Paraphrases J. M. Y. SIMPSON
273
Mysticism R. W. PERRETT
274
Myth
275
J. W. ROGERSON
Oracle J. F. A. SAWYER
276
Performative Utterances P. COLLINS
277
Prayer J. F. A. SAWYER
278
Preaching T. G. ADDINGTON
278
Religious Symbols
280
M. DOUGLAS Silence M. SAVILLE-TROIKE
281
Sutra
283
I. ASTLEY
Section V. Beliefs About Language Introduction J. F. A. SAWYER
285
Alphabet: Religious Beliefs A. P. HAYMAN
286
Analogy D. B. HART
287
xviii
Contents Babel
287
J. F. A. SAWYER Buddhism and Language
288
I. ONIANS Christian Views on Language
291
J. MARTIN SOSKICE Fundamentalism
293
J. BARR Gematria
294
M. IDEL Hindu Views on Language
295
J. J. LIPNER Myths About Language
298
A. CUNNINGHAM Names: Religious Beliefs
302
J. F. A. SAWYER Naming
304
A. P. COHEN Postmodernism
308
G. HYMAN Ritual
310
F. STAAL Romanticism
313
P. FLETCHER Taboo, Religious
314
M. DOUGLAS Taboo Words M. L. APTE
315
Word of God J. F. A. SAWYER
319 xix
Contents Section VI. Religion and the Study of Language Introduction J. F. A. SAWYER
321
Arab and Persian Phonetics M. H. BAKALLA
322
Arabic Linguistic Tradition
326
M. Y. I. H. SULEIMAN Aristotle and the Stoics on Language F. W. HOUSEHOLDER
336
Chinese Linguistic Tradition W. S.-Y. WANG & R. E. ASHER
342
Computers and Religious Studies J. F. ELWOLDE
346
Hebrew Grammarians D. TENE
348
Japanese Linguistic Thought S. KAISER
355
Jesuit Missionaries to Sixteenth Century Japan J. MORAN
360
Linguistic Theory in the Later Middle Ages G. L. BURSILL-HALL
361
Missionaries A. F. WALLS
368
Philology and History D. R. KELLEY
371
Plato and His Predecessors F. W. HOUSEHOLDER
376
Sanskrit, Discovery by Europeans R. ROCHER
380
xx
Contents Sanskrit (Paninian) Linguistics P. KIPARSKY
384
Summer Institute of Linguistics J. BENDOR-SAMUEL
391
Tamil Linguistic Tradition
397
K. V. ZVELEBIL VII. Biographies jElfric(fl. 987-1010) C. ROBINSON
399
Agamben, Giorgio (1942-) P. FLETCHER
400
Albright, WilliamFoxwell(1891-1971)
400
K. C. CATHCART Andrew of St Victor W. MCKANE
401
Aquinas, Thomas (1224/5-74) D. HART
402
Arnauld, Antoine (1612-94)
403
P. SWIGGERS
Ascham, Roger (1515-68) A. P. R. HOWATT
404
Barr, James (1924- ) S. GROOM
405
Barthes, Roland (1915-80)
405
M. TOOLAN
Bataille, George (1897-1962) P. FLETCHER
406
Batchelor, John (1853-1944) J. C. MAKER
407
xxi
Contents
Bayle, Pierre (1647-1706) N. E. CRONK
408
Benjamin, Walter (1892-1940) P. FLETCHER
408
Bergstrasser, Gotthelf (1886-1933) A. SHIVTIEL
409
Bhartrhari (c. 500 CE) H. COWARD
410
Black, Matthew (1908-94) W. MCKANE
411
Bovelles, Charles de (1479-1566) C. DEMAIZIERE
412
Caldwell,Robert(1814-91) R. E. ASHER
412
Carey, William (1761-1834)
413
A. MUKHERJEE
Cerulli,Enrico(1898-1988) A. K. IRVINE
414
Champollion, Jean-Francois (1790-1832) J. D. RAY
415
Coverdale,Miles(1487-1569) G. LLOYD JONES
415
Crowther, Samuel Ajayi (1806/08-91) J. D. Y. PEEL
416
Cyril and Methodios ARCHIMANDRITE EPHREM
417
Daly, Mary (1930s-) D. SAWYER
418
Dante Alighieri( 1265-1321) M. DAVIE
419
xxii
Contents Davidson, Andrew Bruce (1831-1902)
420
W. JOHNSTONE
Delitzsch, Friedrich Conrad Gerhard (1850-1922) G. LLOYD JONES
421
Derrida, Jacques (1930-) G. COLLINS
421
Dobrovsky, Josef (1753-1829) V. M. Du FEU
422
Driver, Godfrey Rolles (1892-1975) J. F. A. SAWYER
423
Falc'hun,Fran9ois (1909-91) P.-Y. LAMBERT
424
Foucault, Michel (1926-84) J. C. MAKER
425
Frazer, James George (1854-1941)
426
J. W. ROGERSON
Gadamer, Hans-Georg (1900-) L. P. HEMMING
426
Gesenius, Wilhelm (1785-1842) G. LLOYD JONES
427
Gordon, Cyrus Herzl (1980-2001) K. J. CATHCART
428
Gundert, Hermann (1814-93) R. E. ASHER
429
Guthrie,Malcolm(1903-72) W. M. MANN
430
Hayyuj, Judan (ca. 940-1010)
431
E. GUTWIRTH
Heidegger, Martin (1899-1976) L. P. HEMMING
432 xxiii
Contents
Herder, Johann Gottfried (1744-1803) P. B. SALMON
433
Holder, William (1616-98) J. A. KEMP
433
Humbolt,Wilhelmvon(1767-1835) J. A. KEMP
434
Huss, Jan (1372-1415) G. LLOYD JONES
436
Ibn Ezra, Abraham (ca. 1089-1164)
437
E. GUTWIRTH
Ibn Janah (ca. 990-1050) E. GUTWIRTH
437
Ibn Mada' al-Qurtubi M. Y. I. H. SULEIMAN
438
Irigaray, Luce (1930s-) T. BEATTIE
439
Jerome (c. 346-420) G. LLOYD JONES
440
Kant, Immanuel (1724-1804) R. C. S. WALKER
441
Kilwardby, Robert (ca. 1215-79)
442
F. P. DlNNEEN
Kimhi,David(l 160-1235?) J. WEINBERG
443
Kittel,Gerhard(1888-1948) G. LLOYD JONES
444
Koelle,SigismundWilhelm(1823-1902)
444
M. SCHLADT
Krapf, Johann Ludwig (1810-81) E. D. ELDERKIN xxiv
445
Contents Kristeva, Julia (1941-) T. BEATTIE
446
Kuiper, Franciscus Bernardus Jacobus (1907- ) A. G. MENON
447
Kumarajiva P. WILLIAMS
448
Lacan, Jacques (1901-81) J. C. MAHER
448
Lancelot, Claude (1615/16-95)
449
P. SWIGGERS
Lepsius, Carl Richard (1810-84) J. A. KEMP
450
Levinas, Emmanuel (1906-95) P. FLETCHER
451
Levi-Strauss, Claude (1980-) A. T. CAMPBELL
452
Levita,Elijah(1469-1549) J. WEINBERG
453
Lowth, Robert (1710-87) I. MICHAEL
454
Luther, Martin (1483-1546) C. J. WELLS
455
Malinowski, Bromslaw Kaspar (1884-1942) A. T. CAMPBELL
456
Matilal, Bimal Krishna (1935-91) J. GANERI
457
Meinhof,CarlFriedrichMichael(1857-1944)
458
M. SCHLADT
Mesrob (c. 361-c. 439) ARCHIMANDRITE EPHREM
459 XXV
Contents
Miiller, Friedrich Max (1823-1900)
460
R. SOHNEN-TfflEME
Nida, Eugene Albert (1914-)
461
R. E. LONGACRE
Nobili, Roberto de (1579-1656) F. X. CLOONEY
462
N6ldeke,Theodor(1836-1930) A. SHTVTIEL
463
Oldendorp, Christian Georg Andreas (1721 -87) G. G. GILBERT
464
Panini F. STAAL
465
Petrus Hispanus (1210-76)
467
F. P. DlNEEN
Pike, Kenneth Lee (1912-2000) R. E. LONGACRE
467
Planudes,Maximus (1260-1310) R. H. ROBINS
468
Polotsky, Hans (Hayyim) Jacob (1905-91) A. SHTVTIEL
469
Postel,Guillaume(1510-81) R. E. ASHER
470
Priestley, Joseph (1733-1804) I. MICHAEL
471
Rajarajavarma, A. R. (1863-1918) V. R. PRABODHACHANDRAN NAYAR
472
Reinisch,SimonLeo(1832-1919) D. L. APPLEYARD
473
Renou,Louis(1896-1966) R. E. ASHER
474
xxvi
Contents
Reuchlin,Johann(1455-1522) G. LLOYD JONES
474
Ricci, Matteo (1552-1610) J. H. GRAYSON
475
Ross, John (1842-1915) J. H. GRAYSON
476
Saadya Gaon (882-942) J. WEINBERG
477
Saussure, Ferdinand(-Mongin) de (1857-1913)
478
E. F. K. KOERNER
Scaliger, Joseph Justus (1540-1609) R. H. BREMMER JR
480
Schlegel, August Wilhelm von (1767-1845) K. GROTSCH
481
Schlegel, (Carl Wilhelm) Friedrich von (1772-1829) E. F. K. KOERNER
481
Sen, Sukumar (1900-92) P. SARKAR
483
SIbawayhi (Eighth Century CE) M. G. CARTER
484
Silvestre de Sacy, Baron Antoine-Isaac (1758-1838) M. V. MCDONALD
485
Trithemius, Johannes (1462-1516) R. E. ASHER
486
Tyndale,William(1494-1536) D. DANIELL
487
Ullendorff, Edward (1920-) A. K. IRVINE
487
Weber, Max (1864-1920) G. OAKES
488 xxvii
Contents
Weinreich, Uriel (1926-67) T. HILL
489
Welmers, William E. (1916-88) R. G. SCHUH
490
Westermann, Diedrich Hermann (1875-1956)
491
M. SCHLADT
Whitney, William Dwight (1827-94)
492
E. F. K. KOERNER
Whorf, Benjamin Lee (1897-1941) J. H. STAM
493
Wilkins,John(1614-72)
494
J. SUBBIONDO
Wittgenstein, Ludwig (1889-1951) C. TRAVIS
495
Wulfila (Ulfilas) (311 ?-382?) J. M. Y. SIMPSON
499
Wycliffe, John (1330-1384) G. LLOYD JONES
500
Young, Thomas (1773-1829) J. D. RAY
500
Ziegenbalg, Bartholomaus (1682-1719) R. E. ASHER
501
Section VIII. Glossary Glossary M. DAREAU
503
Section IX. Transcriptional Conventions
519
XXVUl
Contents
Name Index
523
Subject Index
547
List of Contributors
571
XXIX
This page intentionally left blank
Editor's Preface The ten-volume Encyclopedia of Language and Linguistics (ELL) was but one of the many trail-blazing enterprises in the field of language-study conceived by Emeritus Professor Angus Mclntosh of Edinburgh University. The publication of it in 1994 was the culmination of a period of preparation that had begun with discussions in 1987 and continued at a three-day-long meeting of some 30 experts in linguistics and related areas of study on the island of Jersey in April 1988; in the course of this meeting, the planning of the mammoth work was undertaken in detail. From the outset, the possibility had been kept in mind that there could be a series of 'spin-off volumes deriving from it. These were intended to be collections of articles from£LL, each concerned with only one area within the vast field of language studies and appropriately updated to reflect the most recent research. This project was initiated with the appearance of A Concise History of the Language Sciences in 1995 and the present work is the latest in the series, produced under the sympathetic and authoritative guidance of Emeritus Professor R. E. Asher, Editor-in-Chief of ELL. As was to be expected, the selection of articles from ELL devoted to the area of language and religion revealed the possibility of an even better publication that would be achieved by commissioning additional articles. Thus it is that articles on, for example, African traditional religions, feminism, Islamic calligraphy, missionaries, romanticism, syncretistic religions of the Caribbean, and many other important topics have now been included, as well as a number of new biographies of eminent scholars. Over 110 articles have been specially written for the present work. The editors are extremely grateful to the authors of these articles, and to the authors of those articles that had already appeared in ELL for revising and updating them. Sadly, we have to record the deaths of several of the authors of ELL articles reprinted here, among them G. L. Bursill-Hall, F. W. Householder, R. H. Robins, and M. Weitzman. Other hands have undertaken the updating of their articles. A feature of the present work is the Glossary; this is a selection of relevant entries from the splendid Glossary of linguistic and other terms in ELL, written by Marace Dareau, augmented by a few items from the pens of the present editors. The present editors are indebted to the editorial and production staff of Elsevier Science, in particular to Dr Helen Collins, for immediate and good-natured attention to their many requests, expressed in e-mail communication between Brazil, Edinburgh, Lancaster, and Oxford. It is difficult to imagine a more helpful framework for working or a more enthusiastic team of collaborators. We would also like to say how much we have appreciated the willingness of many authors to go far beyond what would normally have been expected of them, and the scholarly advice freely given us by colleagues and friends, not all of them authors, especially in the Department of Religious Studies at Lancaster and the State University of Rio de Janeiro. A noteworthy feature of ELL and the volumes derived from it has been renewing of old friendships and the forging of new ones as a result of the cooperation involved. The present editors may perhaps be forgiven for expressing their pleasure that a long-standing personal friendship, begun in the distinctly unacademic context of active service in the British Army in the 1950s, should have been complemented by professional collaboration in the publication of ELL and of the present work. John F. A. Sawyer, Lancaster, UK J. M. Y. Simpson, Fortaleza-CE, Brazil May 2001
XXXI
This page intentionally left blank
Language and Religion General Introduction J. F. A. Sawyer
Language and religion share a very long and a very close history and it is perhaps surprising that this Concise Encyclopedia of Language and Religion is the first of its kind. There have been studies of the relationship between language and religion by linguists like David Crystal (Linguistics, Language and Religion, 1965, theologians like Ian Ramsey (Religious Language, 1957) and anthropologists like Rodney Needham (Belief, Language and Experience, 1972). Special cases have been analyzed in works like S. D. Gill, Sacred Words. A Study of Navajo Religion and Prayer (1981), Julius Lipner, The Face of Truth: A Study of Meaning and Metaphysics in the Vedantic Theology of Ramanuja (1986), and James Barr, The Semantics of Biblical Language (1961). Information on linguistic aspects of the religions of the world— what language are the sacred texts in? what language is used in public worship? what influence has religion had on the history of this or that language?—can usually be found in studies of a particular religion. But such material is not always readily accessible to the general reader and especially to students of religious studies, who, although they cannot be expected to be experts in more than one or two of the relevant languages, have to be aware of and sensitive to the crucial role of language and translation in the history and development of the religions and religious movements they are studying. All the many ways in which language and religion interact can be approached from various directions, each of which provides a convenient point of access to the material and highlights particular issues or aspects of the subject. Inevitably, the titles of articles cannot reflect the range of topics dealt with in them and the index will be found to be invaluable in locating specific items of information. Section I, entitled 'Language in the Context of Particular Religions,' describes a wide variety of religions and religious movements, from African Traditional Religions to Zoroastrianism, from Cao Dai and Celtic Religion to Rastafarianism and Roman Religion. Articles in this section contain some basic general information on each religion but focus particularly on the role of language in each. The focus in Section II
is on sacred texts and includes articles on major examples like the Bible, the Granth, the Qur'an, and the Talmud, but also on important religious translations like the English Bible, the Septuagint, the Vulgate, and translations of the Buddhist canons and the Qur'an. Translation is a major topic in its own right and is covered in half a dozen special articles. In this section there are also a few articles on important archaeological finds including the Cairo Geniza, the Dead Sea Scrolls, and the Rosetta Stone. Section III approaches the subject from the point of view of particular languages or language varieties, and their role in the history and development of religion. Some of these may properly be described as 'religious languages' and would include Avestan, Christian Syriac, Byzantine Greek, Church Latin, Church Slavonic, Ge'ez, Gurmukhi, Biblical Hebrew, Jewish Aramaic, Buddhist Hybrid Sanskrit, and Pali. Others like Arabic, Armenian, Chinese, Panjabi, Persian, and Tamil, although not in any sense exclusively religious languages, have been so closely associated with particular religions that they are included as well. A number of 'sacred scripts' like Devanagari, Egyptian hieroglyphs, Garshuni, Ogam, and Runes are discussed in this section too, as are palaeography and the development of the Alphabet. Section IV focuses on special uses of language in various types of religious context, from worship (mantra, sutra, dharani, glossolalia, hwyl, preaching, hymns, silence) and theological discourse (allegory, metaphor, myth) to religious experience (channeling, meditation) and everyday life (blessing, cursing, magic). There are articles on performative utterances, religious symbols, and the special use of scripts and writing techniques in, for example, copying sutras, Islamic calligraphy, and masoretic tradition. Language developments in the context of evangelism, feminism, gnosticism, and mysticism are discussed here too. Section V covers beliefs about language such as those enshrined in the biblical story of the Tower of Babel and the racist myth of an Aryan superlanguage. Theological speculation on what language gods and angels speak, and belief in the magical power of words and names, including gematria and taboo, and
1
Language and Religion there are important philosophical discussions of religious language in Buddhism, Christianity, and Hinduism. The next two sections focus on the influence of religion on the history of linguistics, a major element in our subject, due partly to the need for the accurate transmission of sacred texts and oral traditions from generation to generation, and partly to the impetus of missionary activity, especially Buddhist and Christian, in having them translated into the vernacular. Access to this vast subject is provided first by a series of general articles on 'Religion and the Study of Language' and then by a biographical section. Section VI includes articles on the contributions
made by Plato, Aristotle, medieval Arab, Jewish, and Christian scholars, and the Arab, Persian, Chinese, Indian, Japanese, and Tamil linguistic tradition. There are also special studies of the Europeans' discovery of Sanskrit, Christian missionaries, the Summer Institute of Linguistics, and the role of computers in the modern study of language and religion. Finally, the biographical section contains over 100 short articles on religious leaders, missionaries, and theologians who have played a significant role in the history of language and linguistics, as well as linguists, orientalists, and philosophers who have played a significant role in the history of the study of religion.
SECTION I
Language in the Context of Particular Religions Introduction J. F. A. Sawyer
This section contains articles on all the major world religions: Baha'ism, Buddhism, Christianity, Confucianism, Hinduism, Islam, Jainism, Judaism, Shinto, Sikhism, and Zoroastrianism, as well as a wide range of other religions or religious movements. Some of these, like the Hare Krishna Movement, Mormonism, Quakerism, Rastafarianism, Shamanism, and Theosophy, are quite well known, while others are less familiar such as Candomble, Cao Dai, Kwanzaa, and Macumba. From the ancient world there are entries on the Etruscan Religion, Greek and Roman Religion, the religions of the Ancient Near East, Gnosticism, and Manichaeism. There are articles on various groupings, geographical like the indigenous religions of North and South America, the Caribbean, Africa, Australia and Melanesia, phenomenological like New Religious Movements and Ecstatic Religions, and both as in the case of New Religions in Japan. The entries on Buddhism, Christianity, and Islam are divided into geographical subsections (e.g. Chinese Buddhism, Tibetan Buddhism, Buddhism in the West), written by different authors. These articles have two areas of interest: the role of language in the origins and development of each religion or religious movement, and the influence of religion on the history of language and linguistics. In some cases language and religion are inseparable, Sanskrit and Hinduism, for example, Hebrew and Judaism, Arabic and Islam. In the case of Islam the Qur'an is traditionally believed to have been composed in an inimitable variety of Arabic in heaven and attempts to translate it into other languages have been strongly resisted by the religious establishment. The origins of Judaism and Christianity illustrate two quite different approaches to translation which are symptomatic of major theological differences between the two religions. While Judaism has always gone to great lengths to preserve Hebrew, 'the sacred language,' in worship and scholarly discourse, Christianity from the beginning gave no privileged
position to Hebrew, although it was the original language of most of the books in their Bible, and instead have devoted vast amounts of energy and resources to translating it into every language. A similar contrast can be seen between Hinduism where Sanskrit has always played a central role, and Buddhism where Tibetan, Pali, Chinese, Japanese, and other translations have assumed the role of sacred texts. The effect of this on the development of each distinctive religious tradition cannot be overestimated. It is hardly imaginable that the niceties of early Christian doctrine could have been defined with such precision in a language other than Greek, or that mediaeval Muslim theology would have taken the form it did take in a language other than Arabic. The sheer global power of a privileged language like Greek can be seen in its profound influence on the languages of all subsequent forms of Christianity, including Syriac, Coptic, Armenian, Latin, German, Russian, and English. The influence of Arabic on the vast Muslim world can be seen in the number of Arabic loan words in many of the languages of Africa and Asia, as well as the widespread use of the Arabic script for writing Ottoman Turkish, Persian, Pashtu, Urdu, Malay, and a variety of other languages. Early Christian scholars invented the Armenian, Georgian, Russian, and Gothic writing systems, to which many more must be added as a result of the tireless efforts of the last 300 years of missionary activity. Many interesting linguistic phenomena are associated with particular religious movements: the Quakers' use of silence, for example, channeling in Spiritualism and some New Age movements, the unique combination of African languages with English, French, or Portuguese in the varieties used in the Caribbean and Brazilian syncretistic cults, and the status given to Jamaican creole by the Rastafarians and their method of giving positive meanings to words with negative associations in standard English
Language in the Context of Particular Religions (e.g. dread as a term of approbation). In some forms of ecstatic religion it has been suggested that the word god can function as a personal pronoun reflecting the experience of the speaker. Most of these and other linguistic matters are dealt with in more detail in subsequent sections under separate headings, e.g. Sacred Texts and Translations;
Special Language Uses; Religion and the Study of Language. But in many cases language is so closely related to religion that the articles in this first section, although intended to focus primarily on linguistic aspects of religion, go beyond that and are in effect useful introductions to each of the religions or religious movements described.
African Traditional Religions I. A. Phiri
African Traditional Religion is the oldest and one of the major religions in Africa. It is African because it has its origins in the south of the Sahara desert. Since it was the first religion on this continent, it is also referred to as the primal religion of Africa. Historical studies have shown that before British, French, German, Portuguese and Belgium colonization in the nineteenth century there was no continent called Africa. Instead there were several communities with different languages, political, social, economic and religious systems. Therefore, the terms Africa and African are a construction of the European countries that colonized Africa. This historical truth has raised problems of identity. For example, can the European settlers in Africa be called Africans? Can Christianity and Islam, the two other major religions also be called African religions? The world 'traditional' has been controversial among the scholars of this religion. It assumes that the religion is static, customary, and passed on from one generation to another without much thought and change. It may also imply something, which is old and out of touch with modern realities, and therefore needs to be discarded and replaced with something more modern and relevant to the present. The reality is that African Traditional Religion is a dynamic religion in that over the centuries it has been adapting to the political, economic, geographical and social changes that have taken place among the people who have been and are still practicing it. For example, Matthew Schoffeleers' recent research has examined how African Traditional Religion speaks to issues of the AIDS pandemic and democratization process in Malawi (1999: 406-41). Traditional spirit mediums played a crucial role in the liberation war in what is now known as Zimbabwe (Ranger 1988: 867). The term religion is also problematic in the title 'African Traditional Religion' for western scholars coined it. The practitioners of the faith do not call it 'African Religion.' It is simply referred to as 'our beliefs.' Thus the word religion is foreign to the indigenous African people. Before colonial rule in
Africa, there was a holistic view of life in that there was no separation between culture and religion. To the indigenous African, religion is practiced in all areas of one's life. It is a way of life. The fact that there are a variety of expressions of African Traditional Religion has led to discussions among the scholars as to whether one should talk about African Traditional Religion in plural or in singular. J.S. Mbiti, one of the outstanding scholars of this religion, argues for a plural description. He bases his arguments on the fact that the 1,000 ethnic groups of indigenous African people each have their own religious systems. Just as there are cultural differences between one African group of people and another, so there are differences in the expression of the religion. Even within one cultural group, the expression of the religion may vary slightly from clan to clan. One practices the beliefs of the people that one came from. Each ethnic group and family has its own founders who are revered. The family and community heroes are committed to memory and the information is passed on from one generation to the next generation orally. On the other hand, another prominent scholar of African Traditional Religion, B. Idowu argues for a singular description of African Religion. He argues that despite the diversity found among the indigenous African people, one could still find sufficient shared societal traits as well as same cultural and religious beliefs that are worth maintaining. His study showed that the concept of the Creator God is found in all the African communities. Furthermore, he recorded similarities in the names given to God in different communities. One category of the names and concepts of God in Africa, present God as Creator or maker from the beginning. Examples are Mu'umba, among the Swahili, Lubumba among the Tonga of Zambia, and Karunga among the Herero of Namibia. What is common in all the words that they use is the root 'to mold.' God is viewed as the one who 'molded' creation. He therefore concludes that what brings Africa together is a strong belief in
African Traditional Religions the existence of a living God. It is on this concept that he believes one should speak of African Traditional Religion in the singular. This is where one also notices more interaction between religion and language. African Traditional Religion is oral. The first scholars of the religion were Christian missionaries who came to Africa with the intention to evangelise. They also came with the attitude that their culture and religion were superior. They could not fathom the African worldview. They therefore concluded that the African people had no religion. With the passing of time more and more Western scholars began to accept the existence of the African Traditional Religion. Nevertheless, misinterpretations of the beliefs and practices of African people have persisted to the present, due to what appears to be continuing lack of accurate knowledge of what African world view and religion are all about. The aim of such publications is not to promote dialogue but to give a Western interpretation of African Traditional Religion for the Western audience. The scholarly works of Idowu and Mbiti, to mention a few African scholars, are attempts to give a systematic description and analysis of African Traditional Religion from an insider's perspective. The advantage of such writers was that they were able to find out what the religion is all about through a study of African proverbs, songs, art, prayers, riddles, names of people, places and objects. Others had first had experience of the religion, which previous Western scholars did not have. However, their writings came at a time when it was necessary to explain to the Western world as to what this religion is all about. In the process the early African writers fell in the trap of using Christian Western concepts and structure to describe African Traditional Religion. In so doing African Religion acquired, to a certain extent, a new understanding that was not there before. Describing African Traditional Religion through Western concepts and language is bound to affect our understanding of the religion. For example, Western understanding of religion requires that there must be doctrines, founders, Scriptures, rituals, experience, and moral code. African Traditional Religion does not have one set of dogma, nor one founder or Scripture. Therefore, if the yardstick is Western religions, then African religion is forced to describe itself in terms of how it differs from the 'norm' rather than appreciating it for what it is, without apologies. Current approaches have been qualitative studies of African communities, which require knowledge of the people's language, observations over extended period of time, participation in events and the right attitude and language to describe the religion. The thematic approach has afforded scholars an oppor-
tunity to explore areas of commonality among the diverse indigenous African peoples. African traditional beliefs about the source of life are found in myths and names. Each group of people has its own myths that help it explain where it came from and why things happen the way they do. The belief in the existence and religious powers of ancestors is also wide spread in Africa. In African worldview, death is not the end of life. After death, a person continues to live, and depending on his/her position in society, has an influence on the lives of the living relatives. Due to the interest that the ancestors have in the living relatives, John Mbiti has called them 'the living dead.' There is a controversy as to whether Africans worship their ancestors or not. Space does not allow us to go into that debate but the bibliography provided gives a balanced view. Another important concept is community. There is a religious basis for it in that most African communities maintain that from the beginning of creation, the people were created in community. Therefore, at every stage of growth, rituals are performed to incorporate a person into the community. In traditional African communities, every position of leadership is religious because the holder communicates with the ancestors and/or the Creator. In African Traditional religion(s), places, which are believed to be the dwelling places of ancestors, or places which are surrounded by mystery are said to be sacred. The totemic system, which is practised in some African communities, makes it possible to declare some animals and natural objects as sacred. At the heart of the belief in sacred places lies the African's regard of land as being sacred. Communication is through masks and symbols. Rock paintings, songs and the sounds of drums speak volumes about the people's beliefs. See also: Christianity in Africa; Missionaries; Crowther S. A.; Candomble; Caribbean Syncretistic Religions 1: Cuban Santeria and Haitian Voodoo; Caribbean Syncretistic Religions 2: Jamaican Cumina and Trinidadian Shango; Macumba. Bibliography Idowu E J 1973 African Traditional Religion: A Definition. SCM Press, London Mbiti J S 1975 An Introduction to African Traditional Religion. Heinemann, London Olupona J K 1991 African Traditional Religions in Contemporary Society. International Religious Foundation, New York Phiri I A 1996 African Religion: The Misunderstood Religion. In: Steyn M E, Motshabi K B (eds.) Cultural Synergy in South Africa: Weaving Strands of Africa and Europe. Knowledge Resources, Randburg, pp. 55-64 Platvoet J, Cox J, Olupona J K 1996 The Study of Religions in Africa: Past, Present and Prospects. Roots and Branches, Cambridge
Language in the Context of Particular Religions Ranger T O 1988 African Traditional Religion. In: Sutherland S, Beaver R P, Bergman J, Langley M S, Metz T W, Romarheim A, Walls A, Withycanbe R, Wootton R W F (eds.) The World Religions. Routledge, London
Schoffeleers M 1999 The AIDS Pandemic, the Prophet Billy Chisupe, and the Democratization Process in Malawi. Journal of Religion in Africa XXIX: 4
Ancient Near Eastern Religions W. G. E. Watson
Knowledge of ancient near eastern languages has been seriously affected by the religious viewpoints of modern scholars. Most noticeable is the special attention they have given to religious texts, largely because of their possible connection with the Bible, and the corresponding neglect of administrative and other documents. Studies of vocabulary, for example, have tended to be based on the evidence of hymns, prayers and other religious texts. It is of course a fact that a disproportionate amount of the surviving data from the ancient near east is of a religious nature, coming as it does mainly from cities with a strong temple establishment. Although the exact relationship between school and temple in the areas under discussion remains unknown, a significant part of the training of ancient scribes and scholars consisted of copying out and even composing religious documents. Certainly there were many secular compositions such as love songs and letters, but most of the literary texts were religious in character, and inevitably most of the literary languages of the ancient near east were influenced by religious factors. In general, the topic discussed here has not yet received the attention it merits. Although several indications are available in the works listed below, there is no book nor even a journal article specifically concerned with the influence of religion on the languages of the ancient near east. Moreover, due to the factor of chance involved in archaeological exploration and the random nature of epigraphic finds in the areas under consideration, our knowledge is very patchy. The rich material from Ebla and Emar is still being edited. Little is known of Human, although the discovery of Hurrian-Hittite bilingual texts is promising. However, while more data would certainly be welcome, it is already apparent that in differing degrees the religions of the ancient near east left their mark on the languages of that region. This is most dramatically evident from the thousands of personal names which survive in the documents available to modern scholars. For convenience, reference to each of the ancient near eastern religions discussed in this article will normally be by the name of a particular language (e.g.,
Assyrian, Babylonian, Hittite, Egyptian, Sumerian, etc.) because each religion was largely co-extensive with the language in which the documents were written, although occasionally geographical terms will be used instead (e.g., Anatolia, Mesopotamia, Syria, etc.). 1. Ordinary Vocabulary
Many personal names contain religious language even though it is more than probable that people using these names rarely if ever thought about what they meant. At birth, or when a baby was named, the parents often expressed their religious beliefs by their choice of name. 'Belshazzar,' for example, (from Babylonian Bel-sar-usur) means 'May (the god) Bel protect the king'; and Egyptian 'Ramses' or 'Rameses' (from Egyptian r'-ms-sw) means 'child of (the sun-god) Ra.' Such names express many different theological beliefs, concerning, for instance, the relationship between the bearer and the gods. Even if in the common daily use of language these meanings probably went unnoticed, personal names in the ancient near east were usually quite easy to decipher and generally reflected the language used by the name-giver(s). In Hittite the king is generally referred to as UTUSI, pronounced /samsi/ 'my Sungod,' equivalent to 'his majesty' or 'your majesty.' The name is an Akkadian loanword, spelled in cuneiform with the Sumerian sign for 'sun' (UTU). The same usage was also current in Ugaritic, with the spelling sps for /sapsu/ or /sipsu/. In Anatolia, the queen had the very ancient Haitian title tawanannas 'mother of (the god) Tawa' (Tawa corresponds to later Zeus). In Mesopotamia too, royal epithets and titles, often very elaborate, included references to divine election or favor (e.g., migir Enlil, 'Enlil's favorite'—of Hammurapi, Merodach-baladan, etc. and sa Assur Marduk uttusuma zikir sumisu usesu ana resete, 'whom Ashur and Marduk have chosen and whose renown they extol to the utmost'—of Sargon II). The Egyptian pharaohs were addressed by traditional sequences of names which included the nomen 'son of (the sun-god) Re.' Religious names were also given to certain places, parts of buildings and other constructions. In the city of Babylon there were, besides the famous Ishtar
Ancient Near Eastern Religions Gate, seven others, all named after deities. Many of its walls, canals, streets and processional ways also had religious names. The very name bab-ili 'Babylon' was understood to mean 'Gate of the God,' although it had another name, TIN.TIR (meaning unknown George 1992:238f.) which apparently was secular. The Egyptian king Akhenaten named his new capital 'Akhetaten' ('Horizon of the Sun-Disc'), after the Aten, the god he worshipped. Many month names are religious in origin: for example, Babylonian Du'uzu (a god) and Tasritu (a goddess) (from which Tammuz and Tishri in the Jewish calendar are derived); and Assyrian belet ekalli '(month of) the Lady of the Palace' and Sin '(month of the mood-god) Sin.' At Ebla in Syria the new calendar introduced by king Ibbi Sipish (ca. 2500 BCE) replaced agricultural month-names by names which referred to religious festivals: e.g., nidba kamis '(month of) the feast of (the god) Kemosh,' corresponding to August. Much the same was true of Emar. Most of the month names in Ugaritic are now known and some of them also apparently refer to festivals: e.g., ris yn '(the month of the feast of) First Wine' (September/October). Noteworthy is the Phoenician month name zbh sms, '(Month of) sacrifice for the Sun(-god).' Similar names were used in the texts from Alalakh, also in Syria. In all these cultures the days of the week were simply referred to by number, although in Egypt each hour of the day and night had a name corresponding to a particular deity. In Babylonia the nineteenth day of the month was termed ibbu (a Sumerian loanword) '(the day of divine) wrath' and the twentieth was sacred to the Sun-god, Shamash. 2. Names Some of the words for natural objects and phenomena, such as fire, rain, thunder, water, the subterranean waters, the sky, rivers, and mountains were probably religious in origin. Examples are Sumerian dois.BAR (also deiL.Gi)—(the d is an abbreviation of dingir, a determinative denoting a divinity)—both equivalent to Akkadian girru, 'fire' (used instead of common Semitic isatu); Akkadian and Babylonian manzdt, 'rainbow'—the name of a goddess, written dTiR.AN.NA (literally, 'Bow of Heaven'); Hadad, 'thunder' (literally, the god Hadad) in Syria. In a letter from Mari (eighteenth century Syria) comes the descriptive expression rigimsu udannin '(the god) has intensified his growl,' that is to say, 'the storm has worsened.' In an Assyrian incantation each of the four cardinal points is addressed with reference to different gods (e.g., 'O South, beloved by (the god) Ea'), and in an inscription of the Assyrian king Esarhaddon (and in a wisdom text) the north wind is called mamt bel ill tabu 'that beneficial breath of the lord of the gods.' The names (and hierarchy) of the eight 'magnates' (lit. 'great men') making up the
Assyrian cabinet exactly match the names of gods in the Assyrian Tree of Life, e.g. ummdnu 'Scholar' corresponds to Ea, god of wisdom; sartinnu 'chief judge' corresponds to Shamash, god of justice (Parpola 1988). As well as proper names, many items of everyday vocabulary contain elements, whose original religious meaning has long since been forgotten (cf. English ladybird, German Marienkdfer). Various Akkadian words for birds and animals, for example, contain the names of deities or demons: kallat samsi 'the bride of Shamash' is a dragonfly; issur kifili 'the bird of (the female demon) Kilili' is an owl; and a species of reptile is known as humbabitu after its similarity to Humbaba, a giant mythical monster. In Hittite the Sumerian loanword GIS d iNANNA 'the (goddess) Ishtar instrument' is the name given to a musical instrument of some kind, frequently used in rituals. 3. Letter Writing and Greetings It was quite common for letters to incorporate traditional expressions.. For example, in Ugaritic the formula was iluma tagguruka tasallimuka 'May the gods keep you safe and well!.' Other greetings were more elaborate and one salutation written in Akkadian (in an Akkadian letter from the archives of Ugarit) runs to several lines: 'May the gods of (the land of) Tipat and the gods of Ugarit and all the gods of our father's house keep you healthy, be favorable to you and give you many years (of life) in the presence of our father's house, forever!.' Sometimes the greeting was written in a language different from the rest of the letter. In some Hittite letters the opening lines (including the religious greeting formula) were written in a mixture of Sumerian and Assyrian. Within this tradition, however, there was some room for variation and expansion, which indicates that such greetings were not frozen expressions but part of everyday life. Some corroboration comes from the Epic of Gilgamesh which records the following farewell to a traveler: 'May Shamash open the obstructed path for you, keep the road in order for you to tread, the open country in order for your foot.' Religion has left its mark on numerous other expressions. In Mesopotamia Ham rasu 'to acquire a (personal) god' means 'to have good luck,' and the phrase qat Hi 'the hand of the god' denotes an epidemic. In Babylonian medical texts language about venereal disease frequently contains the phrase qat istar 'the hand of Ishtar (goddess of love),' while other afflictions are named after a variety of demons, believed to be responsible. The expression amaru samas'to see Shamash (god of justice)' can mean 'to be free, to be exposed.' More than likely there was wide variation in the extent to which the original theological content of such expressions was taken
Language in the Context of Particular Religions literally by individual speakers and writers. In Hittite the idiom dUM-is kisat 'he became a god' (used only of kings) means 'he died.' The Egyptian phrase m3'hrw 'true of voice,' originally used only of Osiris, god of the underworld, was customarily added to the name of a deceased person and came to mean 'deceased' (or 'justified'). At Nuzi in Anatolia an accused person was given the option 'to lift the gods' (nasu Hani), that is, to challenge witnesses against him to perjure themselves at their peril. Several lists of offences against morals or manners in Mesopotamian wisdom and other literature end with the comment nig.gig dingir.ra kam 'these constitute an abomination to such-and-such a god.' However, unless committed on an unfavorable day, no actual religious taboo was involved: the expression simply implied profound disapproval. Occasionally the religious content of an idiom is present, perhaps, though in muted form. An Assyrian letter, for example, includes the statement: 'The following day we shall arrive safe and sound, the king's gods protecting' (DINGIRME* sa LUGAL inassur). The last phrase corresponds quite closely to English 'God willing.' The converse expression Hum la iddin (or Hum ay iddin) 'May God not allow, God forbid!' is common in the Mari letters. 4. Special Languages In Mesopotamia, as Sumerian was replaced by Akkadian, Sumerian was considered the prestige language especially in the liturgy even though it was no longer spoken. In Babylonian hymns and epics a special literary dialect was used, characterized by, for example, the preposition el for eli 'upon' and the pronominal suffix -sun for -sunu 'their.' Bilingual texts and some trilingual texts, including lists, vocabularies, interlinear translations and the like, were produced all over the ancient near east not only to facilitate international communication, but also to make some of the 'special languages,' used in rituals and elsewhere, such as Sumerian, Akkadian, Old Babylonian, Hieroglyphic Hittite (or Luwian) and Phoenician, intelligible. By the Persian period (sixth century BCE) the cuneiform script had disappeared from ordinary, secular use but was maintained in the temples for religious, astronomical, and literary texts. Egyptian hieroglyphs were similarly reserved for sacred use and demotic for secular purposes, although a notable exception is the trilingual Rosetta Stone, in which both hieroglyphics and demotic are used along with a Greek translation. At Ugarit in Syria, Akkadian was used both for religious and literary texts, but also as the lingua franca for correspondence and diplomatic documents dealing with the outside world. Although few of the people living in Ugarit knew Human, it is worth noting that a number of Human documents, all of them religious in character, are actually written
in the Ugaritic alphabetic script, rather than the normal syllabic cuneiform script used elsewhere (e.g., in Anatolia). Some documents were written purely for religious purposes and were not intended for human eyes: for example, foundation documents buried under buildings in Mesopotamia, Egyptian mortuary texts and generally certain magical texts such as amulets. Although essentially legal documents, many of the following texts were also couched in special religious varieties of language: boundarystone inscriptions, inter-state treaties, marriage contracts, law codes. The law codes and treaties, for example, usually ended with a series of curses and blessings on those who either flouted or obeyed the stipulations contained in them. The Babylonians in particular devoted a great deal of time and energy to determining the future from omens. To this end they produced highly technical lists of unusual phenomena of all kinds, and detailed descriptions of animal organs. For example, the umbilical fissure of the liver was called bob ekallim 'the gate of the palace' as in the prophecy 'If the "gate of the palace" is absolutely straight the campaign will be peaceful.' Certain difficult and esoteric religious texts in Babylonian later engendered their own commentaries. The most obvious example of a special language is the use of Sumerian for religious purposes and for documents produced by and for the establishment in Southern Mesopotamia long after it had ceased to be a spoken language (about 1800 BCE). It was also studied in the scribal schools of Syria, as texts discovered at Ebla prove, and in the first millennium certain classes of Sumerian text were provided with an interlinear translation into Akkadian, a clear indication that it was no longer understood. The use of Sumerian for religious purposes also served to maintain the study of Sumerian grammar. It is perhaps not entirely by chance that most of the epigraphic material in Phoenician and Punic comprises grave inscriptions and other texts of a religious character. Even the famous Phoenician (or possibly Punic) inscription from Pyrgi (present day Santa Severa, Italy) written on gold lamina is religious in content. The two accompanying versions of the text into Etruscan were written in Phoenician characters. A most significant exception, however, is the bilingual inscription in Phoenician and Hieroglyphic Hittite (Luwian), which is not a religious text but a royal inscription from Karatepe in Cilicia. Due to the conservative nature of religion there is a tendency for language to remain unchanged over many centuries and therefore to become archaic in vocabulary and style. Eventually, a gap opens up between the living language used in letters, popular sayings, folktales and the like, and in the fixed patterns of religious texts. As a result, the
Australian Aboriginal Religions language of religious texts becomes a dead language, surviving only in certain frozen expressions and in the cult. See also: Names: Religious Beliefs; Myths About Language; Akkadian; Ancient Egyptian and Coptic; Egyptian Hieroglyphs; Phoenician/Punic; Rosetta Stone; Semitic Languages. Bibliography Arnaud D 1993 Jours et mois d'Ougarit. Studi Micenei ed Egeo-Anatolici 32: 123-129 Cohen M E 1993 The Cultic Calendars of the Ancient Near East. CDL Press, Bethesda, MD Cunchillos-Ilarri J L 1989 Estudios de epistolografia ugaritica. Fuentes de la ciencia biblica 3; Institution San Jeronimo, Valencia, pp. 193-234 Gardiner A 1927 (etc) Egyptian Grammar. Oxford University Press, London George A R 1992 Babylonian Topographical Texts. Orientalia Lovaniensia Analecta 40, Peelers, Leuven Gibson J C L 1982 Textbook of Syrian Semitic Inscriptions, vol. III. Phoenician Inscriptions. Clarendon Press, Oxford
Groneberg B 1987 Syntax, Morphologic und Stil der jungbabylonischen 'hymnischerf Literatur. Steiner Verlag, Stuttgart Gurney O R 1977 Some Aspects of Hittite Religion. Oxford University Press, Oxford Hallo W W 1985 Biblical abominations and Sumerian taboos. Jewish Quarterly Review 76: 21-40 Jacobsen T 1976 The Treasures of Darkness: A History of Mesopotamian Religion. Yale University Press, New Haven, CT Lambert W G 1960 Babylonian Wisdom Literature. Clarendon Press, Oxford McEwan G J P 1981 Priest and Temple in Hellenistic Babylonia. Franz Steiner, Wiesbaden Olivier J P J 1971, 1972 Notes on the Ugaritic month names. Journal of Northwest Semitic Languages 1: 39-45; 2: 53-59 Parpola S 1995 The Assyrian Cabinet. In: Dietrich M, Loretz O (eds.) Vom Alien Orient Zum Alien Testament. Verlag Butzon and Bercker, Kevelaer/Neukirchener Verlag, Neukirchen-Vluyn Seux M-J 1967 Epithetes royales akkadiennes et sumeriennes. Letouzey et Ane, Paris Starr I 1983 The Rituals of the Diviner. Undena Publications, Malibu, CA
Australian Aboriginal Religions C. H. Berndt and R. M. Berndt
Traditionally Australian Aborigines lived in partly separate but overlapping regional constellations cross-cut with similarities and differences in, for example, religion and language. In the creative era mythic beings, some in human form, some male, some female, shaped the landscape. Their tracks and associated sites cover the whole continent. Knowledge of these is crucial in the process of 'reading the landscapes.' They located human populations, languages and dialects, and natural resources. They left general and specific instructions about a variety of sociocultural rules, including religious rituals, to ensure that people could maintain their divinely ordained life-style. The sacred time of spiritual continuity, sometimes called the Dreaming or Dreamtime, contrasts with everyday time: the cyclical rhythms of sun and moon, named seasons, and decay and renewal of physical organisms. As for the fate of the human spirit or soul, even where there is a belief in a Land of the Dead or in reincarnation or in mobile spirit manifestations, the
emphasis is on a dead person's continuing association with his or her home country and language area. Almost everywhere there is a ban on uttering names of the recently dead, and in some regions alternatives must replace everyday words that resemble them. Instead of written scripts, Aborigines traditionally relied on oral transmission, supplemented by material representations, rock and ground and body markings, dramatic actions, musical rhythms and songs, verbal and vocal styles, hand-sign vocabularies, speech taboos, and other constraints; and the unspoken understandings acquired in the course of socialization. Body scarring and other ritual operations can be conventionally identified within a varying regional range, but abstract designs in body and facial painting, emblems, ground and other surfaces, and Aboriginal art generally need verbal explanations and can have several layers of meaning. So does red ocher, which has ritual as well as decorative significance. Religious discourse, which up to a point embraces magic and sorcery, is not simply
Language in the Context of Particular Religions a matter of words and how these are deployed. It should involve a wider context: not only pauses, for instance, but rules about absence of words. In some regions circumcision novices have mandatory periods of silence (special vocabularies are another feature); or a girl at puberty is told to utter only a few words. Actors and dancers in major ritual events mostly do not speak but leave that to the singers (individual singers in much of the north, groups in the interior); or they join in various calls or wordless sounds or breathing effects in unison or harmony at stipulated junctures. Physical stance is important too. A northeastern Arnhem Lander stands chanting invocations in a specific ritual setting and lifts his clapping sticks high, using them to emphasize his rapid calling of sacred place and other names. (In the same region a person with a grievance may harangue a camp of seated people for hours at a time, with a wealth of symbolic imagery.) Instruments such as clapping sticks, including boomerangs and other sound-making devices, come in various regional styles with various regional rules, but they are not merely accompaniments. They can constitute an acknowledged sign-vocabulary. In western Arnhem Land, for instance, a distinctive pattern of clapping sticks on a ritual occasion can alert women to the approach of men 'coming down' (the vernacular expression) from their men-only ritual ground. In an evening ceremony in the Victoria River area a change in the tempo and sound of the clapping boomerangs during a wordless pause by the male singers signals a change in the program to a men-only performance; at once all the women get up and move away into the darkness beyond the fires. The didjeridu is also a signaling instrument and even more versatile, capable of producing human-like and other vocal sounds. It has spread south from the northern coasts during the last 50 years to become (except for a few inland groups) a musical symbol of traditional Aboriginal identity. Religious rules and authority are basic, but most conspicuous in sacred, especially secret-sacred, matters. In prose narratives and in songs and invocations and rites, modes of expression and layers of meaning vary according to age and ritual status, sex/gender, and territorial affiliations. Divisions of religious labor on a gender basis are more conspicuous in some areas, but least so among the Tiwe of Bathurst and Melville Islands and people of the lower River Murray and lakes in South Australia. Open-sacred affairs are for everyone in a community, but the elaborate patterning of participation and explanations involves rules of exclusion as well as inclusion: who is permitted to say or sing or hear or do what, when or where and at what distance. So, there is usually diversity even within one region. Versions of myths for children are simplified in language and imagery, as a traditional storehouse of information 10
about their local environment and rules about 'good' and 'bad' behavior. Rituals include reenactment of mythic characters' activities, site-focused celebrations, and topics such as initiation, mortuary events, and fertility. In some areas women have secret or semi-sacred rites and songs, as men do, but the overall picture is one of multifaceted collaboration, in a kaleidoscopic cohesion of verbal, visual (art, emblems), musical, and dramatic ingredients. In a few cases the scope for individual expression and innovation extended to song composition, but usually the most sacred songs are seen as the least amenable to change. Some words range from versions of ordinary spoken language to poetically dramatic forms and to compressed symbolic or cryptic statements, especially in the sphere of religion. At one extreme, Strehlow (1971: 207) refers to the language of Aranda 'ceremonial songs' as a 'highly artificial creation' that was 'never... a spoken language.' In some other areas untranslatable or 'nonsense' vocabularies are a minor feature of particular religious rites (as in northern Arnhem Land). More usually problems in translation are linked with the wide spread of songsequences. Ritual gatherings between neighboring groups helped to communicate a large range of religious as well as everyday items, although specific translations of song words often get lost in longdistance transmission. Important 'traveling cults' such as the Kunapipi/Gunabibi were (like dreams) a blend of continuity and innovation; but the impact of European contact on Aboriginal religions has been almost wholly negative. Current efforts to sustain or restore a distinctively Aboriginal identity, including vernacular languages, face numerous difficulties. One is the problem of how to keep the details of local cultures within the new, overarching framework that incorporates urban people as well. Increasingly, for many of them now the distinctive feature of Aboriginally is its land-based religious quality, summed up as 'Aboriginal spirituality.' See also: Ritual; Taboo, Religious.
Bibliography Berndt R M 1951 Kunapipi. Hawthorne, Melbourne Berndt R M 1974 Australian Aboriginal Religion. E. J. Brill, Leiden Berndt R M, Berndt C H 1987 The World of the First Australians, 5th edn. Aboriginal Studies Press, Canberra Durkheim E 1976 The Elementary Forms of the Religious Life. Allen & Unwin, London Morphy H 1984 Journey to the Crocodile's Nest. Australian Institute of Aboriginal Studies, Canberra Stanner W E H 1989 On Aboriginal Religion. Oceania Publications, University of Sydney, Sydney Strehlow T G H 1971 Songs of Central Australia. Angus & Robertson, Sydney
Baha'ism
Baha'ism S. Lambden and G. Lambden
The now globally diffused Baha'I religion originated in the Islamic Middle East. It evolved out of Babism, a neo-Shi'I religious movement founded by the Iranian martyr-prophet Sayyid 'Ali Muhammad Shlrazi ('the Bab'='Gate') (1819-1850). His contemporary, MIrza Husayn 'AIT Nun, entitled Baha'u'llah ('the Glory of God') (1817-1892) spent 40 years or so living outside his native Iran in Ottoman Iraq, Turkey, and Palestine and founded the Baha'I Faith (Baha'ism) in the middle of the nineteenth century. As independent and successive 'religions of the book,' Babism and Baha'ism have scriptures in the Persian and Arabic languages—both of which are regarded as 'languages of divine revelation.' Between 1844 and 1850, the Bab 'revealed' a very large number of Persian and Arabic books, treatises, and letters. He had something of a distaste for arid scholasticism and, in his revolutionary, ecstatic, 'stream of consciousness' (shath), and sometimes esoteric-Kabbalistic type revelations, was moved to ignore or 'transcend' established rules of grammar and syntax. His linguistic innovations and idiosyncracies are championed or defended in a number of his works and letters, for example, his early and brief Elucidation of Grammar and Syntax (Bayan fl nahw wa sarf), the Equitable Tract (Sahlfa-yi 'adliyyd), and the Persian and Arabic Expositions (Bayans). He exhibited a tendency, especially in certain late works, to neologize. Note, for example, his use of arcane locutions based upon words with identical numerical values according to the abjad system. A multitude of permutations or unused derivatives of Arabic roots are contained, among other places, in sections of his difficult Book of Names (Kitab al-asma1, e.g., buhyan and mubti[a]ha from the root BHA* 'to be beautiful,' splendid, glorious). Gnostic (lirfarii) terminology is in evidence in a good many of his works; a proportion of it rooted in the quasi-extremist (ghuluww) 'Sermon of the Gulf (Khutbah altutunjiyyah) attributed to Imam 'AIT (died 661 CE, the cousin and son-in-law of the Prophet Muhammad): including the etymologically opaque Arabic loanword TTNJ (spellings vary; Arabic (loosely) 'Gulf) and the Arabic 'Ama' ((loosely) 'Cloud of Unknowing'), both of which, for doctrinal reasons, occur in the dual in the early Commentary on the Suraih of Joseph (Tafslr surat yusuf, mid-1844). The ShirazT Sayyid, who claimed to be the expected Mahdi (or QcCim ('Ariser'), the 'messiah figure' expected by ShT'T Muslims), and one possessed of the station of subordinate divinity, has been much
criticized for being ungrammatical both by Muslim divines and Western Orientalists. In excess of 15,000 of Baha'u'llah's Arabic and Persian 'revelations' (or alwah, 'tablets') are extant, dating from between 1852 and 1892. A considerable number of early poetical and related compositions draw on Sufi themes and exhibit such esoteric terminology as is typical of mystagogues of the school of Ibn 'ArabI (d. 1240). While a few of his Persian revelations are almost wholly devoid of Arabic (notably epistles to Zoroastrian converts), many mix and interweave the language of his homeland with that of the Qur'an. On occasion Baha'u'llah ignored stylistic norms and revealed verses after the fashion of the Bab. In his Most Holy Book (al-Kitab al-aqdas, ca. 1873) he counsels governments to select an existing language and script (or invent new artificial ones) in order to facilitate global communication and encourage world unity. He referred to the Persian and Arabic languages as spiritual and linguistic 'milk' and 'honey.' Though Baha'Ts do not expect Arabic to be chosen as the anticipated international auxiliary language of the near or foreseeable future, the founder of their Faith viewed Arabic as a language of such supernal magnitude (Arabic bast) that it would be fit to become a global language in the distant future. Baha'u'llah's eldest son 'Abdu'1-Baha (head of the Baha'I community until his death in 1921), as the appointed interpreter of his father's teachings, wrote much in a highly polished yet inspirational Persian and Arabic, and occasionally in Turkish. He endeavored to promote the principle of an international auxiliary language encouraging Baha'Is and others—as a temporary measure—to learn Esperanto. As Guardian ('Head') of the Baha'I Faith (between 1921 and 1957), Shoghi Effendi, educated at Oxford for a while, translated 'several of the Founder's major works into elegant and 'Biblical' (King James Version) English and wrote thousands of expository letters in that language—as well as much in the 'languages of revelation.' In the early 1990s, the 5 or 6 million strong and rapidly expanding Baha'I community is headed by an elected body entitled the 'Universal House of Justice,' whose official communications are in either English or Persian. Further translation into Spanish or French is often made at the Baha'I World Centre in Haifa, Israel, and subsequently when required into other languages by Baha'I bodies internationally. 11
Language in the Context of Particular Religions Regarded as the 'Word of God' Bahal scripture, as indicated, consists primarily of the voluminous revelations of the Bab and Baha'u'llah. Of central yet secondary importance is the authoritative exegesis of this scripture by Baha'u'llah's aforementioned eldest son and great-grandson. Translation of small portions of this scripture and the publication of a constantly expanding and multifaceted BahaT literature—including expositions of BahaT doctrine and its relationship to other religions and contemporary fields of learning—exists in well over 500 languages. See also: Arabic; Ecstatic Religion; Persian; Qur'an.
Bibliography Note: Many relevant primary Babl-BahaT source materials only exist in Persian and Arabic manuscript sources. For BabT scriptural sources see MacEoin (1992). A proportion of Western language materials are listed in Collins (1990) Browne E G (ed.) 1891/1 Traveller's Narrative, vol. u, Note R, p. 317f. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge Collins W P 1990 Bibliography of English Language Works on the BdbiandBahd'iFaiths 1844-1985. George Ronald, Oxford MacEoin D 1992 The Sources for Early Bdbi Doctrine and History: A Survey. E J Brill, Leiden Momen M (ed.) 1987 Selections from the Writings of E G Browne on the Bdbi and Bahd Y Religions. George Ronald. Oxford
British Israelites W. L. Ingrain
British-Israelism is a belief system which states the Caucasian people of Western Europe and the United States are the biological descendants of the ancient Israelites. Originating in England in the mid-nineteenth century, it was transported to the United States in 1887, where it found its most fertile ground. Joseph Allen published the first attempt to codify British-Israelite thought in 1901. In 1933, the British Israelites found their most successful voice in Herbert W. Armstrong, whose Radio Church of God, renamed The Worldwide Church of God in 1968, remained a bastion of British-Israelism. At its peak in the early 1970s, believers were estimated between 200,000 and 300,000 people. Following Armstrong's death in 1986, British Israelites have dwindled to less than an estimated 10,000 believers worldwide. Biblical analysis supporting British-Israelism begins with the promises God gave to Abraham regarding his descendants. Via primogeniture, these promises were transferred to Abraham's grandson, Jacob/Israel and his 12 sons who are believed to be the ancestors of the individual Israelite tribes that bore their names. British-Israelism teaches that each of these tribes can be identified with a particular nation in Northern and Western Europe, and the United States. They believe all Jewish people are Israelites, but not all Israelites are Jewish. When Assyria conquered Israel in 722 BCE, only the tribe of Judah remained in historical documentation. Adherents of British-Israelism believe these 'lost' tribes of Israel were not assimilated, but migrated intact to western and northern Europe, where they became the ancestors of modern nations. 12
Particular importance is given to Jacob's blessing of his grandsons, Ephraim and Manasseh. the sons of Joseph: Ephraim father of a 'multitude of nations,' that is, ancestor of the British; and Manasseh father of 'a great nation,' that is, ancestor of the Americans. British-Israelism believes the true inheritors of the promises God gave to Abraham are the British and the Americans, because they are the 'true' Israelites. British Israelites offer linguistic evidence to support their claims. They claim the Assyrians who conquered the Israelites called them 'Khumri,' and that Crimea, Cambridge, and Cambria are places named by Israelites. Northumberland is 'merely the land north of the Khumbris.' Reminding us that the ancient Hebrew alphabet contained no vowels, followers of British-Israelism point to the rivers Danube, Dnieper, Dniester, and the Don as evidence the tribe of Dan had passed close by. Place names such as Donegal, Dunsmor, and Denmark offer further evidence as does Jutland, that is 'land of the Jews,' in Denmark. British-Israelism also sees a connection between Irish dunn 'judge' and the tribe of Dan, since the descendants of Dan were a judgmental people (Genesis 49: 16). The Angles are claimed to be descendants of the same people who worshipped the Golden Calf. (Hebrew "egel 'calf): hence the British symbol 'John Bull.' The name Saxons originally 'Sac's sons' is derived from 'Isaac's sons.' 'British' is derived from the Hebrew words berith 'covenant' and 'ish 'man' which proves that God's covenant has been properly passed down to King David's descendants, who, in the British monarchy, occupy his throne today.
Buddhism, Chinese British-Israelism lends itself well to a rhetoric of racist imperialism, through which Caucasian, English-speaking people maintain a divine right to dominate world events. Bibliography Allen J H 1997 Judah's Sceptre & Joseph's Birthright, 4th edn. Health Research, Pomeroy, WA
Armstrong G T 1981 Europe & America In Prophecy. Church of God, International, Tyler, TX Armstrong H W 1980 The United States & Great Britain In Prophecy, 4th edn. Worldwide Church of God, Pasadena, CA Ingram W L 1995 God & race: British Israelism and Christian identity. In: Miller T (ed.) America's Alternative Religions. State University of New York Press, Albany, NY, pp. 119-26
Buddhism, Chinese D. Lancashire
Buddhism in China is characterized by its interest in attitudes and teachings which reflect the cosmic invocations of the doctrine of metempsychosis and the experience of supreme enlightenment of the Buddha. These are commonly known as Mahayana, 'the Great Vehicle.' This does not mean that Chinese Buddhists are merely interested in philosophical speculation. Whether they explore the nature of being through concepts like 'voidness' (sunyatd), 'non-being' (wu), 'suchness' (tathatd), and the like, or whether they stress the relations between Bodhisattvas and mankind, through the invocation, for example, of such figures as Avalokitesvara (Guanyin), they seek to practice and present their faith in such a way as to cause themselves and others to attain Buddhahood. 1. The Introduction of Buddhism into China
A number of accounts exist of the manner of Buddhism's introduction into China, but a careful reading of Chinese historical texts suggests that Buddhism first became known in Chinese governmental circles about the middle of the first century CE. Pengcheng, an important center of commerce at the eastern end of the silk route, contained a community of foreign monks and Chinese laymen at the court of Liu Ying, king of the region, in the year 65 CE, and the evidence suggests that a community had also been established in Loyang, the Han dynasty capital, by the same date. Concerning Liu Ying, the records state that he kept the eight commandments laid down for lay Buddhists, and that he offered 'sacrifices.' He is said to have set up altars to both the Buddha and Lao-zi (the progenitor of Taoism) in his palace, which suggests that at the layman's level, at least, the Buddha was regarded as another 'divine' figure to be
worshiped for whatever blessings he might be able to bestow. Although the first Buddhists were, of necessity, foreigners, and although Chinese were forbidden during the Han dynasty (206 BCE-220 CE) to enter monastic life, the promulgation of the faith to the Chinese people was clearly felt to be important, and the translation of Buddhist texts was early seen to be a vital part of this task. The Sutra of the 42 Sections seems to have been the first major scripture to be translated, and by the year 189 over 50 works had been produced. Of this number, the Parthian, An Shigao, is said to have translated 31 books, and Zhi Loujiaqian 14. It should be noted, however, that the majority of these translations represented selections from larger Sanskrit works, and that with few exceptions, they consisted of little more than one or two chapters. An Shigao's translations were mostly of meditation scriptures, which advocated techniques not unlike those found in Taoism—techniques which have been aptly described as 'Buddhist yoga.' Works translated by Zhi Loujiaqian were representative of the prajna (wisdom, gnosis) system. Despite the poor quality of these translations, the impetus was provided for large translation projects in subsequent years. 2. Period of Consolidation and Growth
Towards the end of the second century CE, Confucianism underwent a major crisis, and both Mahayana Buddhism and Taoism were to be the beneficiaries. Events of the time opened the way to the second period of Buddhist history in China which covered the Wei and Jin dynasties (220-420). This was a period of consolidation and growth. It witnessed the entry of the first Chinese nationals
13
Language in the Context of Particular Religions into full monastic life following a monastic rule devised in China. An ever-increasing number of Buddhist scriptures were translated into Chinese, and Chinese translators appear in their own right in addition to those from abroad. Chinese commentators on scripture also emerged for the first time, which suggests a growing depth of understanding of the faith, and a greater self-confidence among the Chinese religious. Buddhist temples and monasteries sprang up in every part of the nation, and the number of religious showed a marked growth. In the two capitals of the Western Jin dynasty there were 180 centers with more than 3,700 monks and nuns, and in the Eastern Jin area there were said to be 1,768 centers and some 24,000 monks and nuns. Clearly, the growth of the Buddhist community to such proportions and the support it now received from ruling houses, meant that it had roots deep into Chinese soil. Two translators of note during this period were Kang Senghui, who arrived in Jianye (the present Jiangningxian) in 247, and KumarajTva (344—413) (see Kumarajlvd). Born in China, but of Sogdian origin, Kang Senghui (d. 280) was the first Buddhist monk to have a thorough grasp of Confucian and Taoist thought, as well as of Buddhism. Although he would appear an 'idealist' in Buddhist terms, regarding 'mind' as the ground of all things, he promoted Confucian ethics, and in his exposition of 'mind' reflects Lao-zi's thinking on the Dao (see Taoism). Records differ markedly regarding the number of works translated by KumarajTva, but just over 30 comprising more than 300 chapters seem the most plausible figures. To produce such a number of works, KumarajTva organized a Translations Bureau which employed between 500 and 800 persons selected from his more than 3,000 students. Apart from Prajna and Lotus-type ('One BuddhaVehicle') scriptures, he also tackled a number of important works which had not previously been available in China in any form. These included the madhyamika treatise Zhonglun, the Shiermenlun, and four of the Bailun. The importance of these excellent translations is that they clarified Buddhist thought and teachings, and provided foundation material for the growth of 'schools of thought.' The translations of the above three treatises, for example, were to give rise to the Sanlun (in Japanese Sanron) 'ThreeTreatise' school. KumarajTva represents a watershed in the history of Buddhist scripture translation in China, and his translations are sometimes referred to as the 'new' as opposed to the 'old' translations. 3. Period of Maturity The fourth century witnessed an outburst of creativeness through which the implications of the Taoist concepts of 'being' (you) and 'non-being' (wu) were 14
related to Buddhist concepts of ultimate reality. Outstanding among the thinkers of this time were Zhi-dun (314-66) and Seng-zhao (384-414). The Sui and Tang dynasties (581-907) saw the full flowering of Buddhism in China and the establishment of all the major schools associated with Mahayana Buddhism, including the Tiantai 'Heavenly Terrace' (Japanese Tendai), Huayan 'Flowery Splendor* (Japanese Kegon), Jingtu 'Pure Land,' and Chan 'Meditation' (Japanese Zen). Despite serious persecution in 845, Buddhist thought was a major factor in the emergence of Neo-Confucianism in the Song dynasty (960-1279). During the Mongol Yuan dynasty (1206-1368), an attempt was made by Phags-pa (1235-80), the lama of the powerful Sa-skya monastery, to introduce Tibetan Buddhism into China. Although appointed chaplain to the emperor, Kublai Khan, he found that Tantric literature did not appeal to the Chinese, and therefore confined himself to presenting summaries of basic Buddhist teachings to the Mongol princes. Although the Mongol court was deeply influenced by the Tibetan form of Buddhism, Shamanism was the common religion of the Mongol people. Sensing the need for a more profound religious climate by which literacy and greater social sophistication could be encouraged, Altan Khan, in the mid-sixteenth century, invited a leading Tibetan monk to come to Mongolia where he was proclaimed Dalai Lama. Church and state were united through the system of reincarnation which resulted in the head of the Mongolian Tibetan Church being proclaimed Khan of all Mongolia. The Mongol synthesis was eventually disrupted by the Manchus (1644-1911), and this disruption was carried further by the Communist government of the twentieth century. In China, Buddhism continues to have a profound influence on Chinese life where it is allowed freedom of expression. See also: Buddhism in Southeast Asia; Buddhism, Tibetan; Buddhism, Japanese; Buddhist Canons: Translations; Confucianism; Apocrypha, Buddhist.
Bibliography Chan Wing-tsit 1963 A Source Book in Chinese Philosophy. Princeton University Press, Princeton, NJ Ch'en K K S 1964 Buddhism in China: A Historical Survey. Princeton University Press, Princeton, NJ Conze E (ed.) 1954 Buddhist Texts Through the Ages. Penguin, Harmondsworth Miller R J 1959 Monasteries and Cultural Change in Inner Mongolia. Harrassowitz, Wiesbaden Welch H 1967 The Practice of Chinese Buddhism 1900-1950. Harvard University Press, Cambridge, MA Zurcher E 1972 The Buddhist Conquest of China. Brill. Leiden
Buddhism, Indian
Buddhism, Indian S. Collins
Buddhism in India probably began in the fifth century BCE; by the twelfth century CE it had virtually disappeared from the land of its birth, but was established throughout the rest of Asia. This article will deal with the languages used by Buddhists in India and with attitudes to language found in the philosophical thought and religious practice of the various Buddhist schools. 1. The Languages of Indian Buddhism The Buddha was born as Siddhartha Gautama, from the Sakya clan in what is now southern Nepal. At the time of his birth that part of the subcontinent was gradually being 'Sanskritized'; that is, the Indo-Aryan (originally Indo-European) peoples, who had begun to conquer India from the Northwest perhaps 1,000 years earlier, were now spreading their language (Sanskrit, or Old Indo-Aryan) east and south, along with the religious culture of the Brahman priesthood. It is not known what language the Sakyan families had spoken previously; but it seems that when the Buddha began to teach in and around what is now Banaras in Northeast India, he used one or more forms of Middle Indo-Aryan, or Prakrit, although it is not known exactly which (see various authors in Bechert 1980). Buddhist texts are extant in a number of forms of Middle Indo-Aryan and Sanskrit. The American scholar Franklin Edgerton called some of them 'Buddhist Hybrid Sanskrit'; not all scholars like the term, but no other has yet proved generally acceptable. Discoveries of manuscripts since the end of the nineteenth century have vastly increased the knowledge of Buddhist literature in Prakrit and Sanskrit, but the most extensive collection of extant writings is in what is now called Pali. The word originally meant 'a (canonical) text,' but it has come to be used in modern times for the language of those texts. It contains features of various North Indian dialects, and some forms which cannot have occurred through normal phonological development, but must be oral or scribal inventions or errors. On these grounds it has been claimed that Pali is an artificial literary language (von Hiniiber 1982). Later Pali texts regularly refer to their language (which they assume to be that of the Buddha) as 'Magadhi': but philological analysis shows that this cannot be so. It is likely that the term was used in order to associate the language of early Buddhism with that of the Mauryan Empire, which was based in Magadha in Northern Central India, and particularly with the great Buddhist emperor Asoka of the third century BCE (see Norman 1983; 2-7). Asoka's
edicts, preserved on pillars, rocks and religious monuments, and translated from Magadhi into various dialects (some into Greek) represent the earliest decipherable writing in India. In fact Buddhist texts were at first preserved orally, and are said to have been written down for the first time in Sri Lanka in the first century BCE. 2. Buddhist Attitudes to Language According to the usual interpretation of an enigmatic story in the Pali Canon, the Buddha refused to allow his words to be preserved in Sanskrit verse, on the model of the Brahmanical Vedas, and permitted different monks to learn his sermons in their own dialect (see the article by Brough in Bechert 1980). Philosophers of the later tradition, moreover, explicitly articulated a conventionalist view of language. Although by this time most Buddhist scholasticism had adopted Sanskrit, as the lingua franca of Indian intellectual tradition, they were consciously opposing the essentialist attitude to it found in Brahmanical thought, in which each Sanskrit word was held to be intrinsically connected with, or even part of, what it referred to. For Buddhists it was important for metaphysical and spiritual reasons that language should be, as they put it, merely a matter of 'conventional truth'; 'ultimate truth' was beyond words altogether. Some of them elaborated a complex theory of linguistic reference, called the apoha or 'exclusion' theory, in which words were held not to refer directly to their objects, but indirectly through the exclusion of what is other; any one referring term thus implies all others, all interrelated in a single, conventional network. Philosophy in India, in Buddhist, Hindu and other traditions, has always been grounded on an extensive and rich tradition of grammar and linguistics, one which Western scholarship has scarcely begun to explore. Alongside these sophisticated conceptual developments can also be seen the emergence, or reemergence, of other attitudes to and uses of language. In the Pali commentarial texts, for example, Magadhi is spoken of as 'the root language' of all beings, which children would speak naturally if they heard no other. In the same tradition various texts, normally taken from the Canon, are used in ceremonies of 'protection' (parittd), recited on a variety of ritual and practical occasions. Such uses may be called magical, in the sense that the language itself is credited with intrinsic and automatic practical efficacy. Similar attitudes are seen very widely in the northern, Mahayana tradition, particularly in the
15
Language in the Context of Particular Religions Tantric schools. The actual words of sacred texts, whether recited orally or written in manuscripts, were themselves the objects of ritual and reverence, since they were thought to embody, in a more than merely semantic sense, the Buddha's saving Truth. Particular words or phrases, called mantra (see Mantra) or dhararii (see Dharani), which are sometimes meaningful phrases and sometimes nonsense collections of syllables, were recited or written as part of an elaborate ritual and symbolic system, for propitiatory, apotropaic and other purposes, as well as for the more traditional soteriological goals of Buddhism. In the Pure Land schools repeated recitation of the name of the Buddha Amitabha was combined with visualization and meditation as means of salvation; in parts of China and Japan, it eventually
came to be the sole means. (For a summary of these attitudes, and others, see Gomez 1987.) See also: Pali; Pali Canon; Buddhist Hybrid Sanskrit; Buddhism and Sanskrit Language. Bibliography Bechert H (ed.) 1980 The Language of the Earliest Buddhist Tradition. Vandenhoeck and Ruprecht, Gottingen Gomez L O 1987 LANGUAGE: Buddhist views of language. In: Eliade M (ed.) Encyclopaedia of Religion, Vol. 8, pp. 446-51. Macmillan, New York Hiniiber O von 1982 Pali as an artificial language. Indologia Taurinensia 10: 133-40 Norman K R 1983 Pali Literature. Harrossowitz, Wiesbaden
Buddhism, Japanese I. Reader
Buddhism has had major linguistic influences in Japan, ranging from the development of classical Japanese literary forms and new syllabaries to the use of a wide vocabulary that has, in the course of time, become part of standard Japanese usage. It entered Japan along with many other facets of continental Asiatic culture from the sixth century onwards. Along with Buddhism the most significant cultural influence that entered Japan in this period was the Chinese writing system which the Japanese adopted. It was through the medium of Buddhist texts written in Chinese that the Japanese originally encountered and studied Buddhist thought. This Chinese orientation provided the predominant lens through which the Japanese viewed and learnt about Buddhism. Until the nineteenth century no systematic attempts were made to study such root languages of Buddhism as Sanskrit or Pali or to study early pre-Chinese Buddhist texts. There was, however, in the work of the eighteenth-century writer Tominaga Nakamoto, a recognition of the conditional nature of language, dependent on the time in which it was used, the form of expression used, and the intent of the user. Tominaga's studies of Buddhist texts and of the varying ways that Sanskrit terms had been translated, in different eras and by different authors, into Chinese, enabled him to come to an understanding of the relative nature of language and of religious forms, and to develop the foundations of a critical scholarship of religion and of Buddhist texts. The entry of Buddhism into Japan led the Japanese to study Chinese culture in depth and, especially, to 16
embark on an intensive study of the Chinese language and its writing system so as to facilitate study of the new religion. Consequently the entry of Buddhism was a powerful spur towards the Japanese adoption of the Chinese writing system. It also proved to be a major medium for its gradual transformation into a Japanese system, for in order to make the texts more readily comprehensible they were read in a Japanese syntactical style which applied Japanese pronunciations to the ideograms. Even in the present day, Japanese Buddhist priests intone, with Japanese pronunciations, texts written in Chinese. Because few understand Buddhist Chinese this has led to a situation in which most priests and worshippers do not understand the meanings of the texts they recite. Large numbers of contemporary Japanese translations and commentaries on Buddhist texts are, however, available to explain such texts. Buddhism played a major part in the development and use of the phonetic syllabary katakana which forms an intrinsic part of the written language along with Chinese ideograms. Katakana developed as a mnemonic device for providing Japanese readings and pronunciations of Chinese Buddhist texts, and was widely used in the temples of Nara, the ancient capital, by the eighth century. Its use was subsequently diversified into the world of literature and eventually into general use. Although the earliest usages and development of the other phonetic syllabary, hiragana, occurred outside of Buddhist temples, it is clear that this syllabary was also widely
Buddhism in Southeast Asia used in the Buddhist world by the tenth century, and this further stimulated the emergence of an authentic written language combining ideograms and phonetic script. Many Buddhistic words still in use in the modern era (e.g., the term issai shujo, 'all sentient beings') derive from the earliest wave of assimilation in the sixth century: although changes in the dominant form of Chinese in the seventh century affected the ways that the Japanese pronounced most Chinese ideograms, the Buddhist temples resisted this change and continued for the most part to preserve the earlier forms. For example, the ideogram meaning 'being, existence' is more commonly pronounced sei, but in Buddhist contexts generally retains the earlier pronunciation jo. To this extent, Buddhist Japanese as used in rituals has a rather archaic feeling compared to standard Japanese. Nonetheless many standard Buddhist terms based on these earlier forms of pronunciation, for example, jigoku (hell) and
gokuraku (heaven), have become everyday terms still extant in contemporary Japanese and not limited to Buddhistic usage. Because of its close relationship with the Chinese language which formed the basis of the Japanese writing system and which added immeasurably to the Japanese vocabulary of the time, Buddhism has thus played an instrumental role in the evolution of the Japanese language and in augmenting its scope, both orally and in written forms. See also: Buddhism, Chinese. Bibliography Matsunaga D, Matsunaga A 1978 Foundation of Japanese Buddhism, 2 vols. Buddhist Books International, Los Angeles Miller R A 1967 The Japanese Language. Charles Tuttle, Tokyo Nakamoto T 1990 Emerging from Meditation (transl. with an introduction by Pye M). Duckworth, London
Buddhism in Southeast Asia G. Condominas
Born in India, Buddhism eventually disappeared from the subcontinent, but it spread to Sri Lanka, Southeast Asia, and Central and East Asia. While on the main part of the continent it was Mahayana Buddhism ('the Great Vehicle') which flourished, in Sri Lanka and Southeast Asia, it was for the most part Hinayana Buddhism ('the Lesser Vehicle') or more precisely Theravada ('of the Ancients'), in the Pali tradition, that encrusted itself onto the cultures and civilizations of these different countries. Vietnam which through Chinese influence belongs to Mahayana Buddhism, is the one exception (see Buddhism, Chinese). At the level of language, the impact of Buddhism was considerable. In Burma, Laos, Thailand, and Cambodia (Malaysia is a Muslim country: see Islam in Southeast Asia), all the teaching is done in Pali. The writing systems of the national languages of these countries are all ultimately of Indian origin, in contrast to the ancient Vietnamese system, called nom, which is based on Chinese characters. In these countries borrowings from Pali, and to a lesser degree from Sanskrit, are numerous, mainly in matters of religion. For example, bun (from Pali punnd) 'merit' in Lao and Thai is frequently used in the expression 'to acquire merit,' as in the daily offering of food to the monks and the giving of a feast at the pagoda. Such loanwords may acquire
different meanings in neighboring languages: sim (from Pali and Sanskrit simd) keeps in Thai its original meaning of 'stone post,' marking the limits of the sanctuary, while in Lao it signifies the sanctuary itself, which in Thai is bo:t. In Laos, many Buddhist texts are in Pali or tham, a mixture of Lao and Pali. In rural Laos, most of the monks who read or recite these texts do not understand them at all, a phenomenon one commonly encounters in the other Theravada Buddhist countries of Southeast Asia. The borrowing of Pali words is equally prominent in the domains of art, literature, and history: for example, Thai ruup-pdn 'sculpture' is a combination of a Pali word and a Thai one. This corresponds to the modern introduction of French and English technological terms into the spoken language. In the written language, not only in books but also in newspapers, there is a preference for Pali or Sanskrit words. The result is that people who understand borrowings from modern Indo-European languages such as French and English, do not recognize the synonyms borrowed from the ancient Indo-European languages Pali and Sanskrit, and this leads to the creation of two language levels, one for the literati and another for the general population. A Khmer peasant, for instance, easily understands and uses laga (from French la gare), but
17
Language in the Context of Particular Religions is perplexed by thaniy ayahsmayien (from Sanskrit sthana ayasmaya, literally, 'locality iron-made,' i.e., 'the place (where is found) the iron-machine'). The introduction of Marxism in the east of Southeast Asia, combating all forms of religion, obviously had a crucial but nevertheless temporary effect on the situation. Among the Buddhist Dai Lu in Yunnan (China), for example, at the time of the liberalization in 1985, the first thing the people did was to rebuild the pagoda destroyed by the Red Guards and to call in Thai-speaking monks from Burma to reintroduce the teaching of Buddhist texts. See also: Cao Dai; Pali.
Bibliography Bechert H 1966-1973 Buddhismus: Staat und Gesellschaft in den Ldndern des Theravada-Buddhismus, 3 vols. Otto Harrassowitz, Wiesbaden Bechert H, Gombrich R (eds.) 1984 The World of Buddhism. Thames and Hudson, London
Bizot F 1976 Le figuier a cinq branches: Recherches sur le bouddhisme khmer. L'Ecole francais Extreme Orient. Paris Cadiere L, Leopold P 1955-1958 Croyances el pratiques religieuses des Vietnamiens, 3 vols. Ecole francaise Bulletin de la Societe des Etudes Indochinoises. Saigon Condominas G 1968 Notes sur le bouddhisme populaire en milieu rural lao. Archives de Sociologie des Religions 25, 26 Condominas G 1988 In search of a Vat: Lao external exile and Dai Lu internal exile. Third International Thai Colloquium. Canberra Gabaude L 1988 Une hermeneutique bouddhique contemporaine de Thailande. Buddhadasa Bhikkhu. Ecole francaise d'Extreme-Orient, Paris Mus P 1935 Barabudur. Esquisse d'une historic du Bouddhisme fondee sur la critique archeologique des textes. Impr. d'Extreme-Orient, Hanoi Tambiah S J 1976 World Conqueror and World Renouncer: A Study of Buddhism and Polity in Thailand against a Historical Background. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge Zago M 1972 Rites de ceremonies en milieu bouddhiste lao. Documenta Missionalia 6. Universita Gregoriana. Roma
Buddhism, Tibetan P. M. Williams
Tibetan Buddhism may be understood as both that form of Buddhism which normally looks to Tibet for its models of orthodoxy and excellence, and also the Buddhism which relies almost entirely upon the Tibetan language for its doctrinal and spiritual concerns. As well as Tibet proper, Tibetan Buddhism includes the Buddhism of Mongolia, and some of the southern Himalayan regions such as Ladakh, Bhutan, and Sikkim. The model for all religious usage in Tibetan Buddhism is Classical Written Tibetan, to all intents and purposes the language of the Tibetan translation of the Buddhist Canon. Thus the canonical language, a sophisticated technical language developed for the translation into Tibetan of Indian Buddhist concepts expressed in Sanskrit, has exercised a very strong normative role in Tibetan Buddhist practice and life. The great scholar mKhas grub rje /kai'drupdse/ (1385-1438) exhorts the learned to speak language free from fault 'like that which arises from the scriptures' (gsung rab dag las 'byung ba bzhiri). He contrasts correct speech, known as the 'language of the (Buddhist) Teachings' (chos skad} or 'literary language' (yig skad), with the regional language (yul skad), which the learned scholar does not hesitate to call the language of fools. This normative and prestige value of Classical Written Tibetan pervades the world of Tibetan Buddhism.
18
Although the Canon was translated into Mongolian in the seventeenth century, still Mongolian religious practice continued to use Tibetan as the regular liturgical and doctrinal language, and young Mongolian monks of promise would be sent to Tibet to study. A number of important figures in the doctrinal history of Tibetan Buddhism were ethnically Mongols. Only in fairly recent years, as with the Dzongkha language in Bhutan, has there been any extensive and systematic effort to present Buddhist teachings in a regional language. Nevertheless there were conscious individual attempts in the past to express Buddhist ideas for the common people in a form influenced by regional languages. There remains a work written by the eighteenth-century scholar Gung-thang dKo mchog-bstan-pa'i sgron-me/gugtarj kantjoktenpai dranme/ in a colloquial nomad dialect of the Amdo region of northeast Tibet. Scriptural quotations, however, occur in their regular canonical form. The great saint and yogin Mi la ras pa (Milarepa 1040-1123) in his songs shows the adoption to Buddhist usage of a number of the structures and linguistic forms from an oral and secular folk literature. It has been estimated that in some parts of the Tibetan world adult male lay literacy, understood as at least being able to recognize and pronounce the letters, may have reached 50 percent. The production
Buddhism in the West of written literature, however, was mainly (although not completely) the preserve of monks. In spite of the dominance of Classical Written Tibetan, nevertheless in liturgical usage by no means the entire text would be in Tibetan. Parts of liturgical texts are in an Indian language, very often a form of Sanskrit which is rather corrupt by Classical standards. These are the mantras, sacred formulas imbued with particular power. In Vajrayana (Tantric) Buddhist practice associated with particular forms of a Buddha or other spiritual figures, a mantra is repeated which may be thought to embody the qualities of that figure and connect the mind to the Buddha's spiritual being and realm. The recitation of these 'sacred words of power' is frequent in Tibetan Buddhism, and such expressions (for example, the famous Om manipadme hum) are carved, written, painted, wafted on the wind, and even written on water for the benefit of all
sentient beings. Through the expression of mantras all Tibetan Buddhists, even the illiterate, take part in an articulation of religious identity and enthusiasm. As always in Buddhism its significance is thought to lie not in the act but in the mind from which it springs. See also'. Buddhism, Indian; Buddhist Canons: Translations; Tibetan; Mantra. Bibliography Ekvall R B 1964 Religious Observances in Tibet. University of Chicago Press, Chicago, IL. Stein R A (transl.) Stapleton Driver J E 1972 Tibetan Civilization. Faber and Faber, London van der Kuijp L W J 1986 Studies in the life and thought of Mkhas-Grub-Rje iv: Mkhas-Grub-Rje on regionalisms and dialects. Berliner Indologische Studien 2: 23-49
Buddhism in the West J. Cresswell
The early development and construction of Buddhism in the West is closely connected to scholarly interest in Asian texts and language. The term 'Buddhism' is itself a Western construct for which there is no Asian equivalent and misleadingly suggests that there exists such a unitary 'object.' The major Asian Buddhist languages are Sanskrit, Pali, Tibetan, Chinese, and Japanese. As early as 1664 a Sanskrit grammar appeared in Germany and sections of Buddhist texts began to be translated from Pali and Sanskrit into European languages soon after. During the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries scholars including Alexander Csoma de Koros and Brian Hodgson uncovered and analysed texts from Tibet, Ladakh and Kathmandu, and many were sent back to Europe. The philologist, Eugene Burnouf made the first complete translation of a Buddhist sutra from Sanskrit in 1852—The Saddharmapundarikasutra or Lotus Sutra. The Pali Text Society, set up in the UK in 1881, has been pivotal in presenting Pali Buddhism to the West. Its voluminous translations of the Pali canon or Tipitaka (see Pali Canon) are to this day a major reference source for the study of Buddhism. However the early philological emphasis led to a textual presentation of 'original' Buddhism which viewed the Asian cultural manifestation as corrupt. During the twentieth century, emphasis shifted from the scholarly to the religious. Groups from the
majority of Asian Buddhist traditions began to emerge in the West, the earliest of which were often based on Pali and later, Japanese and Tibetan. The use of multiple languages for similar terms has led to a confusing array of interpretations and translations. Many prefer to leave terms untranslated, whilst others are seeking translations which more closely match Western culture, for example 'contingency' rather than 'co-dependent origination.' The use of Western religious terms such as 'faith,' 'prayer,' 'merit,' and 'worship' can lead to subtle though significant misinterpretations. Whilst there is no lingua franca in evidence there is a tendency, both in contemporary writing and between Buddhists, towards the use of Sanskrit. Buddhist terms such as karma, nirvana, and zen now appear in popular usage and whilst broadly understood in their Buddhist usage they are also used in non-Buddhist contexts: a cosmetic called Zen Blush; a rock band called Nirvana; a pop song entitled Karma chameleon. Many groups continue to chant mantras and texts in Buddhist languages for example Om Mani Padme Hum (Tibetan) and Nam Myo Ho Renge Kyo (Japanese). Often the Mantra is considered to hold inherent power and is therefore untranslatable. The Order of Buddhist Contemplatives chooses to chant in English and to use English terms for example 'contemplation' rather than 'Zen.' Within some 19
Language in the Context of Particular Religions Buddhist groups language classes are made available to enable texts to be read in their native language though increasingly translated texts are relied upon. See also: Mantra; Sutra; Meditation; Miiller, F. M.; Buddhist Canons: Translations.
Bibliography Batchelor S 1994 The Awakening of the West, The Encounter of Buddhism and Western Culture 543 BCE-1992. Aquarian, London Fields R 1986 How the Swans Came to the Lake: a Narrative History of Buddhism in America. Shambala, Boston
Candomble C. H. Ribeiro dos Santos
Candomble is one of the principal Black Brazilian manifestations of religion. The etymological origin of the word Candomble is to be found in the Kimbundu (Loanda Mbundu) language: ka + ndumbe + mbele 'house of initiation.' Candomble is practiced in almost all the territory of Brazil; the oldest houses of this sect, however, are in the states of Bahia, Rio de Janeiro, Maranhao, and Pernambuco. Its ceremonies are based on the worship of forces of nature (Orixas) and of ancestors. The sacerdotal structure is extremely hierarchical; a principal priest is called babalorixd (in Portuguese pai-de-santo) and a principal priestess yalorixd (mae-de-santo). Its origin dates back to the slave trade when Africans were taken to Brazil to serve as manpower in the plantations and in urban work. The principal three groups that came to make up Candomble were the Nago, the Fon, and the Bantu. The Nago or Yoruba originated from different regions of presentday Nigeria; the Fon, also known in Brazil as Jeje, were natives of the ancient Kingdom of Dahomey (today the Republic of Benin), of Ghana and of Togo; and the Bantu came from the extensive territory of Southern African colonized by the Portuguese, such as Angola, the Congo, and Mozambique. These ethnic groups respectively brought the Yoruba, Ewe-Fon, and Kimbundu languages to Brazil. The appearance of sects of African origin in the New World was an unforeseen result of the traffic in slaves and it forms one of the most important areas of the survival in Brazil of Black culture, including various African languages. The investigation of the language of Candomble shows that its traditional and conservative character—a fundamental facet of archaic cultures—encouraged the preservation of an immense richness of vocabulary, proverbs, and accents. The enduring African element, inherent in its forms of language and present in this manifestation of religion, has ensured a cultural continuity, in spite of the imposition of Portuguese as the official language of the country. Thus an amalgam, formed between the 20
Portuguese language and the different African languages that arrived in Brazil, has given rise to the linguistic heterogeneity existing in the Candomble communities, and equally to the elaboration of forms of communication and speech very typical of—and also peculiar to—this religious group. Because of this, in the Candomble communities it is possible to come across many different levels of expression in lexis and idiom that are attributable to their origin in varied linguistic situations. Such linguistic situations are of the following kinds. First, there is the common Portuguese spoken in Candomble houses, with the use of regionalisms, colloquialisms, and expressions regarded as vulgar, used principally in non-religious contexts. Second, there is Portuguese with a strong idiomatic presence of terms in Yoruba, Ewe-Fon, and Kimbundu; this is used in conversations among novices, as an introduction to the language of ritual and of everyday life in the communities, either in non-religious activities or in the preparation of less complex rituals. Third, there is the Portuguese spoken by older initiates, in which Yoruba, Ewe-Fon, and Kimbundu terms predominate. The use of more African forms of speech appears as an additional affirmation of the power of the elders and as a form of excluding from conversations novices who are not yet prepared to have access to more profound knowledge of the rituals. Fourth, there is the exclusive use of Yoruba, Ewe-Fon, and Kimbundu, confined to the more complex moments of the ceremonies, in which the gods (Orixas, Voduns and Inquices) are invoked by means of hymns, prayers, and direct appeals. In this cultural microcosm is found evidence of a vital linguistic force; it is separate from the power and ordinances of the state and in it the 'desire for blessing' is translated into the common speech of the Candomble communities, such as Motwnbd in the houses of Yoruba origin, or Kolofe in those of Fon or Jeje origin, and Muculu in those of Bantu origin. In these three words, of different origin yet of identical meaning, there is summed up the sense of reverence
Cargo Cults for the older initiates of the community and for the gods in whom they believe. See also: African Traditional Religions; Caribbean Syncretistic Religions 1: Cuban Santeria and Haitian Voodoo; Caribbean Syncretistic Religions 2: Jamaican Cumina and Trinidadian Shango; Macumba. Bibliography Abraham R C 1981 Dictionary of Modern Yorubd. Hodder and Stoughton, London Fonseca Jr E 1993 Diciondrio Yorubd (Nago)—Portugues. Civiliza?ao Brasileira, Rio de Janeiro
Maia A da Silva 1964 Diciondrio Complementar PortuguesKimbundo-Kicongo. Editorial Missoes, Cucujaes Maia A da Silva 1964 Diciondrio Rudimentar PortuguesKimbundo. Editorial Missoes, Cucujaes Maia A da Silva 1964 Epitome de Gramdticas Portuguesa e Quimbunda. Editorial Missoes, Cucujaes Muniz Sodre 1988 O Terreiro e a Cidade: A Forma Social Negro-Brasileira. Vozes, Petropolis Povoas R do Carmo 1989 A Linguagem do Candomble. Jose Olympic Editora, Rio de Janeiro Ramos A 1979 As Culturas Negras no Novo Mundo. Companhia Editora Nacional, Sao Paulo Verger P 1993 Orixds—Deuses lorubds na Africa e no Novo Mundo. Corrupio, Salvador
Cargo Cults K. O. L. Burridge
Cargo cults are socio-magico-religious activities which have been occurring in Oceania since at least the 1850s, the vast majority (say 97 percent) in Melanesia. Involving genuine socio-political and economic aspirations (a new earth) and also elements of spiritual and moral renewal (a new heaven), they are millennarian. The name cargo ( = kago in Tok Pisin) derives from the overt aspirations and rites which—articulated and urged on others by a charismatic leader or 'prophet' after a revelatory experience—point to imminent access to quantities of processed foods and manufactured goods: the cargo imported from industrialized countries. The recorded instances of cargo cults (more than 400) have much in common. Generally, following serious talk about activities elsewhere, which tends to arouse expectations, someone may have a dream or vision in which a traditional or Christian spirit entity reveals the means by which cargo will be obtained. Bizarre though these may seem at first (e.g., signaling for cargo with radios of palm thatch, grotesque baptismal rites, orgiastic dances, sexual promiscuity, destruction of crops, and traditional sacra), the word used to refer to the rites, both in Tok Pisin (wok) and in local vernaculars, means 'work': work in gardens which translates into food, exchanges, gaining status, and the power to attain, maintain, and be worthy of high status. Moreover, the symbolisms in the rites are clear: a fresh start to life in community; movement from an economy based on exchanges of food and valuables to one based on money; equal status and opportunity of access to cargo in relation to whites. Cargo cults have generally been interpreted as reactions to the sociocultural changes attending
colonialism, mission work, wage labour, two world wars, the several exchanges of one set of masters for another, and so on. Yet the incidence of the cults, in particular their high concentration in former New Guinea where Tok Pisin was most used and standardized by missionaries and administrators, shows that other factors may be at work. Also, accounting for the relatively few occurrences in Polynesia and Micronesia, where Tok Pisin is absent, and the Highlands of New Guinea, where the same general social conditions have obtained, presents problems. One answer is that in a cult context the Tok Pisin word kago carries a transcendent sense of final redemption from obligation which the English 'cargo' does not. And this seems to go with the fact that the cults are more frequent where infirm authorities and a shifting leadership give rise to ambiguities of obligation and identity, as in former New Guinea, and rarer where traditional political structures, identities and the loci of authority have persisted in reasonable certainty, as elsewhere in Oceania. See also: Ecstatic Religion; Glossolalia; Melanesian Religions; New Religious Movements; Religious Symbols. Bibliography Burridge K O L 1960 Mambu. Methuen, London 1970 Harper Torchbooks, New York. Princeton University Press, NJ Burridge K O L 1969 New Heaven. New Earth. Basil Blackwell, Oxford Lawrence P 1964/1971 Road Belong Cargo, Manchester University Press, Manchester 21
Language in the Context of Particular Religions Lindstrom L 1990 Knowledge and Power in a South Pacific Society. Smithsonian Institution Press, Washington Steinbauer F 1971 Melanesian Cargo Cults. George Prior, London
Wilson B R 1973 Magic and the Millennium. Harper and Row, New York Worsley P 1957/1968 The Trumpet Shall Sound. MacGibbon and Kee, London
Caribbean Syncretistic Religions 1: Cuban Santeria and Haitian Voodoo C. H. Ribeiro dos Santos
Santeria is the generic term for the religious sects of African origin on the island of Cuba. Yorubas—a corruption of whose ancient name, Ulcumi, is preserved in Cuba as Lucumi—were the predominant group, in spite of the fairly important presence of Bantus (among others, speakers of (Ki)Kongo and Mbundu, as well as a group known in Cuba as Mayombe) and Dahomeans (speakers of Fon-Ewe) in the formation of Cuban culture. This culture is also the result of Spanish colonization, above all in the legacy of its language and of Roman Catholicism. The word santeria refers to the santos 'saints' and the sect's adherents combine devotions to the Orixas (divinities and forces of nature), known as el santo, and to Catholic martyrs in the same ritual. Oshun is associated with the Virgin of la Caridad del Cobre, Yemaya with the Virgin of Regla, Babaluaye with St Lazarus, and Chango with St Barbara. Religious practices of several African ethnic groups are included under the name Santeria. Such rituals are popularly called Regla 'rule,' in the sense of 'sect' or 'religion.' The best known are the following. First, there is the Regla de Ocha or Regla Lucumi, the cultural and linguistic basis of which is Yoruba, consisting fundamentally in the worship of Orixas and of ancestors. Originally the term Santeria was applied to the Regla de Ocha. This religious ceremony is conducted by a priest known as babalocha or santero, and the novices are called iyabo. Second, there is the Regla de Mayombe or Palo Monte. It worships gods (Nkisi) and ancestors (Fumbi) and its main linguistic features are from Kongo. In the course of colonization, the Regla de Mayombe became closely associated with witchcraft. In this sect, the religious heads are called mayomberos or Tata Nkisi. Third, there is the Regla ArdrdDahomey, originating among Fons from the ancient Kingdom of Dahomey (present-day Benin), devotees of divinities called Voduns. Their priests are called bokono. In Cuba, the ceremonies for the dead and ancestors (Eguri) and the oracular rituals invoking the mediation of the god of divination Orumila are of great importance. Fate is revealed by a method of
22
divination (Ifa), carried out by manipulating conch shells, oil palm seeds, and the like. These rituals are more characteristic of the Yorubas, the priest who consults the oracle being known as babalawo, a Yoruba expression meaning 'father of the secret.' Revelations are given by the interpretation of long poems (ltd), dealing with portents of fate, and of legends of the Orixas recited in Yoruba, such legends being called pataki. The bokonos of the Regla Ardrd-Dahomey employ a roughly similar procedure, though the recitations are in the Fon-Ewe language. It is noteworthy that the oral expressions of the followers of Santeria are made up of words in Spanish, Yoruba, Fon-Ewe, and different Bantu languages. However, the use of African languages is quite clear-cut in the caste of initiates. Thus, the higher the level of the celebrant in the hierarchy, the greater is his command of the African language of his sect. In Haiti, a former French colony, the largest groups of Black slave labour who were taken to this island were of Fon origin (tribes from present-day Benin), Bantus (principally from the Congo and Guinea), and Yorubas. Among these ethnic groups Voodoo originated. Voodoo is a mystery religion, and at the same time, it is a word which for the Fons refers to a divinity. Its cultural diversity ensures that its religious observances form a multicolored mosaic of phenomena similar to a kaleidoscope: at each movement it presents a different appearance yet, by the same token, it is almost impossible to say what these appearances have in common. Voodoo also represents a generic religious designation under which different rituals are encountered. First, there is the Radd sect, which worships and honours spirits and divinities of Dahomeyan origin, the latter being also syncretized with Catholic saints. Second, there is Ginen, originating in the beliefs of the Bantus of Guinea, in which good spirits or has are honored. Third, there is Kongo, of Bantu origin. This is one of the least widespread rituals in Haiti, and one of its principal
Caribbean Syncretistic Religions 2 characteristics is the sacrifice of dogs. Fourth, there is Petro, whose divinities are all native to Haiti. This is a sect of national character, in which the so-called has Creoles are worshipped. The existing stereotypical macabre picture of Voodoo is due to Petro, since it is used to cause harm. The singing, prayers and everyday conversation in Voodoo temples or houmfort are conducted in Creole, a mixture of French with African languages, such as Fon-Ewe, Yoruba, and Congo. In the Haitian countryside, the continued use of African languages in Voodoo is more deep-rooted and better preserved. See also: African Traditional Religions; Candomble; Caribbean Syncretistic Religions 2: Jamaican Cumina and Trinidadian Shango; Macumba. Bibliography Alfonso J H 1994 Santeria: Uma Religiao Cubana de Origem Afrieana. In: Moura C E M de (ed.) As Senhoras do Pdssaro da Noite. Edusp, Sao Paulo
Alonso G A 1995 Los Arards en Cuba: Florentina, La Princesa Dahomeyana. Editorial de Ciencias Sociales, La Habana Benedicto I L L 1988 Cuba. Ediciones Anaya, Madrid Cabrera L 1975 El Monte: Notas sobre las Religiones, la Magia, las Superticiones y el Folklore de los Negros Criollos y del Pueblo de Cuba. Ediciones Universal, Miami, FL Chesi G 1980 Voodoo. Perlinger Verlag, Worgl Davis W 1986 A Serpente e o Arco-Iris. Jorge Zahar Editor, Rio de Janeiro Helgueras A L, Salmoral M L 1988 El Caribe. Ediciones Anaya, Madrid Laennec H 1987 O Deus da Resistencia Negra: O Vodu Haitiano. Paulinas, Sao Paulo Laennec H 1993 Les Mysteres du Vaudou. Gallimard, Paris Laennec H 1993 El Barbara Imaginario. Fondo de Cultura Economica, Mexico City Metraux A 1989 Le Vaudou Hai'tien. Gallimard, Paris Price-mars J 1928 Ainsi Parla L'Oncle: Essais D'Ethnografie. Imprimerie de Compiegne, Port-au-Prince Ramos A 1979 As Culturas Negras no Novo Mundo. Companhia Editora Nacional, Sao Paulo
Caribbean Syncretistic Religions 2: Jamaican Cumina and Trinidadian Shango C. H. Ribeiro dos Santos
Jamaica, like the rest of Afro-America, was the birthplace of important religious and cultural phenomena among Blacks whose origins were on African soil but who were slaves for more than three centuries. The predominant ethnic group were the Kromanti of the Gold Coast (present-day Ghana), this name being used in the Americas to include speakers of Fante, Asante (Twi), Ga, and Agona; there were also Bantu cultural influences, principally from the Congo. The island was discovered in 1494 by the Spaniards, who governed it until 1655, when it was captured by an English expedition. Although English is the official language of the country, the majority of the population, especially in the rural central area, speak Creole or Black English, a mixture of African languages with the language of the colonizer. Anglicans and Baptists form the major religious groups and are the official religions recognized by the state; however, beliefs of African origin are extremely widespread. Because of this, on this particular island there is an interesting process of syncretization between Protestant and African religions; this is something different from the rest of Afro-America, almost all of which was colonized by Catholic nations.
Cumina is a religion closely bound up with beliefs about life after death and with the worship of ancestors. It is the product of cultural elements from ethnic groups from the Gold Coast (Fanti-Ashanti), mixed with a Bantu culture, probably from the Congo. In this religion, it is believed that man is endowed with two souls or spirits. One of these, after death, departs to a divine existence, never to return to the world of the living. The other soul, better known and called a duppy, is like a shadow. After death, it remains in the grave with the corpse and can walk about on earth and torment the living. The word duppy seems to be a corruption or Anglicization of the Jamaican word jumbie, itself originating from the Kimbundu nzumbi, meaning 'afflicted spirit' or 'spirit which wanders about to torment the living.' Among the Blacks of the island, it is common to meet proverbs which make reference to duppies, for example, Duppy know who fe frighten in a dark night, that is, 'A duppy knows whom it frightens on a dark night.' It should be pointed out that in Jamaica we still find other Black religious movements, such as Obi or Obeah (associated with black magic, witchcraft, and other anti-social practices), Myalism, Rastafarianism
23
Language in the Context of Particular Religions (which has taken on political and ideological overtones, linked to the advancement of Black culture), Pocomania, and the Convince Cult. In all of these can be seen syncretism between elements of Protestant sects and of African cultures. Trinidad was also colonized by the English. On this island we find Shango as the principal religious movement of African origin. In it the influence of Yoruba culture is predominant, originating from the peoples of present-day Benin and Nigeria. The word shango is the same as the name of the God of Thunder, of a mythical king, and at the same time of a historical person, who was a member of a long dynasty of rulers of the city of Oyo in Nigeria. One section of this cult is syncretized with Catholicism, there being links between the Orixas or Orichas (divinities and forces of nature) and Catholic saints. The other section became fused with Protestant sects, principally Baptists ('the shouters') and Adventists, and various Protestant hymns and customs were introduced into Shango. Practices from spiritualism, too, were introduced into these Afro-american sects. The members of the religious community in general use a patois or dialect that mixes words from Yoruba and English. However, words in French are also used. It is interesting to note that in Shango the altars are called stools. Given the connotations of 'seat,' 'base' and 'support,' a stool can be either an altar or a stone dedicated to a divinity. The culthouse, properly speaking, is known by the French word palais 'palace.' The festivals in honor of the divinities are celebrated on the same days dedicated to the Catholic saints with which the Orixas are associated. Such ceremonies are accompanied by hymns, dances, and sacrifices of animals. In the course of the dancing trances are experienced in which African gods appear. The rituals are conducted by a director, who invokes the spirits to appear in his 'horses,' initiates who embody the Orixas.
The supreme divinity of the cult is Olorun. However, he does not have special rituals, a feature also observed in Africa, Brazil, and Cuba. It is Shango—the God of Thunder, symbolized by a double axe—who gives his name to this religion, since he is the most popular and important Orixa. Leba-Echu is also worshipped; he rules crossroads, roads, and the sexual act. Spirits of infants are also worshipped in the cult of Ibechi (the same Ibeji of the Yorubas), the twins associated with St Cosmo and St Damian, the protectors of children. Various other divinities are worshipped, there being a great similarity between them and the Yoruba gods worshipped in Cuba and Brazil. In Grenada there is also a cult of African origin called Shango, fairly similar to that of Trinidad with, however, rather less elaborate rituals. See also: African Traditional Religions; Candomble; Caribbean Syncretistic Religions 1: Cuban Santeria and Haitian Voodoo; Macumba; Rastafarianism.
Bibliography Fichte H 1987 Etnopoesia—Antropologia Poetica das Religioes Afro-Americanos. Editora Brasiliense. Sao Paulo Franco M D G 1994 Antropologia de lo Sagrado en el Caribe: Culto Obeah en Jamaica. In: Boletin de Antropologia Americana (No. 30), Mexico, diciembre, 134-142 Maia A da Silva 1964 Diciondrio Complementar PortuguesKimbundo-Kicongo. Editorial Missoes, Cucujaes Pollak-eltz A 1972 Cultos Afroomericanos. Universidade Catolica Andres Bello, Caracas Pollak-eltz A El Concepto de Multiples Almas y algunos Ritos Funebres entre los Negros Af roomericanos. Caracas: s/e, s/d Ramos A 1979 As Culturas Negras no Novo Mundo. Companhia Editora Nacional, Sao Paulo
Cao Dai C. Nguyen
Cao Dai is a popular religion that emerged towards the end of the period of French colonialism in South Vietnam. The movement never had any influence in North Vietnam. Cao Dai was 'founded' by a group of French-employed bureaucrats based on the claim of its original leader that in 1920 he had a series of 24
revelations from the Supreme Being (Cao Dai) who referred to himself as 'Ngoc Hoang Thuong De' ('The Jade Emperor Lord on High') or 'Cao Dai Tien Ong Bo Tat Ma Ha Tat' ('The Supreme Immortal Bodhisattva Mahasattva'), a title suggesting the syncretism of Confucianism, Taoism and Buddhism.
Celtic Religion Although presented as a self-styled reformed Buddhism, doctrinally, Cao Dai proposes a syncretistic ideology that represents the convergence and culmination of Eastern and Western religions. The Cao Dai pantheon includes, among others, Shakyamuni Buddha, Lao Tzu, Confucius, Jesus Christ, Socrates, Victor Hugo, Li Po, and Sun Yat-sen. At the center of Cao Dai teachings is the proclamation of the coming of the new era, a third era of general amnesty which would follow the first era of creation and the present era of decline. The Cao Dai teachings consist of a series of words spoken by Cao Dai Tien Ong to his disciples received through a spirit medium. It was imperative that the medium scribe write down faithfully to the minutest detail what was revealed to him. Absolutely no editing was allowed. The revealed words were in Vietnamese, Sino-Vietnamese and occasionally French. Stylistically, they were a mixture of prose and verse. The verses are written in 'Duong Luat' (Tang style) either of the 'that ngon tu tuyet' (four lines, seven syllables to a line) or 'that ngon bat cu' (eight lines, seven syllables to a line) style or the traditional Vietnamese 'luc bat' (a sixsyllable line followed by an eight-syllable line) of various length. Most of them are in colloquial Vietnamese, some are in Sino-Vietnamese—Chinese characters with Vietnamese pronunciation written in the Roman alphabet. The prose part is a mixture of an awkward Sino-Vietnamese and an archaic collo-
quial southern Vietnamese with all its idiosyncrasies. Occasionally, there are mispellings typically of Southern Vietnamese. Since Cao Dai beliefs and practices draw on the main principles of Confucian ethics and popular Taoist/Buddhist tenets, a motley array of technical terms—in Sino-Vietnamese—from these religions are used throughout the canon. Western names are found in their French spellings. For instance, Moise (Moses), St. Jean-Baptiste (St. John the Baptist), Hebreux (Hebrew). Overall, the language of the Cao Dai scriptures is not readily intelligible and sounds hybrid and even comical to outsiders. However, it has become canonical language for the adherents of Cao Dai—the majority of them are Southern Vietnamese. Before the Fall of Saigon (1975) Cao Dai had about over 1 million followers. Nowadays, there are Cao Dai groups among the Vietnamese diaspora, particularly in California. Bibliography Do Van-Ly 1989 Tim Hieu Dao Cao Dai, Vol. I [Understanding the Cao Dai Religion]. Cao Dai Giao Viet Nam Hai Ngoai, Ferris Thanh Ngon Hiep Tuyen va Tan Luat Phap Chanh Truyen [Selected Sacred Words and the New Orthodox Laws]. Reprinted. Toa Thanh Tay Ninh, Tay Ninh, 1985 Vuong Kim 1965 Tan The va Hoi Long Hoa [The End of the World and the Long Hoa Assembly]. Tan Sanh, Saigon
Celtic Religion H. Moisl
The language of pre-Christian Celtic religion was a version of the contemporary Celtic vernacular specialized to the point of obscurity. It was metrical in form, highly metaphorical, self-consciously recondite, and deliberately archaic. To understand why it was so, one has to consider the nature of the priesthood which cultivated it. An identifiably Celtic culture emerged in central Europe round about the fifth century BCE, underwent a period of development and extensive geographical expansion in the centuries which followed, and then disappeared rapidly in the face of Julius Caesar's campaigns of conquest in the first century BCE and the subsequent romanization of Celtic regions. Most of the textual information about the continental Celts of this period conies from Greek and Roman
historians of the first century BCE and the first century CE; vernacular continental Celtic material is limited to a relatively small number of short inscriptions. Thereafter, Celtic culture survived only in peripheral areas of Europe where Roman influence was weak or nonexistent, and which escaped the Germanic settlements which subsequently engulfed the western Empire: Ireland, Scotland, Wales, Cornwall, and Brittany. Textual information about these areas begins to appear with the establishment of the Christian Church, which introduced literacy into the essentially preliterate Celtic culture and thereby made it possible for Celtic oral tradition to be recorded for the first time. Christianity was dedicated to the eradication of what it regarded as a heathen Celtic religion, and it 25
Language in the Context of Particular Religions succeeded rather quickly. But for various reasons the Church did record a substantial amount of information about the old paganism and its priesthood. The Irish material is the earliest and by far the most extensive: it begins ca. 650 CE with law tracts, royal dynastic history and mythological texts, and proliferates rapidly thereafter. The Welsh and Scottish records begin several centuries later and are relatively much sparser; for Cornwall and Brittany virtually nothing survives. For present purposes, therefore, 'Celtic' refers to the continental Celts up to about the first century CE, and to the Irish and Welsh from pre-Christian times into the early medieval centuries. The priests of pre-Christian Celtic religion were the druids. Descriptions of them in Classical, Irish, and Welsh sources correspond in detail, and the account given here is composite. Like any preliterate society, the Celts needed some means of perpetuating the traditions which articulated and maintained their ethnic identity: history, law, mythology, and ritual. The cultivation of such tradition was entrusted to the druids, and in that task they were highly disciplined. Druidical schools existed in which students spent years—Caesar says 20, the Irish 12—memorizing the entire corpus of oral tradition. To aid memorization, the material was in verse form. Actual examples of such verse survive only in the Irish and, to a small extent, in the Welsh historical records. The basic metrical unit is the two-, sometimes three-stress line in which all stressed words alliterate; metrical lines are bound together by alliteration between the final stressed word of one line and the initial stressed word of the line following, which imparts mnemonic continuity. Because, moreover, this material was transmitted over successive generations in a fixed and memorized metrical format, its language tended to remain unchanged and thereby to become archaic relative to the current vernacular. Like any priesthood, the druids' primary function was to mediate between the human and divine spheres. As part of their training, they learned mystical techniques which were intended to give them direct access to their gods, and by virtue of this access they claimed prophetic and magical powers. Divine invocations, prophetic pronouncements and magical spells were all couched in alliterative verse of the kind just described. In keeping with its numinous character, such verse tended to be syntactically convoluted and heavily metaphorical. The druids occupied a socially prestigious and politically influential position by virtue of their learning and claimed mantic powers. The basis of Celtic political organization was tribal. Each tribe was ruled by a king, and each king had a druid in his court whose legally defined status was equal to his own. That status derived from the druid's broadly 26
tripartite function. First, he administered the cult of sacral kingship, which derived royal authority from the sanction of the tribal deity. The druid was custodian of this mythology and associated ritual, and so was able to bestow and reiterate that authority on public occasions. By virtue of his prophetic powers, moreover, the druid advised the king in political matters, and used his claimed magical powers on the king's behalf, particularly to achieve victory in battle. Second, the druid maintained the history of the royal family, and was thus crucial in determining such things as historically based family prerogatives and rights of succession. Third, as custodian of law, the druid oversaw the administration of justice within the tribe, and advised the king in his role as ultimate arbiter. Because the druids occupied their privileged position by virtue of their learning, they were concerned to restrict that learning to themselves. They therefore deliberately accentuated the obscurantist characteristics already mentioned, and further increased its inaccessibility by liberal use of technical and exotic vocabulary. The following verse fragment is characteristic. It comes from the Dindsenchas, a collection of Irish historical and mythological tradition which was almost certainly part of the curriculum in a druidical school. The Eo Rossa of the first line is a waterfall which, in pre-Christian mythology, was regarded as one of the places of contact between the world of men and the Otherworld: Eo Rossa, roth ruirthech, recht flatha, fuaimm tuinne, dech duilib, diriuch dronchrand, dia dronbalc, dorus nime.
Eo Rossa, swift current, outpouring of water, noise of wave, excellent to men, straight firm tree, god vigorous and true, door to the Otherworld.
See also: Archaism; Incantations; Magic; Ogam; Shamanism. Bibliography Cunliffe B 1986 The Celtic World. Crown, New York Ellis P B 1992 Dictionary of Celtic Mythology. Constable, London Ellis P B 1994 The Druids. Constable, London Ellis P B 1998 The Ancient World of the Celts. Constable, London Green M 1986 The Gods of the Celts. Alan Sutton, Gloucester Green M 1992 Dictionary of Celtic Myth and Legend. Thames and Hudson, London Green M 1995 The Celtic World. Routledge, London Green M 1997 Exploring the World of the Druids. Thames and Hudson, London 6 Croinin D 1995 Early Medieval Ireland, 400-1200. Longman, London
Christianity in Africa
Christian Science D. Treacy-Cole
Founded in the nineteenth century by a New England woman, Christian Science is described in and distinguished by its unique textbook Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, first published in 1875. Audacious and radical, the language in Science and Health is described by its author, Mary Baker Eddy, as original, and decried by her detractors as incomprehensible. Eddy struggled to find both terminology and a grammatical style to communicate her theology, often resorting to metaphorical language in the tradition of biblical writing. She employed a system of capitalization to distinguish seven synonymous terms (viz., Mind, Spirit, Soul, Principle, Life, Truth, Love) used 'to express the nature, essence and wholeness of Deity' (Eddy 2000: 465). Critics accused Eddy of repetitiveness and circularity in her writing. However, a recent biographer points out that postmodernist and feminist critical theory do not necessarily consider non-linearity a failing (Gill 1998: 218). Objections to Eddy's style may be attributable to what has been called an oracular treatment of great theological themes, rather
than the more common rationalistic and philosophical treatises of male theologians. In an era that viewed the Christian God in patriarchal terms, Eddy emphasized God's motherhood. In her spiritual interpretation of the opening 'Our Father' of the Lord's Prayer, she offered 'Our Father-Mother God.' From the third edition of Science and Health published in 1881 through the fifteenth edition of 1885 Eddy went even further, using the feminine pronoun for God, although she subsequently reverted to the masculine form. Science and Health also includes a glossary of 125 biblical terms. In some cases the original Hebrew or Greek word is mentioned, although the definitions correspond with Eddy's metaphysical interpretation of the subject. See also: Feminism. Bibliography Eddy M B 2000 Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures. The Writings of Mary Baker Eddy, Boston Gill G 1998 Mary Baker Eddy. Perseus Books, Reading, MA
Christianity in Africa A. Hastings
The involvement of the Christian churches in issues of language has been central both to the modern linguistic history of sub-Saharan Africa and to the life of the churches themselves. Apart from Swahili in the east and Fulfulde and two or three others in the more islamicized west, none of the languages of SubSaharan Africa had been given a written form prior to the coming missionaries. 1. Early Missionary Translation Work The earliest extant Bantu text is a lengthy catechism in Portuguese and Kongo produced by the Jesuit Mattheus Cardoso and printed in Lisbon in 1624. This, a subsequent Kongo dictionary by a Capuchin, Georges de Geel, and a grammar produced by another Capuchin, Giacinto Brugiotti da Vetralla in 1659, are immensely valuable for Bantu linguistic history. The last includes the Bantu noun-class and
concord system. Unfortunately the Catholic missionaries of that era produced little work in any other language. It was the nineteenth-century Protestant missionaries with their far higher conviction of the necessity of Bible translation who produced a mass of linguistic work—the production of dictionaries, grammars, and biblical texts for scores of languages in every part of Africa. The pioneering work of Krapf in the east, van der Kemp, Moffat, Applevard, and Colenso in the south and Raban Schon, and Crowther in the west—to name but a few from the early and middle years of the nineteenth century—stands for a vastly larger undertaking which has as yet received no adequate historical survey. In almost every African language with a written literature missionaries have been responsible for the basic work and, indeed, for most subsequent published literature as well, except in a handful of the 27
Language in the Context of Particular Religions larger languages. The vast multiplicity of African languages and the policy of most colonial and postcolonial governments to use English, French, or Portuguese for educational purposes mean that (apart from some score of languages such as Yoruba, Swahili, Shona, and Ganda) there is still little, if anything, of any extent published in most languages except for church purposes. 2. Missionary Imposition of a Dialect as a Language Missionaries could not, of course, have done this work without African collaborators who had themselves first learnt English. Inevitably the precise language canonized by missionaries, in the first dictionaries and New Testaments, was the dialect used by their assistants. As all languages inevitably varied geographically, so that it is indeed open to argument how far any specific language actually existed prior to its precise missionary-constructed form, the language of missionary literature represents in every case the particular local form in which the missionary's assistants were at home. Once printed it was, however, essential that it be used across a wider area in which people were much less at home with it. The missionary approach had mistakenly assumed a degree of linguistic uniformity which in fact it had rather to impose. This produced inevitable tensions and at times rebellions. Moreover, other missionaries working in the same general languages area but some distance away inevitably absorbed different dialectical forms. Missionaries certainly revised their translations as their language knowledge improved, but Africans had also to some extent to relearn their languages when they studied the Scriptures or other works in mission schools. Moreover, tensions between different forms of a language as fixed by a range of different missionary translations (so that, for instance, Protestant and Catholic Baganda could divide linguistically as well as theologically) continued for decades, at least until the 1930s or later when colonial governments insisted on standardized forms for state-assisted schools. Even then imposed uniformity such as 'Union Igbo' was not easily accepted. The missionary preoccupation with the vernacular written word was quickly taken over by leading African Christians. The Reverend John Raban's initial work on Yoruba was continued by the Yoruba schoolteacher, and later bishop, Samuel Ajayi Crowther who made a major linguistic contribution in his recognition of the essential role of tone in Yoruba, Nupe, and other Nigerian languages. In southern Africa, the Presbyterian minister, Tiyo Soga, the translator of Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress into Xhosa, died in 1871 while at work on the Acts of the Apostles. While some missionaries and African Christians, such as Schon and Crowther, were undoubtedly outstanding precisely as students of language, their primary preoccupation to translate as
28
quickly as possible as much biblical and Christian literature as they could often, it must be said, weakened their achievement precisely as linguists. 3. The Name of God For missionaries, the great question was a practical and pedagogical one: how far could they find suitable words already in existence for the special things they wished to teach about, how far had they instead to invent words in which to do so? In the latter case, how were they to arrive at the words they needed? It is striking that in the large majority of African languages, missionaries were content to use an existing vernacular name for the all-important name of God. In some places, at least at first, they felt unable to do this and imported foreign names like Dio or Godi. But these were exceptional and mostly short-lived. For the greater part, they became convinced that Africans had already sufficient belief in a single almighty spirit for it to be possible to adopt an African name for such a spirit to use for the biblical and Christian Yahweh, the Father of Jesus. Thus in East Africa, Mungu, Mulungu, or Ruhanga; in central Africa Lesa or Nzambi; in southern Africa Molimo all came—among many other names—to be used. In Zimbabwe, there were long hesitations among some over the use of Mwari—in this case because of its localized cult. It is noticeable that in many cases these names had already obtained a considerable degree of intertribal currency, in some cases overshadowing more local names. It seems clear that missionaries preferred words with the wider usage. 4. Other Key Christian Terms This seems true for a wide range of religious terms. As missionaries advanced from one people to another, they inevitably carried words, especially key words, across intertribal boundaries. They did this particularly in eastern Africa in the early years with regard to Swahili. While Swahili is basically a Bantu language, it has incorporated a very large number of Arabic words, including especially religious words. Despite their Muslim origin, these seemed, with their theistic character and biblical links, ideal for missionary use. Hence words like eddini, essala, in/Hi, kanisa ('religion,' 'prayer,' 'gospel,' 'church') were imported into many other inland Bantu languages from Swahili. They seemed to fill a gap, while avoiding the importation of purely European words to which many missionaries were driven in other circumstances, when no suitable vernacular word was discovered for some major Christian concept. However, a later generation of missionaries found this dependence upon Swahili regrettable, perhaps because of its apparent Muslim connotations, and in several languages such words
Christianity in Africa were systematically eliminated if alternatives could be found. 'Gospel' and 'baptize' are typical cases. The root meaning of the one is 'good news,' of the other 'wash' or 'sprinkle,' but each has turned in Christian usage almost into a proper name. Many early missionaries (Catholics especially) were unwilling simply to find a vernacular phrase meaning 'good news' or 'wash' and render the words in this way. Hence vernacular Christian doctrinal texts could be peppered with strange-sounding terms, transliterations of Greek, Latin, or English. The tendency now is to eliminate these in favor of genuinely local words. 5. Muzitnu and Nganga In other cases, traditional words with a religious connotation were available but were avoided just because it seemed the wrong connotation. Words for 'spirit' are probably the clearest case. Missionaries were most anxious not to let the 'Holy Spirit' become identified with, or understood in terms of, the 'spirits' of traditional religion, especially spirits of the dead, which frequently possessed the living. Hence nearly everywhere the typical Bantu spirit word muzimu was rejected. Again, the almost universally used term throughout Bantu Africa for a priest, diviner, or medium nganga, was regarded as unusable for a Christian minister in the nineteenth century and since. The nganga became, instead, the stereotype of the pagan 'witchdoctor' against whose influence Christianity is battling. This is interesting because missionaries in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries willingly described themselves as 'nganga'. These are two cases in which the linguistic challenge of assimilation still remains to be met. 6. The Fluidity of Word Meanings What seems clear is that language usage in nonliterate societies is far more fluid than might be imagined. It is less a matter of finding the right word than making it right by regular usage. Existing words had the flexibility of all language and missionaries could anyway not know how reliable were their informants. Words (and not only the name of God) moved easily across language groups in precolonial Africa. Missionary importations and adaptations were nothing new. Once a word was adopted, used in a certain way in scriptures, hymns, and sermons, it easily acquired the meaning now given it whether it had it before or not. Within a generation or so nonChristians too could be using it the missionary way. Thus, for instance, even where missionaries mistakenly adopted for 'God' a local name which had really belonged to a culture hero of quite limited importance (e.g., the Nyakyusa Kyali), the new missionary content for the word quickly became a normative one, recognized by all but the antiquarian.
7. The Lasting Language Impact of Missionary Translations
In the scores of African languages which have possessed a Bible, a hymn-book, a catechism for 50 to 100 years, but still very little more in the way of written literature, these books with their specific vocabulary and the meanings of the words which the content of the Bible and Christian tradition impose upon them may now be near the heart of living language usage. Rather little in that vocabulary was formally imported, but the conversion of traditional words to new meanings has effectively taken place. Nevertheless, the new meanings have not simply obliterated old meanings. African religion in most places is now an integrated mix of the traditional with the Christian (or the Islamic). That mix is one of concept, of ritual, and also, inevitably, of linguistic meaning. Moreover, the process described above has not proceeded everywhere at the same rate or gone so far. In some languages it began considerably later than in others. In many smaller languages little of scripture has even now been printed. Much has depended too on how skilled linguistically early missionaries were. In some places they did indeed master the language, translate intelligibly, preach eloquently, and in a way impose their meanings upon it. In others, missionaries were unable to do this. Their linguistic ability was simply inadequate. They preached through poorly trained interpreters and remained so marginal to the vernacular culture that what translations they produced had little impact upon its world of meaning. The very fact that schooling was in English or French might actually protect vernacular meanings from the impact of Western Christian verbal imperialism. Nevertheless, in most rural areas where Christian churches have been actively at work and (as in the case of most countries of Africa south of the Equator) now have a majority of the population considering itself Christian, biblical literature and a Christian interpretation of religious words may be almost has central to vernacular culture as was the King James version and its vocabulary specific to the culture of preindustrial Britain. See also: African Traditional Religions; Missionaries; Bible Translations, Modern Period; Islam in Africa. Bibliography Bontinck F, Ndembe Nsasi D 1978 Le Catechisme Kikongo de 1624. Rendition critique, Brussels Coldham G 1966 A Bibliography of Scriptures in African Languages Doke C M 1967 The Southern Bantu Languages. International African Institute, London Fabian J 1986 Language and Colonial Power: The Appropriation of Swahili in the Former Belgian Congo, 1880-1938. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge
29
Language in the Context of Particular Religions Hair P E H 1967 The Early Study of Nigerian Languages. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge Hastings A 1989 The choice of words for Christian meanings in eastern Africa. In: African Catholicism. SCM Press, London
Rowling F, Wilson C 1923 Bibliography of African Christian Literature Samarin W 1986 Protestant missions and the history of Lingala. Journal of Religion in Africa 16(2): 138-63
Christianity in East Asia J. H. Grayson
1. China
The history of Christianity in China began with the establishment of the Nestorian Church during the T'ang Dynasty (618-907 CE) by missionaries and priests from Mesopotamia and the Near East who arrived in China in the year 635 and afterwards. In 638, the first of these missionaries, a Persian priest known in Chinese as Alopen (Abraham) is said to have written in Chinese an outline of the teaching of Christ entitled Hsu-ting Mi-shih-so Ching (The Gospel of Jesus the Messiah) which was a condensation of and exposition on St Matthew's Gospel. In 781, a great stela, inscribed in Chinese and Persian known latterly as the 'Nestorian Monument,' was erected in the T'ang capital, Ch'angan. Rediscovered by Roman Catholic missionaries in 1625, the stela is a primary document of the history and progress of the Nestorian Church (see Chinese: Translation of Theological Terms). Following the collapse of the T'ang state, Nestorian Christianity survived mainly amongst the 'barbarian' peoples to the north of China. During the Mongol or Yuan Empire (1234-1368), which encouraged various religious traditions within their vast domains, the Nestorian Church again flourished within the bounds of the Chinese empire, although largely amongst non-Chinese peoples. Also at that time, embassies from Europe to the Mongol court included priests or friars, and the first Roman Catholic missionary to arrive in China was the Italian Franciscan John of Montecorvino (sent after 1272, died before 1333), who translated the New Testament into Mongolian. An organized church was created with dioceses and an archdiocese located in the Mongol capital, Khanbalik, but this did not survive the collapse of the Mongol Empire in 1368 because the church was largely composed of nonChinese members, has no native clergy, and was overly dependent on imperial patronage. Permanent missionary work in China recommenced in 1573 with the arrival of the Jesuits, notably Matteo Ricci (1552-1610), who attempted to express Christian concepts through Chinese culture. 30
The Jesuits were later joined by Franciscans and Dominicans who took a different view on 'The Term Question' concerning the appropriate word for the Supreme Being, and 'The Rites Controversy' over the propriety of Christian attendance at Confucian ancestral rituals. In 1773, the Jesuit order was suppressed by Papal command, a result of this interorder struggle, and the right to mission work in China given to the Paris Missionary Society. Because the Roman Catholic Church traditionally emphasized the teaching of doctrine over scriptural study, translation of the Bible did not form a significant part of Catholic missionary endeavor before the early nineteenth century, although part of the New Testament was translated into Manchu in the seventeenth century. A number of apologetic works in Chinese were published. Most important of these was the Tien-hsiieh Shih-lu ('The True Doctrine of the Holy Religion') by Matteo Ricci in 1595, revised in 1601 as the T'ien-chu Shih-i ('The True Doctrine of the Lord of Heaven'), which had an enormous influence in China, Korea, and Japan. The Lord's Prayer, Ave Maria, and the Apostles' Creed were also translated at an early stage, and then somewhat later the breviary, the missal, Aquinas's 'Summa Theologiae,' Thomas a Kempis's The Imitation of Christ,' and St Ignatius of Loyola's 'Spiritual Exercises' and several other liturgical and theological works. Both Protestant and Roman Catholic missions expanded rapidly in China after the signing of the unequal treaties which concluded the 'Opium Wars' of 1839-44. Imperial edicts of toleration enabled the expansion of missions and the growth of the Protestant and Catholic churches. By the end of the nineteenth century there were over 530,000 Roman Catholics and 52,000 Protestants. Because of the priority placed on Scripture, the first work undertaken by the earliest Protestant missionaries was the translation of the Bible into Chinese. The New Testament was first translated into a crude form of Chinese by Joshua Marshman (1768-1837) and others in Serampore, India in 1811,
Christianity in East Asia and the Old Testament by 1823. The finest early translation of the complete Bible was produced in Malacca by Robert Morrison (1782-1834) with the assistance of Robert Milne (1785-1822) in 1819. Morrison also prepared a valuable Chinese-English dictionary, and Chinese versions of the Church of Scotland Shorter Catechism and an abbreviated form of the Book of Common Prayer of the Church of England. Bible translation continued to be one of the major efforts by Protestant missionaries throughout the nineteenth century. It was not only important to perfect the literary style and accuracy of the earlier translations, but it was also necessary to create translations which would be understandable to ordinary people rather than to the educated elite. A further problem was the translation of the Bible into the various 'dialects' (in reality different regional languages) of China. Like their Roman Catholic predecessors, early Protestant missionaries were also concerned about the selection of correct theological terms, especially the correct term for 'God' (see Chinese: Translation of Theological Terms). Among the interesting techniques utilized by the missionaries was the transliteration of some of the southern coastal 'dialects' using Roman letters, rather than translation using Chinese characters. This was done both to facilitate literacy amongst the largely illiterate population and to represent words in those 'dialects' for which there were no Chinese characters. The first attempt at a union Bible translation was made with the selection of a group of scholarly missionaries from various societies, The Delegates, who produced a common version of the New Testament in 1850. Unresolved questions of translation method prevented the Old Testament committee from producing a common translation. Two versions were produced, one more literary in form in 1853, and another in a more popular form in 1862. From the 1870s on, notable attempts were made to produce good translations in the Mandarin dialect of the north, and an easier form of the literary style called 'easy Wen-li.' By 1895, there were reported to be 10 missionary printing agencies to further literary mission work, and by the end of the missionary period in 1949, the Bible had been translated into 27 distinct Chinese 'dialects,' languages, or literary styles using Chinese characters, Roman letters, two different Chinese phonetic scripts, and a mixed script of Chinese characters and phonetic script. Following the collapse of the Ch'ing Dynasty (1616-1912) and its society, many young Chinese turned to Christianity as a source of hope for the future of their country, and the number of Christians increased both numerically and in percentage representation within the population during the first half of the twentieth century. By 1949, there were over
3,500,000 Roman Catholics and 700,000 Protestants, forming roughly 1 percent of the Chinese population. This growth had been achieved under conditions of great economic hardship, foreign invasion, and civil war. In 1949, the Communist regime abolished all religious bodies formed by free association and created bodies subservient to the central, provincial, and local governments. The Three-Self Patriotic Movement and the Patriotic Catholic Movement had responsibility for Protestant and Catholic Christians respectively until the Cultural Revolution (1966-76) when churches and all other places of worship were closed. Since 1979 the practice of religion has again been permitted and places of worship have been reopened. The main division in contemporary Chinese Christianity would appear to be between the officially sanctioned churches of the patriotic associations, and the semi-underground churches of the house church movement. By the mid-1990s, there may have been as many as six million Christians associated with the latter body and up to five times that many in the former grouping. The translation of the Bible into Chinese still remains an important linguistic undertaking, the most notable recent example being the version based upon the Good News for Modern Man translation issued in 1975. As a result of the increased toleration of religion after the Cultural Revolution, the Three-Self Movement and its associated China Christian Council have acquired modern printing presses which have been used to produce hundreds of thousands of copies of the Bible in Chinese. Modern translations into the languages of the minority peoples of China include New Testaments in the Kalmuk dialect of Mongolian (in the Mongolian script, 1815 and 1897), in Literary Mongolian (using the Manchu script, 1846 and 1952), in Manchu (1835), and in Tibetan (1903 and 1948). Parts of the New Testament were translated into the Khalka dialect of Mongolian (1872) and the Buriat dialect of Mongolian in the Cyrillic script (1909 and 1912). 2. Korea Although knowledge of Christianity and Western customs was available to the Korean scholarly class from the early seventeenth century on, there appears to have been no missionary contact or Christian influence on Korea until the late eighteenth century. In the winter of 1777, a group of Korean scholars gathered to study Matteo Ricci's Tien-chu Shih-i. In 1784 one of their number went to Peking with a royal embassy, and was baptized. Upon his return, he began to evangelize and baptize his friends so that by the time the first missionary, a Chinese priest, arrived in 1795, there were 4,000 believers. But with the death of the tolerant King Chongjo in 1800, an edict to
31
Language in the Context of Particular Religions suppress the 'pernicious superstition' was promulgated and until the 1880s, the history of the Roman Catholic Church in Korea was one of persecution and martyrdom. The first Western missionaries from the Paris Missionary Society entered Korea in 1836, but the Church had to remain underground for fear of persecution. By the end of the nineteenth century, the Catholic Church had become primarily a church of the lower and outcaste classes of society. The establishment of diplomatic relations with Western nations in the 1880s brought the Hermit Kingdom into intercourse with the outside world and religious toleration was permitted. The Catholic Church began to come out from its ghetto, and Protestant missionaries established schools, a university, and hospitals which attracted large numbers of young progressive Koreans. At this time, mission schools created and helped to propagate new scientific and technical terms which were required for a Western-style academic curriculum. The first Korean translation of the New Testament by John Ross (1842-1915), completed in 1887, not only was instrumental in the initiation of Protestant Christianity in Korea, but through its exclusive use of the indigenous Korean alphabet, disdained by the Confucian literati, had a profound effect on Korean literature and education. The alphabet, which Ross saw as the perfect tool for Christian evangelism, is today the symbol of Korean nationalism. Ross's choice of theological terms, especially his use of the native term for the 'High God,' Hananim, influenced every subsequent translation. Later translations were usually printed in a mixed script of Chinese characters and Korean letters rather than solely in the Korean script as Ross had preferred. There are two contemporary translations of the Bible, the more colloquial Common Translation (1978) and the New Standard Version (1993) which is more traditional in style. Both of these translations use only the Korean alphabet and not Chinese characters. Other early missionary translation work includes the outstanding contribution of James Scarth Gale (1863-1938) who translated John Bunyan's 'Pilgrim's Progress' into Korean, and compiled a 'Korean-English Dictionary' which is the basis for all subsequent works of its type. As the singing of hymns is an important aspect of Protestant worship, it is not surprising to learn that by 1896 there were at least three different hymnals in use. However, ecumenical cooperation was early encouraged and since 1905, there has been only one hymnal in use throughout the Protestant denominations. Under Japanese rule (1910-45), Korean nationalism and Protestant Christianity became closely linked. In the 1930s, Protestant Christian refusal to participate in the worship conducted at Shinto shrines in Korea, lead to the persecution and, in a few instances, the death of Christians. The Catholic 32
Church, because of the Concordat signed between the Vatican and Japan, accepted participation in Shinto rites as a 'patriotic act.' Liberation from Japanese rule led to the division of the Korean peninsula into American and Soviet zones of influence, the Republic of Korea in the south, and the Democratic People's Republic of Korea in the north. In the north, as in China, the government suppressed free religious associations and created bodies directly controlled by the government. In the south, religious bodies were permitted to form freely and Protestant and Roman Catholic Christianity have both seen spectacular increases in membership. Ten million people, approximately one quarter of the population, are Christians. By the mid1990s, there were more than two million Catholics and eight million Protestants, largely Presbyterians and Methodists. The situation in the north is hard to assess. Since 1987, delegations representing the Christian community there have traveled abroad, and two Protestant churches and a Catholic church have been built and opened for worship. Claims are made that there are 10,000 Catholic and 10,000 Protestant believers, but as northern Korea was the heartland of Korean Protestant Christianity before Communism, it is conceivable that, if there is an underground church, its size may be many times larger than that. 3. Japan Christianity was brought to Japan in 1549 by St Francis Xavier (1506-56). Under the supervision of Xavier, the Gospel of St Matthew and the Catechism were translated and devotional literature was written. Christianity was suppressed ruthlessly throughout the Tokugawa shogunate (1603-1867) and these materials were destroyed. With the collapse of the shogunate, and the opening of Japan to the West, Christian mission work was again possible, and nineteenth-century Roman Catholic missionaries discovered underground Christian communities which had maintained their faith for over 200 years. Protestant missionaries also arrived in 1859 and by the end of the nineteenth century, it seemed possible that Japan might become a 'Christian country,' such was the reception given to the new religion by the educated elite. By 1880, the first complete translation of the New Testament appeared (revised 1917) and in 1888, the Japanese Old Testament was published, which remained the standard Protestant Bible for nearly 50 years. Colloquial Japanese translations of the New Testament appeared in 1953 and 1955, and the ecumenical Common Bible in 1978. Japan did not become Christian in part as a result of the revival of Shinto and the connection which was made by the government between adherence to Shinto rituals and nationalism. Throughout the first
Christianity in Europe half of the twentieth century, the Church was often treated with suspicion by the government, especially during the era of military governments in the late 1920s to the mid-1940s. It was during this era that the various Protestant denominations were 'Japanized' by amalgamating them into one government supported group, the Kyodan. The Catholic Church was likewise 'Japanized' by the removal of all foreigners in authority. Although the impact of the Church on Japanese society has been relatively small, the Christian churches have produced some outstanding persons in the areas of the arts, letters, and philosophy, notably Uchimura Kanzo (1860-1930) and Kagawa Toyohiko (1886-1960). Following the conclusion of World War II, contrary to expectations, the Christian percentage of the population remained at about 0.8 percent until the early 1980s, when there was a remarkable increase until it represented about 1 percent of the population in the early 1990s. A significant difference between the Korean and Japanese churches is that Japanese Christians have tended to be more intellectual and less evangelical than their Korean neighbors. See also: Chinese: Translation of Theological Terms; Ricci, M.; Ross, J.; Korean; Missionaries.
Bibliography Gary O 1976 A History of Christianity in Japan: Roman Catholic, Greek Orthodox and Protestant Missions. C. E. Tuttle, Rutland, VT Clark D N 1986 Christianity in Modern Korea. University Press of America, Lanham, MD Grayson J H 1989 Korea: A Religious History. Oxford University Press, Oxford Jennes J 1959 History of the Catholic Church in Japan from Its Beginnings to the Early Meiji Period, 1549-1873: A Short Hand-book. Committee of the Apostolate, Tokyo Lambert T 1991 The Resurrection of the Chinese Church. Hodder & Stoughton, London Latourette K S 1929 A History of Christian Missions in China. SPCK, London Latourette K S 1939^5 A History of the Expansion of Christianity, vol. 5. Eyre and Spottiswoode, London Lee S K 1971 The Cross and the Lotus. The Christian Study Centre on Chinese Religion and Culture, Hong Kong Paik L-G G 1971 The History of Protestant Missions in Korea: 1832-1910. Yonsei University Press, Seoul Whelan C 1996 The Beginning of Heaven and Earth: The Sacred Book of Japan's Hidden Christians. Hawai'i University Press, Honolulu Zetzsche J O 1999 The Bible in China: The History of the Union Bible or the Culmination of Protestant Bible Translation in China. Monumentica Sericam Institute, Sankt Augustin
Christianity in Europe J. F. A. Sawyer
Despite its Near Eastern origins within the context of ancient Judaism, the dominant language of early Christianity was a European language. Many Jews were Greek-speakers, and the Hebrew scriptures had been translated into koine Greek (see Bible Translations, Ancient Versions) long before the time of Christ. To these were added the Gospels, Paul's Letters, and the rest of what later became Christian scripture, all originally written in Greek. Even the Coptic, Syriac, and later Arabic varieties of Christianity were strongly influenced by Greek. The shift from Jerusalem to Greece and Rome, represented already in the life and work of the Apostle Paul and described in the Book of Acts, was thus from a linguistic point of view less significant than might appear at first sight, and the rapid spread of Christianity through the Roman Empire, mostly among the lower classes of society, more understandable. By the end of the fourth century, Christianity had become the official religion of the Roman Empire. The final split between the Western Church under the Papacy at Rome and the Eastern or Orthodox
Church, with its center until 1453 at Byzantium/ Constantinople, took place in the eleventh century. In the sixteenth century, European Christianity was further fragmented by the Protestant Reformation, and at about the same time began to spread in its various forms to North America, Latin America, Africa, and Asia. Latin was the sole liturgical language of Western Christianity until the Reformation, and continued to hold this position in the Roman Catholic Church until the Second Vatican Council in 1962-65 which encouraged the use of the vernacular in the mass (see Church Latin). The Eastern Orthodox Church, in contrast, familiar with established Syrian and Armenian traditions, did not insist on linguistic uniformity, and it was with the blessing of Constantinople that Ulfilas (see Wulfild) (ca. 311-83 CE), originally from Cappadocia in Asia Minor, invented the Gothic alphabet and translated the Bible into Gothic for his mission to eastern Europe. It was an Eastern emperor, too, who commissioned Cyril (826-69) to take the Gospel to the Slavs, 33
Language in the Context of Particular Religions for whom he invented the Glagolitic script, based on the Greek alphabet, and wrote his Slavonic translation of the Bible (see Cyril and Methodius; Old Church Slavonic; Church Slavonic). The influence of the Church on the Slavonic languages can still be seen in the use of the Cyrillic alphabet in Russia, Bulgaria, and Serbia, which are historically Orthodox, in contrast to the use of the Roman alphabet in Catholic regions like Poland, Czechoslovakia, and Croatia. By far the most influential among the other European Bible translations are Martin Luther's German Bible (see Luther, Martin) and the 'Authorized Version' of King James (1611). 1. Conservatism Out of respect for tradition, the languages and language varieties used by the Church in Europe as elsewhere, especially in the liturgy, are mostly characterized by conservatism which separates them from everyday language. The retention of Latin by the Roman Catholic Church throughout the world until the latter part of the twentieth century is the most obvious example, and corresponds to the use of Arabic in Islam and Hebrew in Judaism. The first of the Vatican II documents, published in 1963, acknowledges that 'the use of the vernacular in the Mass... may frequently be of great advantage to the people' and authorizes translations from the Latin 'approved by the competent territorial ecclesiastical authorities.' Similar concerns have led to the publication of numerous new translations of the Bible, official and unofficial, in every European language. Conservative opposition to these developments, due as a rule to a mixture of theological, aesthetic, and political factors, and rearguard actions of various kinds, have never been lacking. Reactions to vernacular translations range from the violence that led in the sixteenth century to the execution of the Bible translator, William Tyndale, in 1536 and the break-up of the Roman Catholic Church in Europe, to sardonic comments like that of Thomas Hobbes: 'After the Bible was translated into English, every man, nay, every boy and wench that could read English, thought they spoke with God Almighty and understood what he said.' The 'Tridentine Mass' movement led by the rebel Archbishop Lefebvre, and the 'High Church' Anglican 'Prayerbook Society,' dedicated to preserving the use of the 1661 Book of Common Prayer, are twentieth-century examples. In most English-speaking varieties of Christianity, however, archaic forms like thou, thee, and ye have now been dropped, except, significantly, in the 'Lord's Prayer' and the 'Hail Mary' (see Prayer). Much traditional biblical and liturgical language which was borrowed, via Latin, from Ancient Hebrew and Greek, has also been abandoned. Thus, for example, modern vernacular translations no
34
longer preserve English Hebraisms like all flesh 'all mortals,' children of Israel 'Israelites,' beast of the field 'wild animals,' and with thy spirit 'and also with you,' and the bowels of Christ 'Christ's compassion.' A few words of Greek (notably Kyrie Eleison 'Lord, have mercy') and Hebrew (e.g., Hosanna 'give victory'; Hallelujah 'Praise the Lord') still survive, as do a number of simple Latin hymns and chants popularized by the international and ecumenical Taize community in France (see Hymns). 2. Sectarianism and Prejudice Divisions within the Church are clearly reflected in language variation. In Britain, a Catholic priest lives in a presbytery and an Anglican in a vicarage or a rectory, while a Protestant minister lives in a manse, and for Presbyterians a presbytery is not a building at all, but one of the Church councils. Catholics go to mass on Sunday with their missals, Anglicans go to church with their prayer books. The distinctions and many others, such as that between Roman Catholic Derry and Protestant Londonderry, can be a matter of life and death in a situation like that in Northern Ireland in the late twentieth century. Until the Act of Union in 1800, Irish Gaelic was associated with Roman Catholicism, while English was the language of the powerful, landowning Protestant settlers, including the Scots in Ulster, and even today IRA graffiti are often in Irish. Sectarian conflict has spawned many terms, such as papist 'Roman Catholic' and proddie 'Protestant,' and some, like Roman candle, a type of firework burnt on Guy Fawkes night, have an obvious and gruesome origin in the history of persecution in England, even though this is no longer known to most people. The history of the Church's attitude to Jews in Europe has been characterized by prejudice and hatred, frequently erupting into persecution, and, since the Holocaust, attempts have been made in the Protestant and Catholic Churches, though not so far in the Eastern Orthodox Church, to remove or reword some of the blatantly antisemitic language of the Good Friday liturgy, including the 1661 prayer for 'Jews, Turks, and infidels,' and to revise some passages in the Gospels where the Greek word for 'the Jews' can arguably be translated 'the Judaeans' or even, in some contexts, 'the people.' The term 'Old Testament,' however, is still used, often unthinkingly, in such expressions as 'Old Testament ethics' and 'the God of the Old Testament,' which tend to denigrate Judaism and perpetuate traditional antisemitic attitudes. The language of the Church has also been affected by the changing role and status of women. In 1983, the Methodist Church in the UK published a hymnbook which 'takes equal account of the place of both women and men in the Church.' omitting or altering such compositions as 'Rise up, O men of
Christianity in Iran and Central Asia God.' In the ecumenical 'New Revised Standard Version' of the Bible (published in 1991) 'inclusiveness has been attained by simple rephrasing or by introducing plural forms.' Female images of God are now common in the language of worship and theological discourse, especially that of God as Mother, for which the authority of a number of scriptural passages can be cited (e.g., Deuteronomy 32: 18; Isaiah 42: 14), and a Trinity of 'Mother, Lover, and Friend' has been introduced as an alternative to the patriarchal 'Father, Son, and Holy Spirit' (McFague 1987). As expressions like 'my brothers and sisters,' 'men and women,' and 'humankind' become more frequent and more accepted in the liturgy, it will become harder to retain relics of the past, such as 'for us men and our salvation,' which is still current in modern translations of the Nicene Creed. 3. Influences on Secular Language
Christian beliefs and practices have left their mark on many aspects of secular vocabulary, even though their original Christian connection has long since been forgotten, from the commonest personal names like John and Joanna (cf. Gaelic Iain, German Johann, Johannes, or Hans, French Jean and Jeanne, Italian Giovanni, Spanish Juan and Juanita, Greek loannes, Russian Ivan, Hungarian Janos: see Names: Religious Beliefs), to hundreds of items of vocabulary. These include not only specifically religious terms like French Pdques 'Easter' (from Greek pascha, Hebrew pesah) and bishop (cf. French eveque, Greek episkopos), but also common everyday words like ladybird (cf. German Marienkdfer, Spanish vaca de San Anton, French bete a bon Dieu). The days of the week in the European languages present an interesting variety, clearly related to the differing degrees of success among the indigenous cultures in withstanding the influence of Christianity. Thus in English and other Germanic languages they bear the names of the sun, the moon, and the five planets, called after the deities Tewis, Wotan, Thor, Freya, Saturn, and have no Christian associations at all (although in some very religious communities the Lord's Day or the Sabbath is preferred to Sunday). Greek, on the other hand, following Jewish and
biblical tradition, uses the ordinal numerals 2-5 for 'Monday' to Thursday,' and the specifically religious terms paraskeue 'preparation,' sabbaton 'sabbath,' and kuriake 'the Lord's Day' for Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. Some Latin languages compromise with a combination of both systems, Christian and preChristian, by calling 'Sunday' the Lord's day (French dimanche, Italian domenica, Spanish domingo), and using the names of the moon and planets, called after the Roman deities Mars, Mercury, etc., for the rest of the week: French lundi, mardi, etc., Italian lunedi, martedi, etc. The Russian for Sunday, Voskresenye, literally '(the day of) the resurrection,' survived 70 years of official atheism. In a number of countries, including England, Christian language and beliefs have a privileged status not afforded to other religions, in that they are protected by blasphemy laws (see Blasphemy). Through the global activities of Christian missionaries from the sixteenth century on, who to begin with believed it to be their right and duty to impose their own beliefs and practices wherever they worked, it was European Christianity and with it some extraordinarily influential European Christian languages, especially English, Dutch, French, Spanish, and Portuguese, that established itself in many other parts of the world, including, ironically, Western Asia where it originated. See also: Christian Views on Language; Feminism; Christianity in the Near East; Byzantine Greek; Vulgate.
Bibliography Cross F L, Livingstone E A (eds.) 1997 The Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church, 3rd edn. Oxford University Press, Oxford Hastings A H, Mason A, Pyper H (eds.) Oxford Companion to Christian Thought. Oxford University Press, Oxford Martin D (ed.) 1979 Crisis for Cranmer and King James. PN Review 13: 1-64 McFague S 1987 Models of God: Theology for an Ecological Nuclear Age. Fortress Press, Philadelphia, PA Ruether R R 1983 Sexism and God-talk. SCM, London Sawyer J F A 1991 Combating prejudices about the Bible and Judaism. Theology 94: 269-78
Christianity in Iran and Central Asia N. Sims-Williams
By the end of the third century CE, the Syrian church had expanded southwards and eastwards from its earliest strongholds in northern Mesopotamia and Adiabene to become well established in many parts
of western Iran. Here the Christians suffered from intermittent persecution, for reasons which were political as well as religious, since the ruling Sasanian dynasty, which adhered to the Zoroastrian religion,
35
Language in the Context of Particular Religions was often at war with the neighboring Christian state of Byzantium. However, the church in Iran received unintended reinforcement from the policy of Shapur I (ca. 240-270 CE), who deported large numbers of Greek speakers, including Christians, from Roman territory into Iran. These settlers retained their own ecclesiastical language and hierarchy as late as the fifth century, when some cities still had both a Greekspeaking and a Syriac-speaking bishop. Early in the fifth century the church in Iran demonstrated its independence from Byzantium by refusing to accept the authority of the Patriarch of Antioch, a breach which became permanent when the doctrinal formula adopted by the Council of Chalcedon (451 CE) was rejected by the great majority of the Christians of Iran in favor of the so-called 'Nestorian' christology. Towards the end of the century, isolated both administratively and theologically from Western Christendom, the Nestorian church of Iran became more inward-looking. This is the period from which comes the first reliable evidence of the composition of Christian literature in Middle Persian, the Iranian dialect of the southwestern province of Pars, and the state language of the Sasanian empire. One such work was a summary of Christian theology, which the Catholicus Acacius (d. 496) translated from Syriac into Middle Persian for submission to the Sasanian monarch Kawad I. Others included treatises on canon law, some of which are extant in Syriac translation, as well as hymns and other liturgical texts. The linguistic nationalism which may have given the first impetus to this literary activity is clearly seen in an episode in the Life of the East Syrian saint John of Dailam (d. 738), which describes a quarrel between Persian and Syriac-speaking monks over the language to be used in the liturgy. Later, Syriac regained its exclusive status as the language of Iranian Christendom, with the result that no Christian literature in Middle Persian survives. The only exception is a fragmentary psalter found in Chinese Turkestan (see below); other parts of the Bible are not known to have been translated into Persian before the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. The evangelization of Central Asia, which had begun by the fifth century, was principally due to the missionary zeal of the Nestorian church of Iran, though the Jacobites (the monophysite branch of the Syrian church) set up bishoprics as far east as Herat in Afghanistan, and the Melkites (the Syrian Christians who accepted the doctrine of the Council of Chalcedon) also had important centers in eastern Iran and Choresmia. In these distant outposts of the Syrian church, amongst speakers of languages such as Choresmian (Khwarizmian), Sogdian (the Iranian dialect of the Samarkand area, which had become a lingua franca of the trade route between Iran and China), Turkish, and Chinese, there is little evidence 36
of knowledge of Greek, let alone Hebrew. Only the Melkites continued the use of Greek, beside Syriac, in their liturgy. For most Christians in Iran and Central Asia, the Syriac Peshitta version effectively took the place of the original texts of both Old and New Testaments. The prestige of Syriac, as the language of Scripture and of central parts of the liturgy, led to its continued use for religious and formal purposes, even amongst people whose grasp of Syriac grammar and orthography was shaky, such as the thirteenth and fourteenth century Christians, of mainly Turkic origin, whose gravestones have been found in great numbers in the region of Frunze (Kirghizia). The position of Syriac in the Nestorian church was thus somewhat comparable to that of Latin in the West, a parallel noted by the Franciscan traveler William of Rubruck in the mid-thirteenth century, who wrote of the Central Asian Nestorians: They say their services and possess sacred books in Syriac, a language which they do not understand, so that they sing like those monks amongst us who are ignorant of grammar' (Pelliot 1973: 136-37). Unlike the Roman church, however, the Nestorian church had always allowed the vernacular a place in the liturgy, in particular for hymns, psalms, and Bible readings (Hage 1978). As the church expanded eastwards, a wide range of languages came to be employed in its worship, as has been demonstrated by the discovery, in the ruins of a Nestorian monastery at Bulayiq (in the Turfan oasis, Chinese Turkestan), of a library of fragmentary manuscripts in Sogdian, Syriac, Turkish, and other languages, including the Middle Persian psalter mentioned above. Most of these manuscripts are written in Syriac script, which was adapted to the phonology of non-Semitic languages such as Sogdian, New Persian, and Turkish by the addition of a few extra letters. Neither this modified Syriac script nor the Syriac vocabulary employed in these manuscripts (mainly technical terms such as 'bishop/ 'monastery,' 'canonical hour'; see Sims-Williams 1988) were ever adopted by non-Christian users of the languages concerned. The use of Middle Persian for the vernacular parts of the liturgy was probably introduced into Central Asia during the initial stages of the Nestorian mission from Iran, but Middle Persian, which would not have been understood by the local population, was soon superseded by Sogdian. Later, but still before the end of the first millennium, Christianity became well established amongst the Turkic peoples of Central Asia, some of whom continued the by then traditional use of Sogdian—beside Turkish and Syriac—as a language of Christian literature and liturgy. Later still, certain Mongol rulers of Central Asia and Iran were attracted to Christianity and some Christian texts are said to have been composed in Mongolian. However, the Nestorian church in the
Christianity in the Near East East did not long survive the ravages of the Mongol hordes of Timur in the late fourteenth century, after which the Christians were soon reduced to an insignificant minority in western Iran, Turkey, and Iraq, where the so-called 'Assyrian' church survives to the present day (see Christianity in the Near East). See also: Byzantine Greek; Persian; Peshitta; Semitic Scripts; Syriac, Christian. Bibliography Hage W 1978 Einheimische Volkssprachen und syrische Kirchensprache in der nestorianischen Asienmission. In:
Wiessner G (ed.) Erkenntnisse und Meinungen 2. Otto Harrassowitz, Wiesbaden Pelliot P 1973, 1984 Recherches sur les Chretiens d' Asie Centrale et d'Extreme-Orient [1], 2(1). Imprimerie Nationale, Paris Sims-Williams N 1988 Syro-Sogdica. Ill: Syriac elements in Sogdian. In: A Green Leaf. Papers in Honour of Professor Jes P Asmussen (Acta Iranica 28). E J Brill, Leiden Sims-Williams N 199la Christianity in Central Asia and Chinese Turkestan. In: Yarshater E (ed.) Encyclopedia Iranica. Mazda, Costa Mesa, CA Sims-Williams N 1991b Christian literature in Middle Iranian languages. In: Yarshater E (ed.) Encyclopedia Iranica. Mazda, Costa Mesa, CA
Christianity in the Near East J. N. Birdsall
The Christian communities of the Near East, together with their members forced by circumstances to emigrate, are the descendants of the earliest adherents of the faith, in and about the lands of its origin. Their fragmented aspect is the result of the divisions of the Church in the fifth and sixth centuries over the details of the doctrinal definition of the relationship of the divine and human natures in the person of Christ, especially as these had been decided in the Council of Chalcedon (451 CE). Divisions based on beliefs and formulae, both traditional and subtly defended, were intensified by the support given by successive rulers to one side or another, or by their attempts to enforce their own formulae of intended reconciliation. Sections of the population of the Eastern Roman Empire were alienated by the proscription of their beliefs, the exile of their leaders, and the legal sanctions invoked against them. Thus, when in the seventh century and afterwards, Islam grew and spread, the conquerors were welcomed as liberators. There were regimes and periods where Christians were respected and protected sections of the population, playing an active part in the service of the state. Yet slowly but surely more repressive tendencies asserted themselves. Persecution and the more insidious pressures of legal, political, and social disabilities hemmed the Christian communities in. Proselytizing and conversion to Islam, massacre, and emigration led to numerical decline. Even protective measures, such as the Ottoman institution of the millet whereby each minority group had rights and representatives, led to the formalization and fossilization of the religious and social patterns inherited from earlier times. The divisions were rendered more complex when after minimal contact for some centuries, Eastern Christians again met Western Christians in the
period of the Crusades, and throughout the following centuries. The Roman Catholic Church sought to bring the churches of the Christian East into formal communion with itself and it sometimes appeared politic to the Eastern leaders to accept such overtures. But the people, whose experience was frequently of being despised, conquered, and exploited by Western liberators, would often fail to go along with their leaders, and thus new schisms and divisions were created within those already existing, leading to duplications of the old alignments: one group in communion with Rome, the other, as a rule the majority, still dissident. Only the submission of the Maronites to the claims of the Roman Church resulted in a simple transference from the Eastern to the Western camp. The division of the Western Church at the Reformation in the sixteenth century intensified Roman Catholic missionary effort, especially through the Society of Jesus. Protestant interest in the Eastern churches was never absent but missionary activity producing separated churches began only in the late eighteenth century. Western nations, especially Britain and France, took an interest in the political fortunes of groups religiously affilitated to them, up to the mid-twentieth century. If should be noted that when Eastern churches were reconciled with the Roman Catholic Church, accepting papal supremacy, their liturgical language remained unchanged. The objective of reconciliation was not the imposition of uniformity in this or other matters of practice, but doctrinal authenticity brought about by the acknowledgement of one ecclesiastical head. Thus Syriac, Arabic, Armenian, Coptic, Ethiopic, Greek, and Old Slavonic continued to be used in Catholic churches of the 'oriental rite,' as they are termed. 37
Language in the Context of Particular Religions This brief survey begins with the Nestorians or Assyrians. These are the survivors of a church separated from orthodoxy by the decisions of the Council of Ephesus in 431. They prospered outside the Roman Empire in northern Mesopotamia and Iran, and during the Middle Ages their missionary zeal established Christianity in Central Asia, Mongolia, China, and South India. Most of these communities were destroyed by Timur-Lenk in the fourteenth century. Communities in Iraq, Iran, and Syria, still speaking a form of Syriac, however, have survived in spite of much persecution and massacre. In the territories of the former Soviet Union small communities are found in the Caucasus. Many have emigrated, especially to the USA. A great part of the indigenous Christians of South India are of this stock too. In communion with Rome, they are called 'Chaldaeans' in Iraq, Syria, the former Soviet republics, and elsewhere, or 'Syro-Malabars' in India. Their Bible and liturgy are in Syriac. Jacobites or Syrian-Orthodox, together with Copts, Ethiopians, and Armenians, are descended from groups which opposed the formulations of the Council of Chalcedon in 461. 'Jacobite' is derived from their organizer in secession, Jacob Baradai (sixth century). They survive in Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, and Turkey, although in the latter they too have suffered persecution. Large-scale emigration has taken place to the USA and South America. Some South Indian Christians are in communion with them. A few villages in Turkey and Syria speak a form of Syriac, and another form is found in Lebanon, but most have Arabic as their mother tongue. Their Bible and liturgy, however, are in Syriac. In communion with Rome they are known as 'Catholic Syrians,' in India as 'Syro-Malankars.' Maronites, found mainly in Lebanon and in emigrant groups from there, descend from a distinct theological stream. Having taken refuge in the Lebanon mountains in the ninth century, they accepted Roman supremacy in 1182 (those in Cyprus not until 1445). Their liturgy is mainly in Syriac, with parts in Arabic. Arabic is their mother tongue. The Armenians have been a Christian nation since the end of the third century. They have known periods of independence but have often been subject to neighboring states, generally Muslim. In 1915-16 they were subjected to ferocious massacres at Turkish hands, in which almost all the Armenians in eastern Anatolia were exterminated. Two million now live in the republic of Armenia, and there is a worldwide diaspora. Modern Armenian flourishes in two dialects, eastern mainly in the territories of the former USSR and western elsewhere. Classical Armenian is the language of liturgy. The main Christian group opposed to Chalcedon is called 'Gregorian,' after the third-century evangelizer, Gregory the Illuminator, or 'Armenian Orthodox.'
38
Those in communion with Rome are known as 'Armenian Catholics.' The name 'Copt,' used to describe the indigenous Christians of Egypt, derives from the Greek Aigyptios 'Egyptian,' via the Arabic. The Coptic Church is descended from the Church in Egypt in late Roman and Early Byzantine times, which, through its large monastic component, vigorously rejected the decisions of Chalcedon. In spite of the very great pressures towards apostasy for social advantage, it maintains its existence with about four million adherents. It gained some advantages from Egyptian nationalism, but is now again at a disadvantage with the growth of Muslim fundamentalism. Its liturgical language is the Bohairic (Northern) dialect of Coptic, the latest form of the Old Egyptian language. Early Christian literature survives in several other dialects, none of which survives as a spoken tongue. Arabic was gaining ground in liturgical settings, but the renewed threat of Islam has given a certain strength to the retention of a distinctive ancient language. The Catholic Copts numbered over a million in a count made in 1973. South of Egypt lay Nubia, where Christianity flourished from the fourth to the fourteenth centuries. Excavations there have brought many Christian documents to light, including scripture, liturgy, and hagiography, and fragmentary inscriptions. Translations were from Greek; and the Nubian language was written in the Greek alphabet, with five additional characters. The relationship of Old Nubian to the language families of the Sudan and the Horn of Africa has not been precisely defined as yet, although it is known to be related to modern dialects in the area (for Ethiopian Christianity, see Ge'ez). Orthodox Chalcedonian Christianity is found in the Near East, first in Cyprus, and the Greek Orthodox presence in Turkey, Egypt, and Palestine, and second in the churches which were from early times supporters of Chalcedonian theology. In Syria, Egypt, and elsewhere they are known as 'Melkites," that is to say, the 'Emperor's men,' seen from the viewpoint of their opponents who would not yield to government pressure. There are patriarchates of Antioch and Alexandria. These groups are Arabic speakers, and Arabic is also their liturgical language, following the Orthodox practice of using the vernacular for liturgy. The other main Orthodox Christian body is the Georgian Church, found mainly in the republic of Georgia, as there is no significant Georgian diaspora. Georgian Christianity goes back to the fourth century: like the Armenians they have known periods of independence and periods of foreign rule. They too are not without martyrs. In the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries they sought Russian suzerainty and were at length incorporated into the Russian empire. Their liturgical language remains Old Georgian.
Christianity in South Asia Another form of Eastern Christianity in the Caucasus region was Christian Albania, situated in modern Azerbaijan. It was wiped out by TimurLenk, and few remains survive except for ruins and a few inscriptions. Its alphabet is recorded in Armenian manuscript lists. A modern survival of this Albanian (or Agvan) language is Udi, a North-east Caucasian language related to Lezgi and spoken in a few villages in Azerbaijan and Georgia. Some of the inscriptions have been deciphered, using the records of the alphabet and knowledge of modern Udi grammar. Important documents of which the originals are lost or have only very recently come to light, have been preserved in the 'Near Eastern Christian languages.' These include Jewish and Christian pseudepigrapha, Gnostic and Manichean material, and lost patristic texts. These churches may also sometimes preserve ancient material otherwise unknown in their liturgical texts and practices. This raises the difficult question of the possibility of tracing an original language beneath the translations. It is not infrequently asserted, for example, that clear signs of an Armenian intermediary are to be found in early Georgian versions of the Bible, and of Syriac originals in both Armenian and Georgian texts. But such conclusions are seldom convincing. The insights of modern research on bilingualism have yet to be applied here. Improved knowledge of Syriac, Armenian, and Georgian palaeography also needs to be brought to bear on some earlier hypotheses which are in danger of assuming the status of fact. Churches at the end of the twentieth century are caught up in many of the problems of the Near East and the Caucasus. They lack friends amongst the mighty, such as those they had in previous centuries. Nevertheless they continue to maintain a tenacious
existence in their native lands, while, where there is a diaspora, their church migrates with them, as amongst Armenians worldwide and Syrian-Orthodox Gastarbeiter in Western Europe. There are often in such churches those who are eager to maintain the group's traditions of liturgical and even spoken language, and where there are means, academic study of the tradition is promoted, the Armenian case being the most striking example. These beleaguered churches and their cultural heritage may, against the odds, yet survive. See also: Syriac, Christian; Ge'ez; Christianity in Iran and Central Asia; Arabic; Armenian; Ancient Egyptian and Coptic; Byzantine Greek; Georgian; Missionaries; Cyril and Methodius.
Bibliography Arberry A J (ed.) 1969 Religion in the Middle East. Vol. 1. Judaism and Christianity. Cambridge University Press, London Assfalg J, Kriiger P (eds.) 1975 Kleines Worterbuch des Christlichen Orients. Harrassowitz, Wiesbaden Atiya S 1968 A History of Eastern Christianity. Methuen, London Attwater D 1961-2 The Christian Churches of the East, 2 vols. Bruce, Milwaukee, WI Blau J 1966-7 A Grammar of Christian Arabic. Secretariat du Corpus SCO, Louvain Brown L 1956, 1982 The Indian Christians of St Thomas. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge Janin R 1955 Les eglises orient ales et les rites orientaux, 4th edn. Letouzey & Ane, Paris Korolevskij C 1957 (trans. Attwater D) Living Language in Catholic Worship: An Historical Inquiry. Longmans, Green & Co., London Schultze W 1982 Die Sprache der Uden. H. Fahnrich, Wiesbaden
Christianity in South Asia C. Shackle
Christianity is the third most widespread religion in South Asia. Census returns for 1981 record some 19,000,000 Christians of different denominations in South Asia. Most of this figure is accounted for by the 16,000,000 Christians in India (2.6 percent of the total population), while there are also 1,350,000 in Pakistan (1.5 percent), and 1,100,000 in Sri Lanka (10 percent). In these three countries (numbers elsewhere being insignificant) Christians exist as small minorities, often thinly spread, among majority populations of Hindus, Muslims, and Buddhists
respectively. The general sociolinguistic patterns of the local language area to which they belong have thus tended to be the prime determinants of language use among the various Christian communities. Their linguistic profile has naturally also been formed by their origins in one or other of the missions to South Asia launched by various churches at different historical periods. Three principal phases of missionary activity may be distinguished, of which only the first predates the colonial period. This was the early spread of Nestorian Christianity from the
39
Language in the Context of Particular Religions Middle East to Kerala in southwest India. Roman Catholicism was brought to the western and southern coasts of India and to coastal Sri Lanka by the Portuguese in the sixteenth century. The substantial spread of Christianity to other parts of South Asia took place only after 1800, when the efforts of mostly British and American missionaries founded numerous Protestant churches (as well as further spreading Roman Catholicism) with particular appeal both to the lowest castes and to linguistically isolated tribal communities. 1. Christianity in Kerala The oldest community is that of the St Thomas or Syrian Malayalam-speaking Christians (Brown 1982) of Kerala, a region long associated with the Middle East through the Indian Ocean spice trade. A local Nestorian community, claiming to have been founded by the Apostle Thomas himself, was certainly in existence there by the sixth century, acknowledging the distant supremacy of the Jacobite patriarch of Antioch and having Syriac as the sacred language of its priests and monks, but fully integrated into the highly stratified society of precolonial Kerala. There still exists a distinctive spoken Christian dialect of Malayalam (Nair 1971), resembling the dialect of the Nairs, the warrior caste with whom Christians were traditionally ranked, though differentiated by such features as the loss of aspiration from the voiced aspirate series, the absence of a morphologically distinct honorific plural imperative, or the use of distinctive kinship terminology, e.g., pempila 'wife' for standard bharya. Later Roman Catholic and Protestant missions, directed towards 'reconversion' of the Syrians or proselytization of lower castes, have created numerous rival churches in Kerala, where the 5,000,000 Christians constitute one-fifth of the population. Although Syriac survives as a liturgical language among the Jacobites and some other churches, it is being displaced even in this role by standard Malayalam, the cultural language of the Keralan Christians, with English being cultivated in the usual South Asian fashion by the more educated. 2. Roman Catholicism and Portuguese A Roman Catholic presence in India was forcibly established by the Portuguese in the early sixteenth century. From their headquarters at Goa on the Konkan coast, vigorous proselytization was undertaken along the coasts of South India and Sri Lanka. A leading role was played by Jesuit missionaries, following the example of St Francis Xavier (1506-52) and his successful mission to the Parava fisher caste of coastal Tamil Nadu, where there were nearly 3,000,000 Tamil-speaking Christians in the early 1990s. The Tamil and Sinhala-speaking Christian communities of northwestern Sri Lanka are also 40
largely the product of these Jesuit missions, whose emphasis upon working through local languages yielded the first Western descriptions of them. While Latin long remained the liturgical language of all South Asian Roman Catholics (except in Kerala, where the Syriac liturgy was permitted), the first printed books in local languages were produced to propagate the faith, e.g., the Konkani Doutrina Cristd (1622), an elementary manual by the English Jesuit Thomas Stephens. Unusually for South Asia with its wealth of indigenous scripts, Christian Konkani literature (in a variety of dialects defined by both caste and locality) has traditionally been recorded in the Roman script, writing retroflexes as geminates and giving <x> its Portuguese value //,/ e.g., the Goan place-name Saxtti (for sasti). Portuguese influence on formal Christian Konkani extended beyond loans even to syntax, e.g., te cottat xeva devachi 'they perform the service of God,' with SVP for Indo-Aryan SPY (Miranda 1978). With the expulsion of the Portuguese from Goa in 1961, however, such Lusitanisms are becoming less characteristic as the Christians of Goa (300,000) draw closer to the Hindus in the common cause of maintaining Konkani as a language distinct from Marathi. The former role of Portuguese as the premier language of Christianity in South Asia is still evidenced by the diffusion throughout New IndoAryan of such basic loanwords as Hindi girja 'church' or padri 'priest' ( ^=
5
rr
q
^(
r
t>^
s t L
4 —
Figure 2. The Ugaritic Cuneiform Alphabet (after J. F. Healey 1990 The Early Alphabet. © British Museum Press, London. Reproduced with permission).
lists the letters in order: 'a, b, g, b, d, h, w, z, h, t, y, k, s, 1, m, d, n, z, s, ', p, s, q, r, t, g, t, 'i, 'u, s. The last three appear to be additional, so it appears to have been a basic 27-letter system which has been expanded by the addition of 'i, 'u, and s, a special s-sound used in words of Human origin. This cuneiform alphabet is regarded as a 'long' alphabet, by comparison with the 'short,' 22-letter alphabet used later (first millennium BCE) for Phoenician and Hebrew. It may be noted that in the Ugaritic script there are signs to represent three varieties of the glottal stop: 'a, 'i, 'u, (called aleph in Hebrew). Apparently the three forms of aleph were devised as aids to help indicate the vowel following the aleph (or sometimes in front of it), though without any distinction in vowel length. Occasionally, though not regularly, these signs seem to be used as pure vowel signs. The three alephs are, in fact, an intrusion of syllabic writing into an otherwise consonantal system. The Ugaritic scribes who developed the long cuneiform alphabet may have been inspired in this regard by the
existence of certain syllabic cuneiform signs which were sometimes used simply to indicate a vowel. The Ugaritic signs for /'i/ and /'u/ may actually be derived from the Akkadian i and u signs. Like the letter s, they may have been devised initially to assist with the writing of non-Semi tic words. There are a number of other cuneiform alphabetic inscriptions of similar or slightly later date from the area to the south of Ugarit. These come from various sites such as Ta'anach, Nahal Tabor, and Beth Shemesh in Palestine, Tell Nebi Mend in Syria, and Sarepta in Lebanon. There is also a Ugaritic-type inscription from Cyprus (Hala Sultan Tekke), though it is uncertain whether the silver dish on which it is found is an import from the Levantine coast. Some of these inscriptions, as well as a small number of texts from Ugarit itself, are in a shorter version of the cuneiform alphabet, representing a smaller range of phonemes. The shorter alphabet was more or less adequate for the later languages of the area like Phoenician and Hebrew, since some phonemes had merged. 3.1 The Plurality of Alphabets in the Second Millennium BCE It is not easy to explain the complex history of the alphabet in this period. According to a widespread view the alphabet was in the process of being shortened because linguistic changes were taking place which involved the loss of certain sounds. Thus Hebrew did not need to represent /b/, /d/, /z/, /g/, or /t/. While a sign to represent /s/ was needed, it came to be represented by the otherwise unwanted sign for /t/, so that the old letter s was dropped. The shorter cuneiform alphabet is usually seen as a step in this direction, though the sporadic nature of the finds suggests that the idea of a cuneiform alphabet never became popular. It depends upon the local availability of suitable clay, while the southern area of Syria-Palestine was under Egyptian cultural influence at this time and writing there, using a descendant of the linear Proto-Sinaitic/Proto-Canaanite script, was normally carried out on papyrus, which unfortunately rarely survives. However, a variation on this view has recently been put forward (Dietrich and Loretz 1988), suggesting that the normal (longer) Ugaritic cuneiform alphabet was created to allow for extra sounds which were needed as a result of southern Semitic— Arabian—influence involving an expanded phonemic repertoire. Key evidence for this view would be the cuneiform alphabetic abecedaries from Ugarit (discovered 1988) and Beth Shemesh in Palestine, which, instead of following the established northwest Semitic order (beginning ', b, g, d ...), follow the South Arabian order (h, 1, h, m ...). This would suggest that what is known as the South Arabian letter-order (though only from a later date) already
157
Religious Languages and Scripts existed in the second millennium BCE and may have been brought to Palestine with an incoming ethnic group at a very early date. Ugaritic cuneiform is the only alphabetic cuneiform that is well known. The cuneiform alphabets disappeared and the other branch of alphabetic tradition, that of the linear forms descended from the Proto-Sinaitic/Proto-Canaanite script, replaced it. Ugarit itself was destroyed ca. 1200 BCE. 3.2 Variable Direction of Writing West Semitic texts before the emergence of the Phoenician script are not uniform in their direction of writing. The Ugaritic alphabet is written left to right, but there are a few right to left Ugaritic texts. The earlier Proto-Sinaitic/Proto-Canaanite scripts are very irregular. Writing could be in either direction or vertical. Some early Greek and South Arabian texts are written boustrophedon (Gk)—reversing direction at the end of a line like on ox ploughing a field. In such inscriptions the letters are often reversed to face the direction of writing. With the settling down of the Phoenician alphabet (ca. 1100-1050 BCE) the right to left order became fixed. It may be noted that this is of some significance in the discussion of the date at which the Greeks received the alphabet from the Phoenicians, since in the earliest Greek inscriptions the direction is still not fixed. 4. The Settling of the Alphabet Although the main evidence of the Proto-Sinaitic/ Proto-Canaanite and even cuneiform alphabets is in the south—Palestine, Sinai, etc. (with Ugarit an outpost of the cuneiform alphabet in the north)— Byblos may have been a major focus of script development. The 22-letter Byblian alphabet, the early Phoenician alphabet, evolved ca. 1050 BCE in a direct line of descent from the earlier linear alphabets (see Fig. 3). The right to left orientation of writing and the stylized linear character of the letters became fixed about this time. The inscription of the Ahiram sarcophagus, dated ca. 1000 BCE, finds the script already in a classic form. Other inscriptions follow soon after, also from Byblos. This Phoenician script spread and came to be used also by kingdoms to the north, as is evidenced by inscriptions from Zincirli and Karatepe (Turkey, ninth and eighth centuries BCE) and to the south, where the Phoenician alphabet spread to the Hebrews. To the east it was adopted by the Aramaeans. Both the Hebrews and Aramaeans were at this time establishing kingdoms. The Aramaeans have left a number of monumental inscriptions, while the Hebrew material is mostly of a less formal kind, though it is very extensive (letters, seals, etc.), partly because of the intensive archaeological exploration of Palestine.
158
The Phoenician script remained essentially unchanged during most of its long life and it was used at first unchanged by the Hebrews. Thus the very earliest 'Hebrew' inscription, the tenth century BCE Gezer Calendar is in the Phoenician script, but it is uncertain whether this text is Hebrew. In fact the best witness to the earliest distinctively Hebrew scriptform is the ninth century Moabite inscription of King Mesha, the Moabites having used the Hebrew script (see Fig. 3). It may be noted, however, that when the short, Phoenician alphabet was taken over by other language-groups, it was not always able to express distinctions which were important. At least one of the Phoenician letters taken over by Hebrew was used for two different Hebrew phonemes, both for /§/ and also for another s-sound (a lateral sibilant?). Later Hebrew came to distinguish the two by placing a diacritic mark on the right or left of the letter. Other Hebrew inscriptions follow in a long series throughout the first millennium BCE, frequently written on ostraca (pieces of broken pottery). There are also clay sealings (bullae) from Lachish, Arad, and Jerusalem, which were originally attached to papyrus documents. These show the importance of the writing of Hebrew, and the other related derivatives of Phoenician, on papyrus at this period, though virtually everything has perished. Politically and culturally ancient Israel was somewhat isolated and as a result the developments in the script during this long period are limited. There are certain tendencies to a more cursive style, but almost all available sources are inscribed on stone and pot and only very limited evidence is extant on soft materials. There may have been no Hebrew tradition of royal inscriptions requiring a monumental script. Having been in decline from the time of the Babylonian exile (sixth century BCE) when the Aramaic language was in the ascendant, the Hebrew script was eventually abandoned by the Jewish community. The old script, called in later Jewish tradition ketab "ibrl 'the Hebrew script,' did not, however, disappear immediately. Among the Dead Sea Scrolls there are Bible fragments in the old script and there are also coins from the Hasmonaean period (135-37 BCE) and coins and ostraca from the first and second Jewish Revolts (66-70 CE and 132-35 CE). The retention of the old script may have had an element of nationalism about it. It was also favored by certain Jewish sects, certainly by the Samaritans who retained the old script throughout the ages. The Aramaic script, derived from Phoenician ca. the eleventh and tenth centuries BCE, was the most flourishing and long-lived of the three scripts (see Fig. 3). Not only did it ultimately supplant the other two, it also spread far beyond the area of the Aramaean people and became a script of convenience for Assyrians, Persians, and others and was used in
* b g d h
-6 A -d^
* J 1
•r y *
>
¥
f
*
o
«
o
^ (j
7
-*
k
-y
y
#
r
1
6
L 7 1
I
t
-»
n
fc
s
a
Bf
^
^
J
&
y
r
J
T
®
q
>
)
I
* x] was probably not consummated until after the Moriscos were expelled. The most highly Arabized form of Spanish was the literary language written in Arabic characters (literatura aljamiada) exclusively by and for Muslims. It can have had no influence on the wider Spanish-speaking community, who appear to have remained ignorant of its very existence. When, in the fifteenth century, the Muslims of Castile and Aragon (who spoke the same Romance dialects as their Christian neighbours) realized that their ignorance of Arabic was cutting them off from their sacred literature, they had translations made of pious texts, and even of the Qur'an (in spite of the doctrine that the Qur'an is untranslatable). Such texts are closely calqued on the Arabic originals. Loanwords from Arabic abound: khaleqar 'to create,' and Spanish words acquire the semantic range of the Arabic word they are made to represent: descender (and derivatives) may mean 'to reveal' because in Arabic form IV of nazala 'to descend' means 'to reveal' (of a sacred text). Literatura aljamiada, which flourished in clandestinity in the sixteenth century, repeated many of the characteristics of the Alphonsine translations from Arabic. There is no evidence that the everyday speech of the Moriscos was affected, but their original writings often do imitate the style of the translations. After their expulsion, 1611, the Moriscos were absorbed into the mass of Arabic speakers in North Africa and elsewhere, and within a few generations the language they had brought from Spain had disappeared. See also: Arabic; Qur'an.
Bibliography Corriente F 1977 A Grammatical Sketch of the Spanish Arabic Dialect Bundle. Institute Hispano-Arabe de Cultura, Madrid
167
Religious Languages and Scripts Galmes de Fuentes A1956 Influencias sintdcticas deldrabe en la prosa castellana. Boletin de la Real Academia Espanola, Madrid Huffman H R 1973 Syntactical influences of Arabic on medieval and later Spanish prose. Unpublished University of Wisconsin dissertation Jones A 1988 Romance kharjas in Andalusian Arabic Muwassah Poetry: A Paleographical Analysis. Ithaca
Press for the Board of the Faculty of Oriental Studies, Oxford University, London Steiger A 1932 Contribucion a la fonetica del hispano -drabe y de los arabismos en el ibero-romdnico v el siciliano. Junta para Ampliation de Estudios. Madrid Steiger A 1963 Origin and Spread of Oriental Words in European Languages. S. F. Vanni, New York
Arabic Script: Adaptation for Other Languages J. N. Mattock
Most of the languages associated with Islam have, at some time, been written in the Arabic script, with appropriate modifications. The first language to which it was adapted after the Islamic conquests was the newly emergent form of Persian; there is no solid evidence for this until the tenth century CE, but it must have begun considerably earlier. With the spread of Islam from Iran into Central Asia, the Turkic languages next came to employ the script, during the period from the tenth to the twelfth centuries. It was used for the writing of various Hispanic dialects from at least the thirteenth century. There are indications that Malay and Kurdish were written in it as early as the fourteenth century, and, by the sixteenth century, Urdu and Pashto had adopted it. It is uncertain when it was first used for such languages as Swahili and Hausa; the first definite indications are from the eighteenth century, but it is quite probable that it was used well before that. It has also been used for Malayalam and Tamil. The modifications that had to be made to the script were largely cumulative, each language retaining those made by that from which it had received it and adding its own. At the same time, the Arabic letters that were redundant, in that they represented no sounds existing in the new language, were retained, principally for loanwords from Arabic, but in a few cases for native words, even when these could be perfectly well represented with other letters; examples are Persian sad [JU»] 'hundred' (spelt with s rather than s) and Turkish dag [£ U» ] 'mountain,' and oda [*tjl] 'room' (where d is represented by /). The pronunciation, generally speaking, of these redundant letters in all the languages that adopted the script was as follows: th [^] = s or t\ h [^] = h; dh [ J] = z or d; s [u*] = s; d [>] = z; / [J,] = /; z [Ji] = z; q [i5 ] = k, except in Persian, in which it coalesced with gh [£J as a voiced or voiceless uvular plosive according to phonetic context ('ayri) [£] was more or less disregarded. 168
The modified letters that Persian added are four: b H modified to p [V]; j [ e ] to ch [ 5 ]; z [ j] to zh [ j]; and k [*J/^*] to g [£]. It should be remarked, however, that in all the languages that adopted the script, modified letters were often written informally as though they were the original letters from which the modifications were made. This, of course, adds a further complication to reading. No further modifications were necessary for the Turkic languages. The script was able adequately to represent the Turkic consonants, although the representation of n in certain circumstances (where it was a voiced velar nasal in some languages, but not in Ottoman Turkish) by k/g {£1 S\ created a further difficulty. In addition, a factitious distinction was made between the 'hard' (following a back vowel) and 'soft' (following a front vowel) forms of certain consonants, g, h, k, s, t, and z; the 'hard' forms were represented by the redundant Arabic letters, the gh [£] being used for Turkish g. It was for the Turkic vowels that the script was less serviceable; /, /, o, a, u, u could often not be distinguished from one another. The adaptation of the script to Urdu again required modifications. The retroflex sounds d, r, and / were represented by the Arabic d [•>], r [ j], and / [*j], with a superscript / [i], which displaced the dots of /, or alternatively four dots arranged in a square, e.g., [:]]. A final/independent n [J] without a dot was adopted to represent the velar nasal, and a modified form of independent y/J [if] to represent e MPashto has the same retroflex sounds as Urdu, but modified the Arabic letters differently, putting a small ring beneath them [9 , j,*i»], as it did also with the nasal [v]. In addition, it adopted three further modifications: h fe] to [£] for dz/is (in different dialects), r [ j] to ['J ] for g/zh, and s [cT] to [Jf] for sh/ kh. . Malay made three further modifications: gh [%] to [£] for ng, n [J] to [$\ for ny\ and/[«J] to [Jj] for p.
Aramaic, Jewish The last indicates that the script (known as Jam, i.e., of Java) arrived in the peninsula directly from the Arabs, rather than by way of other Asian countries. Malay also modified k [£} rather differently for g [Jf]. Swahili used both modifications for p [V and ,_$], represented ch by sh [ = From the late first century BCE onwards, various /i/, = /3/, = /e/, and = /rjg/. It is Gothic tribes migrated from southern Scandinavia to possible that intervocalically the letters , , eastern and southeastern Europe (following the rivers and denote fricative allophones. Vistula and Danube), reaching the Black Sea by the The Gothic of Wulfila shows the typically Germamiddle of the third century CE. To the east of the nic features of (a) the 'First Sound Shift' developRiver Dniestr were tribes of Ostrogoths, to the west ment; (b) strong verbs versus weak verbs (respectively Visigoths. In the fourth century, in modern Bulgaria, with vowel-change ('Ablaut') versus a dental suffix in a translation of most of the Bible was made by the the past tense); (c) a 'weak' declension of adjectives Visigoth Bishop Wulfila; parts of this have survived and, since it is the earliest text of any length in a Germanic language, these are documents of out. standing importance for Germanic and Indo-Eura b g d e q z h P i k I m n opean linguistic history. Wulfila designed an alphabet q n n i i j i S T Y ^ x e e t clearly based on the Greek, but with some characters j u p — r s t w f x h o — from Latin and one or two that may be runic in Figure 1. origin. It appears in Fig. 1 with a widely use
189
Religious Languages and Scripts (used after a demonstrative) versus a 'strong' (used elsewhere). Among various archaic features, the most striking is perhaps the retention of a nominative in such forms asfisks 'fish', akrs 'field'. Morphologically, Gothic is conservative. Verbs show inflections for (a) past and non-past tenses; (b) indicative, subjunctive, and imperative moods, plus an infinitive form; (c) active and passive voices; (d) first, second, and third persons; (e) singular, dual, and plural numbers. There are not, however, distinct forms for every possible combination of these. Nouns, adjectives, and pronouns show inflections for (a) singular and plural numbers; (b) masculine, feminine, and neuter genders; (c) nominative, accusative, genitive and dative cases. Pronouns in addition have distinct forms for the dual number. 2. Sample Text Jah
ban
bidjaib
ni
sijaib
AND WHEN PRAY + 2/pl/press/indic NOT BE + 2/pl/pres/subj
swaswe pai
liutans,
unte
LIKE THE + m/pl/nom
HYPOCRITE + m/pl/nom
FOR
frijond
in gaqumpim
LOVE + 3/pl/pres/indic
IN SYNAGOGUE+ f/pl/dat
jah AND
waihstam CORNER + m/pl/dat
standandans STAND + pres.pr/m/pl/nom
gaumjaindau SEE + 3/pl/pres/subj/pass
plapjo STREET+ f/pl/gen bidjan PRAY + infin
Gothic lived on longer in the east, surviving in present day northern Bulgaria until the ninth century and in the Crimea until the sixteenth century, according to accounts by travelers. The last of these was by Ogier Ghiselin de Busbecq in 1560-62, the Imperial ambassador to the Ottoman court at Constantinople, who recorded a list of some hundred Crimean Gothic words. This is of rather limited value, for it was published without his permission and may contain misprints; more importantly, his two informants were dubious, one being a native Greek-speaker. One great lack is that of any indication of morphological variation and syntax. But it seems likely that Crimean Gothic was a descendant of a somewhat different variety from that of Wulfila. Busbecq also notated a 'Gothic' song (the 'Cantilena'); but he gives no translation and it has been variously claimed to be not Gothic but Turkish, Swedish, or Italian. Gothic had died out by the end of the eighteenth century. Related East Germanic languages are those of the Vandals (who established themselves in North Africa) and the Burgundians (who set up a kingdom in Gaul); both languages became extinct in the sixth and seventh centuries and little is known of them except personal and place names. See also: Wulfila (Ulfilas) (3117-382?).
ei SO-THAT
mannam. MAN + m/pl/dat.
Bibliography
'And when you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, for they like to pray in synagogues and on street corners standing up, so that they may be seen by people.'
3. Later History and Crimean Gothic Some Goths, forced out by the invading Huns in the third century, migrated westwards and founded kingdoms in modern Italy (Ostrogoths), France and Spain (Visigoths); but their power was shattered everywhere by the beginning of the eighth century and the language became extinct in the west.
Braune W 1961 Gotische Grammarik 16. Auflage neu bearbeitet von Ernst A. Ebbinghaus. Tubingen Friedrichsen G W S 1961 Gothic Studies. Blackwell. Oxford Heinemeyer W 1961 Studien :ur Geschichte der gotischen Urkundenschrift. Bohlau, Cologne Stearns M 1978 Crimean Gothic: Analysis and Etymology of the Corpus. Anma Libri, Saratoga, CA Voyles J B 1981 Gothic, Germanic, and Northwest Germanic. Steiner, Wiesbaden Wright J 1954 Grammar of the Gothic Language [with selected texts]. 2nd edn. with supplement by Sayce O L. Clarendon Press, Oxford
Gurmukhi C. Shackle
Gurmukhi ('guided by the Guru') is the script of the Sikh scriptures, which has also become the standard script for writing modern Panjabi by Sikhs and others in India.
190
Although it is visually similar to Devanagari, the Gurmukhi script is typologically somewhat distinct, having proved to be the sturdiest survivor of a formerly very widespread subgroup which might be
Hebrew, Biblical and Jewish A verse by Guru Ninak (Adi Granth 83):
H1?) Trfua jtefaT few* g$ ferr fefer H^f$ 5 53fi$ feas1 Hfjup £fe Q6rfei datitrn] sahib(a) sandH[m] Ida calai tis(u) nal(i) ik(i) jagande na lahannh(i) ikan[h]a[m] sut[t]ii[m] dei uthal(i) Gifts are the L end's, what prevails with Him? Some get none though awake, others He wakes up to give to. Figure 1.
termed 'semi-learned' in view of its intermediate position between learned full scripts of the Devanagari type and abbreviated commercial shorthands. Now mostly obsolete, other exemplars of this type include the Khojki script of the Ismaili Muslims of western India (see Islam in South Asia). These semi-learned scripts contrast with Devanagari in having a reduced syllabary, which eliminates some distinctive vowel graphemes as well as signs for consonants found only in Sanskrit. The 35 letters of the Gurmukhi alphabet begin with the three vowel letters [u], [a], [i] where the reversal from the usual Indian order reflects the primacy of the sacred syllable om. They also follow the Brahmi model more closely in largely eliminating the conjunct consonants of the learned scripts. The doubled consonants so generally retained in Panjabi from Middle Indo-Aryan are indicated as in Brahmi by a single consonant in Gurmukhi, which has only a few
subscripts to indicate e.g., -r- and -h- in place of the numerous Devanagari conjunct clusters. The sacred associations with Gurmukhi as the vehicle for recording the gurbam ('the Word of the Guru') were successfully drawn upon by the twentieth century Sikh protagonists of modern standard Panjabi in opposition to the Hindi written in Devanagari favored by Panjabi Hindus. There are however a number of significant divergences between scriptural and modern conventions in writing and reading the script. While orthographic rules have been systematized for writing the modern language, the printed scriptural textus receptus (see Granth) carefully continues to reflect looser medieval usage, e.g., in frequent omissions of superscript or subscript features (indicated in square brackets in the transcription in Fig. 1). Conversely, the modern reading pronunciation of the Granth omits the final postconsonantal short vowels (indicated in round brackets) which were essential grammatical markers in the older language (see Sikhism). See also: Devanagari; Panjabi (Gurmukhi) Sacred Texts; Panjabi. Bibliography Dani A H 1963 Indian Palaeography. Oxford University Press, Oxford Gill H S 1996 The Gurmukhi Script. In: Daniels P T, Bright W (eds.) The World's Writing Systems. Oxford University Press, New York and Oxford, pp. 395-8 Masica C P 1991 The Indo-Aryan Languages. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge Shackle C 1983 An Introduction to the Sacred Language of the Sikhs. School of Oriental and African Studies, London
Hebrew, Biblical and Jewish J. F. Elwolde
Hebrew is the language of the people who, throughout the first millennium BCE, comprised a major part of the population of the territory broadly coterminous with that of the modern State of Israel. Members of this people stopped living in most of its ancient lands in any significant numbers following the Roman suppression of the BarKochba revolt in 135 CE. Indeed, for some 500 years previously Jews
(from Judah/Judea, in the south of Israel) had settled in large numbers throughout the Persian and GrecoRoman world. Even though they retained a high level of ethnic exclusivity, Jews became identified, and tended to identify themselves, as being more a 'religious' than a 'national' group, and this has been of enormous significance for the survival of Hebrew over three millennia. 191
Religious Languages and Scripts 1. A Holy Language From the early centuries CE, Hebrew is frequently referred to as leshpn ha-qodesjf 'the sacred language' (an expression also found in the Dead Sea Scrolls) in contrast to other languages spoken by Jews— particularly Greek, Aramaic, and, much later, Yiddish. In addition, the Hebrew of the Bible was sometimes regarded (by certain medieval writers, for example) as 'purer' than later varieties. It is possible that this view is attested as early as the second century BCE, when the Qumran community derided their religious adversaries as speaking an 'uncircumcized tongue' (Rabbinic Hebrew perhaps; see Sect. 3 below). Jewish traditions claim that Hebrew was the language spoken at the creation, that the letters of the Hebrew alphabet were active in the creation (see Alphabet: Religious Beliefs), and that it is the only language understood by the angels and efficacious in prayer. 2. Biblical Hebrew The main corpus of ancient Hebrew is the Bible (minus its Aramaic portions), consisting of some 451,000 running words distributed over slightly fewer than 10,000 items of vocabulary (including proper nouns). The consonantal text of this corpus had achieved roughly its current state by the second century BCE, after ongoing revision of its different parts. A point to be stressed is that Biblical Hebrew, as it has been handed down, comprises a literary, rather than an oral or 'colloquial,' corpus. The Bible is not a straightforward record of spoken utterances from biblical times, but is better viewed as a collection of written compositions, including literary versions of conversations, orally transmitted stories, etc. The language of those parts of the Bible composed after the Jews' return from exile in Babylonia (538 BCE) is usually called 'Late Biblical Hebrew,' and it differs from the 'Classical' literary language of before the exile (586 BCE). Partly it appears to represent a consciously 'archaizing' imitation of the earlier language and partly, like Rabbinic Hebrew (see Sect. 3 below), a distinct, naturally developed, stage in the history of Hebrew. When the Bible is viewed as a single work, albeit a composite of different works, it is clear that it has been written, or at least edited, from a religious perspective and with religious motives. Even so, it contains relatively little material that was composed in order to express feelings of a specifically religious character. Far more representative are historical or epic narratives, historical fiction, social polemic ('prophecy'), and detailed regulations about law, the cult, and city planning. It has been claimed that Biblical Hebrew is particularly rich in vocabulary related to, for example, farming and water-sources.
192
But unlike the Arabic of the Qur'an created in a state of religious fervor, Biblical Hebrew is restrained in its descriptions of and vocabulary for the divine. In short, the corpus is more concerned with a people whose religion was of major importance to it rather than with that religion itself. Hebrew is not the only language used in the great documents of Judaism. The Palestinian and Babylonian versions of the Talmud (fifth to sixth centuries CE), excluding the Mishnah (ca. 200-225 CE), are both written mostly in Aramaic, as is the Zohar (late thirteenth century CE). Aramaic is also used for parts of the prayer book and even the Bible itself. Arabic (albeit often written in Hebrew characters) was the language of most of the great works of Jewish theology/philosophy written in territories under Muslim domination, especially Spain. Elsewhere in Europe, with the introduction of printing, Yiddish was widely employed from the sixteenth century onward for devotional, ethical, popular midrashic, and homiletic literature. Moreover, even in biblical times, the use of Hebrew for secular (and nonliterary) purposes is attested on hundreds of inscriptions (usually very short but occasionally extensive) on seals, ostraca, graves, etc. (These provide a further corpus of "preRabbinic' Hebrew along with various manuscripts of Ecclesiasticus and the majority of the Dead Sea Scrolls.) 3. The Decline of Hebrew The Hebrew represented by the Mishnah and other early rabbinic works (Tannaitic, or early Rabbinic, Hebrew) is generally thought to be the literary crystallization of a vernacular form of Hebrew that had existed perhaps even in pre-exilic times as a northern spoken counterpart to literary 'Biblical' Hebrew, and had already vitrually died out as a spoken language when the Mishnah was compiled in the third century CE. Rabbinic Hebrew survived for another seven centuries as a literary and scholarly dialect (Amoraic Hebrew). However, during even its early phase, Rabbinic Hebrew had to vie with Aramaic and Greek, and it is known that large Jewish communities in Egypt apparently spoke Aramaic (Elephantine) or Greek (Alexandria) exclusively. Although the testimony of Jerome in the late fourth century CE indicates a good knowledge of Hebrew among his Jewish informants, the emergence, from the third century BCE onward, of Greek and Aramaic translations/interpretations of the Bible (see Septuagint, Targuni) is a sign of Hebrew's decline. Moreover, because written Hebrew gives relatively few indications of vocalization, there was a danger that unlearned Jews would forget even how to read their Scriptures properly let alone understand them. The situation was made yet more difficult by the existence of versions of the Bible containing
Hebrew, Biblical and Jewish different readings of the consonantal text and contentious interpretations of passages by the emerging Christian movement. 4. The Masoretes The sixth to eighth centuries saw a flowering of activity among various schools of Masoretes ('bearers of tradition'), who can perhaps be regarded as religiously motivated linguistic theorists (see Masoretic Tradition). Their aim was to safeguard against corruption of the consonantal text and to provide a system of 'pointing' the basically consonantal Hebrew script to represent how it was to be pronounced at both segmental and suprasegmental levels. One of the systems developed by the Masoretes of Tiberias became dominant and is used in the oldest surviving undamaged manuscript of the whole Hebrew Bible. This document, Codex Leningradensis (Firkowitsch /) B19A from 1008-09, is standardly reproduced in critical editions of the Hebrew Bible. Much earlier texts of parts of the Bible also exist, most notably the second century BCE Isaiah Scroll from Qumran Cave 1 (unpointed). Texts employing other Masoretic traditions have also survived, and different pronunciations of Hebrew, as well as different trends in morphology, etc., are represented by the various communities of the diaspora (e.g., Ashkenazic, Sephardic, Yemenite). 5. Hebrew in the Diaspora After its complete demise as the day-to-day spoken language of the Jewish people and until its twentiethcentury revitalization as the principal language of the modern State of Israel, Hebrew survived as a language spoken and written by Jews in most diaspora communities in synagogue worship and religious texts. Hebrew was used, for example, in ceremonial documents, such as Torah scrolls, Passover haggadot, and texts inside phylacteries and mezuzot, as well as in synagogue and grave inscriptions. With the exception of the sermon and the prayer for the Royal Family (in the UK), Orthodox synagogue services are conducted throughout the world in Hebrew. Elementary Hebrew is traditionally taught to children in a heder or 'synagogue-school.' All orthodox Jewish males have to be sufficiently competent in Hebrew to read out loud a portion of Scripture at the age of bar-mitzva (13 years), and, thereafter, when called upon, at ordinary synagogue services. Note as well that Hebrew is imparted within the family in the context of festivals like Passover and Hanukkah. At a much more advanced level, Hebrew is also used for instruction within rabbinic academies (yeshibhoi). 5.1 Literature The use of Hebrew by Jewish writers never died out, even though its geographical center shifted through
time in accordance with the fate of Jewish communities in different countries. For example, in France, Rashi, the great eleventh-century Bible and Talmud commentator, wrote in Hebrew. Indeed, the 'dynamic' of Hebrew—the cause of its internal developments and its ability to adapt to new circumstances, most notably the need to provide a language for what would become the State of Israel—has been one of literature, not speech. In the twelfth to thirteenth centuries CE, for example, the Ibn Tibbon family, through their translations of Arabic works, accommodated Hebrew to the expression of a wide range of philosophical and scientific topics. Although medieval and earlier literature is frequently religious (including material written at relatively short notice, such as responsa to problems arising within particular communities), there is also a wealth of Hebrew poetry, especially from Andalusia, on profane themes. 5.2. Secular Contexts To a limited extent, Hebrew was also used as a lingua franca for Jews from different parts of the world, as well as in correspondence and in credit notes, contracts, and other commercial and legal documents within Jewish communities. Records of the Spanish Inquisition attest to the use of Hebrew in oaths, etc., by forced converts to Christianity. From the late eighteenth century, the widespread use of Hebrew for secular composition developed with the Haskala or Jewish 'Enlightenment.' This had less to do with Hebrew's status as a lingua franca than with the Enlightenment's negative view of the Yiddish dialects of European Jewry, associated by the reformers with the socially disadvantaged status of Jews and their allegedly low level of cultural achievement. It has also been claimed that Hebrew was in daily use in Palestine during the nineteenth century. 6. Hebrew in Other Languages Jews have normally spoken the dominant language of their host community, although in pre-modern times specifically Jewish vernaculars have usually emerged (Yiddish, Ladino, etc.), with varying degrees of literary, educational, and formal social functions, and with significant influence from Hebrew not only in vocabulary and phraseology but also in morphology and syntax. Where such a development has not taken place, or where a Jewish language/dialect has been superseded by the dominant language, it is in most cases misleading to speak of a Jewish dialect (or sociolect) of a non-Jewish language. But in this situation, Jews continue to use a number of Hebrew expressions for items of Jewish culture (e.g., siddur 'prayer book,' tephillin 'phylacteries,' tallit 'prayershawl') and in particular contexts (e.g., mazzal tobh 'congratulations'). The Israeli pronunciation given here represents that used by younger members of
193
Religious Languages and Scripts Jewish communities, who also tend to use more Hebrew expressions. But the Hebrew pronunciation of older Jews and their vocabulary often reflects that of the Jewish language/dialect once used by themselves or their parents (e.g., Ashkenazic/kosher/for Israeli/kash' er/'kosher,' Yiddish shul for Hebrew betkeneset 'synagogue'). Classical Hebrew has left a few direct traces in the religious vocabulary of other languages, although this has been through the medium of Bible translations rather than that of Jewish communities (e.g., hallelujah, amen, behemoth, shibboleth). In the occult, various terms, for example, names for God and other supernatural beings, have been taken over, often in garbled form, from Hebrew. More significantly, the vocabulary and phraseology of the languages of Christian countries have been influenced in a variety of ways by loan-translations from Hebrew via prestigious early, fairly literal, vernacular translations of the Bible. Hebrew also underlies many 'Christian' names (e.g., Isabel, David, John, Jeremy, Sarah), and is encountered in some Jewish surnames (e.g., Cohen, Levi, Rabinowitz). 7. The study of Hebrew Within Christianity
Historically, Hebrew has gained the scholarly attention of Christians wanting to gain a better understanding of the Old Testament or to facilitate attempts at conversion of the Jews. Until the beginning of modern 'scientific' analysis of the Bible, few non-Jewish scholars could have claimed a
familiarity with Hebrew or the ability to contribute to its linguistic analysis on anything approaching the scale of the medieval Jewish grammarians. But it is possible that their efforts aided the long survival of Hebrew, and it is in large measure due to them that Hebrew, elementary Biblical Hebrew at least, still finds a place in the curricula of many universities. See also: Judaism; Hebrew Grammarians; Hebrew. Bibliography Aronoff M 1985 Orthography and linguistic theory: The syntactic basis of Masoretic Hebrew punctuation. Lg 61: 28-72 Caird G B 1980 The Language and Imagery of the Bible. Duckworth, London Davis M D 1888 Hebrew Deeds of English Jews before 1290. Jewish Chronicle, London Horbury W (ed.) 1999 Hebrew Study from Ezra to BenYehuda. T & T Clark, Edinburgh Jouon P 1993 A Grammar of Biblical Hebrew (Corrected rev. ed.; trans, and ed. by T. Muraoka). Editrice Pontificio Istituto Biblico, Roma Koehler L, Baumgartner W 1994-2000 The Hebrew and Aramaic Lexicon of the Old Testament. E.J. Brill, Leiden Kutscher E Y 1982 A History of the Hebrew Language. Magnes Press, Jerusalem Parfitt T V 1972 The use of Hebrew in Palestine 1800-1882. Journal of Semitic Studies 17: 237-52 Saenz-Badillos A 1993 History of the Hebrew Language. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge Perez Fernandez M 1997 An Introductory Grammar of Rabbinic Hebrew. E.J. Brill, Leiden
Korean J. H. Grayson
The Korean language, a member of the Altaic family of languages, is spoken as a native language by peoples of Korean ethnic derivation living in the Korean peninsula, southern and eastern Manchuria, the Russian Far East (eastern Siberia), Kazakhstan, Japan, North America, and in other communities scattered throughout the world. The total number of speakers of the Korean language now numbers over 69 million persons, more than 67 million of whom live on the Korean peninsula. Based upon the subcultural regions of the Korean peninsula, there are six principal dialects, the dialects of the northeastern, northwestern, central, southeastern, and southwestern regions plus the dialect spoken on the island of Cheju. The latter dialect shows marked differences from the language spoken on the Korean mainland. As the language spoken by a people of a 194
culture stretching back for nearly two millennia, the Korean language possesses a rich body of literature. The Korean language is a nontonal, polysyllabic, agglutinative language belonging to the Altaic family and probably closely related to the Manchu and Tungus members of that language family. The only modern, major language to which Korean would appear to be related is Japanese, but the two languages—although similar in most respects grammatically—are significantly different phonologically. Korean and Japanese are therefore linguistic isolates because of the lack of source material to demonstrate the precise linguistic connections between themselves, and with the members of the Altaic family. Throughout the vocabulary of Korean, there exists a parallel set of Korean and Sino-Korean vocabulary. Mention must be made of the existence of two
Korean systems of counting. This feature carries throughout the entirety of the Korean lexicon. Often, but not exclusively by any means, Sino-Korean words are used to name objects or subjects of discourse, whilst Korean words have a descriptive function. On some occasions, there is no preference in the use of one or the other type of vocabulary, in other instances it is a matter of honorific or nonhonorific usage. With regard to time, hours are given in Sino-Korean numbers, whilst minutes are given in Korean numbers. Again, duration of time (i.e., 'it took one hour to go home') is given using Korean numerals. Notwithstanding the enormous impact which Sinitic vocabulary has had on enriching the vocabulary of the Korean language, there has been virtually no influence from Chinese on the grammar of Korean. This is possibly because Chinese and Korean derive from two radically different language families. Although Korea is a full member of the Chinese cultural sphere, the language spoken in modern Korea and its ancient antecedents spoken in the early states of Koguryo, Paekche, and Silla are significantly distinct from both ancient and modern Chinese. Whereas ancient and modern Chinese are tonal, monosyllabic languages with a comparatively simple syntax, ancient and modern Korean are highly agglutinative, polysyllabic languages with an extraordinarily complex syntax. Two languages could hardly be more different than Chinese and Korean. Because of the prestige of Chinese civilization, when the ancient Korean states accepted the culture of their great neighbor, the canons of written Chinese and the Chinese writing system were both adopted. It was obvious from the first that considerable adaptations would have to be made to the Chinese writing system to make it suitable for transcribing the structure of Korean. The history of writing in Korea is essentially the attempt to write Korean using a script designed for a radically different language. Three systems were used for writing Korean before the development of a true alphabet in the fifteenth century. These were the idu, hyangch'al, and kugyol scripts. These scripts were not, however, the first attempt to write Korean words. One of the oldest Korean historical sources before the advent of the early writing systems was the great stele erected in 414 to King Kwanggaet'o of Koguryo (reigned 391^412) which is written with Chinese characters and uses Chinese syntax. What distinguishes this monument from Chinese monuments of the period is the occurrence of a set of more than 100 Chinese characters which are used to represent phonologically the sounds of personal names, place names, and official titles. Using Chinese characters in this way was not unique to Koguryo, as the Chinese themselves used a certain set or sets of characters for the purpose of transcribing foreign words and names. This type of system, however, is not a true
transcription system for the Korean language. Significantly, the same set of characters used for transcription purposes on the Kwanggaet'o monument was used for the same purpose at a later date in Paekche, Silla, and Japan. The earliest writing system for which there is firm evidence is idu. This system was used primarily for the purpose of prose transcription, whereas hyangch'al and kugyol were used for poetic transcription and transcription for translation and interpretative functions, respectively. The twelfth-century historical work, the Samguk sagi ('History of the Three Kingdoms'), indicates that the hyangch'al writing system was used from at least the ninth century, and it is entirely probable that it may have been used much earlier. Nonetheless, the earliest extant examples of this system of writing occur in an eleventh-century eulogy of a Buddhist monk, the Kyunyo-jon. The kugyol system attempted to give a complete and accurate representation of the underlying Korean sentence and as such this system of transcription was used especially for the elucidation and interpretation of Buddhist scriptures and Confucian philosophical works. As with hyangch'al, there is no extant documentation for the early use of this transcription system, although its use as far back as the seventh century has been postulated by some authorities. The earliest records of kugyol are marginal notes in a copy of the Buddhist scripture, the Inwang-gyong (Chinese, Jenwang Ching, 'Sutra of the Benevolent King'), dated to the fifteenth century. A text which is rendered in the kugyol system has two elements: the Chinese character textual material itself and a marginal system of annotation to transform the textual material into a piece of Korean prose. The latter element is the kugyol system proper. In this system of writing, parts of Chinese characters are used for phonetic purposes to transcribe Korean morphemes and to annotate a given text. This is obviously a development from the original use of Chinese characters to provide the phonetic values of Korean words, but in this case the characters have been abbreviated to provide a set of phonetic symbols. This system resembles the Japanese kana syllabaries both in function and in form and, indeed, the kanbun kundoku system of annotation in Japanese for which there is documentary evidence from 828, is very similar to the Korean kugyol writing system. See also: Ross, J.; Christianity in East Asia.
Bibliography Buzo A 1980 Early Korean writing systems. Transactions of the Royal Asiatic Society, Korea Branch 55 Ch'oe H 1942 Han'gul kal. Seoul
195
Religious Languages and Scripts Cho S B 1967 A Phonological Study of Korean With a Historical Analysis. Uppsala Hulbert H B 1905 A Comparative Grammar of the Korean Language and the Dravidian Dialects of India. The Methodist Publishing House, Seoul Kanazawa S 1910 The Common Origin of the Japanese and Korean Languages. Sanseido, Tokyo Kim C-W 1965 On the autonomy of the tensity feature in stop classification: With special reference to Korean stops. Word2\: 339-59 Kim C-W 1968 The vowel system of Korean. Language 44: 516-27 Kim C-W 1972 Regularity of the so-called irregular verbs in Korean. In: Kisserberth C W (ed.) Studies in Generative Phonology. Linguistic Research Inc, Edmonton Kim C-W 1974 The making of the Korean language. Korea Journal 14(8): 4-17 Kim K 1961 Idu yon'gu Asea yon'gu 4(1) Kim M 1957 Chuhae Hunmin chongiim. Seoul Konsevic L R 1965 Pervyi pamjatnik koreiskoi pis'mennosti. Narody Asii i Afriki 4 Lee H H B 1989 Korean Grammar. Oxford University Press, Oxford Lee K 1971 Formation of the Korean language. Korea Journal 11(12)
Lee S B 1957 The Origins of the Korean Alphabet. National Museum of Korea, Seoul Martin S E 1951 Korean phonemics. Lg 27: 519-33 Martin S E 1954 Korean Morphophonemics. Linguistic Society of America, Baltimore, MD Martin S E 1966 Lexical evidence relating Korean to Japanese. Language 42: 185-251 Martin S E 1968 Grammatical evidence relating Korean to Japanese. In: Proceedings of the 8th Congress of Anthropological and Ethnological Sciences Mazur I N 1960 Koreiskii iazyk. Izd. vostocnoj literary, Moscow Nam P 1975 Hanja ch'ayong p'yogibop ui paltal. Kungmun hangnon-jip 7-8 Ramstedt G J 1933 The nominal post-positions in Korean. In: Memoires de la Societe Finno-Ougrienne 67 Ramstedt G J 1939 A Korean Grammar. Suomalaisugrilainen seurs, Helsinki Ramstedt G J 1949-53 Studies in Korean Etymology, Memoires de la Societe Finno-Ougrienne, no. 95, 2 vols. Helsinki Rosen S 1974 A Study on Tones and Tonemarks in Middle Korean. Orientaliska Institute Stockholm University, Stockholm Yi K 1972 Kugo-sa kaesol kaejong p"an. Seoul
Ogam J. M. Y. Simpson
Ogam or Ogham is an encoding of the roman alphabet by means of notches cut on stone slabs. It was principally used for writing Old Irish. Some 300 Old Irish inscriptions in Ogam are to be found in Ireland (principally in the southwest), but an additional 57 are outside Ireland, 40 being in Wales and the remainder in England, the Isle of Man, and Scotland. The majority probably date from the fifth and sixth centuries CE, though some may be from a century or more later. The existence of such inscriptions outside Ireland makes it possible to argue for the continuing presence of Irish-speaking colonies in western southern Britain until the sixth or even the seventh centuries (Jackson 1953: 171). These inscriptions are in general very short and the language is purely funerary, being limited usually to a personal name; they are therefore of limited philological value. Ogam is also used in some two dozen inscriptions in Pictish, all in Scotland. None of these is intelligible. However, it has recently been claimed (Cox 1999) that the language of these is not Pictish, but Norse. The system was also used for divination. The basis of encoding is highly uneconomical, consisting in numbers of straight or diagonal lines incised across one edge of a slab, or to one or other
196
side of it. In the case of Pictish Ogam this baseline was sometimes drawn across the face of the slab. Twenty letters could be encoded in this way; they were divided into four groups, each containing from one to five similar notches (see Fig. 1). Each letter had some kind of divinatory connotation and was associated with a tree and an animal or bird, for example, with the color white, beithe 'birch' and besan 'pheasant'; with light grey,
=
0 —
~
c ~~
—
T= D H
Old Church Slavonic Ms 'rowan' and lacha 'duck'. (The alphabet was, in fact, sometimes known as the Beithe-Luis after these two letters.) The system is reputedly named after its inventor Ogma, son of the God of Eloquence, whose name appears in Gaul as Ogmios and whose tasks included that of taking souls to the Other World. See also: Celtic Religion. Bibliography Cox R A V 1999 The Language of the Ogam Inscriptions of Scotland: Contributions to the Study of Ogam, Runic and Roman Alphabet Inscriptions in Scotland. Department of Celtic, University of Aberdeen Henderson I 1967 The Picts. Thames and Hudson, London
Jackson K H 1950 Notes on the Ogam inscriptions of southern Britain. In: Fox C, Dickins B (eds.) The Early Cultures of North-West Europe. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge Jackson K H 1953 Language and History in Early Britain: A Chronological Survey of the Brittonic Languages, 1st to 12th C. CE. Edinburgh University Press, Edinburgh Jackson K H 1955 The Pictish language. In: Wainwright F T (ed.) 1955 McManus D 1990 A Guide to Ogam. An Sagart, Maynooth Marstrander C J et al. 1913-76 (4 vols) Dictionary of the Irish Language. Dublin Price G 1984 The Languages of Britain. Edward Arnold, London Wainwright F T (ed.) 1955 The Problem of the Picts. Nelson, Edinburgh
Old Church Slavonic C. M. MacRobert
Old Church Slavonic is the earliest Slavonic literary language. It was first used in the ninth century as the vehicle of translations and original compositions by SS Cyril and Methodius (see Cyril and Methodius) and their associates for the benefit of the Slav peoples who had recently accepted Christianity. Some of these texts have survived in copies of the late tenth and eleventh centuries, which are the prime source of information about the language. The sound system implied by the two alphabets, Glagolitic and Cyrillic, in which Old Church Slavonic was written, antedates certain radical changes in the phonology of the Slavonic languages which took place between the tenth and twelfth centuries. Many grammatical forms used in Old Church Slavonic manuscripts are also highly conservative. The evidence of Old Church Slavonic therefore has considerable weight in attempts to reconstruct the Common Slavonic proto-language and to elucidate the relationship between Slavonic and other Indo-European languages. Old Church Slavonic is the main source of information about the early history of the SouthEast Slavonic languages. As natives of Saloniki, SS Cyril and Methodius doubtless spoke the local variety of Slavonic. There is some ground for supposing that during their work in Moravia (863-885 CE) they may have adopted some West Slavonic linguistic features; but the manuscripts of South Slavonic origin from which the information about Old Church Slavonic is largely derived at best preserve only traces of such a hybrid usage, for the most part reflecting the Slavonic dialects of the Southeast Balkans.
From its inception, however, Old Church Slavonic must have differed from contemporary spoken varieties of Slavonic, as it was used primarily to translate Scriptural, liturgical and patristic texts from Greek and, sometimes, from Latin and Old High German. Comparison with Greek shows that the translations aimed at faithfulness: while the grammatical forms and most of the words and semantic distinctions were Slavonic, the syntax mirrored Greek constructions, apart from a specific range of exceptions where imitation of Greek would presumably have led to unacceptable results. The compound word-formations of Greek were also frequently reproduced in Old Church Slavonic, and even pronunciation may have been modified to accommodate Greek loan-words. Texts believed to be original Old Church Slavonic compositions display the same type of language, which can be characterized as a compromise between early Slavonic idiom and Greek literary usage in a balance so delicate that it was not subsequently maintained (see Church Slavonic). See also: Christianity Methodius.
in
Europe;
Cyril
and
Bibliography Aitzetmiiller R 1978 Altbulgarische Grammatik als Einfuhrung in die slavische Sprachwissenschaft. U. W. Weiher, Freiburg Griinenthal O 1910-1911 Die Ubersetzungstechnik der altkirchenslavischen Evangelienubersetzung. Archiv fur slavische Philologie 31: 321-66, 507-29; 32: 1-48
197
Religious Languages and Scripts Lunt H G 1974 Old Church Slavonic Grammar, 6th edn. Mouton, The Hague
Vlasto A P 1970 The Entry of the Slavs into Christendom. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge
Pahlavi A. V. Williams
Pahlavi is generally synonymous with the term 'Middle Persian,' i.e., the language of the Sasanians (224-651 CE) and their subjects in the province of Pars in southwest Iran. It was imposed by the Sasanian authorities as the sole official language of Iran and consequently it became the living language of the state religion, Zoroastrianism. More specifically, 'Pahlavi' (Book Pahlavi) is the name given to the medieval language in which Zoroastrian religious texts were written down in the Sasanian and early Islamic periods until the tenth century. It may be compared with the other main Middle Iranian dialects: Parthian, Sogdian, Khwarazmian, and Khotanese Saka. The earliest examples of Pahlavi script are found in rock inscriptions and on coins from the Parthian and early Sasanian periods. The orthographical system was derived from the western Semitic consonantal script of Aramaic, the court language of the Achaemenian Empire. The cursive script of Book Pahlavi is full of ambiguities and corrupt forms, having only 14 letters (as compared with the 22 letters of Imperial Aramaic). For example gimel represents the letters ddleth, and yod_h, but also the corrupt forms of beth, zayin, and kaph. Combinations of these letters, accidental reduplications, and the fact that two yod_h resemble both "aleph and sdmekh, create further difficulties. The chief characteristic of Pahlavi is that, in spite of its being phonetically purely Iranian, it mixes Semitic and Iranian words in its orthography. From an early period, writers of Pahlavi used Aramaic words as ideograms, that is, they no longer pronounced or even thought of them as Semitic words but as familiar shapes or signs only, written to convey Iranian equivalents. The Semitic words are not ideograms in the sense of Sumeric or Chinese symbolic characters, but are written with a consonantal alphabet, and so may be better termed 'heterograms,' and Iranian phonetic spellings 'eteograms' (Klima 1968: 28). By convention, modern scholars transliterate ideograms in upper case type, phonetic spellings in lower case. Book Pahlavi is written in an almost equal mixture of Iranian eteograms (e.g., pyfk* = paydag 'revealed,' gwpt' = guft 'said,'—but cf. also YMRRWNt = gufi) and Aramaic heterograms (e.g., GBRA 'man' was read and pronounced as Iranian mard, and YWM 'day'
198
renders Iranian roz). Usually verbal stems are written heterogrammatically, with Iranian phonetic inflexional endings, e.g., YHWWNyt*=bawed 'it is.' Occasionally a word can be read as both an ideogram or as a phonetic spelling, e.g., TWBjdid is like tang, and LHYKIdur is identical to Ihyk/rahlg. Problems of haplography and dittography blemish the manuscripts and make reading difficult: since Pahlavi was no longer a vernacular language in Islamicized Iran, nor was its script used outside the Zoroastrian religious texts after about 700 CE, copyists often did not understand what they were writing. The greater part of Sasanian literature in Pahlavi was in fact secular poetry, but this has not survived in its original form, having been translated to suit Islamic tastes into New Persian, notably in the Shahnana of Ferdausi (c. 935-c. 1020), in Arabic script. Those who remained faithful to Zoroastrianism after the Islamic conquest (seventh century CE) continued to use Pahlavi to preserve their scriptures and religious lore in the archaic orthography which kept them obscure to all except Zoroastrians. They are of interest to the historian of religions because of the richness of their theological and mythological content, but, with a few exceptions, they are of limited literary merit. Pahlavi was a sonorous and robust language, which is recognizably the source of the characteristic mellifluous qualities of New Persian, even after centuries of arabicization. See also: Avestan; Zoroastrianism. Bibliography Boyce M 1968 Middle Persian literature. In: Spuler B (ed.) Iranistik. E J Brill, Leiden de Menasce J P 1983 Zoroastrian Pahlavi writings. In: Yarshater E (ed.) Cambridge History of Iran, vol. 3. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge Klima O 1968 The Middle Persian era. In: Rypka J (ed.) History of Iranian Literature. D. Reidel, Dordrecht MacKenzie D N 1967 Notes on the transcription of Pahlavi. Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies xxx: 17-29 MacKenzie D N 1983 A Concise Pahlavi Dictionary. Oxford University Press, Oxford. West E W 1904 Pahlavi literature. In: Geiger W, Kuhn E (eds.) Grundrifi der Iranischen Philologie, vol. n. Strasbourg
Palaeography
Palaeography K. A. Lowe
Palaeography (literally 'old writing') is the study of ancient and medieval handwriting. The term is generally used to refer to Greek and Latin scripts and their derivatives (all western European and American scripts), although some include Chinese and Arabic in the study. The term 'palaeography' does not seem to have come into common use until 1708, with the publication of Palaeographica Graeca by Bernard de Montfaucon. First attempts to study manuscripts systematically by date and script had, however, begun at the end of the previous century with Jean Mabillon's De Re Diplomatica (1681), which included a section on Latin palaeography. It was not until the invention of photography in the mid-nineteenth century that the study of palaeography attracted wide interest. Photography has allowed basic materials of research to be easily reproduced, collected together from different repositories, and circulated to scholars all over the world. Palaeography involves the study of writings on papyrus, animal skins, paper, and wax tablets (see Sect. 3.1 below). Inscriptions on other writing materials, including stone, metal, wood, clay, and slate are also of interest, especially for periods where there is no other available evidence. For example, up to the beginning of the first century BCE, the development of Latin script can be established only through inscriptions. Usually, however, inscriptions are considered to be the province of the related discipline of epigraphy. The technique of cutting individual letters with a chisel onto a hard surface results in a different style from writing on a flexible material such as papyrus. The basic task of palaeography is to provide the means of dating and localizing manuscripts by establishing patterns in the development of characteristic letter-forms and abbreviations. Its study has developed as a result of work on other disciplines, most notably diplomatics, the investigation of the form, structure, and authenticity of charter material. Palaeography is therefore generally regarded as an auxiliary historical science, although it is now increasingly studied in its own right. Palaeography is closely associated with codicology, the study of the physical manufacture of the book, for example, the nature and preparation of the material it has been written on, the ruling for script, the make-up of the material into booklets (known as quires or gatherings), and the binding. These practices vary with the time and place of production. Together with codicology, palaeography can reveal much about the methods by which a manuscript book
was produced and the audience for which it was made, and even about the changing role and function of writing itself. This article concentrates on the development of Latin script in the Middle Ages, the principles and problems underlying the study of palaeography during this period, and the value of the science to other disciplines. Space does not permit more than a brief survey of scripts. Those interested in Greek palaeography should consult Barbour (1981) or Metzger (1981). Discussion of Roman script in antiquity can be found in Ullman (1980) and Mallon (1952). Boyle (1984) provides a comprehensive bibliography on specific subjects, including a section on post-Humanistic scripts. 1. Terminology
Palaeographers have various terms for the strokes which go to make up a letter, as well as for the types of scripts themselves. The nomenclature has not been standardized, and there is still some disagreement about terminology. For example, the term provenance (provenience in America) is generally applied to a manuscript's earliest known place of preservation. Some, however, use it to designate the manuscript's place of origin (where this can be ascertained). Occasionally the term refers instead to the place where a manuscript is preserved (such as the British Library in London). /./ Letter-forms The most basic stroke of a letter is the simple upright stroke, known as a minim. In later medieval scripts, such as Gothic, a word such as minim would be formed as 10 virtually identical i-strokes. This causes obvious problems for transcribers and editors, as a group of letters such as min could be read variously as ium, vim, nun, miu, and uni, among other possibilities. It is not uncommon for the scribe himself to miscount the numbers of minims in a word. An ascender is a letter-stroke which extends above the top of other letters, such as / or the upright stroke of b. A descender projects below the level of the shortest letters, such as the tail of g or p. A letter such as p is composed of a stem (the name given to a minim when it supports another part of a letter) and a bow, or lobe. A serif or finial is the name given to the fine stroke which is sometimes used to finish the main strokes of letters. A ligature is where two or more letters are joined together in a way which changes the appearance of either or both of them. Ligatures are often used at the end of a line where space is confined.
199
Religious Languages and Scripts The script's ductus refers to the way in which it has been written, for example, how the letters have been formed or how carefully they have been executed. The general appearance of a hand is known as its aspect. 1.2 Abbreviations Abbreviations are often of great value in ascertaining when and where a text has been written. There are many thousands of different abbreviations, and it is often very difficult to know how to expand them. They fall into three major categories or types: suspensions, contractions, and abbreviations symbols. A suspension is where one or more letters at the end of a word have been omitted. A contraction is where a letter or letters have been omitted from elsewhere in the word. Abbreviation symbols are often used to replace whole words, such as ~ for and or et, and Hfor est. Some scripts are much more heavily abbreviated than others. 1.3 Dating Conventions Palaeographers usually employ a system for indicating the approximate date of a script based on the word saeculo, abbreviated to s., followed by the century in lower-case Roman numerals (thus s.ix for ninth century). Where more specific dating limits can be arrived at, the conventions are generally as follows: s.ix1 (first half of the ninth century); s.ix2 (second half of the ninth century); s.ix"1 (for ineunte: beginning of the ninth century); s.ixex (for exeunte: end of the ninth century); s.ixmed (for medio: middle of the ninth century); s.ix/s.x (indicates the turn of the century). Dating information such as s.ix-s.x indicates no more than that the text was written at some stage during the ninth or tenth centuries. 1.3.1 Dated and Datable Texts A distinction should also be made between dated and datable texts. Few medieval manuscripts are reliably dated. This is particularly the case in the early medieval period. A datable text is one in which the date (or, more frequently, dating limits) can be reliably established by external information. For example, a royal diploma (a document recording grants of land or of privileges to religious foundations or individuals) can often be dated quite closely, first by the regnal dates of the monarch in whose name it is written, and second by the persons cited in the witness-list. A later medieval manuscript may similarly contain references within the text to known individuals, or name the person for whom the manuscript was written. An inscription which records details in the manuscript such as the name of the scribe and the date or place of production is known as a colophon. As colophons are sometimes later 200
additions to a manuscript, they cannot be relied upon to provide accurate information. 1.4 Grades of Script Palaeographers make initial distinctions between scripts based on their aspect. Scripts can, for example, be broadly described as calligraphic or cursive, majuscule or minuscule. 1.4.1 Calligraphic and Cursive In calligraphic script, individual letters or parts of a letter are formed separately. The sequence of strokes making up each letter is rigorously followed and executed. It is thus a constructed script. Examples of calligraphic scripts are Uncial (see Sect. 2.2 below), Caroline minuscule (Sect. 2.5), and Textualis (Sect. 2.6.1). These scripts are written with a broad quill and are known generically as bookhands, formal scripts which are deliberately and carefully produced. A cursive script is one in which more than one part of a letter is made in a single stroke. Letters are joined together without the writing instrument (generally a finer quill) being lifted from the writing surface. Cursive scripts are generally informal and utilitarian. They are sometimes known as charter-hands. Such a distinction can, however, be misleading, as some charters are written in bookhand, and some books in a more cursive script. There are many intermediate grades between the extremes of calligraphic and cursive. 1.4.2 Majuscule and Minuscule The Latin alphabet existed originally in majuscule script, in which the letters are all of the same height. Majuscule scripts are those which correspond to the printer's uppercase letters, that is, confined between two parallel lines. A majuscule script is therefore a bilinear script. Capitalis (see Sect. 2.1 below) and Uncial (Sect. 2.2) are examples of majuscule script. A minuscule script is one which corresponds to the printer's lower-case letters, and includes ascenders and descenders. It is thus a quattrolinear script. 2. Latin Script in the Middle Ages
By the third century CE, formal bookhands existed alongside cursive forms of both majuscule and minuscule script. From these scripts were developed the new bookhands of Uncial and Half-Uncial during the late Antique period and the Continental minuscule scripts of the Middle Ages. 2.1 Capitalis The most highly revered script during the late Antique period was that of Capitalis, which had two basic varieties. Square Capitals (Capitalis Quadraid) was originally used for monumental inscriptions and was restricted in use to very high-grade manuscripts. Canonical Capitals (also known, rather
Palaeography misleadingly, as Rustic Capitals or Capitalis Rustica) was more fluidly written and therefore more suitable for the pen (see Fig. 1). From the fifth century onward, Capitalis seems to have been reserved as a distinguishing script used for running titles and where special emphasis was required. It was still used in this way into the twelfth century. 2.2 Uncial Capitalis seems to have been superseded in popularity as a text hand by Uncial, a broader, more rounded script which became widely diffused after the fourth century (see Fig. 2). The term itself is attributed to St Jerome, who criticized the script for its luxury status and waste of space, with letters as much as an inch high ('uncial') written on expensive material. Uncial appears to have been the most popular script for copying a text from about the fifth until well into the eighth century, although its use was generally confined to gospel and some liturgical books. Elsewhere it was used, like Capitalis and often in conjunction with it, as a display script. Although in many cases the ascenders and descenders in Uncial extend beyond the head and baseline, early examples show the script to be virtually confined between two
lines. The script may therefore be considered majuscule. Abbreviations are rare. 2.3 Half-Uncial Despite its name, Half-Uncial is no longer believed to have developed from Uncial, but from a common ancestor, the Roman cursive minuscule. During the Middle Ages, it rivaled Uncial in popularity in some centers, especially in Anglo-Saxon England, where Insular Half-Uncial became a characteristic and influential script. Insular is the name given jointly to the Irish and Anglo-Saxon system of scripts in the early Middle Ages, emphasizing the close interaction between the two countries during this period. Opinions vary as to whether Half-Uncial should be considered a majuscule or minuscule script. HalfUncial is very important in the development of national scripts (see Fig. 3). 2.4 National Scripts After the disintegration of the Roman Empire, various regional minuscule scripts were developed in western Europe from Roman cursive minuscule as well as distinct forms of the Half-Uncial scripts. In many cases, one can distinguish between scripts of various centers (such as Corbie, St Gall, Fleurie,
Figure 1. Canonical Capitalis (from Vatican City, Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, Vat. Lat. 3225, fo. 64).
Figure 2. Uncial (from London, British Library, Harley 1775, fo. 193), s. vi.
201
Religious Languages and Scripts Bobbio, and Luxeuil) and phases of development within these centers. These scripts evolved during the fifth and sixth centuries and lasted until the development of Caroline minuscule in the ninth century, Some national hands lasted longer: Visigothic minuscule (in Spain) survived until the twelfth century, and Anglo-Saxon minuscule until the middle of that century, and Beneventan minuscule survived in parts of southern Italy into the fifteenth century. The endurance of these scripts may be attributed to a greater measure of political independence. 2.5 Caroline Minuscule By the beginning of the ninth century, there were many regional minuscule scripts. From the ninth to the twelfth century, however, an international script was developed and eventually predominated over regional scripts. Caroline minuscule takes its name from the Emperor Charlemagne (771-814). Its development is closely associated with his extensive educational and ecclesiastical reforms, which led to a wider dissemination of texts. There is considerable
cnnm
debate about the precise origins of Caroline minuscule, but its obvious advantages over many of the regional scripts— it was clear, regular, and balanced — led to the gradual adoption of this disciplined and elegant script across Europe. In England, Caroline minuscule script was generally reserved for Latin texts. Old English texts continued to be written in Anglo-Saxon minuscule. Elsewhere, the script was used for both book and documentary purposes. Caroline minuscule was a calligraphic script and was therefore comparatively slow to write and hard to execute (see Fig. 4). 2 6
- Gothic Scripts From the tenth to the twelfth century, Caroline minuscule underwent gradual changes, with the script becoming more angular, compact, and vertical in appearance. These changes became marked during the twelfth century, and a new type of script, Gothic, evolved at the end of that century which was uniform and consciously systematic in character. Both calligraphic and cursive forms were evolved. Gothic
cjmmnpnicncem po&rau pncrcncmi COOSUTICJ ppessrono amoempor /"___ •lepis adatuemum ccmwrn&efyKr ^emnfterub? c^-pmrrniamcun eipannissuos neannr ™
*n,
Tiotntddnrm penpecnccuenuTHr
Figure 3. Half-Uncial (from Cologne, Diozesan- u. Dombibliothek, 213, fo. 19v), s. viii.
ipffc ftrer uerricer auwaaf prxt
cprcum* dupnarem mciefir
fidmnbuf A3) luJiCAnJum pjttun
ktbere-' Ifmim fefrtr inter
r
dum«
rexpunortim« f?*z> lunc n Aucxormf uefirac
rur- .\ndoc m.v>•, M-+V, r-*r, /-»/ (rather than, for example, /-»r) are ensured by a further general condition: among alternative possible replacements, the closest must be chosen. The closest of the replacements which the rule allows are precisely y for /', v for M, r for r, and / for /, as desired. 6. Outlook 'One of the greatest monuments of human intelligence' (Bloomfield) is only beginning to claim its rightful position in linguistics. Many of the insights of Panini's grammar still remain to be recaptured, but those that are already understood constitute a major theoretical contribution. Its impact on generative grammar was felt first in phonology (the Elsewhere Condition, unmarked rule ordering), and more recently in syntax (Linking Theory). The rewards for the currently burgeoning study of morphology promise to be richer still. Bibliography Bronkhorst J 1981 The orthoepic diaskeuasis of the Rgveda and the date of Panini. Indo-Iranian Journal 24: 273-82 Bronkhorst J 1983 On the history of Paninian grammar in the early centuries following Patanjali. Jounral of Indian Philosophy 11: 357^12 Buiskool J 1939 The Tripadi. Brill, Leiden Cardona G 1976 Panini, a Survey of Research. Motilal Banarsidass, New Delhi Cardona G 1988 Panini: His Work and its Traditions, vol. I. Motilal Banarsidass, New Delhi Cardona G 1990 Paninian studies. In: Jha V N (ed.) New Horizons of Research in Indology. Pune Deshpande M 1980 Evolution of Syntactic Theory in Sanskrit Grammar. Karoma, Ann Arbor, MI Joshi S D, Kiparsky P 1979 Siddha and asiddha in Paninian phonology. In: Dinnsen D (ed.) Current Approaches to Phonological Theory. Indiana University Press, Bloomington, IN Joshi S D, Roodbergen J A F 1983 The structure of the Astadhyayi. In: Joshi S D, Laddu S D (eds.) Proceedings of the International Seminar on Studies in the Astadhyayi of Panini. University of Poona, Pune Kiparsky P 1979 Panini as a Variationist. MIT Press, Cambridge, MA/Poona University Press, Poona Kiparsky P 1982 Some Theoretical Problems in PdninCs Grammar. Bhandarkar Oriental Research Institute, Poona
Summer Institute of Linguistics Kiparsky P 199la On Paninian studies: A reply to Cardona. Journal of Indian Philosophy 19: 331-67 Kiparsky P 1991b Economy and the construction of the Sivasutras. In: Deshpande M D, Bhate S (eds.) Paninian Studies: Professor S D Joshi Felicitation Volume. Center for South and Southeast Asian Studies, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI Scharfe H 1971 Panini's Metalanguage. American Philosophical Society, Philadelphia, PA Sharma R N 1987 The Astadhyayi of Panini. Munshiram Manoharlal, New Delhi
Staal J F 1962 A method of linguistic description the order of consonants according to Panini. Language 38: 1-10 Staal J F 1972 A Reader on the Sanskrit Grammarians. MIT Press, Cambridge, MA Staal J F 1988 Universals: Studies in Indian Logic and Linguistics. University of Chicago Press, Chicago, IL Thieme P 1935 Panini and the Veda: Studies in the Early History of Linguistic Science in India. Globe Press, Allahabad
Summer Institute of Linguistics J. Bendor-Samuel
The Summer Institute of Linguistics (recently renamed SIL International) is an educational and humanitarian organization involved in linguistic research and its application in literacy and translation programs in over 1,000 languages. Its research has concentrated on the languages of minority peoples where little previous study has been undertaken, and is focused on assisting in the development of those languages with a view to a body of written materials being published in them and descriptive materials about them (grammars and dictionaries, etc.) being compiled. It has developed training programs in many parts of the world to facilitate this. 1. Purpose
The SIL's statement of goals reads: 'The primary purpose for the existence of the Summer Institute of Linguistics is to: (a) provide training in language learning and linguistic analysis, carry on linguistic investigation of minority group languages wherever they may be found, and (b) provide a writing system for such languages and a literature which will be of educational, cultural, moral, and spiritual value.' In working to achieve this purpose, SIL's activities vary in response to local situations but can be summarized as having the following elements. 1.1 Linguistic Research Most SIL Language programs involve personnel learning to speak the local language and to record, both in oral and written forms, substantial quantities of language data, including oral literature (tradi-
tional accounts of the origin and history of the people, their beliefs and customs) and informal conversational material. Linguistic analysis covering the phonology, morphology, syntax, and discourse structure of the language concerned is carried out. The collection of a lexicon and a body of interlinear text is also made. Local colleagues are trained to participate fully in this research. A significant part of this material is published either in print, or in computer-readable or microfiche form. The need for dictionaries and grammars usable by the local people has also been recognized. 1.2 Translation In accordance with its aim of providing literature of educational, moral, and spiritual value, SIL works with local speakers to facilitate the translation and publication of the Bible, but does not normally become involved in the translation of other religious material. Usually the New Testament is translated, but increasingly in some parts of the world there is a demand for most or all of the Old Testament in addition. The Institute also assists local government and private agencies in the translation of other materials, for example, health and hygiene booklets, agricultural and other technological and developmental materials. 1.3 Literacy The aim of SIL is to assist the local communities in establishing ongoing literacy programs which are suited to local conditions and needs. This frequently includes the drafting and testing of reading primers and easy reading materials. Attention is also given to
391
Religion and the Study of Language the skills of writing and of numeracy. The training of local people to serve as literacy teachers and supervisors for literacy programs is usually undertaken. Recognizing the need that exists for the writing and production of new materials in the local language, SIL frequently holds new writers' workshops. In such workshops, those from the local community who have an interest and show some ability in writing are trained to become authors. Frequently, material of considerable cultural value, such as the traditions of the group preserved in their oral literature, is published. In its literacy work, SIL seeks to cooperate with other government and non-government agencies, and indeed endeavors to ensure that its efforts are fully integrated into local institutions. In countries where this has been desired by the government and by the communities concerned, SIL has assisted the government to establish a system of bilingual schools. In these schools, students are taught to acquire the skills of reading and writing in their own language and to master the national language. In this way, after the early years of instruction in their own language, they become competent to continue their education with the national language as the language of instruction. 1.4 Training and Transfer of Technology High priority is given to the transference of languagerelated skills to the citizens of the countries where projects are undertaken. Training covers a wide range of activities from teaching linguistics, translation, and literacy courses at local universities to onthe-job training as personnel work alongside local translators and literacy personnel. In an increasing number of language programs, SIL personnel serve as advisors or consultants to local personnel. 7.5 Cultural Awareness In carrying out linguistic, translation, and literacy work, a knowledge of the local culture is acquired. Normally a significant amount of ethnographic material is gathered, to do with the social organization and relationships in the community and the world-view of the language group concerned. 1.6 Practical Community Assistance Personnel from the SIL normally reside in the language communities for substantial periods of time. Six months of the year over a 15-year period is not uncommon. They seek to be sensitive to the desires of the local community, and are often involved in community development projects of various kinds. 2. Historical Origins The Summer Institute of Linguistics began modestly enough in 1934 with a summer school to teach young
392
people aboriginal languages. There were two students when it started out. W. Cameron Townsend, who organized the school and taught the grammar and literacy lessons, learned the Cakchiquel language of Guatemala the hard way—without any training. He was convinced that a knowledge of phonetics and some introduction to the structure of non-IndoEuropean languages would make a big difference. He deliberately chose a rustic setting in Arkansas where nail kegs substituted for chairs as good training for life among aboriginal peoples. The next summer, there were five students; one of them was Kenneth L. Pike (see Pike, Kenneth Lee). After the course, the students accompanied Townsend to Mexico to study some of the Native American languages. This pattern was repeated the next summer, and by the end of 1936 students were studying Aztec, Maya, Tarascan, Mazatec, Otomi, Mixe, Tarahumara, Mixtec, and Totonac. The linguistic schools and the fieldwork of SIL were under way. The Schools of the SIL International have a pragmatic purpose. They aim to provide the student with the background and skills which will enable him or her to learn a language, usually unwritten, for which pedagogical and descriptive materials are nonexistent or inadequate. The student learns basic linguistic theory and acquires techniques not only to learn to speak but also to analyse a new language and to provide a written form for that language. A strong emphasis from the very beginning of the Institute has been that linguistic theory and its practical application should continuously interact and reinforce each other. Thus, Pike, who studied under Townsend in 1935 and carried out initial linguistic fieldwork the following winter, came back as one of the teachers for the 1936 session. Similarly. Eugene Nida (see Nida, Eugene Albert), who was a student in 1936, subsequently alternated practical fieldwork and regular teaching at the Summer Institutes. At Townsend's insistence, Pike began to write a textbook on phonetics in the summer of 1936 and continued to work on that manuscript during the winter months when a broken leg kept him out of the Mixtec area. The following summer, 1937, Pike attended the Linguistic Institute of the Linguistic Society of America at the University of Michigan. Professors Charles Fries and Edward Sapir encouraged him to continue his studies, and these led eventually to his Ph.D. in 1942 at the University of Michigan, with the phonetics book as his dissertation. This pattern of summer teaching followed by practical fieldwork gave the courses and the textbooks that developed from those courses a strong practical emphasis. All the courses utilized extensive language material drawn from the fieldwork that was
Summer Institute of Linguistics being carried out, and these served to familiarize the students with diverse linguistic structures and to give them the opportunity of analyzing short language problems. Many of those who were called upon to teach were encouraged to continue their studies in general linguistics so that their teaching could be soundly based as well as practically oriented.
could not only provide much safer communication but also make it possible to reach some language groups which would otherwise be inaccessible. His vision and insistence led to the formation of the Jungle Aviation and Radio Service to provide this service to the linguists. Another innovation in Peru was the establishment of a system of bilingual schools, to serve the 3. Expansion of Activities educational needs of the jungle peoples who were The pattern of annual summer schools and linguistic outside the normal educational system. Potential field work in Mexico continued for a number of years. teachers in the various jungle villages were selected to Growth was steady but unspectacular. By the end of come to the SIL center at Yarinacocha to be trained 1941, SIL had 44 members and was involved in 17 to teach their own people the skills of reading, writing, and numeracy, and the first stages of indigenous languages in Mexico. A significant year was 1942, when, at the invitation elementary education, using their own languages as of the University of Oklahoma, SIL moved its the medium of instruction. At the same time, they summer school to that university. From that summer were able to acquire a good grasp of the national and for more than 40 years following, SIL offered language, Spanish, so as to be able to teach the courses each summer at Norman, Oklahoma, as part national language to their own people. These new teachers returned to their villages after of the summer program at the university. In 1942, for the first time, enrolment reached 100 three months' training and passed on to their people students. At the end of the summer, 51 of these what they had learned. The next year, they came students joined the SIL organization with the back to Yarinacocha to learn more, and once again intention of carrying out long-term language work, returned to their jungle schoolrooms. This cycle of three months' training and the rest of the year in the thus doubling SIL's membership. Growth made it necessary to put SIL on a village was repeated until the normal elementary legal basis, and in 1942 SIL was formally incorpo- syllabus had been covered. Successful teachers were rated. At the same time, a sister organization, the given recognition by the government and commisWycliffe Bible Translators (WBT), was set up to sioned as bilingual teachers. Monolingual pupils who learn to read in their own represent the aims of SIL, and particularly its translation work, to friends and churches who language, in the first year read with understanding. did not fully understand an educational and scientific They also begin to learn Spanish, at first orally, but organization such as SIL. Over the years since, the in the second year they are introduced to reading two organizations have worked together in a Spanish. Thereafter their education continues to be symbiotic relationship. While SIL carries out the bilingual at least through the first three primary linguistic training, and is responsible for the grades. Beyond that, materials in Spanish can be used linguistic, translation, and literacy work, WBT effectively. Instead of having to use teachers from outside the represents SIL's work and seeks to encourage interest, personal involvement, and funding among communities who are alien to the local culture, this friends and churches in the countries from which system results in teachers who know the local language and culture and in pupils learning to read members come. The next major development occurred in 1946. with comprehension. This combination of linguistic research with its Until then linguistic fieldwork had been limited to Mexico and the USA. In that year, SIL began work application in literacy programs and the establishin Peru among the language groups of the Amazon ment of bilingual schools, together with the use of the jungle. Within a year, members had begun research in modern technology, of small planes and radios, was seen by many educators and government officials as a six different languages. Amazonia posed new challenges. The language very practical way to meet the needs of language groups lived in remote and difficult-to-reach groups in remote areas. Soon, SIL was invited to extend its work to other places. Communications were nonexistent and travel slow, dangerous, and exhausting. Not untypi- countries in Latin America; Guatemala (1952), cal was the experience of one team who had Ecuador (1953), Bolivia (1955), Brazil (1957), Cotwo weeks on a dangerous river, followed by a lombia (1962), and Suriname (1967). Another landmark year for SIL was 1953. Up to four-day walk, to reach the language group which they were studying. Cameron Townsend realized that year, SIL's work was limited to the Americas. In that small planes could transform the situation. That 1953, at the invitation of the Department of same journey could be made in a flight of one Education, Culture, and Sport of the Philippine hour and 45 minutes. He saw too, that small planes government, SIL began a program of linguistic
393
Religion and the Study of Language research with its practical applications in literacy and translation in the Philippines. This was followed by new work in Papua New Guinea in 1956. Work spread to other countries around the Pacific (Vietnam 1957, Australian Aborigines 1961, Indonesia 1971, Solomon Islands 1980, Vanuatu 1981, and New Caledonia 1984) and to other parts of Asia (Nepal and India 1966, Thailand 1977). It was in 1962 that SIL began work in Africa, under a cooperative agreement with the Institute of African Studies of the University of Ghana. The next year, similar work began in Nigeria in cooperation with the University of Nigeria (Nsukka). Subsequently, linguistic work has begun in some 25 African countries. Work has also been undertaken in some of the languages spoken in the Commonwealth of Independent States. Some of the textbooks developed by SIL have been translated into Russian and training courses in translation principles have been carried out in response to local requests. 4. Current Activities 4.1 Language Programs Work is being undertaken in some 1,050 languages, and SIL has been involved in various ways in a further 450 languages. These languages are found in all parts of the world in more than 50 countries, approximately as follows: Africa Americas Asia Pacific
300 active programs 300 active programs 220 active programs 230 active programs
In addition to research in the individual languages included in these figures, SIL is involved in a number of linguistic and sociolinguistic surveys, covering many other languages. In many parts of the world, scholars recognize extensive chains of related speech forms. SIL has been engaged in collecting wordlists, making comparisons between such wordlists, recording and transcribing oral texts, and then using these to assess the intelligibility of spoken forms among speakers of divergent dialects/languages. Information has also been gathered through interviews and orally administered questionnaires with speakers of these various speech forms, covering their ethnic selfidentification, their dialect group contacts, and their perception of linguistic similarities and differences. Groupings of relatively similar speech forms which can be labeled 'languages' can be established on the basis of the criteria of lexical similarity, a high degree of intelligibility, patterns of contact, and the perceptions of the speakers themselves. Casad (1974) describes in detail the fieldwork involved in such research. 394
In the many areas of linguistic diversity, there is also considerable multilingualism. Where there are so many languages in close proximity, people frequently acquire some degree of proficiency in a national or regional language or in one or more of the neighboring languages. The sociolinguistic surveys being carried out also gather data regarding the patterns of use and acquisition of second languages as well as data on proficiency in these languages. In doing this, SIL has been developing several methods of assessing the degree of proficiency that speakers have in second languages such as a sentence repetition test and a second language oral proficiency evaluation (SLOPE) which adapts the procedures that are used in the FSI second language proficiency testing to make them appropriate for use in nonliterate communities. SIL's linguistic and sociolinguistic surveys are usually carried out in close cooperation with local academic institutions. An illustration of this and of the nature and scope of SIL's activities in this type of research can be seen in the five volumes of the Sociolinguistic Survey of Northern Pakistan amounting to some 1,400 pages and published jointly by the National Institute of Pakistan Studies of the Quaid-iAzam University and SIL (O'Leary 1992). 4.2 Publications Less than two years after the start of fieldwork in Mexico, in 1937, SIL published the first results of its linguistic research—12 papers in Investigaciones Lingiiisticas, the organ of the Mexican Institute of Linguistic Investigations. Since then, SIL has continued to publish its research. Publications so far are listed in its Bibliography (1992) and can be grouped into four categories: (a) Approximately 5,000 articles and books on general linguistic topics. This includes the various textbooks used in SIL schools. (b) Some 7,000 linguistic articles and books about specific languages and groups of languages. This includes both descriptive and comparative works. While the majority of these have been in English, there are a number in Spanish and French. (c) Approximately 8,500 books and articles written in minority languages. This category includes a wide range of educational, literacy, and cultural books. (d) Biblical material. Up to the time of writing, SIL has been involved in the translation of the New Testament into over 500 languages and of portions of the Bible (e.g. a gospel) into a further 400 languages. The Institute does not normally publish these books, but leaves this to the various Bible Societies and similar agencies. One of the most widely used books published by SIL is the Ethnologue, edited by Barbara F.
Summer Institute of Linguistics Grimes. This is a listing of all the languages of the world arranged alphabetically within each country. Each entry includes the name of the language, alternative names, a three-letter language code, the number of speakers, the location of the speakers, its linguistic classification, a list of known dialects, information regarding the degree of bilingualism, and what Scriptures have been translated, with their date. In addition, the existence of Braille materials, some ecological information, and linguistic typological information is included where available. Maps showing the location of each language are included. The 13th edition (1996) has entries for over 6,700 languages. The Ethnologue is updated with a new edition published every four years. It is available on the World Wide Web at http://www.sil.org/ ethnologue. A companion volume is an Index with over 33,000 entries which identifies all language names, their alternative names, and dialects, and refers these to the main language names and codes. 4.3 Training Programs From Oklahoma, the summer schools spread to other universities in the USA (North Dakota, Oregon, and Texas), and to Australia, Canada, England, Germany, France, and Singapore. Combined enrollment since the early 1970s has averaged around 1,200 students each year. Most of these students take introductory courses in various aspects of linguistics and also in ethnography, but since the late 1970s around 300 enroll each year for the advanced courses at the various schools. These advanced courses, besides covering various theoretical approaches to phonological and syntactic analysis, include topics such as 'Language Use in Multilingual Societies,' 'The Constituent Structure of Discourse,' 'Semantics and Pragmatics,' 'Historical and Comparative Linguistics', and 'Teaching English as a Second Language' Linked to the development of these advanced courses has been the expansion of some of the original summer schools into all-year-round institutes which can offer a wider range of linguistic and applied linguistic courses than the summer schools are able to. In Dallas, an affiliation to the University of Texas at Arlington (UTA) provides for the sharing of faculty and a joint program in linguistics leading to advanced degrees. All-year-round training is also offered in England (in association with the University of Reading) and in Australia. Overall, SIL schools have used a wide variety of theoretical approaches to linguistic analysis. Some schools have used the theoretical approach developed by Pike known as Tagmemics, but never to the exclusion of other linguistic theories. Generally, SIL
schools have tended to reflect the theoretical orientation of the universities in which its members studied. Thus, the British School was strongly influenced by J. R. Firth's prosodic analysis, and the North Dakota School has used a generative approach. At Oregon, a functional-typological approach is used, while at Texas, generative, stratificational, and tagmemic courses are offered. 5. Information Processing
In the 1960s and early 1970s, SIL began using computers to facilitate linguistic analysis and typesetting of documents. Since small computers were not yet available at that time, work had to be done on mainframe computers. In the most notable project of that era, text collections in over 300 languages were turned into concordances in a process developed by Dr Joseph F. Grimes, first at the Universidad Nacional Autonoma in Mexico, and then at the University of Oklahoma with the assistance of a grant from the National Science Foundation. Each field linguist sent in up to 200 typed pages of texts which were entered by keypunch operators at the university and submitted to the program, which generated a printed concordance of every word form and morpheme. In the mid-1970s, with the advent of microcomputer technology, pioneering work began to investigate the feasibility of such information-processing technology being used in field locations. By the early 1980s, when portable personal computers became commercially available, SIL had already developed some basic software tools for supporting field linguistics. By 1990, the use of personal computers by field workers of SIL was virtually universal. Particularly popular are battery-operated laptop computers. Programmers within the organization have developed a full range of programs for both MS-DOS and Macintosh platforms that support the work of field linguistics. SIL has developed programs that are now in use for many linguistic tasks, including: acoustic analysis of speech; automatic glossing and interlinear alignment of text; compilation of dictionaries; generation of concordances; morphological parsing; analysis of comparative wordlists of related dialects and languages; automatic adaptation of written texts among related dialects and languages; and editing and printing of documents using non-Roman characters. Throughout, SIL's policy has been to share these programs freely with others, provided they are not used for commercial gain. Of particular interest to field linguists because of its ability to be used in field situations anywhere in the world is the development of a hardware interface which connects a tape recorder or microphone to a computer and so provides an acoustic phonetics field laboratory. This system, labeled CECIL, and the 395
Religion and the Study of Language accompanying Spectrum program, produces a display on the computer screen giving an analysis of loudness/intensity, fundamental frequency, and changes in sound quality with numerical and graphical readouts for frequency and intensity. The Spectrum program uses the files produced by CECIL and calculates spectrograms and spectra. The program has the very useful facility of being able to play back stretches of speech at one-third or one-fifth of the original speed of the utterance while maintaining the frequency level. Many linguists have found CECIL to be of real assistance in their analysis of pitch features and other difficult phonetic parameters. Attempting to produce similar written materials in hundreds of languages, SIL has developed a program which enables it to adapt materials from one language into a related language or dialect. Such computer-assisted related language adaptation has exciting possibilities for the production of written materials in many languages where the comparatively small number of speakers had previously made the inevitably small number of copies of a book relatively uneconomic. In the 1990s, attention turned to developing a new generation of integrated application programs built on object-oriented and knowledge-based technologies. At the heart of this endeavor is a system called CELLAR (Computing Environment for Linguistic, Literary, and Anthropological Research) which has been developed by a team of programmers at SIL's international headquarters. CELLAR is the data management 'engine' for SIL's LinguaLinks CDROM, which was released initially in 1996 and is updated at least once a year. Technical information about CELLAR, and about LinguaLinks, is available at http://www.sil.org on the Internet. 6. Personnel SIL is set up as a member organization, that is, those who carry out its activities become members of SIL and control its work. Members in a given geographical area, frequently a specific country, form an entity of SIL and set the policies in that country and elect their own leadership. Every three years, delegates from all these entities meet in conference to determine the general policies of the organization and to elect its Board of Directors. The original members of SIL were Americans, but, since the 1990s, personnel come from over 40 countries. While over half its members come from USA, substantial numbers, over 300 from each country, come from the Canada, the UK, and Australia, and significant numbers (over 100 from each country) from Germany, Switzerland, and the Netherlands. The Institute increasingly has an international flavor, with some 50 members from Japan,
396
100 from Korea, 80 from New Zealand, and 60 from Finland, to name but a few countries. Approximately half the members are engaged in language-related activities while the other half provide services which enable the language work to be carried out, often in remote areas—pilots and mechanics for the planes, radio technicians, computer specialists, accountants and other business people, teachers for members' children, and so on. All share the same motivation—service to minority people and, in particular, the provision of Scripture for them. 7. Finances The bulk of the funding for SIL's activities comes from individuals and churches who are interested in SIL's services to minority peoples. They are drawn from a wide spectrum of Christendom; for the most part, they are evangelicals from many different denominations who share a strong desire to see the Bible made available to all the peoples of the earth and who have a keen interest in the educational and humanitarian aspects of SIL's work. Specific projects such as major literacy programs and some linguistic research projects have benefited from government funding grants and from nongovernment funding agencies, such as private foundations. 8. Future Prospects With the number of distinct languages in the world standing at over 6,500 and bearing in mind that more than half of these have not been described in any detail, SIL is not likely to run out of work in the near future! The organization is aiming to be involved in a further 1,000 languages. The pattern of its work will continue to evolve. The increased focus already being given to the transference of language-related skills to local scholars will certainly continue with growing impetus. The higher priority being given by governments in many parts of the world to the eradication of illiteracy, coupled with the recognition that literateness in local languages is vital for economic and social development, will impact on SIL and lead to an increase in all aspects of its literacy-related activities. The harnessing of modern technology will remain another priority. An example of this is LinguaLinks, an 'electronic encyclopedia' produced by SIL with a new generation of tools, helps, and training for the field researcher in anthropology, socioiinguistics, linguistics, and applied linguistics, including literacy and language learning activities. LinguaLinks is a Knowledge Support System (KSS) designed to provide whatever is necessary to generate performance and learning at the moment of need. The goal is to provide a field researcher with information, training, and expert advice at any time and place through the use of the personal computer. This
Tamil Linguistic Tradition system combines the use of hypertext documents, 'smart' computer programs, experts systems and computer-based training. LinguaLinks contains a set of electronic field manuals, with resources for the field language worker in five subject domains: anthropology, language learning, linguistics, literacy, and sociolinguistics. These electronic resources assist the language researcher to observe, collect, organize, analyze, and publish language and culture data. The initial version of LinguaLinks was released in 1996 and incorporates the work of SIL and non-SIL scholars. LinguaLinks is updated at least once a year as new material and functionality is added. The research agenda for LinguaLinks is multidisciplinary, requiring knowledge from a constellation of disciplines. SIL hopes that LinguaLinks will be seen as a contribution to academic excellence in all of its knowledge domains, and invites contributions by SIL and non-SIL scholars. The researchers developing LinguaLinks are committed to close consultation both with those involved in doing field research and
with theoreticians. This makes LinguaLinks reference materials and data management tools useful to a broad range of researchers. 9. Further Information
For more information on SIL worldwide, consult the World Wide Web: http://www.sil.org/ See also: Missionaries; Bible Translations, Modern Period. Bibliography Brend R M, Pike K L (eds.) 1977 The Summer Institute of Linguistics. Mouton, The Hague, TX Casad E H 1974 Dialect Intelligibility Testing. SIL, Dallas, TX Grimes B F (ed.) 1996 Ethnologue, Languages of the World, 13th edn. SIL, Dallas, TX O'Leary C F (ed.) 1992 Sociolinguistic Survey of Northern Pakistan. Quaid-i-Azam University and SIL, Islamabad SIL 1992 Bibliography. SIL, Dallas, TX
Tamil Linguistic Tradition K. V. Zvelebil
The beginnings of Tamil (see Tamil) linguistic tradition are lost in the legendary accounts of the semimythical sage Akattiyan (Sans Agastya) who is said to have composed, in 'hoary antiquity,' a huge fivefold grammar of Tamil, Akattiyam. The fragments of this treatise which are available today are almost certainly forgeries. From very early times, there must have been enormous learned activity in the field of grammatical description of Tamil including the related fields of prosody, rhetoric, and poetics, reaching back at least to the third century BCE. Only a fragment of the actual output has survived. Apparently, at least three or four different linguistic traditions existed even at that early stage: one was definitely that of Tolkappiyam, the earliest grammar extant; another was probably that of the lost Akattiyam, connected with the Aintiram (Sans aindra-) grammatical school. The two characteristic conceptual features of indigenous Tamil linguistic tradition are the vision of Tamil language as a threefold manifestation (muttamil) of textual (iyal), musical (icai), and representational (kuttu, natakam) performance, and
the notion of grammar as fivefold discipline (aintu ilakkanam) of eluttu (sound and symbol), col (word and its forms), porul (meaning and subject-matter), yappu (metrics), and ani (rhetoric). The term for grammar, 'ilakkanam' (Sans laksana-) can be rendered as 'marker'; 'literature' is not 'words written' (Latin liter a) but 'words marked,' ilakkiyam (Sans laksya-) by the markers of grammar; but 'grammar' is 'squeezed out' of literature like 'oil from sesamum seeds.' The earliest grammar, Tolkappiyam (The Ancient Book) is probably the result of protracted (possibly collective) composition from the first century BCE up to about 450-500 CE; in its three books (1,611 aphorisms) on eluttu, col, and porul, it is one of the finest monuments of human intelligence, the first literary expression of pre-Aryan south Indian civilization, representing the essence of classical Tamil culture. Among later grammars one must mention at least two: Puttamittiran's five-fold Viracoljyam (eleventh century CE) and Pavananti's Nannul ('The Good Book,' about 1200 CE) which is still of much influence as the norm of literary language. Besides, 397
Religion and the Study of Language there exists a wealth of specialized grammars of the literature of love (akarri) and of heroism (puram), as well as dozens of pattiyal grammars—descriptive treatises of more than 1200 literary genres, and handbooks of poetics and rhetoric. In later medieval and early modern periods two main trends in Tamil linguistic thought may be discerned: one is based on ^, - ,. — .,' ...^ ^i • t . the indigenous Tamil tradition; another is closer to Sanskntic models. See also: Sanskrit (Paninian) Linguistics; Tamil.
398
Bibliography Albert D 1985 Tolkappiyam—Phonology and Morphology (An English Translation). International Institute of Tamil Studies, Madras Meenakshisundaran T P 1965 A History of Tamil Language. Deccan College, Poona Subrahmanya Sastri P S 1934 History of Grammatical Theories m Tamil ana Their Relation to the Grammatical ^^ jn Sanskri( Jouma, of Orienta, Research Madras Vijayavenugopal G 1968 A Modern Evaluation of Nannul (el.uttatikaram). Annamalai University, Annamalainagar
SECTION VII
Biographies
(fl. 987-1010) C. Robinson
JElfric, homilist and grammarian, was a leading figure in the English literary movement brought about by the Benedictine reforms of the tenth century. He studied at Winchester and in 987 was sent as novice master to the monastery at Cernel, now Cerne Abbas, in Dorset. He had already been ordained by this time and therefore must have been at least 30 years old. His years at Cerne Abbas were his most productive. In 1005 he became the first abbot of the monastery at Eynsham near Oxford. The date of his death is not known. Jilfric's grammatical works include his Grammar, which is of interest because it is the first Latin grammar book to be written in English and moreover because of the evidence it provides for Old English grammar; a Latin glossary; and the Colloquy written to provide his pupils with model Latin dialogues, lively, imaginary conversations, full of insights into the everyday lives of ordinary people. The interlinear gloss found in one of the two extant manuscripts of the Colloquy is not by ^Elfric. Among his many homiletic works are the Catholic Homilies (991-92) consisting of two books intended to be read in alternate years and each consisting of 40 readings. These readings are expositions of the gospels and the passions and lives of those saints whose festivals were observed by the laity. The Catholic Homilies were followed by the Lives of Saints which include the passions and lives of saints whose feast days were celebrated in the services of monks rather than by the laity. Some of the second series of Catholic Homilies, the Lives of Saints, and all his later homilies are written in a distinctive rhythmical prose consisting of pairs of phrases each usually with two stressed syllables and often linked by alliteration. A number of ^Elfric's letters survive. Three of the best known constitute the Epistola de Canonibus: a
letter to Wulfige (Bishop of Sherborne 992-1002) and two letters to Wulfstan (Archbishop of York) originally in Latin but translated at the Archbishop's request and expanded. These three letters were worded so that they could be read out to the clergy instructing them in canonical, liturgical and other matters. He wrote another such letter for his own clergy at Eynsham. De Temporibus Anni was also intended for the edification of the clergy. It is a treatise in Latin on astrology and chronology explaining the calculation of the date of Easter. JElfric's other works include a Life of ^Ethelwold, his former mentor at Winchester. In his many translations from Latin, he aimed to convey meaning rather than provide an exact literal translation. He felt strongly that the clergy had a duty to instruct but at the same time he had doubts about the wisdom of translating the Bible and was selective about the passages he translated. Nonetheless he translated or paraphrased many passages from the Old and New Testaments. A full bibliography of his writings may be found in Clemoes (1959). Reinsma (1987) gives a comprehensive bibliography of scholarship of ^Elfric from early times to 1982. See also: Translation: History. Bibliography Clemoes P A M 1959 The chronology of ^Elfric's works. In: Clemoes P A M (ed.) The Anglo-Saxons: Studies in Some Aspects of their History and Culture presented to Bruce Dickins. Bowes and Bowes, London Clemoes P A M 1966 vElfric. In: Stanley E G (ed.) Continuations and Beginnings. Nelson, London Reinsma L M 1987 Mlfric: An Annotated Bibliography. Garland, New York
399
Biographies
Agamben, Giorgio (1942- ) P. Fletcher
Polymathic in his interests and in the subjects that he has brought to print, Giorgio Agamben, Professor of Aesthetics at the University of Verona, works at the intersection of philosophy, theology, law, literary studies, and political theory. Something of a celebrity in Italy, Agamben starred as Saint Philip in Pier Paolo Pasolini's cinematic version of The Gospel According to St. Matthew in 1964. It is for his academic output, however, that Agamben is best known, particularly for his directorship of the Italian edition of the complete works of Walter Benjamin (see Benjamin, Walter). Born in 1942, Giorgio Agamben studied law in Rome until 1965. His interest in the conjunction of language, politics, and religion seems to have commenced at this stage of his academic career with a dissertation on the political thought of Simone Weil. On various occasions between 1966 and 1968 Agamben studied under Martin Heidegger (see Heidegger, Martin) and in 1974 he worked at the Warburg Institute on the relation between language and phantasm in the medieval notion of melancholia. Agamben's interest in language and experience has developed since those early years and has resulted in a number of academic appointments in Italy, France, and the USA. Much of Agamben's analysis of politics, law, and religious texts and traditions begins from an interrogation of the medium in which assemblages of propositions, discourses and concepts take place. In some respects, his task is a simple one: simply to reveal the existence of language itself. The exposure of the faction loquendi—which is itself the condition of the possibility of community and tradition— makes possible an analysis of the potential of language and what it might become in actuality. But this factum itself cannot be stated because if an utterance attempts to define its status it has already become a saying, a proposition, and has elided the
condition of its sayability. Nonetheless, the singularity of this 'experience' of language itself is found in the theological and philosophical writings of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. These traditions look to the redemption of that which has been said and understand only too well that such an 'experience' is always one at the threshold and can never be captured in prepositional or logical terms. The religious traditions of the west, then, in their Cabilistic, mystical, apophatic and symbolic reflections on language, the creative word and the singularity of divine discourse, expose the 'pure' existence of language freed from the conformation of any presupposition, and, in doing so, conceive of a community which is beyond any representational condition of belonging. Agamben gives this community the name of 'the coming community.' It has no definable identity—other than its existence in language without identity—and, as such, is irreducible and absolute potential. In forging this politics of potential, Agamben takes the deliberations on the intractable status of language that is gestured towards in religious language and, on that basis, challenges contemporary political and juridical ideologies. Bibliography Agamben G 1993 Stanzas: Word and Phantasm in Western Culture [trans. R.L. Martinez]. University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis, MN Agamben G 1993 The Coming Community [trans. M. Hardt]. University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis. MN Agamben G 1998 Homo Sacer [trans. D. Heller-Roazen]. Stanford University Press, Stanford. CA Agamben G 1999 Potentialities: Collected Essays in Philosophy [trans. D. Heller-Roazen]. Stanford University Press, Stanford, CA Wall T C 1999 Radical Passivity: Levinas, Blanchot. and Agamben. SUNY Press, Albany, NY
Albright, William Foxwell (1891-1971) K. J. Cathcart
William Foxwell Albright was one of the most influential figures in twentieth-century biblical studies and in the development of so-called biblical archaeology. A scholar who combined considerable philological gifts and great intellectual curiosity, he was a 400
prolific writer and published 20 books and more than a thousand articles. He was born in Coquimbo, Chile, 24 May 1891, the eldest son of the Reverend William Finley Albright and Zephine Viola, nee Foxwell, who were Methodist missionaries. He
Andrew of St. Victor graduated from Upper Iowa University in 1912 and spent one year as principal of a high school in Menno, South Dakota. In 1913 he went to the Oriental Seminary at Johns Hopkins University, where he studied under Paul Haupt. After he was awarded a Ph.D. in 1916 for his dissertation on 'The Assyrian Deluge Epic,' he taught at the Oriental Seminary for some years, with a break of five months doing limited service in the US army. In 1919 he was able to take up a Thayer Fellowship at the American School of Oriental Research in Jerusalem, where he spent the next ten years. During this period in Palestine he conducted archaeological digs at Tell elFul and Tell Beit Mirsim. Later on he excavated at Bethel and Beth-Zur. From 1929 to his retirement in 1958, Albright was chairman of the Oriental Seminary at Johns Hopkins. He died on 19 September 1971 in Baltimore. There has been much scholarly debate about Albright's work. He believed passionately that archaeology provided objective external evidence to confirm the biblical story and was convinced that his archaeological research and discoveries in Palestine demonstrated the value of the Bible as a source of history. He was sure that he had discredited the views of Wellhausen and his followers. However, his arguments in favour of the substantial historicity of the Mosaic tradition, the patriarchal narratives
and the antiquity of Israelite monotheism have not stood the test of time. Albright had learned much about Semitic philology from Haupt, his teacher at Johns Hopkins, and he knew the civilizations of Mesopotamia, Canaan and Egypt intimately. Quite rightly, he promoted the integration of textual and archaeological data, but he was an historian rather than an archaeologist. His published works show that he was an historian preoccupied with Israelite religion and with the historicity of the Bible. A master of synthesis, he wrote his works with great enthusiasm, though often with rather naive claims for archaeological data. Bibliography Dever W G 1993 What remains of the house that Albright Built? Biblical Archaeologist 56(1): 25-35 Freedman D N, Mattson D L (eds.) 1975 The Published Works of William Foxwell Albright: A Comprehensive Bibliography. American Schools of Oriental Research, Cambridge, MA Long B O 1993 Mythic trope in the autobiography of William Foxwell Albright. Biblical Archaeologist 56(1): 36-^5 Machinist P 1996 William Foxwell Albright: the Man and his Work. In: Cooper J S, Schwartz G M (eds.) The Study of the Ancient Near East in the Twenty-First Century. Eisenbrauns, Winona Lake, IN, pp. 385-403
Andrew of St. Victor W. McKane
At the Abbey of St. Victor in Paris, Andrew was a pupil of 'Master Hugh' who was resident at St. Victor from about 1118 until his death in 1141. According to later information Andrew was born in England of English parents, and he was abbot of Wigmore in Herefordshire from 1147 to about 1155, when he returned to St. Victor. The Abbey of St. Victor was a house of Augustinian canons regular whose rule was founded on that drawn up by Augustine for secular clergy. The canon regular was cloistered and was especially devoted to sacred learning. St. Victor had a splendid library, donated by the French royal family, and was a center of vigorous intellectual life. Andrew's scholarship is founded essentially on Jerome's Vulgate and his grasp of Hebrew should not be exaggerated—he conversed with Jews in French. Such evidence as there is suggests that he did not know Greek. He produces a few Hebrew words (not always accurately), but he was principally dependent on Jerome's Vulgate for his access to the Hebrew Bible. He was a scholar of independent mind
who clashed with patristic exegesis in general and Jerome in particular. Andrew of St. Victor is interesting and significant not because of the excellence of his biblical scholarship, but because of the novelty of his exegetical stance in the theological context of the twelfth century and because of the lively way in which he expressed it. Andrew by his uncompromising pursuit of the literal (Jewish) sense pushed into the foreground an exegesis of the Old Testament which did not have a Christian content and ruffled feathers in doing so. He is an important figure in connection with the history of the Old Testament in the Christian Church. Isaiah 7.14 was a text on which patristic and mediaeval exegetes concentrated in connection with the Virgin Birth and it was over this that Andrew fell foul of perhaps his leading adversary, Richard of St. Victor. Richard's complaint was, 'He (Andrew) gives the Jewish objections or questions without answering them; he seems to award the palm to them, since he leaves these questions unsolved.' Richard's outburst
401
Biographies is an indication that Andrew has stepped out of line in crucial respects and has made a departure which is intolerable to Catholic exegetical orthodoxy. The 'literal' (Jewish) sense of the Old Testament is not to be granted such ill-considered freedom: it must be leashed to the pursuit of Christian truth and not rise above its lowly station in the exegetical system. Andrew's pupil, who springs to his master's defense, cuts little ice with Richard: 'Do not call it my master's opinion but the Jews', for he advances it not as his own but as theirs.' This makes no impression on Richard and his rejoinder is that Andrew ought to
have made it clear when he was formulating a true exegesis, which was his own, and a false one which was Jewish. It is because Richard accepts Jerome's 'literal' (Christian) interpretation of Isaiah 7.14 that he is so vexed by Andrew's exegesis of it. Bibliography McKane W 1989 Selected Christian Hebraists. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, pp. 42-75 Smalley B 1983 The Study of the Bible in the Middle Ages. 3rd edn. Basil BlackwelK Oxford, pp. 112-95
Aquinas, Thomas (1224/5-74) D. Hart
Theologian, philosopher, hymnode, exegete, patristic scholar, avid trencherman, and mystic, St Thomas Aquinas produced the most majestic theological synthesis of the Latin Middle Ages, especially in his two compendious masterpieces the Summa Contra Gentiles and the Summa Theologiae. Certainly no one was more daring or deft in his adoption of the Aristotelian learning emanating from Islamic philosophy in the thirteenth century, nor better able to reconcile its uses with scripture, the Christian platonist writings of the fathers (especially the Pseudo-Dionysius), and the doctrinal deposit of the Catholic Church. More germane here, no one in the mediaeval Church did more to advance coherently—both in theory and in practice—an understanding of the use of human language in regard to the nature and acts of God, and so of the relation between natural reason and the science of divine revelation. Though he devoted a very small portion of his writings to the issue of analogy, he is credited with many of the formulae largely preferred by later generations of Catholic philosophers, especially as regards the primacy of the divine pole of any analogical predication, the apophatic stricture against any attempt to construct a univocal predication of God, and the underlying structure of ontological participation of the creature in God (however this language is tempered by the austere Aristotelian terminology of causation) that certifies the truth of our analogies despite their ultimate transcendence of our powers of thought. Born in Roccasecca in 1224/5, into the landed gentry of the Kingdom of Sicily, Thomas was placed as an oblate in the monastery of Monte Cassino as a small child, where for nine years he was housed and educated, till the expulsion of the monks by the Emperor in 1239; thereafter he went to the University of Naples, where 402
he encountered the impressive scholarly and pedagogical disciplines of the still young Dominican order. Had he persevered in the vocation his family had chosen for him, he could quite plausibly have ascended to the abbacy, adding the monastic estates, informally, to their freehold; so, when he elected instead to become a Dominican, they even resorted to abduction and a year's incarceration to dissuade him. But, when his will proved intractable, he was released, and in 1245 he went to Paris, where he studied under Albert the Great. From 1248 to 1252 he served under Albert as a Master of Students at the new Studium Generate in Cologne, but then returned to Paris to complete his studies. In 1256, possessed now of his baccalaureate and licentia docendi (soon to be followed by full certification as a Magister), he began teaching at the University of Paris. From 1259 to 1268, he served as an advisor of the papal curia, under three popes (from 1265 to 1267, he lectured at the Santa Sabina convent in Rome). In 1268 he returned to Paris, where he became embroiled in the 'Averroist' controversy. Caught between the Scylla of the rigid Augustinians (who held to a strict illuminationist understanding of knowledge, natural or graced) and the Charybdis of the Averroist rationalists (who presumed an irresoluble heterogeneity between philosophic reason and religious faith, and so an autonomous sphere peculiar to each), Thomas (who scandalized one camp with his defense of empirical reason, and the other with his insistence on natural reason's compatibility with and subordination to revelation) could not emerge with his reputation unscathed. The condemnation of the Averroists in 1270 redounded (unjustly) to his discredit. In 1272, he repaired again to the University of Naples to establish a Dominican house; in 1273 he became
Arnauld, Antoine (1612-94) involved in a new dispute with the greatest of the pure Augustinians, Bonaventure; and in January of 1274 Pope Gregory X appointed him to the Council of Lyons. This last commission he could not discharge; on his way to the council, he fell ill and had to stop in Fossanova, at the Cistercian abbey. There, on 7 March, he died. Canonized in 1323, made a doctor ecclesiae in 1567, he now wears the lovely title doctor angelicus. It is perhaps somewhat ironic that a man who contributed so much to theological language, and to the elucidation of its fundamental rationality, chose to end his days in virtual silence: given to spiritual ecstasies, he experienced one of extraordinary duration and profundity while celebrating mass on 6 December 1273. Thereafter he wrote not
another word, remaining instead in a state of rapt serenity, and confessing that, by comparison to the mysteries of which he had been vouchsafed a glimpse, all he had produced now seemed to him to be just 'so much straw.' See also: Analogy; Linguistic Theory in the Later Middle Ages; Christian Views on Language. Bibliography Aquinas T 1996 Opera Omnia. Editoria Elettronica Editel, Milan Gilson E 1956 The Christian Philosophy of Thomas Aquinas. Random House, New York Siewerth G 1961 Der Thomismus als Identitdtssystem. G. Schulte-Bulmke, Frankfurt am Maim
Arnauld, Antoine (1612-94) P. Swiggers
Antoine Arnauld, called 'le grand Arnauld,' was born in Paris, the son of a court lawyer. He studied philosophy, law, and theology in Paris, and in 1635 he was received as Bachelor at the Sorbonne, and in 1641 as Doctor of Theology. He was ordained priest in 1641, and became a harsh critic of Protestantism and an adherent of the ideas of Cornelius Jansen (Jansenius). In 1643, Arnauld published De la Frequente Communion, a defence of Jansenism directed against the Jesuits. Jansenism was condemned in 1653 by Pope Innocent X. Arnauld, who lived as a 'solitaire' at Port-Royal, where an antiJesuit school system had been installed, published two pamphlets (1655) in defense of Jansenism. As a result, he was banned from the rank of Doctor of Theology. He left Port-Royal and pursued his polemical work. In 1656, Pope Alexander VII condemned again the doctrine of Jansen, and the French clergy drew up a formulary to be signed by all ecclesiastics. Arnauld replied with three memoirs, and was instrumental in having Pascal's Lettres Provinciales brought out. At the same time, he took part in the French translation of the Bible, and in the redaction of the Port-Royal grammar (Grammaire Generate et Raisonnee, 1660), published with Claude Lancelot (see Lancelot, Claude). In 1661, Arnauld signed the formulary. Under Pope Clement IX, tensions between Jansenists and Jesuits diminished, and Arnauld became a prominent figure in royal circles. In 1662, he published, with Pierre Nicole, the Port-Royal Logique (La Logique ou T Art de Penser),
and in 1664 La Perpetuite de la Foy de TEglise Catholique Touchant FEucharistie, a refutation of the Calvinist doctrine. In 1672, Arnauld attacked the Protestants in his book Le Renversement de la Morale de Jesus-Christ par les Erreurs des Calvinistes Touchant la Justification. Louis XIV wanted to eradicate the influence of Port-Royal, and persecuted the Jansenists. Arnauld went into voluntary exile to the Low Countries, and established himself in Brussels, where he published some pamphlets against Calvinism (1682, 1688), and against the Jesuits (1689). He continued his philosophical work, often in the form of polemics with Malebranche and Lamy, and of epistolary exchange (e.g., with Leibniz). In 1683, he wrote Des Vraies et des Fausses Idees, and in 1693 the Regies du Bon Sens pour Bien Juger des Ecrits Polemiques dans les Matieres de Science. He died in Brussels in 1694, and was buried in PortRoyal. A bibliography of his writings can be found in Baudrillart (1930), cols. 447-84. See also: Bayle, Pierre; Lancelot, Claude. Bibliography Arnauld A 1775-83 CEuvres de Messire Antoine Arnauld, Docteur de la Maison et Societe de Sorbonne. 45 vols, Paris/Lausanne Balteau J 1939 Arnauld, Antoine. Dictionnaire de Biographie Franpaise, vol. 3. Letouzey and Ane, Paris Baudrillart A (ed.) 1930 Dictionnaire d'Histoire et de Geographic Ecclesiastiques. D'Arnay, Paris
403
Biographies Bracken H M 1967 Arnauld, Antoine. In: Edwards P (ed.) Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Vol. 1. Collier-Macmillan, London Brekle H E 1964 Semiotik und linguistische Semantik in Port-Royal. Indogermanische Forschungen 69: 103-21 Carre I 1887 Les Pedagogues de Port-Royal. Delagrave, Paris Cognet L 1961 Le Jansenisme. Presses Universitaires de France, Paris Dominicy M 1984 La Naissance de la Grammaire Moderne. Langage, Logique el Philosophic a Port-Royal. Mardaga, Brussels
Donze R 1967 La Grammaire Generate et Raisonee de PortRoyal. Francke, Berne Jacques E 1976 Les Annees d'Exil d'Antoine Arnauld (1679-94). Nauwelaerts, Louvain Kunow J von 1926 Sprach- und Literarkritik bei Antoine Arnauld. Romanische Forschungen 39: 123-69 Ndiaye A R, et al. 1991 La Philosophic d'Antoine Arnauld. Vrin, Paris Swiggers P 1987 La semiotique de Port-Royal: Du savoir au vouloir(-dire). Semiotica 66: 331-44 Verga L 1972 // Pensiero Filosofico e Scientifico di Antoine Arnauld. Vita e Pensiero, Milan
Ascham, Roger (1515-68) A. P. R. Howatt
Roger Ascham (pronounced ['aeskam]) was born into a North Yorkshire family of yeoman background which had long been settled in the area. His early education took place in the house of a local landowner who succeeded in inspiring an intense love of learning and archery, both of which were to prove significant in Ascham's later work. In 1530 he entered St John's College, Cambridge, and his aptitude for languages, in particular Greek, was so striking that he was asked to act as tutor to the younger students. After gaining his MA in 1537, he accepted the offer of a readership in Greek and settled down to a life of scholarship. Ascham's health was never good and a period of sickness during a visit to Yorkshire in 1541 depleted his limited resources and he was forced to take up a translator's post with the Archbishop of York. The trip north had, however, revived his love of archery and he set about writing Toxophilus (1545) which is both a practical manual on the topic and a conscious attempt to prove that English was an effective medium for serious work of this kind. Dedicating the book to Henry VIII himself, Ascham traveled south to present it in person to the king, an undertaking that was rewarded with warm praise and a pension of £10. Ascham's royal connections were renewed in 1548 when he was hired to teach the Italian hand to the young Edward VI and later when he was appointed tutor to Princess (later Queen) Elizabeth. After a disagreement with his royal patron in 1550, Ascham traveled abroad where he remained (mainly in Augsburg in south Germany) until after Edward's death in 1553. Given his strong Protestant convictions, his next post as Latin secretary to Queen Mary was unexpected but he fulfilled his duties well and engendered sufficient trust to renew his relationship with Elizabeth who, shortly after her accession in 404
1558, installed him as a prebendary at York. This gave him the financial security to embark on his major work The Scholemaster, but recurrent illness meant that progress was slow and he died in 1568 without having completed it. It was finally published in 1570 by his wife Margaret. At first sight The Scholemaster appears to be merely a method for the teaching of Latin ('a plaine and perfite way of teachying children... the Latin long'), but in reality it is much more. The primary focus is Ascham's philosophy of a humanist education rooted in the study of the classical languages and their literatures accompanied by a strong emphasis on the development of Christian piety and moral judgment. Aims of this nature were familiar in Renaissance Europe, but they were buried in Latin tracts and had rarely been expressed with such cogency in the vernacular language. The book is famous for promoting the technique of 'double translation' (i.e., translating from Latin into English and, after a pause, recreating the original Latin text) but it is not always realized that the purpose of such exercises was not merely to teach Latin but also to develop confidence and elegance of expression in the mother tongue. In many ways Ascham was ahead of his time—he was a firm opponent of corporal punishment, for instance, and a champion of education for girls—but the broad thrust of his curriculum reflected contemporary concerns in seeking to instill in the young, and particularly the young ruler, both soundness of judgment and a forceful eloquence in the use of language. See also: Translation: History. Bibliography Ryan L V (ed.) 1967 The Schoolmaster (1570) by Roger Ascham. Cornell University Press, Ithaca, NY
Barthes, Roland (1915-80)
Barr, James (1924-) S. Groom
James Barr, biblical scholar and philologist, became renowned in the 1960s for his negative criticisms of the etymological approach to biblical interpretation and the biblical theology movement. He continues to write widely on semi tics, biblical studies and theology. Born in Glasgow in 1924, Barr was raised in the Church of Scotland and attended Edinburgh University. He was ordained and served briefly in Tiberias, Israel. He has taught at various institutions in the UK and North America, receiving numerous honorary degrees, fellowships, and guest lectureships. He is Emeritus Professor of Hebrew at Oxford and Vanderbilt. In The Semantics of Biblical Language (1961), Barr produced a devastating critique of procedures which he believed mishandled and distorted linguistic evidence. The biblical theology movement claimed that the structure of the Hebrew language reflects the particular mode of thinking identified as the Hebrew mindset. Barr demonstrated that this was insufficiently supported by the evidence: neat correspondences between linguistic and thought structures cannot be assumed. In Comparative Philology and the Text of the Old Testament (1968) Barr criticized how scholars turned to other Semitic languages to aid comprehension of Biblical Hebrew. He urged philologists to note their motives and mental processes and to become better acquainted with the Semitic languages. He cautioned against undue reliance on the root in the meaning of Hebrew words and excessive emphasis on a word's origin versus its semantic value in its current context. Barr encouraged scholars to be more rigorous in method, to consider the wider implications of their suggestions, and to remember that philological results are always tentative, never final.
In Fundamentalism (1981) Barr challenged those who allowed the principle of inerrancy to dictate the meaning of texts regardless of their linguistic and literary structure. He pointed out that semantic emendation is just as creative as textual emendation and urged that texts be treated with respect. He insisted that semantic analysis and biblical interpretation be allowed adequate freedom from controlling theological assumptions. In The Concept of Biblical Theology (1999) Barr asserted that knowledge of Hebrew grammar is no more a tool in understanding Hebrew texts than prayer is a tool in communication with the deity: language is the means of communication. The Hebrew language is not in itself a theological phenomenon, although statements with theological implications are made through it, hence the need for a command of biblical languages. Barr's contribution to the study of language and linguistics in the context of biblical studies has been twofold: to summon biblical scholars to modern methods of linguistic analysis; and to call for a more responsible and productive relationship between linguistic analysis and theological discussion. See also: Fundamentalism. Bibliography Barr J 1961 The Semantics of Biblical Language. SCM Press, London Barr J 1968 Comparative Philology and the Text of the Old Testament. Oxford University Press, Oxford Barr J 1981 Fundamentalism, 2nd edn. SCM Press, London Barr J 1999 The Concept of Biblical Theology: An Old Testament Perspective. SCM Press, London Knight D A 1999 Barr, James. In: Hayes J H (ed.) Dictionary of Biblical Interpretation. Abingdon Press, Nashville, TN, vol. 1, pp. 98-9
Barthes, Roland (1915-80) M. Toolan
A French critic and theorist of literature and culture, Barthes came to international prominence in an era of structuralist-semiological analyses of myths and cultural practices (see his Mythologies). Semiology was Saussure's (see Saussure, Ferdinand (-Mongin) de) term for a broadranging 'science of signs,' which would apply the methods Saussure adumbrated for
the study of languages to the study of signifying practices quite generally. Barthes' semiological work, more than anyone else's, seemed to validate Saussure's earlier observation that although 'semiology' did not yet exist, its emergence was guaranteed. But Barthes' cultural criticism, which combined subtle philosophical critique with personal and even 405
Biographies confessional individuality of response, moved on to new topics and new methods and anti-methods in the decades that followed. Thus in his later writings, having rejected the idea of the autonomous author as authoritative controller of his or her text and its reception, and having recast characters and readers as shimmering confluences of traces and signs rather than abbreviated denotations of fixed and stable freestanding individuals (the latter view became for him part of an insupportable rationalist, liberal and bourgeois reading of culture), Barthes sought to elaborate a logic of writing and reading which was based on pleasure (jouissance), a concept whose erotic or quasi-erotic aspects he sought to bring out. Certainly from S/Z onwards, Barthes is no longer (or not merely) a structuralist analyst, but one who puts structuralist principles (of oppositions, binarisms, markedness, and proportionality) to such far-reaching tests that the principles' nonrational roots, in desire and emotion, re-emerge. In such ways Barthes contributed to the poststructuralist and deconstructionist turn. For stylistics and linguistic criticism Barthes was chiefly influential in three texts: his early essay on structural analysis of narrative, in which his ideas of functions, indices and catalyzers etc. were introduced; his collection of essays, Mythologies, which
innovatively applied structuralist-anthropological methods to an explication of the overlooked systematicities of aspects of popular culture (e.g., wrestling, restaurant menus) and the mass media; and his 1970 study S/Z, on systematic reversals and deceptions in a Balzac story, in which a procedure of detailed analyses of verbal chunks (lexias) in terms of 5 shaping semiotic codes (hermeneutic, proairetic, semic, cultural, and symbolic) is elaborated in a virtuoso demonstration. See also: Postmodernism; Myth; Romanticism. Bibliography Barthes R 1957 Mythologies. Editions du Seuil, Paris Barthes R 1966 Introduction a 1'analyse structurale des recits. Communications 8: 1-27 [reprinted in English translation in Image-music-text, 1977] Barthes R 1967 Elements of Semiology. Cape, London [transl. from Elements de semiologie. Seuil, Paris. 1964] Barthes R 1970 S/Z. Seuil, Paris [English transl., 1974] Barthes R 1977 Image-music-text, transl. S Heath. Fontana, London Barthes R 1980 New Critical Essays. Hill and Wang, New York Culler J 1975 Structuralist Poetics. Routledge, London Jefferson A, Robey D (eds.) 1986 Modern Literary Theory: A Comparative Introduction, 2nd edn. Batsford. London
Bataille, Georges (1897-1962) P. Fletcher
The prominence of such themes as violence, eroticism, excess, and sacrifice have led critics to denounce (or, indeed, celebrate) the work of Georges Bataille as little more than 'pornographic philosophy.' As the co-founder of the College de Sociologie, established to consider the manifestations of the sacred in society, and as an economic theorist, renegade Surrealist and the author of scandal-provoking novels, Bataille's influence has been both profound and wide-ranging. Recognized by Martin Heidegger (see Heidegger, Martin) as 'one of France's best minds,' Bataille authored numerous books and essays relating to religion, sacrifice and the sacred. Yet his work has always sat uneasily with the beliefs and pretensions of the orthodox. Indeed, his (unfinished) magnum opus—consisting of three texts, Inner Experience (1943), The Guilty (1944) and On Nietzsche (1945)—was given a title that placed it in direct confrontation with the Christian tradition (and Roman Catholicism in particular), La Somme atheologique. 406
Georges Bataille was born in Billon, Puy-de Dome, in central France in 1897. Just prior to the First World War, Bataille converted to Catholicism although he soon lost his faith and abandoned mainstream religion. By 1920, he was heavily involved with the Surrealist movement. This was yet another of Bataille's flirtations with commitment as he was soon excommunicated from the group. From 1922 he served as a librarian and a deputy keeper at the Bibliotheque Nationale in Paris but he resigned in 1944 when he contracted tuberculosis. However, it was his philosophical and literary output which brought Bataille fame and infamy. Indeed, such was his distinction that before his death in 1962 Pablo Picasso, Max Ernst, and Juan Miro arranged an auction of paintings to help alleviate his financial difficulties. Bataille believed that language, in its everyday and scientific use, represents a flight from truth and reality and a securing of identity (the ego) through
Batchelor, John (1853-1944) the tyranny of words. Language, in this form, creates a discontinuity from the sacred and a chasm between selves. His preoccupation with violence, eroticism and sacrifice point to his quest for a form of communication that is only possible with the loss of the self or ego. At the limits of possible experience the self disintegrates and in the midst of this limitexperience comes an intense fusion with the other. Language is the human attribute that points to the possibility of this experience which Bataille calls the sacred. Linguistic communication is founded on a freedom to connect in networks, with others and the world, that comes prior to our actual speech with another subject. This freedom (or space) in which language is possible depends on the loss of the sovereign position and the destruction of the security of the one who addresses the other. In revealing this loss and the possibility of conjunction, language
presages death and opens human beings to the outside—the sacred realm of continuity. Language is therefore dangerous in that is reveals the force of sacred violence and the experience of death which destroys difference and separation. Bibliography Bataille G 1987 Eroticism [trans. M. Dalwood]. Marion Boyars, London Bataille G 1988 Inner Experience [trans. L.A. Boldt]. SUNY Press, New York Bataille G 1989 Theory of Religion [trans. R. Hurley]. Zone Books, New York Bataille G 1992 On Nietzsche [trans. B. Boone]. Athlone Press, London Gill C B (ed.) 1994 Bataille: Writing the Sacred. Routledge, London Noys B 2000 Bataille: A Critical Introduction. Pluto Press, London
Batchelor, John (1853-1944) J. C. Maher
John Batchelor, missionary and pioneer in the field of a language different from Japanese. It was Batchelor Ainu language studies, was born in Uckfield, Sussex who devised the system of romanization to write in 1853, the son of a tailor and parish clerk. He left down the language (previously Japanese kana had school at the age of 12 and worked as a gardener in been employed) and with this system translated the Uckfield Parish Church. He decided to become a Bible and other religious works into Ainu. His missionary and after preparatory studies was sent to fluency in the language as preacher, writer, and Hong Kong. For reasons of health he transferred to member of the Ainu community was well-known and the colder climate of Hokkaido, the northern island he was particularly delighted to be mistaken, as of Japan, and landed in Hakodate on May 1, 1877. sometime happened, for an ekashi or Ainu elder. Moved by the miserable plight of the Ainu, the During the early part of the twentieth century in indigenous people of Hokkaido, Batchelor requested Sapporo, when Batchelor met Bronislaw Pilsudski, permission to minister to them. From 1879 onwards, the Polish scholar of Ainu, they conversed in their he spent 60 years with the Ainu people, becoming only common language—Ainu. Batchelor spoke the an acknowledged authority on the language and Saru dialect of Piratori, the ancient capital of the author of numerous works including the Saru. Batchelor's influence was felt in the fields Ainu-Japanese—English-Dictionary and Grammar of linguistics, ethnography, and anthropology. He (Batchelor 1938, first edition 1889). His investiga- became an honorary member of the Hokkaido tions on place names and speculations regarding the government and was decorated by the Emperor. He origin of the Ainu people contributed towards a re- returned to Britain in 1940 where he died four years interpretation of the Ainu people's role in Japan and later at the age of 91. His work is displayed in particularly in its early history. Batchelor's argument, commemorative museums both in Hokkaido and which subsequent archaeological and anthropologi- near his birthplace in England. cal studies have tended to favor, was that the Ainu presence was not limited to the far north only but, in See also: Japanese Linguistic Thought. fact, extended to other parts of the mainland and perhaps even the entire archipelago. His suggestion that Ainu possesses genetic affinities with the Bibliography Indo-European languages of Europe, such as Cornish Batchelor J 1882 An Ainu vocabulary. Transactions of the and Welsh, and even with Basque, has not, however, Asiatic Society of Japan 20 been substantiated by later generations of scholars. Batchelor J 1986 Ainu Karisia Eiwange Gusu An Inonno-itak By means of his Grammar and other works, Oma Kambi (The Book of Common Prayer). The Church Batchelor emphasized Ainu's independent status as Missionary Society, Tokyo 407
Biographies Batchelor J 1897 Chikoro Utarapa Ne Yesu Kiristo Ashiri Aeuitaknup (The New Testament). Yokohama Bunsha, Yokohama Batchelor J 1903 A Grammar of the Ainu Language. Kelly and Walsh, Yokohama
Batchelor J 1924 'Uwepekere' or Ainu fireside Stories as told by one of themselves. Kyobunkwan, Tokyo Batchelor J 1938 Ainu-Japanese-English-Dictionary and Grammar, 4th edn. Iwanamin, Tokyo Batchelor J 1965 71ega/M/(L^fter5). YamamotoShoten. Tokyo
Bayle, Pierre (1647-1706) N. E. Cronk
Bayle, a French Protestant scholar, is now remembered as a powerful champion of religious toleration, as a debunker of human reason, and as a pioneering exponent of modern historical method. Driven from France by religious persecution, he moved to Holland, where he published his most famous work, the Dictionnaire historique et critique (1696), translated into English in 1710 (An Historical and Critical Dictionary). Originally conceived as a supplement and corrective to the Catholic bias of Louis Moreri's Grand Dictionnaire historique (1674), Bayle's Dictionary is important both for its breathtaking erudition and for the manner in which this learning is marshaled. Arranged as a biographical dictionary, there are articles on Old Testament and mythological figures alongside others on modern philosophers and theologians. The choice of subject is tantalizingly arbitrary: while there is no article on Plato, for example (because Moreri's treatment was deemed
satisfactory), there are numerous articles on obscure heretics. The style of the articles is dry and factual, and copious marginal notes refer to sources. The notes at the foot of each page, often longer and more interesting than the article which is their pretext, are written in a distinctively personal and humorous voice. In the eighteenth century, Bayle was widely—if wrongly—read as a sceptic, and the Dictionary was an influential model for the polemical encyclopedias of the Enlightenment. See also: Arnauld, Antoine; Lancelot, Claude. Bibliography Labrousse E (ed.) Correspondence de Pierre Bayle. Voltaire Foundation, Oxford Labrousse E 1983 Bayle. Oxford University Press, Oxford Popkin R H, Brush C (eds.) 1965 Bayle, Historical and Critical Dictionary—Selections. Bobbs-Merrill, Indianapolis, IN
Benjamin, Walter (1892-1940) P. Fletcher
As both a man and a thinker Walter Benjamin is best described as a nomad. He was constantly on the move—en passant—both materially and theoretically and never held a professional academic position despite his many efforts. If there is any focus to his oeuvre, it can be found in two preoccupations: melancholy, the consequence of what he described in a letter to Gershom Scholem (in 1932) as a life of 'small-scale victories' and 'large-scale defeats,' and an attachment to Jewish thought, particularly its concern with language, law and redemption and its transmutations in a modern context. Born in Berlin in 1892, Benjamin married Dora Sophie Kellner in 1917. He received his doctorate for a thesis entitled 'Concept of Art Criticism in German Romanticism' in 1919 and began to make a moderate living as a literary critic for newspapers and journals 408
and through the writing and presentation of numerous radio broadcasts. Divorced in 1930, Benjamin moved to Paris and was interned along with other exiles of German nationality as the war began in 1939. He was released two months later and fled (after the German occupation of Paris in 1940) to the south of France with the intention of crossing to Spain. However, the Spanish border guards refused to accept Benjamin's transit visa and, in despair, he took his own life. The centrality of language in the thought of Benjamin is apparent from the very beginning of his writing career. In his essay On Language as Such and on the Language of Man (1916) and his study of the Baroque Mourning Play, Origin of the German Tragic Drama (1925), language is presented as the truth content of everything that exists. There is a
Bergstrdsser, Gotthelf (1886-1933) spiritual essence to all that is and it is this truth that is communicated in language. Nevertheless, this quasimystical understanding of language, which is only possible on the basis of the creation of the world through language (Genesis 1), is heavily qualified. For Benjamin, human language is not language as such. The original 'Adamic' language before God consisted in naming and the status of such language was not the disclosure of facts but the communication of 'communicability as such.' It is obvious that revelation is central to Benjamin's delineation of language 'as such' and that he depends on the thought of the early German Romantic philosopher J. G. Hamann who criticized purely natural explanations for the origin of language (see Herder, J. G.) and claimed that language and its use were dependent on the constant and immutable language of God. The fall away from the perfect word of creation (Babel), argues Benjamin, to the imperfections and plurality of human language results in a linguistic being who laments this loss of purity. These themes are more fully developed in Benjamin's later work on Baroque Tragic Drama in which Benjamin concentrates on the place and status of
allegory in the work of seventeenth-century Protestant writers. The use of allegory in this period moves hand in hand with a loss of faith in the proximity of the supernatural. The profuse nature of human utterance conveys the absence of revelation and the loss of salvation. Language as such is lost in the babble of the language of humanity. Human beings in the modern world are marked—as was Benjamin—by the melancholy of this loss. See also: Allegory. Bibliography Benjamin W 1996 In: Bullock M, Jennings M W (eds.) Selected Writings: Volume 1, 1913-1926. Harvard University Press, Cambridge, MA Benjamin W 1996 In: Jennings M W (ed.) Selected Writings: Volume 2, 1927-1934. Harvard University Press, Cambridge, MA Benjamin W 1977 Origin of the German Tragic Drama [trans. J. Osborne]. Verso, London Handelman S A 1991 Fragments of Redemption. Indiana University Press, Bloomington, IN Wolin R 1994 Walter Benjamin: An Aesthetic of Redemption. University of California Press, Berkeley, CA
Bergstrasser, Gotthelf (1886-1933) A. Shivtiel
Bergstrasser was one of the most distinguished Semitic philologists. He was born in Oberlosa, Germany and was killed in an accident while on holiday in the Bavarian mountains. He studied and later taught classical and oriental languages and literatures and in particular was an acknowledged expert on Arabic, Hebrew, and Aramaic. He was a professor at the University of Constantinople, Turkey, and during World War I became a German liaison officer with the Ottoman Army. It was at this time (1915), that Bergstrasser published two of his well-known books, Sprachatlas von Syrien und Paldstina and Neuaramdische Mdrchen und andere Texte aus Ma'lula. The first work is an atlas of the spoken Arabic dialects in Syria and Palestine, whereas the latter work deals with folktales in the neo-Aramaic dialect used in the village of Ma'lula in Syria. To those he later added a glossary for the neoaramaic dialects of Ma'lula (1921). He was assigned to the task of preparing the 29th edition of Wilhelm Gesenius's Hebrdische Grammatik which was first published in 1813 (see also Gesenius, Wilhelm). Since
this book became one of the most important grammar books of Biblical Hebrew, twenty-eight editions of this work had been re-edited and updated from time to time, first by Gesenius himself and later by E. Rodiger and E. Kautzsch. The latter, who was responsible for its 22nd-28th editions re-edited and enlarged the 28th edition which appeared in 1910 and which was used for the second edition of the English translation, prepared by A. E. Cowley (the first English translation had been published in 1898). Bergstrasser updated the work and published it in two stages: the first part appeared in 1918 and the second part in 1926, when he was acting as professor of Semitica at the University of Munich. His edition of Gesenius's Hebrew Grammar is so different from all previous editions and so much enlarged that it only covers, apart from a short introduction to the Semitic languages, a chapter on Hebrew phonology and a chapter on the verb system, mainly based on the comparative study of grammar. The pronouns, nouns, and particles were planned to follow it together with a new part which was supposed to
409
Biographies cover Hebrew syntax, but this was never achieved, because of his other interests, mainly in the field of Arabic, and because of the vicissitudes caused by World War I and his early death. Bergstrasser's contribution to the study of the Arabic language, Arabic dialectology, Qur'anic studies, and Islamic law won him a worldwide reputation among scholars. Thus, his works Zum arabischen Dialekt von Damascus (1924); hunain Ibn Ishak und seine Schule (1913), Hunain Ibn Ishak u'ber die syrischen und arabischen Galen-ubersetzungen (1925-32), and Grundziige des islamischen Rechts (1935), are still regarded as classical sources. His work on Einfuhrung in die semitischen Sprachen (1928) is in fact an excellent introduction to the Semitic languages including a synopsis of their grammars and texts in all the major languages. He also prepared translations into Arabic of works originally written in Greek and wrote on various
aspects of Qur'anic studies, including the preparation of Qur'anic manuscripts which were collected for the purpose of comparative analysis of the various versions. He was well known for his opposition to Nazism and helped many Jewish scholars to escape from Germany and find jobs in other countries. See also: Arabic; Aramaic, Jewish; Gesenius; Wilhelm; Hebrew, Biblical and Jewish; Qur'an; Semitic Languages. Bibliography Rabin C 1972 Introduction to the Hebrew edition. In: Bergstrasser G (ed.) Hebrdische Grammatik. translated into Hebrew by Ben Asher M. Magnes Press. The Hebrew University, Jerusalem Encyclopaedia Judaica 1971 Bergstrasser. Gotthelf. Keter Publishing House, Jerusalem
Bhartrhari (c. 500 CE) H. Coward
Bhartrhari is a renowned author of Sanskrit literature and philosophy. His book the Vakyapadlya is foundational for the Grammarian School of Indian Philosophy and systematizes speculations about language (vak) present in Vedas (Hindu scripture). For Bhartrhari, language is divine in nature. His viewpoint is very similar to The Gospel According to John, Chapter 1, Verse 1, 'In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.' Bhartrhari's term for God is Sabdabrahman—the intertwined unity of word and consciousness that is ultimate reality and both the material and efficient cause of creation. OM, the sacred syllable, is held by Bhartrhari to have flashed forth in the mind of Sabdabrahman while in deep meditation giving birth first to the Vedas and then to all of language. As a manifestation of divine consciousness, language is the source of all knowledge and provides a spiritual discipline (a word-yoga) by which release or salvation may be realized. This word-yoga involves: (a) correct word use (following the rules of grammar) and (b) the repeated chanting of words or phrases (selected by one's teacher or guru) until the obstacles of passion and ignorance, which obscure the divine nature of one's consciousness, are removed. Exact details about Bhartrhari's life are not fully known. Tradition dates him around 500 CE in India 410
and suggests that he was a king who gave up his worldly life (due to the inconstancy of women) and became a sannyasin or forest dweller. In addition to establishing himself in the classical Indian tradition as a grammarian and a metaphysician, Bhartrhari is also well known for his Sanskrit poetry—especially his Vairagya-Sataka or 'Hundred Verses on Renunciation.' Bhartrhari's life has been dramatized by Harihara in his Bhartrharinirveda. In this story Bhartrhari is portrayed as a student of Goraksanatha, from whom he learns Yoga and renounces the world. According to I-tsing, the Chinese Buddhist pilgrim, who studied at the Nalunda monastry/ University in India, Bhartrhari was a contemporary of Dharmapala (CE 530-561). Quotations from Bhartrhari are frequently found in Buddhist texts of the period. While Bhartrhari's poetry may still be found on the lips of Indians today, his most important contribution to modern life is in the field of religious experience. It is Bhartrhari's understanding of language as revelation of the Divine and as a means of Yoga that has a contemporary fascination. Rather than trusting in the methods of science, reason and historical analysis to take one to the essence of the Divine, Bhartrhari counsels trust in and deep meditation upon the revealed word itself. In response
Black, Matthew (1908-94) to the modern fascination for any meditational technique that will raise one beyond empirical or rational consciousness, Bhartrhari offers a spiritual message. That desired higher state of consciousness is already present within language itself. But the higher levels of language/consciousness are known only through the special words of scriptural revelation. Therefore, meditate on such Divine Words, with no thought for yourself. Let your consciousness be filled with their truth and power, and the ultimate religious experience of knowing God will be yours.
See also: Word of God; Mantra; Hinduism.
Bibliography Coward H G 1976 Bhartrhari. G K Hall, Boston Coward H G, Raja K K 1990 The Philosophy of the Grammarians. Princeton University Press, Princeton, NJ Miller B S 1967 Bhartrhari: Poems. Columbia University Press, New York Subramania Iyer K A (translator) 1965 The Vakyapadlya of Bhartrhari. Deccan College, Poona
Black, Matthew (1908-94) W. McKane
After a distinguished career at the University of Glasgow, Matthew Black went to the University of Bonn, was a pupil of Paul Kahle and became a doctor in 1937. The influence which Kahle exerted on a young Matthew Black may be gathered from his description of Kahle as 'the doyen of European Orientalists.' Black's Bonn thesis on the text of a Syriac (Melchite) liturgical document was published in 1954. With respect to its linguistic area, his thesis presaged his best known book, An Aramaic Approach to the Gospels and Acts (1946), but his interest in the liturgy of the Syrian Church, in the Syriac language and in the New Testament Peshitta is vouched for by publications at different periods of his life. Black's approach to the Aramaic of the Gospels and Acts is both linguistic and textual. The latter betrays an abiding interest in Greek manuscripts and in textual criticism: he was involved with others in the production of the Greek New Testament (1966), a project of the Bible Societies. The former led him to review the work of those who had earlier investigated evidences of Aramaic behind the Greek of the New Testament, Wellhausen, Nestle, Dalman, Torrey, and Burney. His most fundamental quarrel with them was that they had been undiscriminating in their choice of Aramaic and had not identified the Palestinian Aramaic dialect which would have elucidated the Aramaic background of the Gospels. There was a second (1954) and third edition (1967). Matthew Black's earliest article on the Dead Sea Scrolls shows that he was in the field before September 1953. The Scrolls and Christian Origins (1966) is his major book, along with The Scrolls and Christianity: Historical and Theological Significance (1969) which he edited and to which he contributed.
Otherwise he published several articles. His interest in the Scrolls was that of a New Testament scholar. He identified the Qumran community as Essenes and set it in the context of Jewish sectarianism, discussing the extent of its connections with Christian origins. He states that there is evidence for some kind of link between Qumran and emerging Christianity, but he argues that direct dependence has not been demonstrated. He agrees with Renan that Christianity was an Essenism which succeeded and the implication of this conclusion would appear to be that Jesus emerged from Jewish sectarianism and not from mainstream Judaism. The 'Son of Man' topic appears as early as 1948 with its emphasis on The Similitudes of Enoch' (/ Enoch 37-71) which he describes as a preChristian, Jewish apocalypse. He published a Greek text of Enoch in 1970, but the culmination of his work on the Suffering Servant and the Son of Man, which he developed in articles between 1952 and 1976 was his last book, The Book of Enoch or I Enoch (1985), that is, the Ethiopic Enoch. He printed a revised version of the translation done by R. H. Charles and continued to hold that the Son of Man of the Similitudes is the foundation of Son of Man christology in the Gospels.
Bibliography Black M 1946 An Aramaic Approach to the Gospels and Acts. Clarendon Press, Oxford Brock S 1969 Review of an Aramaic approach to the gospels (1967). Journal of Theological Studies 20: 274-8 McKane W 1995 Matthew Black 1908-1994. Proceedings of the British Academy 90: 283-94
411
Biographies
Bovelles, Charles de (1479-1566) C. Demaiziere
Bovelles was born in Saint-Quentin in 1479; he died in Ham (Somme) in 1566. A philosopher, theologian, and mathematician, he also wrote a treatise on his linguistic thoughts in 1533, published by Robert Etienne in Paris: Liber de differentia vulgarium linguarum et Gallici sermonis varietate. It is his only book on linguistic matters. He was the disciple of Jacques Lefevre d'Etaples, then became a professor, possibly of mathematics. After various trips to Switzerland, Germany, Spain, and Italy he lived for some time in Paris before settling in Picardy from where he maintained an important correspondence in Latin with French and foreign scholars. He was appointed canon of the collegiate church in SaintQuentin, then in Noyon. In his treatise, he raises the question of the relation between the vernacular languages, French in particular, and Latin. As French grammar books were just beginning to be published, Bovelles wanted to show that the idea of fixing rules for the language is Utopian considering the instability of language and the inconsistency of its use. He gives a historical account of the shaping of the French language with its parenthood to Latin; then in a sort of phonetic approach, he studies the pronunciation of the letters of the Latin alphabet and its variations under the influence of heaven (horoscopus caeli) and the will of men (arbitrium hominuni). His conclusion is that the
vernacular language shows too many disadvantages for it to be corrected with rules and that none of its dialectal forms could be chosen as a model. Latin only is unalterable, the ideal archetype being the original language, the one used by God when he spoke to Adam and Eve, the one all men will find again on judgment day. This treatise is followed by a sort of etymological dictionary presenting tables of words that are explained and commented upon. It is to be noticed that about 60 percent of the etymologies provided are correct, which is a rather good score at a time when the most fanciful explanations were given as to the origin of the French language. Finally, the book closes on a brief and rather flighty collection of onomastic topography, which constitutes no more than a curiosity. Bibliography Bovelles C de 1973 (ed. Dumont-Demaiziere C) Sur les langues vulgaires et la variete de la langue franqaise. Klincksieck, Paris (Contains facsimile of Latin text of 1533) Demaiziere C 1983 La grammaire franfaise au \vieme siecle. Atelier National Reproduction des theses, Universite de Lille III, Paris Universite Francois Rabelais Centre d'etudes superieures de la Renaissance 1982 Colloque international de Noyon. Charles de Bovelles et son cinquieme centenaire (1479-1979). Tredaniel, Paris
Caldwell, Robert (1814-91) R. E. Asher
Born of Scottish parents on May 7, 1814 in County Antrim, Ireland, Robert Caldwell was Bishop of Tinnevelly (modern Tirunelveli) and coadjutor to the Bishop of Madras from 1877 until 7 months before his death on August 28, 1891. After completing his school education, mainly in Glasgow, he was accepted by the London Missionary Society and sent to study at the University of Glasgow, from where he graduated in 1837. While there he developed a passionate interest in comparative philology. Shortly after graduation he left for Madras and had the good fortune during the voyage of receiving advice on linguistic matters from the eminent Telugu scholar Charles Philip Brown (1798-1884). In 1841 Caldwell began 50 years of missionary service in Tinnevelly. His particular concern was 412
education, and he established numerous schools for boys and girls. Having embarked on the intensive study of Tamil during his first year in India, he had an impressive knowledge of the language. One of the uses he made of this knowledge was in helping with the revision of the Tamil version of the Prayer Book and of the Bible. Caldwell published widely—works on South Indian history, archaeology and anthropology as well as collections of lectures and sermons—but as far as posterity is concerned, his major achievement is his Comparative Grammar of the Dravidian or SouthIndian Family of Languages of 1856, which appeared in a considerably revised edition in 1875 and which, further revised by other hands, has been several times republished in English and in a Tamil translation.
Carey, William (1761-1834) Recognition of the existence of the Dravidian languages as a separate family came with E. W. Ellis's (d. 1819) 'Note to the Introduction' in A. D. Campbell's (d. 1857) Grammar of... Teloogoo (1816), but it was with the publication of Caldwell's influential work that Dravidian linguistics as a major field of study is seen to begin. Caldwell had come to the conclusion that 'the supposition of the derivation of the Dravidian languages from the Sanskrit... is now known to be entirely destitute of foundation' (1856: 29) before learning of Ellis's pioneer work, and it was he who gave the family the name by which it is known (Caldwell 1894: 150). For Caldwell there were 11 Dravidian languages—Tamil, Telugu, Canarese (Kannada), Malayalam, Tulu, Tuda (Toda), Kota, G6nd(i), Ku(vi), Rajmahal (Malto), and Uraon (Kurukh)—with Brahui containing a significant 'Dravidian element' (1856: 23). The bulk of his Grammar is concerned with a comparison of the forms, mainly phonological and morphological, of the first nine, but there is some discussion of syntax. In the parts that speculate on the wider affinities of Dravidian (Caldwell favoring
'Scythian,' and particularly 'Finnish or Ugrian'), there are statements which would now be seen to fall under the heading of typology. At the level of detail Caldwell is known for his 'law' of 'the convertibility of surds and sonants' (1875: 21-23). This is intended to encapsulate a feature of Dravidian phonology, as exemplified most notably in Tamil, by which in the plosive system the feature of voice is nondistinctive, surds and sonants (voiceless and voiced sounds respectively) being in complementary distribution. See also: Gundert, Hermann; Missionaries; Tamil. Bibliography Caldwell R 1856 A comparative Grammar of the Dravidian or South-Indian Family of Languages. Harrison, London Caldwell R 1894 Reminiscences... ed. by J L Wyatt. Addison, Madras Day E H 1896 Mission Heroes. Bishop Caldwell. Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, London Ellis F W 1816 Note to the Introduction. In: Campbell A D 1816 A Grammar of the Teloogoo Language, commonly called the Gentoo. College Press, Madras
Carey, William (1761-1834) A. Mukherjee
William Carey, a cobbler who became a Dissenting minister, founded the Baptist Missionary Society in 1792. He arrived in Calcutta in 1793, found employment in an indigo factory in Malda district and began studying Sanskrit and Bengali. His goal was to translate the Bible into all the major languages of India. In 1800 Carey moved to Serampore where, with Joshua Marshman (1768-1837) and William Ward (1769-1823), he established the Serampore Mission. The Serampore Press was set up and supervised by Ward with Panchanan Karmakar as punchcutter. Carey's translation of Matthew's Gospel was published in 1800 and his complete Bengali Bible in 1809. Bitter controversy arose over Carey's decision to translate baptise with abagahan 'immerse.' Anglicans preferred a transliteration of the Greek. The Serampore Community Agreement of 1804 included the commitment 'To labour unceasingly in biblical translation.' At one time 30 pandits were employed in translation and by 1837 the Bible, or parts of it, had been printed in around 40 languages or dialects. First drafts were undertaken by pandits and then revised by the missionaries, but in the case of Bengali, Sanskrit, and Marathi, Carey himself did the initial draft. The Press also published the first
Bengali periodical Digdarsan and weekly paper Samacar Darpan, as well as texts translated from English for educational purposes. From 1801 Carey was employed to teach Sanskrit and Bengali, and later Marathi, at the Government's Fort William College. In order to obtain Bengali prose for use in class, Carey encouraged his pandit colleagues to translate from Sanskrit and write original works. Carey himself compiled Kathopakathan (1801) colloquial conversations between country folk, and Itihasmala (1812) a collection of stories. He has been called the father of modern Bengali literature, but a more balanced assessment sees him as pioneer of a revived interest in the vernacular. Carey wrote a Sanskrit grammar, a Bengali grammar and dictionary, a Marathi grammar and dictionary, and Panjabi, Kanarese and Telegu grammars. In accordance with the evangelical aim, which underpinned all his language work, these books were intended to help future missionaries acquire the Indian languages. His planned dictionary of all the oriental languages derived from Sanskrit, with corresponding Greek and Hebrew words, was intended to assist Scripture translation. The proofs for this perished in the fire that destroyed the Press in 413
Biographies 1812. Carey was elected to the Asiatic Society in 1806 and with that Society's support, he and Marshman began translating the Ramayana. In addition he developed a keen interest in horticulture and agriculture. In 1807 Brown University USA awarded Carey an honorary DD. Carey constantly revised his Bengali Bible, the final edition appearing in 1832, but his translations have been criticized for following English syntax. Although his prose is crude and often incomprehensible, Carey strove to preserve Bengali clause order, a principle abandoned by later Baptist translators. His revisions move from colloquial towards sanskritized
language. Carey firmly believed that Indians, not Europeans, should undertake future translation work. See also: Missionaries; Christianity in South Asia. Bibliography Carey S P 1934 William Carey 1761-1834, 8th edn. Carey Press, London Potts E D 1967 British Baptist Missionaries in India 1793-1837. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge Sen Gupta, Kanti Prasanna 1971 The Christian Missionaries in Bengal 1793-1833. Firma, Calcutta
Ceruffl, Enrico (1898-1988) A. K. Irvine
By profession an administrator and diplomat, Enrico Cerulli's massive contribution to Ethiopian cultural, ethnographic, and language studies reveal him as one of the ablest orientalists of his age. Born in Naples on February 15, 1898, he studied Arabic and Islam at the Oriental Institute there, and at the age of barely 18 produced studies of Amharic popular poetry and Somali customary law which immediately established his scholarly reputation. In 1920 he entered the Italian Colonial Service in Somalia, joining the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in 1925. Largely selftaught in Somali and Oromo, he published several fundamental ethnographic and linguistic studies, notably The folk-literature of the Galla of southern Abyssinia' (Harvard African Studies 3: 11-228) in 1922. His direct involvement with Ethiopia began in 1926-9 when he joined the Italian Legation in Addis Ababa and was able to undertake extensive travels in the south and west of Ethiopia, described in his Etiopia occidentale: dallo Scioa alle frontiere del Sudan (2 vols., Rome, 1930, 1933). After further service as Secretary-General of the Ministry for Italian Africa and, from 1935 till 1937, in the League of Nations at Geneva, he was in 1938 appointed Governor of the Province of Harar, where he remained until 1940. The fruits of his wide experience of the complex language mosaic of southern and western Ethiopia are contained in his Studi etiopici, of which the first volume is devoted to a descriptive study of the Semitic language of the Muslim Hararis (La lingua e la storia di Harar, Rome, 1936). Further volumes were concerned with the Cushitic and Omotic languages of the Lake Abaye region of southwest Ethiopia: La lingua e la storia dei Sidamo (Rome, 1938); // linguaggio 414
del danger6 ed alcune lingue Sidama dell'Omo (Basketo, Ciara, Zaisse) (Rome, 1938); and La lingua caffina (Rome, 1951). Other languages on which he provided data are the Hamer, Gidicho, and the Wellamo dialects (Omotic), Arbore and Deresa (Cushitic), and Berta, Majang (Mekeyer), and Tirma (Sudanic). Cerulli's direct association with the Horn of Africa ended in 1940 when he retired to resume his scholarly interests in Rome. Although his political record in Italian-occupied Ethiopia was impeccable, it was no longer possible for him to work in the newlyliberated country. However, his interest remained undiminished. He resumed his political career in 1944 and from 1950 until 1954 served as Italian Ambassador to Persia. There he concerned himself with medieval Persian religious drama and the NeoAramaic dialects of Persian Azerbaijan, of which he published meticulously annotated texts in his Testi neo-aramaci dell'Iran settentrionale (Naples, 1971). On his return to Italy he was appointed Counsellor of State from 1955 until 1968 when he finally retired to devote the remainder of his life to scholarship. He died in Rome on September 19, 1988. After his departure from Ethiopia in 1940 Cerulli continued to write extensively on her societies and languages, but a notable shift took place in his interests. It is to this period that some of his most influential work belongs. Recognizing the significance of monasticism in Ethiopian society, he published a number of important Ethiopic hagiographical texts and perceptive studies of the cultural interchange between medieval European and Oriental Christianity, notably in his magisterial // Libro etiopico dei miracoli di Maria e le sue fonti nelle
Coverdale, Miles (1487-1569) letterature del Media Evo latino (Rome, 1943), and his Etiopi in Palestina: storia della communitd etiopica di Gerusalemme (2 vols., Rome, 1943, 1947). His La letteratura etiopica (Milan, 1968) is the only work on the subject to attempt an aesthetic appraisal of classical Ethiopic literature.
See also: Ge'ez. Bibliography Ricci L 1988 (1990) Enrico Cerulli. Rassegna di Studi Etiopid 32: 5-19
Champollion, Jean-Francois (1790-1832) J. D. Ray
French Egyptologist and the decipherer of hieroglyphs, Champollion was born at Figeac (Lot), December 23, 1790, but was educated and spent most of his early life in Grenoble. Hagiographers have tended to exaggerate Champollion's childhood achievements, but it is clear that from his earliest years he set himself the mission to be the decipherer of Egyptian, and the rest of his short life was a translation of this dream into reality. He published his first full-scale work on Pharaonic Egypt before he was 21, and an incessant stream of publications followed. This constant activity was a factor in his early death, and many of his manuscripts were edited posthumously by his elder brother. At one point overwork led to a breakdown; his way of recuperating was to learn Chinese. The Rosetta Stone (see Rosetta Stone) was discovered in 1798, and Champollion soon became acquainted with it. Nevertheless, he was convinced that Ancient Egyptian writing (see Egyptian Hieroglyphs} was symbolic, and could not be a rational script; as a result his early work on the language was inconclusive, although he was still able to make remarkable contributions to Egyptian history and the study of its religion. The breakthrough in the study of hieroglyphs was made by Thomas Young (see Young, Thomas), and the extent to which Champollion was influenced by Young remains debatable. Probably Champollion would have reached the same conclusions as Young independently, sooner or later. A more important
factor was the fundamental difference between the two men: Young was a scientific genius with no interest in Egyptology, while Champollion was a linguistic genius with an obsession with the subject. It was precisely this combination which was necessary for success. Champollion's Lettre a M. Dacier of September, 1822 is rightly seen as the birthdate of Egyptology, and the first chair in the subject was created for him at the College de France in 1831. In 1828-29 he made a survey of the monuments surviving in Egypt, and the published results of this visit are still of supreme interest. Champollion played a fringe role in revolutionary politics, and his essays and letters, Egyptology apart, would probably earn him a minor place in nineteenth-century literature. His posthumous reputation is such that he probably has more streets named after him than any other figure in the history of linguistics, but it is impossible to begrudge him this distinction. His decipherment of Egyptian was a considerable moment in the history of Western thought, and in the search for its origins. Bibliography Bresciani E (ed.) 1978 Jean-Francois Champollion; Letters a Zelmire. L'Asiatheque, Paris Dawson W R, Uphill E P 1972 Who Was Who in Egyptology, 2nd edn. Egypt Exploration Society, London Hartleben H 1983 Champollion; sa vie et son oeuwe 1790-1832, rev. edn. Pygmalion, Paris
Coverdale, Miles (1487-1569) G. L. Jones
Coverdale, Miles (1487-1569), Catholic turned Puritan, is remembered chiefly for his translation of the Bible into English. A native of Yorkshire, he studied at Cambridge where he became a priest and an Augustinian friar in 1514. But his enthusiasm for
reform led him to leave the order in 1526. He moved to Hamburg in 1528 to escape persecution for preaching against the use of images and the practice of confession. There he assisted Tyndale in translating the Pentateuch. He was in Antwerp when he 415
Biographies completed his own translation of the Bible in 1535. In that year he went back to England to prepare the Great Bible of 1539. He spent 1540-48 at Strasbourg where he made the acquaintance of Calvin. After his return to England he played an active part in the reforms of Edward VI and was consecrated Bishop of Exeter in 1551. Exiled again under Mary, he settled in Geneva where he was influenced by John Knox. Though he returned to England in 1559, he did not resume his episcopal duties but chose instead to take a leading role in the Puritan party. Coverdale's Bible, published on October 4, 1535, probably at Cologne, was the first complete Bible to appear in English. In his dedicatory letter to the king, Coverdale admitted that he knew no Hebrew and had only a smattering of Greek. The 'five sundry interpreters' on whom he claims to have relied have been identified as Jerome, Tyndale, Pagninus, Luther, and the group of Zurich divines led by Zwingli. C. S. Lewis describes him as being a 'translator whose choice of rendering came nearest to being determined by taste.' In other words, since he had no knowledge of the original languages, he had to choose between his 'sundry interpreters.' In this he was guided by his own judgement, which, fortunately, was sound. Within two years of the publication of Coverdale's Bible another English version appeared. Though prepared by John Rogers, the first of the Marian martyrs, it was known as 'Matthew's Bible.' For different reasons both translations were unsatisfactory. Coverdale's version was based on other translations rather than on the original languages. That of Rogers was doctrinally suspect because of its
tendency to support the Reformers in its marginal notes. Thomas Cromwell therefore invited Coverdale to prepare yet another version which was to be based on the original texts. Coverdale complied and in April 1539 produced the Great Bible which claimed on its title-page to be 'truly translated after the verity of the Hebrew and Greek texts by the diligent study of diverse excellent learned men expert in the aforesaid tongues.' For this version Coverdale derived considerable benefit from the Hebrew-Latin version of Sebastian Muenster with its copious explanatory notes on difficult and obscure words in the text of the OT. The translation was a success and immediately became the 'authorized version' of its day, holding its ground until 1560. Perhaps the most significant characteristic of Coverdale as a translator is his rendering of Hebrew poetry. Two centuries before Lowth's analysis of the parallelism of meaning which is fundamental to Hebrew verse, Coverdale had reproduced the pattern of the original. There is good reason why his version of the Psalter was included in the Book of Common Prayer. See also: English Bible; Jerome; Tyndale, W.; Luther, M.; Wycliffe, J. Bibliography Butterworth C C 1941 The Literary Lineage of the King James Bible 1340-1611. Pennsylvania University Press. Philadelphia Haugaard W P 1984 The Bible in the Anglican Reformation. Morehouse Barlow, Wilton, CN Mozley J F 1953 Coverdale and his Bibles. Lutterworth. London
Crowther, Samuel Ajayi (1806/08-91) J. D. Y. Peel
Bishop Crowther was the first black African to be consecrated an Anglican bishop. Through his work as lexicographer and translator he pioneered the creation of Standard Yoruba, one of the foremost literary languages of West Africa. He was born as Ajayi ca. 1806/08 in the small town of Osogun, about 150 miles to the interior of Lagos, in the Yoruba kingdom of Oyo. In 1821 he was kidnapped by raiders and sold into slavery; but he was rescued from a Portuguese ship by the British anti-slavery squadron and taken to Sierra Leone. Here in 1825 he was baptized—his 'English' names being taken from a leading clerical backer of the Church Missionary Society—by the Rev. J. Raban, a missionary who compiled some Yoruba vocabularies
416
and for whom Crowther worked as an informant. In 1827 Crowther entered Fourah Bay College as its first student and later worked for several years as a schoolmaster and then as Tutor at the College. His own linguistic interests developed when he was chosen to accompany the Niger Expedition of 1841, of which, with the Rev. J. F. Schon, he published an account. After further training in London, he was ordained priest in 1843, the year in which he published his Vocabulary of the Yoruba Language. This also included notes on grammar. It was the CMS which introduced 'Yoruba'— hitherto a name the Hausa applied to the Oyo—as the common designation for a group of peoples who spoke closely related dialects and shared much
Cyril and Methodios common culture, but who in their homeland lacked a common name. (In Freetown they were known as 'Aku.') In 1845 Crowther returned to the Yoruba country as one of the founding members of the CMS Yoruba mission, which soon established its main base at Abeokuta, capital of the Egba. More important than Crowther's directly evangelistic work was his key role as the chief translator of the Bible. The project began in 1847 with the Gospels and continued over the next three decades, with much of the later work being done by other African clergy under Crowther's supervision, until published in its entirety in 1889. The language of this translation— based chiefly on the Oyo and Egba dialects—gained enormous authority among educated and Christian Yoruba. Being also used in primers, catechisms and readers, and (from the 1880s) in a growing vernacular literature, it played a decisive role in the formation of modern Yoruba ethnic identity. Crowther went on two further Niger Expeditions in 1854 and 1857, and became the focus of the hopes of the CMS Secretary, Henry Venn, to develop an indigenous church under African leadership. Despite opposition from many white missionaries, Crowther was, in 1864, made Bishop of the 'countries of Western Africa beyond [the Queen's] dominions.' In practice this meant, not Yorubaland, but the Lower
Niger which was staffed with African mission personnel. Notwithstanding his pioneering labors in this sphere, Crowther's leadership of the Niger Mission came under severe criticism from Europeans in the late 1880s, much of it facially motivated, and he resigned early in 1891. He died in Lagos a few months later. Crowther's humiliation at the hands of his European critics was a major spur to the growth of African nationalist sentiment in both church and state. But his most enduring legacy has been the Bible in the Yoruba language. In its cultural significance for the modern Yoruba, it may justly be compared to Luther's German Bible. See also: Christianity in Africa; Missionaries. Bibliography Ajayi J F A 1960 How Yoruba was reduced to writing. Odu 8: 49-58 Ajayi J F A 1965 Christian Missions in Nigeria, 1841-91. Longman, Harlow Ajayi J F A 1967 Samuel Ajayi Crowther of Oyo. In: Curtin P D (ed.) Africa Remembered. University of Wisconsin Press, Madison, WI Crowther S A 1843 A Vocabulary of the Yoruba Language. Church Missionary Society, London Hair P E H 1967 The Early Study of Nigerian Languages. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge
Cyril and Methodios Archimandrite Ephreni
Constantine, more commonly known by his monastic name Cyril, and his elder brother, who is always known by his monastic name Methodios, were from Thessalonika, which included many Macedonian Slavs. In 840, when Constantine was fourteen, their father died and the boy was sent to Constantinople, where he was taught by Photios, the future patriarch. He was appointed Chartophylax, librarian, of the Great Church, and his intellectual qualities earned him the nickname of 'the Philosopher.' His elder brother had abandoned his secular career to become a monk on Mount Olympos in Bithynia. In 863 Prince Rastislav of Greater Moravia sent an embassy to the Emperor Michael III asking him to send a 'bishop and teacher' to preach to the newly converted Slavs in their own language. The Emperor chose Constantine, who was to be accompanied by his brother Methodios, remarking, 'You are both from Thessalonika, and all Thessalonians speak pure Slavonic.' Rastislav's motives were not purely religious; he was also keen to secure ecclesiastical
autonomy and political independence from the Franks. Before leaving Constantine composed an alphabet and began work on the translation of the Gospels into Slavonic. The alphabet was almost certainly not the one now known as Cyrillic, but rather the older Glagolitic. While the Cyrillic alphabet is clearly based on the Greek, the origin of the Glagolitic is quite obscure. It was once widely held that the complex letter forms are based on Greek minuscule script. R. Auty, on the other hand, holds that the letters derive from a number of different sources, such as Greek letters, Christian symbols and possibly Semitic and Coptic sources. Once in Moravia the brothers set to work translating liturgical texts, but were soon involved in controversy with Western clerics who held that the only languages that could be used in the services of the Church were Hebrew, Greek and Latin. Constantine dubbed them 'trilinguists' or 'Pilatians.' In 867 the brothers traveled to Rome, where Pope Adrian II publicly approved the 417
Biographies use of Slavonic for the Liturgy. Cyril became a monk in Rome just fifty days before his death in 869. Methodios was sent as legate to Pannonia and made bishop of the revived see of Sirmium. In this way Pannonia and Greater Moravia were withdrawn from Bavarian jurisdiction. This provoked a violent reaction and Methodios went into exile for three years. In 879 John VIII summoned him to Rome to answer charges of heresy and of using Slavonic in services. The Pope defended the 'trilingual' view of liturgical language and specifically forbade the use of Slavonic, except for preaching. However, Methodios defended himself successfully on both counts and in June 880 the Pope sent a bull, Industrlae tuae, to Rastislav's successor Sventopluk in which he asserts the important principle that there is no objection in faith or doctrine to the use of Slavonic in the services, since God, who made the three principal languages, also created all the others 'ad laudem et gloriam suam.' The Gospel, however, was to be read in Latin
first. By the time of Methodios' death in 885 the translation into Slavonic of the whole Bible, except Maccabees, was complete. The next year his disciples were expelled from Moravia, but moved south and worked in Bulgaria, Bohemia and southern Poland with far reaching results. See also: Old Church Slavonic; Christianity in Europe. Bibliography Auty R 1968 Handbook of Old Church Slavonic. Part II. London 1968, Athlone Press, London, pp. 1-14 Devos P 1967 Cyril and Methodius. In: New Catholic Encyclopedia, vol. 4 Cyril and Methodius. 1997 In: The Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church, 3rd edn. Oxford University Press. Oxford Parry K 1999 Cyril and Methodius. In: The Blackwell Dictionary of Eastern Christianity. Blackwell, Oxford
Daly, Mary (1930s- ) D. Sawyer
At the heart of Mary Daly's critique of patriarchy lies the conviction that male power is made absolute and affirmed through the construction and repetition of the words we think, speak, and write. She constantly reconceptualizes words and phrases in ways that unmask patriarchal bias. In her Websters' First New Intergalactic Wickedery of the English Language, written with Jane Caputi, she describes her linguistic task as a 'process of freeing words from the cages and prisons of patriarchal patterns,' prompted by the realization that 'words and women have served the fathers' sentences long enough' (p. 3). Daly was a key figure at the vanguard of second-wave feminist theology and philosophy. Her first book, The Church and the Second Sex (1968), presents an extensive critique of Christianity informed by the philosophy of Simone de Beauvoir, and reflecting on her own position as a Catholic woman in the immediate aftermath of the Second Vatican Council. Her disillusionment with the reforms of the Council intensified as it became apparent that they fell far short of the ideals voiced by the growing women's liberation movement in secular contexts, particularly in North America. Her next book, Beyond God the Father: Toward a Philosophy of Women's Liberation (1973), with its intensified intellectual critique of Christianity along with its offer of an alternative feminist spirituality,
418
marked her exit from traditional religion. She named her repositioning 'postchristian,' a term that she defines in the introduction to the 1975 edition of The Church and the Second Sex. This term is now used extensively to describe feminist religious writers who have a background in Christianity but through their encounter with feminism have concluded that the two are irreconcilable, and have moved away from a traditional Christian identity. Beyond God the Father offers an immanent notion of the divine, the 'Ultimate/Intimate Reality' (Wickedary, p. 64), through the use of the term 'be-ing': '(w)hy indeed must 'God' be a noun? Why not a verb—the most active and dynamic of all?' (p. 33). Although 'postchristian' continues to be a term used in the context of feminist spirituality, Daly abandoned it as a self-description when her subsequent ideas and beliefs developed in ways that signified a deliberate lack of engagement with the Christian tradition. In current feminist thinking, Daly's position remains distinctive in its insistence on speaking for women as a single category in tension with a universal notion of patriarchy. This is at odds with the self-conscious shift made by many feminists, in reaction to criticism voiced by non-white and non-western women, towards the accommodation of difference, and away from the essentialism of
Dante Alighieri (1265-1321) 'woman's experience.' Despite her indifference to Christianity, her original critique of that tradition continues to be cited in debate, along with her iconoclastic maxims that encapsulate that critique: 'if god is male, then the male is god'; 'the most unholy trinity: rape, genocide and war' (1973, pp. 19, 114). See also: Feminism; Irigary, L.; Kristeva, J.
Bibliography Daly M 1968 The Church and the Second Sex. Harper and Row, New York Daly M 1973 Beyond God the Father: Toward a Philosophy of Women's Liberation. Beacon Press, Boston Daly M 1987 (with J.Caputi) Websters' First New Intergalactic Wickedery of the English Language. Beacon Press, Boston
Dante Alighieri (1265-1321) M. Davie
Dante's Divine Comedy, written between c. 1308 and the poet's death in 1321, is not only the founding classic of Italian literature but a uniquely ambitious religious poem. His account of a journey through Hell, Purgatory and Paradise encompasses both a comprehensive judgement of the world of his time and a description of eternity culminating in a direct vision of God. Dante's awareness of the unprecedented nature of this undertaking led him to ask fundamental questions about language, both as a literary medium and as the means by which humanity expresses its understanding of the divine. Dante was born in Florence in 1265. From 1295 he was actively involved in politics, and in 1300 was one of the city's six ruling Priors. Following a coup in 1301 Dante and other leading members of the governing party were exiled, and from early 1302 he never returned to Florence; after a decade of wandering among the courts of northern Italy he found refuge first in Verona, then in Ravenna. His reflection on his experience during the years of exile led to a growing conviction that the political and social ills of his time were the result of fundamental moral error, in which the Church, especially the papacy, bore a heavy responsibility. Given the Church's failure to provide spiritual leadership, Dante undertook his own urgent call for social and individual reform. Dante's belief in both the universality and the timelessness of his message produced contrary pressures on his choice of language. On the one hand, his work was too important to be confined to the restricted readership of Latin; on the other, he aspired to write the epic of Christian Rome, comparable and complementary to the Aeneid (whose author Virgil is introduced as his guide in the first two parts of the Comedy). How should he combine the accessibility of the vernacular with the
permanence of Latin? Dante addresses this question in the treatise De vulgari eloquentia ('On vernacular eloquence') (c. 1304-5), which first polemically asserts the intrinsic superiority of vernacular to the artificial 'grammar' of the classical languages, then proposes an 'illustrious vernacular' capable of achieving a degree of stability while retaining its contact with the spoken language. He sought to put this ideal into practice in a series of poems on ethical themes accompanied by a prose commentary, in the Convivio (c. 1304-8). Both De vulgari and Convivio were left unfinished as the Divine Comedy took shape in Dante's mind. By calling his poem a comedy ('divine' is a conventional epithet added by later editors) Dante chose the classical genre which allowed the greatest variety of style and subject matter, enabling him to include passages ranging from vehement polemic to lyrical adoration. But Dante also saw his work as 'comic' in the more fundamental sense in which all human language is 'comic,' i.e. inadequate, in the face of ultimate • reality. At the climax of the Paradiso, expressions of inadequacy alternate with passages of daring invention, and the final canto ends with an admission of defeat. But in the attempt Dante had achieved a work whose linguistic range was unprecedented in any European vernacular, thereby establishing his native Tuscan as the foundation of the language which became standard Italian. Bibliography Auerbach E 1965 Literary Language and its Public in Late Latin Antiquity and in the Middle Ages. Routledge, London Curtius E R 1953 European Literature and the Latin Middle Ages. Routledge, London Kirkpatrick R 1987 Dante: The Divine Comedy. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge
419
Biographies
Davidson, Andrew Bruce (1831-1902) W. Johnstone
Davidson, Andrew Bruce, a pioneer of biblical criticism, is recognized as the author of one of the first 'scientific' commentaries in English on the Hebrew Bible (Strahan 1917: 89). Davidson himself puts it: 'We in this country have been not unaccustomed to... creating Exegesis and Grammar by deduction from Dogmatic, instead of discovering Dogmatic by deduction from Grammar' (Job [1862], vi). He was born at Kirkhill, Ellon, Aberdeenshire, on April 25, 1831, the youngest of six children of a quarryman turned tenant farmer, and died in Edinburgh, February 24, 1902. He was educated at Marischal College, Aberdeen, where in 1849 he graduated with a degree in Mathematics. After a short time as a schoolmaster in his native Aberdeenshire, he studied theology from 1852 to 1856 at New College, Edinburgh, one of the three theological colleges set up by the Free Church of Scotland in the wake of the Disruption of the National Church of Scotland in 1843. In 1858 he was appointed first to a tutorship in Hebrew in New College and then in 1863 to the Chair of Hebrew, which he held for the rest of his life. It was Davidson's achievement in an age of turbulent debate, not least within the church, about the status of the Bible, especially as that was thought to be affected by controversies about authorship and composition, to develop in the English-speaking world an academically disciplined approach to Biblical study that both satisfied the inquiring mind and left open the possibility of faith. That Davidson was able to accomplish this bridging task within one of the most theologically conservative churches while holding a Chair in its gift is testimony to his character and standing, and to his reputation as a commanding figure in the lecture room. By nature retiring and by upbringing reticent, he shunned the more adversarial advocacy of new methods of his brilliant younger contemporary and former student, William Robertson Smith (1846-94), which led to the latter's dismissal from his Aberdeen Hebrew Chair in 1881. The key to Davidson's approach was a linguistically soundly based appreciation and interpretation of the Hebrew Bible in itself. Thus he was able to maintain a certain theological and critical detachment: 'I dislike the old, I distrust the new.' His caution on the latter aspect led at least one Free Church colleague (A. B. Bruce) to remark that, in later life, Davidson had not maintained his place at the vanguard of the critical movement (Riesen 1985: 293, 355).
420
The purity of Davidson's scholarly approach is well indicated by his early writings, Outlines of Hebrew Accentuation, Prose and Poetical (1861), and Commentary, Grammatical and Exegetical, on the Book of Job (Vol. 1, 1862). The latter volume, predicated on the historical linguistics developed for the Semitic languages by Wilhelm Gesenius (1786-1842) (see Gesenius, W.), with its ready deployment of Arabic (which Davidson had studied while in Gottingen with Ewald) and an impressive array of other Semitic languages, and use of the ancient versions chiefly in the London Polyglot of 1657, covers only the first 14 chapters of Job. If academically rigorous, it was not commercially successful and the promised second volume was never published; Davidson did, however, contribute at a more popular level Job in the Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (1884), for which series he also provided Nahum, Habakkuk and Zephaniah (1866) and Ezekiel (1892). Indicative of his interest in the Bible as a whole is his commentary on Hebrews (1882). Davidson's Introductory Hebrew Grammar, which became the standard text book for generations of students internationally was first published in 1874: it has since passed through the hands of three successive editors and, almost completely transformed, still remains in print in the 27th edition, a monument to traditional Classics-influenced pedagogy. The companion volume on Syntax, published in 1894, was thoroughly revised only in 1994. His other chief literary and theological works (e.g., Theology of the Old Testament) were, in the main, edited posthumously: the debate about whether the editors correctly arranged these works and thus faithfully reflected development in Davidson's critical thought is perhaps testimony to an essentially enigmatic element in his make-up and theological outlook. See also: Gesenius, Wilhelm; Bible; Hebrew, Biblical and Jewish. Bibliography Anderson G W 1975 Two Scottish Semitists. Congress Volume Edinburgh 1974 (Vetus Testament Supplement 27). Brill, Leiden Riesen R A 1985 Criticism and Faith in Late Victorian Scotland: A. B. Davidson, William Robertson Smith and George Adam Smith. University Press of America. Lanham, New York Strahan J 1917 Andrew Bruce Davidson. Hodder and Stoughton, London
Derrida, Jacques (1930- )
Delitzsch, Friedrich Conrad Gerhard (1850-1922) G. L. Jones
Delitzsch, Friedrich Conrad Gerhard (1850-1922), an accomplished German linguist and one of the founders of modern Assyriology, was the son of the famous Lutheran biblical scholar of Jewish descent, Franz Delitzsch. Born in Erlangen and educated at the university of Berlin, he served as Professor of Assyriology in Leipzig (1877), Breslau (1893), and Berlin (1899). His scholarly endeavours may be summarized under two main headings. First is the contribution he made to the study of ancient languages. His many textual studies placed the grammar of the Mesopotamian languages on a sound academic basis. His first major work was an investigation of the connection between Hebrew and Akkadian, The Hebrew Language Viewed in the Light of Assyrian Research (English translation 1883). This was followed by an Assyrian Grammar in 1889, an Assyrian Dictionary in 1896, and a Sumerian Grammar and Glossary in 1914. He and his pupils dominated Mesopotamian studies until World War I. Second is the impact he made on biblical studies. As a member of the 'history of religions' school of thought, he traced much of the material found in the OT to Mesopotamian origins. Lectures which he delivered to the German Oriental Society in the presence of the Kaiser in 1902 were published a year later in Leipzig under the title Babel und Bibel (English translation Chicago 1903). In them he made public what every Assyriologist already knew, namely that there were obvious similarities between the Bible and the literature of the Ancient Near East. But the significance he saw in these similarities were unacceptable to members of faith communities. By calling into question the uniqueness of the Bible, by maintaining that the sources of Hebrew religion were to be found in Babylon and that Babylonian ideas were superior to those of Israel, he unleashed a fierce debate which became known as the 'Babel-Bible controversy' in which he was castigated by those who
defended the antiquity and originality of the OT. The only appreciative result of the debate was that the tendency to treat the history and culture of Israel separately from its oriental environment was curbed. Though silent for a while, Delitzsch returned to the fray in 1921 with the publication of Die Grosse Tduschung (The Great Deception), a highly antagonistic two-volume work in which he seeks to demonstrate that most of the OT is not fit to be regarded as Holy Scripture by Christians. He brands as inadequate the traditional method of regarding the biblical account of Israel's origins as the appropriate model for understanding the nation's history because the OT is essentially propaganda. In his view the Bible was an ancient 'deception,' a word which he applies liberally to the account of the conquest of Canaan, the Sinai revelation, the preaching of the prophets, and the religion of the Psalmists. The Hebrews were nothing but a crowd of 'robbing and murdering nomads' responsible for a book full of errors and exaggerations. His attack is reminiscent of that made by Marcion. Though some discern an antisemitic motive behind Delitzsch's biblical studies, he must be credited with making his readers aware of the limitations of the OT, and warning them of the difficulties inherent in an uncritical acceptance of the written record. Bibliography Huffmon H B 1987 Babel und Bibel: the Encounter between Babylon and the Bible. In: O'Connor M P, Freedman D N (eds.) Backgrounds for the Bible. Eisenbrauns, Winona Lake, MI, pp. 125-136 Kraeling E G 1955 The Old Testament since the Reformation. Lutterworth, London, pp. 147-163 Sweek J 1995 The Monuments, the Babel-Bible Streit and Responses to Historical Criticism. In: Holloway S W, Handy L K (eds.) The Pitcher is Broken: Memorial Essays for Gosta W. Ahlstrom. Sheffield Academic Press, Sheffield, pp. 401-419
Derrida, Jacques (1930-) G. Collins
Jacques Derrida is one of the most influential poststructuralist thinkers. His writing has interrogated the status of philosophy and literature by focusing on the ambiguities, contradictions, and aporias within texts. Derrida has always asserted the depth, complexity and indeterminacy of textual-
ity. As a result many of Derrida's key ideas, such as deconstruction and differance, purposefully resist definition. Born in 1930 at El-Biar in Algeria to Jewish parents, he grew up in an occupied and anti-Semitic Algeria. In 'Circumfession' he juxtaposes his 421
Biographies religious origins in North Africa with a reading of St. Augustine (Bennington 1993). He moved to France, where he studied in Paris at the Ecole Normale Superieure (1952-6), before going on to teach philosophy at the Sorbonne between 1960 and 1984. Since then he has been Director of Studies at the Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales. As a friend of Paul de Man, and in dialogue with the Tel Quel group that included Julia Kristeva, Derrida's thought has remained at the heart of Continental, and increasingly Anglo-American, intellectual life. His frequent lecturing in the United States has assisted the wider dissemination of his thought. Derrida's first major work was on the phenomenology of Edmund Husserl, preparing the way for his analysis of the sign Of Grammatology and Speech and Phenomena in 1967. Over the next five years he produced a series of seminal works in which he explored linguistic differance. Derrida's neologism differance encapsulates his understanding of the differing and deferring active-passivity of language. This analysis of language makes time and spatiality fundamental categories, and signals his fascination with Martin Heidegger. Derrida calls into question Western attempts to stabilize language and eradicate the 'play' (jeu) and inherent undecidability of textuality. In this he implicates Heidegger along with other practitioners of the 'metaphysics of presence.' Derrida pressed this point home, with deconstructive readings of thinkers as diverse as Freud, Hegel, LeviStrauss, Rousseau, and Saussure. Derrida problematized the distinctions between the literal and metaphorical, implying instead the endless sign substitutions of metonymy. Increasingly from the 1980s and throughout the 1990s Derrida's interest in language has broadened to an overt analysis of ethical and religious questions. Part of this reflects his interest in Emmanuel Levinas, for whom ethics is first philosophy. Derrida has also engaged at length with the concept of responsibility, famously analyzing John Searle, Paul de Man, and Martin Heidegger. Derrida has argued for the infinite nature of responsibility and justice, connecting these with demands to respect otherness: every other is wholly other. In turn, Derrida's awareness of a fundamental alterity to language has signalled the possibility that the wholly other might at times be the holy other.
Writing on Kierkegaard and the gift in The Gift of Death, Derrida focused on the similarities between the religious paradox and aporia. For Derrida the singularity and scandal of religious paradox is anticipated and mirrored in the fabric of language itself. In Religion Derrida enlarged on the similarities between religion and textuality by emphasizing a common—yet different—structure. of messianicity that underlies both discourses. Derrida's understanding of this messianicity has its roots in Marx, and is configured as a sense of promise inherently linked to emancipatory justice. Derrida has also been drawn to questions of law and politics, and how these require deconstructive responses. Aside from his vast impact on literary and critical theory, Derrida has become an important figure for theologians—not least because of his concentration on the infinite demands of justice. Whilst Derrida refuses to be drawn on his religious commitments, there are significant areas of contact between his work and negative theology. Derrida rejects the God of metaphysics and ontotheology, leaving room instead for a more subtle understanding of the divine. In his relentless questioning of how things are named, there remain deep affinities with theology's own emphasis on the unknowability of the divine. Whilst postmodern theologians differ in their reception of Derrida, his thought remains essentially hospitable to religious language. See also: Postmodernism; Heidegger, M; Levinas, E; Saussure, F de.
Bibliography Bennington G (ed.) 1993 Jacques Derrida. Chicago University Press, Chicago Caputo J 1997 The Prayers and Tears of Jacques Derrida. Indiana University Press, Indianapolis, IN Derrida J 1973 Speech and Phenomena [trans. David Allison]. Northwestern University Press, Evanston, IL Derrida J 1995 The Gift of Death [trans. David Wills]. Chicago University Press, Chicago Derrida J, Vattimo G 1998 Religion. Polity Press, Oxford Gasche R 1986 The Tain of the Mirror: Derrida and the Philosophy of Reflection. Harvard University Press. Cambridge Ward G 1995 Barth, Derrida and the Language of Theology. Cambridge University Press. Cambridge
Dobrovsky, Josef (1753-1829) V. M. Du Feu
Dobrovsky was born in Balassagyarmat, in presentday Hungary. He studied philosophy and theology in
422
Prague and Brno and was ordained in 1786. For a time he was tutor in the home of Count Nostic. He
Driver, Godfrey Rolles (1892-1975) was appointed vice-rector and then rector of the Olomouc seminary. However, he left the seminary to live in the Nostics' house in Prague, and subsequently lived in the houses of other members of the gentry, devoting himself to scholarship. His historical and linguistic works made Prague a center of Slavonic studies. An early work (1777) on the so-called 'Prague Fragments'' (Church Slavonic of the late eleventh century) was published in Frankfurtam-Main, and in the 1780s and 1790s a number of his articles on Slavonic burial types and place-names came out in Germany. But generally he published in Prague, in German or Latin, although probably his most famous work, on Church Slavonic, including declensions and conjugations (Dobrovsky 1822) was published in Vienna. Dobrovsky's work on Old Czech Uber das Alter der bohmischen Bibelubersetzung (1782) laid the foundations of the grammatical description and cultural revival of Czech at a time when it was despised as fit only for the field or the kitchen. He set the scene for understanding the Moravian activities of Cyril and Methodius, the 'apostles of the Slavs' in the ninth century, and also the role of glagolitic (the alphabet invented by Cyril). Slavonic mythology was another of Dobrovsky's interests, and in 1806, 1808, and 1823 he published collections under the title Slavia: Botschaft aus Bohmen an alle slawischen Volker, oder Beitrdge zu ihrer Characteristik, zur
Kenntnis ihrer Mythologie, ihrer Geschichte und Alter turner, ihrer Literatur und ihrer Sprachldnde nach aller Mundarten. Dobrovsky's works touched on all aspects of Slavonic, not just Czech, history and language; they were a source of information and inspiration for other Slavonic nations, particularly the East and South Slavs whose ancient manuscripts were beginning to come to light, mainly in the monasteries of the Balkans. Because he published in Latin and German he had a wide audience; scholars of this period, engaged in early comparative and historical linguistics, could find in his works the material for an Ursprache and also the concrete evidence of the interrelations of the South, East, and West Slavs (the divisions, still in use in the late twentieth century, were Dobrovsky's) which could then fit into the Indo-European picture. To Dobrovsky goes the title of 'Founder of Slavonic Philology'; he was the first Slavonic linguist of European stature. See also: Church Slavonic; Cyril and Methodius; Old Church Slavonic. Bibliography Dobrovsky J 1822 Institutiones linguae slavicae dialecti veteris quae quum apud Russos, Serbos, aliosque ritus Graeci, turn apud Dalmates glagolitas ritus latini slavos in libris sacris obtinet. Schmid, Vienna
Driver, Godfrey Rolles (1892-1975) J. F. A. Sawyer
Son of S. R. Driver, who with Brown and Briggs edited 'BDB,' the most used Hebrew and English Lexicon of the Old Testament (1907), Sir Godfrey Rolles Driver (1892-1975) inherited from his father a passion for Hebrew. As he was not a clergyman, he could never have become like his father, Regius Professor of Hebrew at Oxford, but was appointed lecturer in Comparative Semitic Philology there in 1927 and Professor in 1938. During both World Wars he spent time in Palestine where he had the opportunity to study colloquial Arabic and gain some experience of contemporary middle-eastern cultures to which he frequently referred to in his writings. His first books published in 1925 were a grammar of colloquial Arabic, and editions of texts in Babylonian and Syriac. Over the next 40 years he published substantial works on the Hebrew verbal system, Semitic writing, the Assyrian and Babylonian laws, Canaanite myths and legends (see Ugaritic),
Aramaic papyri from fifth century BCE Egypt and the Dead Sea Scrolls. In addition he published about 200 articles on all manner of philological and textual problems, for which he regularly proposed a novel solution, and hundreds of reviews. He was a Fellow of the British Academy and played a leading role in the New English Bible translation project from 1957 till it was published in 1970. He was awarded a knighthood in 1968. His knowledge of ancient near-eastern texts, including the Bible, and the Semitic languages in which they were written, was encyclopedic, although his theories and conclusions about them were at times unconvincing. In his initial work on the Dead Sea Scrolls, for example, he alone among the experts of the day argued that they were of an early mediaeval date. From his lifelong study of the texts and from his experiences in Syria and Palestine, he amassed detailed information on every word in the
423
Biographies Hebrew Bible, with a view to compiling a Hebrew dictionary. This never saw the light of day, but his influence on Hebrew lexicography in the middle of the twentieth century, through his publications, his teaching and most notably his contributions to the New English Bible, was profound. Following comparative philological methods developed mainly in the nineteenth century, he was convinced that the way to discover the original meaning of a rare or obscure Hebrew word, was to identify a cognate in Arabic, Ugaritic, Babylonian, or another Semitic language and apply its meaning to Hebrew. In his enthusiasm for comparative philology he occasionally neglected other semantic issues and produced quite inappropriate meanings, some of which, like
tzanah 'break wind' in Judges 1:14, found their way into the New English Bible. He will be remembered for his sense of humour, his generous nature and tireless energy as well as for his keen intellect and immense erudition. See also: Barr, J.; English Bible.
Bibliography Barr J 1968 Comparative Philology and the Text of the Old Testament. Oxford University Press, Oxford Thomas D W, McHardy W D 1963 Hebrew and Semitic Studies presented to G.R.D. Oxford University Press, Oxford
Falc'hun, Francois (1909-91) P.-Y. Lambert
Canon Falc'hun was born in 1909 in a peasant family of North Finistere—so he was a native speaker of Breton. He went to Lesneven college (or 'petitseminaire') and prepared for priesthood in the Grand-Seminaire of Quimper. Soon after his ordination, he asked his bishop for authorization to go to Paris to study Phonetics and Celtic studies. Researcher in the Centre National de Recherche Scientifique from 1939 on, he became a lecturer (1944) and Professor of Celtic (1952) in the Arts Faculty of Rennes. When Brest University was founded, he transferred there, close to his own birthplace. From the age of 20 he suffered from tuberculosis, which obliged him to interrupt his work for long periods several times. He died in January 1991. During his stay in Paris, Falc'hun recorded his own Breton language and studied its sounds with various instruments. He became particularly interested in 'initial mutations' in Breton, together with the exact pronunciation of consonant groups. His phonetic observations were also interpreted phonologically under the influence of M.-L. SjoestedtJonval (Professor of Irish in the Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes), who had written a thesis on the phonology of Kerry Irish. According to Falc'hun, Breton consonants are divided into strong (fortes) and soft (douces, lenes), in twelve pairs. In a stressed syllable (that is, in the penultimate for most of the dialects), a strong consonant always follows a short vowel, and a soft consonant follows a long vowel. The initial mutation, called 'lenition' (voicing of voiceless stops, spirantization of voiced stops, etc.), is 424
based on the opposition between strong and soft consonants: in the case of resonants, the strong variants are softened by the 'lenition.' This mutation occurs in every context where the word would have been originally preceded by a word with a vocalic ending: the following initial consonant has been assimilated to the vowel, resulting in softening. In his phonetic analysis of stops and spirants, Falc'hun also suggested a possible explanation for the Germanic Lautverschiebung. His phonetic analysis of Breton consonants was published in 1951 as a part of his thesis. As a consequence of these observations, Canon Falc'hun planned a reform of Breton orthography, in the years 1954-55. This was later called the 'University spelling.' He felt the need for two different spellings for the velar spirants (the voiced and the voiceless). As the final stops of Breton do not have a voice opposition, he proposed to distribute the corresponding letters (-t/-d, -c/-g) according to morphological classes. His main thesis was devoted to 'Linguistic Geography'; he maintained that the analysis of dialect maps on its own can enable us to understand the history of a language. Basing his study on the Atlas Linguistique de la Basse-Bretagne, by Pierre Le Roux, he drew the different isoglosses, trying to establish the main frontiers between the dialects. Though his historical conclusions were fairly rational (as, for example, an innovating center in Carhaix, and archaizing zones in NW and SE), they sometimes suggested erroneous assumptions about
Foucault, Michel (1926-84) what was archaic and what was not: Jackson later proved that the analysis of isoglosses on its own cannot lead one to differentiate archaisms and innovations. Towards the end of his career, Canon Falc'hun wrote many articles and books on more popular subjects, most of which are condemned to oblivion. He was unfortunately unable to meet the scientific requirements of linguistic history and comparative grammar. His fantastic etymologies, his idea of a direct filiation between Gaulish and Breton, and his supposed 'Gaulish article' are all to be rejected. See also: Celtic Religion.
Bibliography Falc'hun F 1951 Le systeme consonantique du breton, avec une etude comparative de phonetique experimental. Plihon, Rennes Falc'hun F 1963 UHistoire de la langue bretonne d' apres la geographic linguistique, 2nd edn. 2 vols, Presses Universitaires de France, Paris; enlarged edn. in Perspectives nouvelles sur i'histoire de la langue bretonne. Union Generate d'Editions, 1981 Falc'hun F 1982 Les noms des lieux celtiques, premiere serie, vallees et plaines. Slatkine, Geneva Hardie D W F 1948 A Handbook of Modern Breton: University of Wales Press, Cardiff, UK Jackson K H 1963 Language and History in Early Britain. Edinburgh University Press, Edinburgh
Foucault, Michel (1926-84) J. C. Maher
Michel Foucault, philosopher, cultural historian, and sociologist whose critical theory involved influential observations on the role of language in society, was born in Poitiers, France in 1926. He held degrees in philosophy and psychology from the Ecole Normale Superieure at the Sorbonne and the University of Paris. He also held a diploma in psychopathology and was a student of the Marxist scholar, Louis Althusser. After academic appointments in Sweden and Poland, he returned to France in 1960 as chairman of the Department of Philosophy at the University of Clermont-Ferrand and then as professor at the University of Paris-Vincennes (1968-70). He held the chair as Professor of the History of Systems of Ideas at the College de France until his death in 1984. Foucault's inaugural lecture 'Discourse in Language' at the College de France in 1970 established his reputation in France as a leading ethnomethodologist of language. In this treatise, he examined the relation between truth and description in language arguing that if one wants to be heard in society it is not enough simply to 'speak' the truth rather one must be, in some sense, within the truth and embody its regime. The prohibitions surrounding speech inexorably reveal language's links with desire and power. In his investigation of mental illness, Foucault noted how, from the Middle Ages onward, a man was considered mad if his speech could not be said to form 'part of the common discourse of man.' The language of the mentally ill was considered either inadmissible in the authentification of acts or contracts or, alternatively, 'credited with strange
powers of revealing some hidden truth, of predicting the future, of revealing... what the wise were unable to perceive' (1976: 216). By examining conventional explanations and understandings of madness (likewise, criminality or homosexuality) one can see how the boundaries of the normal are created as new forms of speech emerge. Foucault's seminal studies on the religious, therapeutic, and judicial domains emphasized the presence of a 'fellowship of discourse' for each distinct social group. In what way does the dominant discourse of a powerful group, established in an 'institutional site' (e.g., hospital, prison), control those it marginalizes? Does not every speaker, in fact, unconsciously site an interlocutor or object of discourse within a power relation as the 'questioning subject,' the 'listening subject', or the 'seeing subject'? The function of a fellowship is to maintain and reproduce discourse in order that it may circulate within its boundaries according to strict regulations. Foucault stressed that the meanings contained in discourse cannot be based upon an a priori system of signification as if the world is given to people simply to decipher. Discourse is, rather, a violence that people do to things. See also: Language and Power.
Bibliography Foucault M 1963 Naissance de la Clinique. PUF, Paris Foucault M 1966. Les Mots et les Choses: une archeologie des sciences humaines. Gallimard, Paris
425
Biographies Foucault M 1972 Discourse in language (appendix). In: Foucault M (trans. Sheriden Smith A M) Archaeology of Knowledge. Tavistock, London Foucault M 1976 Histoire de la Folie a I'Age Classique. Gallimard, Paris
Foucault M 1977 Language, Counter-Memory, Practice: Selected Essays and Interviews. Bouchard D F (ed.) Blackwell, Oxford Hoy D (ed.) 1986 Foucault. Blackwell, Oxford Smart B 1985 Michel Foucault. Ellis Horwood. Chichester
Frazer, James George (1854-1941) J. W. Rogerson
James George Frazer was born in Glasgow in January 1854 and educated at the universities of Glasgow and Cambridge, concentrating upon classical studies, although to please his father he studied sufficient law to be called to the bar by the Middle Temple. In 1879 he was elected to a fellowship of Trinity College, Cambridge, which he held for the rest of his life and where he wrote the books for which he became renowned. From 1907 to 1922 he held a chair of social anthropology at the University of Liverpool, specially created for him, but undertook no duties in connection with it. He was knighted in 1914 and died in Cambridge in May 1941. He had been afflicted with blindness for the last ten years of his life. Frazer is best known for his monumental The Golden Bough, so named after a legend recorded by Servius in his commentary on Virgil, according to which such a bough grew on a tree in a sacred grove of Diana at Aricia. The grove's priesthood was held by anyone who broke off the bough and slew the existing priest in single combat. Frazer's quest to understand the meaning of this legend led him not only to classical sources but to correspondence with informants throughout the world, as he accumulated a vast amount of information about customs, rites and legends which was synthesized into an allembracing theory that was to extend the third edition of The Golden Bough (1911-1915) to 12 volumes. Basically, this theory was that the death of the priest at Aricia was regarded as the death of its god, necessary before he became enfeebled and unable to control the cosmic energies on which humans depended; but in its elaboration the theory assumed various different forms, and touched upon many subjects including the moral and spiritual evolution of humanity through the successive stages of magic,
religion and science, and the nature of totemism, taboos, and magic. Living in an age dominated by Darwinism, Frazer believed that all races had evolved through similar moral and spiritual stages, with the evidence from contemporary 'primitive' peoples indicating that they were still a long way back on the path of development. Among the important influences on his theories were E. B. Tylor's Primitive Culture, published in 1871, and personal contact with William Robertson Smith and the latter's Lectures on the Religion of the Semites (1889). In the preface to the first edition of The Golden Bough (1890) Frazer also mentioned the importance for him of the research of the German Wilhelm Mannhardt into the superstitions of German peasants. From a modern perspective, Frazer's work was compromised by being based upon reports of untrained observers, accounts which he severed from their social settings in order to incorporate them into his grand intellectual scheme. He was, however, a great pioneer of anthropology and comparative religion within his own time. See also: Myth; Religious Symbols. Bibliography Ackerman R 1987 J. G. Frazer. His Life and Work. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge Downie R A 1970 Frazer and The Golden Bough. Victor Gollancz, London Evans-Pritchard E E 1981 A History of Anthropological Thought. Faber and Faber, London, pp. 132-152 James E O 1959 Frazer, Sir James George 1854-1941. In: Dictionary of National Biography 1941-50. Oxford University Press, Oxford, pp. 272-278 Segal R A 1998 The Myth and Ritual Theory. Blackwell, Oxford
Gadamer, Hans-Georg (1900- ) L. P. Hemming
Hans-Georg Gadamer is best known for his major contribution to hermeneutics through his most 426
important work, Wahrheii und Methode (Truth and Method) which is an exploration of historicity.
Gesenius, Wilhelm (1785-1842) language and art. He has written numerous other shorter pieces, many of which have been translated, as well as a major evaluation of Martin Heidegger. Born in Breslau in Germany on 11 February 1900, the son of a Professor of Chemistry, he studied at Marburg under Nicolai Hartman and concluded his doctoral studies in 1922 on Plato under Paul Natorp. After Martin Heidegger's appointment to Marburg in 1923 Gadamer worked as his assistant, a formal appointment, and completed his Habilitationsschrift in 1928 under Heidegger. In 1933 he was appointed to teach Aesthetics at Marburg, and then given an appointment at Kiel (1934-35). He returned to Marburg, and was then appointed to a professorial chair at Leipzig in 1939. He remained in Leipzig throughout the Second World War and served as Rector in 1946-47. In the autumn of 1947 he went to Frankfurt, and then on to succeed Karl Jaspers in a Chair of Philosophy at Heidelberg. He became Emeritus Professor in 1968, and has remained, often surrounded by young students, a part of the academic scene at Heidelberg. He has often taught in, and developed extensive links with, North America. Truth and Method remains by far his most influential work. In it he undertakes a critique of German Idealism and the Romantic and NeoKantian schools of interpretation of history and aesthetics (Schleiermacher, Droysen, and Dilthey). Through an engagement with Heidegger's phenomenology he developed an understanding of prejudice as a philosophical category, and finally of language as the 'horizon of a hermeneutic ontology.' Gadamer's concern with hermeneutics, or the enquiry into how we, as humans, take account of our own self-understanding, has been throughout his life carried out as a concern with language. With the problem of language comes the problem of translation and interpretation across time. In this he has been profoundly influenced by Heidegger, and his argument that language and being are inseparable— indeed that being cannot be understood outside language—closely parallels Heidegger. To be human is to be involved in discourse: oral, written, or in
more discreet forms. In this Gadamer shares Heidegger's critique of Husserl and of much of nineteenth-century, particularly German, philosophy, that there is no primordial or uninterpreted level of human experience. Perception and interpretation are the same: to know is to translate. Gadamer has remained rooted in the Classical tradition, with an effortless and encyclopedic understanding of Aristotle and Plato, while continuing to develop a theory of understanding, or hermeneutics, applicable in contemporary thinking. Of particular note have been his critical engagements with Jurgen Habermas and Jacques Derrida. His work continues to have application in philosophy, theology, religious studies, and literary theory. See also: Heidegger, Martin; Derrida, Jacques; Romanticism; Postmodernism. Bibliography Gadamer H-G 1976 Philosophical Hermeneutics. University of California Press, Berkeley Gadamer H-G 1980 Dialogue and Dialectic: Eight Hermeneutical Studies on Plato. Yale University Press, New Haven, CT Gadamer H-G 1985 Philosophical Apprenticeships. MIT Press, Cambridge MA [translation of 1977 Philosophische Lehrjahre: eine Riickschau]. Klostermann, Frankfurt Gadamer H-G 1997 (1975) Truth and Method. Sheed & Ward, London [translation of 1975 (1960) Wahrheit und Methode]. Mohr Siebeck, Tubingen Gadamer H-G 1997 Reflections on My Philosophical Journey. Open Court, Chicago Gadamer H-G 2001 Gesammelte Werke. Mohr Siebeck, Tubingen Grondin J 1995 Introduction to Philosophical Hermeneutics. Yale University Press, New Haven, CT [translation of 7997 Einfuhrung in die philosophische Hermeneutik]. Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, Darmstadt Grondin J 1999 Hans-Georg Gadamer: Eine Biographie. Mohr Siebeck, Tubingen Palmer R E (ed.) 1989 Dialogue and Deconstruction: The Gadamer-Derrida Encounter. State University Press of New York, New York Silverman H J 1991 Gadamer and Hermeneutics. Routledge, New York
Gesenius, Wilhelm (1785-1842) G. Lloyd Jones
Gesenius began his teaching career as a privatdozent at Gottingen, Germany, but moved to Halle in 1810 on being appointed professor of theology. There he remained for the rest of his life, despite the offer of Eichhorn's chair at Gottingen and an invitation to go
to Oxford. He was a popular and gifted teacher. His lectures, which unfailingly attracted a large audience, were not only clear and concise, but witty and animated; it is unfortunate that they were never published. His influence on oriental studies may be
427
Biographies measured by noting his contribution in the related areas of grammar, exegesis, and lexicography. Gesenius's Hebrdische Grammatik (1813), which was based on the empirical method, soon replaced existing grammars and became the most widely used of all his writings. It ran into fourteen editions during his own lifetime. The twenty-eighth edition (1909) was revised by E. Kautzsch and translated into English by A. E. Cowley. To his grammatical works also belongs Die Geschichte der hebrdischen Sprache und Schrift (1815). While this provides a valuable overview of the contributions of earlier scholars in grammar and lexicography, it was not as successful as his earlier work because he did not have sufficient knowledge of Mishnaic Hebrew. It has been the author's intention to revise it later, but he failed to do so. The commentary on Isaiah (Philologisch-kritischer und historischer Commentar iiber den Jesaia, 1820-21) demonstrates Gesenius's ability as a biblical exegete. The work, which is moderate and circumspect in its criticism of the text, suggests that the author was a rationalist but with conservative tendencies. His attitude to the Masoretic Text was one of caution; where previous textual scholars had criticized it, he came to its defense. But in matters theological he was no dogmatist. For him the Hebrew Bible was not an inspired book, but a graphic history and great poetry. His tendency to be dismissive of biblical miracles engendered fierce opposition which culmi-
nated in an unsuccessful attempt to remove him from office. Gesenius's contribution to lexicography surpasses all his other scholarly work. The Hebrdisch-deutsches Handworterbuch (1812) was the basis for all subsequent lexicons by Gesenius himself and those compiled by other Hebraists. His lexicographical sources were three: the Hebrew of the Old Testament itself, traditional interpretation, and cognate languages. The Hebrew Bible was an important source for determining the meaning of Hebrew words. Rare words, and even hapax legomena, can be explained from the context. Traditional interpretation comprised of the ancient Greek, Syriac, and Latin versions of the Scriptures, coupled with the contributions of rabbinic and medieval Jewish commentators, lexicographers, and grammarians. The cognate languages were divided into three groups: Aramaic, Canaanite, and Arabic, pride of place as a philological aid being given to Arabic. See also: Hebrew, Biblical and Jewish; Hebrew Grammarians; Semitic Languages. Bibliography Cheyne T K 1893 Founders of Old Testament Criticism. Methuen, London Miller E F 1927 The Influence of Gesenius on Hebrew Lexicography. Columbia University Press, New York Nyberg H S (ed.) 1972 Congress Volume: Uppsala 1971. Leiden. Series: Supplement to V.T. no. 22
Gordon, Cyrus Herzl (1908-2001) K. J. Cathcart
A scholar with remarkable linguistic talents and a prolific writer, Cyrus Gordon has spent much of his distinguished career proposing provocative interpretations of ancient Near Eastern and Mediterranean cultures. He was born in New York in 1908 to Lithuanian Jewish parents. After attending high school in Philadelphia, he was admitted to the University of Pennsylvania, where he studied under J. A. Montgomery. In 1930 he was awarded a Ph.D. for his dissertation on 'Rabbinic Exegesis in the Vulgate of Proverbs'. During these years he also attended Dropsie College, taking further courses in Hebrew and Arabic. Gordon reckons that at this time he became 'consciously dedicated to international and interconfessional cooperation in scholarship' (Gordon 2000, p. 19). From 1931 to 1935 he held a fellowship at the American School of Oriental Research in Baghdad and Jerusalem. He excavated
428
at the sites of Tepe Gawra and Tell Billa in Iraq and at Beth-Zur in southern Palestine. It is clear that the young scholar enjoyed travelling around the Middle East, visiting the archaeological sites and learning colloquial Arabic. During the following three years he was a teaching fellow under W. F. Albright (see Albright, W. F.) at Johns Hopkins University, where he began to point out the parallels between Greek literature and Near Eastern literatures. In the summer of 1939, while holding a Scandinavian-American fellowship at the University of Uppsala, Gordon wrote the first draft of his Ugaritic Grammar, the first of his many significant contributions to the study of north-west Semitic literatures and civilizations. His publications in Ugaritic studies were particularly important for the study of Canaanite mythology. His academic career was interrupted by World War II during which he worked as a cryptanalyst in Washington and then enlisted in the
Gundert, Hermann (1814-93) Persian Gulf Command. From 1946 to 1956 he taught at Dropsie College, giving courses in Assyriology, Egyptology, Aramaic, and Hebrew. He had a particular interest in Aramaic incantations. Then came one of his most notable contributions to academic life in America. In 1956 he moved to Brandeis University as a professor of Near Eastern and Judaic studies and quickly set up a department of Mediterranean studies. Mentor and teacher par excellence, he attracted many fine doctoral students to this new academic program. Unfortunately, in the early 1970s, Brandeis decided to close the department that he had so energetically built up, so he accepted
an appointment at New York University. There he remained until his retirement in 1989, contributing to the new field of Eblaite studies. Bibliography Gordon C H 1995 Recovering Canaan and Ancient Israel. In: Sasson J (ed.) Civilizations of the Ancient Near East. Charles Scribner's, New York, vol. 4, pp. 2779-89 Gordon C H 2000 A Scholar's Odyssey. Society of Biblical Literature, Atlanta, GA Lubetski M, Gottlieb C 1996 Portrait of a Master Scholar with a Global Perspective. Biblical Archaeologist 59(1): 2-12
Gundert, Hermann (1814^-93) R. E. Asher
The year 1993 saw celebrations in both Germany and South India to mark the centenary of the death of Hermann Gundert, one of the most distinguished among the many missionaries who, having gone to India to spread the message of Christianity, became scholars in the language of the area in which they found themselves stationed. Gundert, who was born in Stuttgart in 1814, left Germany for South India in 1836, arriving at Madras almost 130 years to the day after Ziegenbalg. His purpose was to act as tutor to the sons of A N Groves, an Englishman who had been a missionary. The two boys proving disinclined to study Greek and Hebrew, Gundert was sent to work with K T E Rhenius (1790-1838), a German member of the Church Missionary Society in Tirunelveli, with whom he studied the Tamil classics. Two years later, by then married to Julie Dubois, a schoolteacher, he accepted an invitation to join the Basel Mission in Mangalore. While there he made a study of Kanarese. In 1838 he went to Illikunnu, Thalassery, in Malabar to set up a new mission station and so began his acquaintance with Malayalam. He is reputed to have learnt sufficient Malayalam to preach in the language within a few months of his arrival. The development of his proficiency in the written language was equally impressive and in the course of his life he produced almost 50 works in Malayalam, including a translation of the Bible. His knowledge of a number of Dravidian languages is no doubt part of the reason for his close friendship with Bishop Caldwell. Ill health forced his return to Germany in 1859. Steeped in the knowledge not only of Malayalam language, but also in the customs, culture, and legends of the part of India in which he had lived for three decades, he devoted the rest of his life to
writing and publishing—the latter as chief editor of the Calwer Verlagsverein from 1862. Much of what he learned is contained in his letters and diaries, which were later published (see Gundert 1983a, 1983b and 1986). Among Gundert's descendants was the poet Hermann Hesse, his grandson. Extensive and varied though his writings were, Gundert is particularly celebrated for his contributions in the field of Malayalam language. His first major endeavor of this kind was his Malayala vyakaranam ('Malayalam grammar') of 1851 (see Gundert 1868). Gundert also contributed to the understanding of the importance of epigraphy in the study of the history of Malayalam language by his decipherment of inscriptions. Gundert's important grammatical and epigraphical studies, however, can be seen as secondary to his work as a lexicographer. After returning to Germany he concentrated all his intellectual energy on the editing of a Malayalam-English dictionary (Gundert 1872) which was still considered sufficiently commercial ninety years later to justify the publication of a second edition and which remained perhaps the most important landmark in Malayalam lexicography until the appearance of the multi-volume Malayalam Lexicon (Kunjan Pillai 1965). Gundert attempted, in the manner of the compilers of the Oxford English Dictionary, to produce a work on historical principles. He was the first Malayalam lexicographer to illustrate meanings with quotations from literary sources. He aimed wherever possible to indicate the source of lexemes, noting which words were borrowed from Sanskrit and, in the case of pure Malayalam words, those for which cognates existed in other Dravidian languages, the identity of these languages being indicated in each case. For these 429
Biographies reasons, and because of its general reliability, it is not surprising that Gundert's Dictionary has been a major source for work on comparative Dravidian by such scholars as T. Burrow and M. B. Emeneau in the second half of the twentieth century. A further innovation was a roman transcription to indicate the pronunciation of each headword, this going beyond a mere transliteration of the Malayalam script to include such symbols as y. Written sources, which include old letters and official records as well as literary works in both prose and verse, are supplemented by spoken materials from most parts of Kerala. Foreign words in regular use are included, as are "provincialisms and vulgarisms,' including 'coarse and even obscene modes of speech.' Altogether the work is a worthy forerunner of the great Malayalam Lexicon. At the beginning of the twenty-first century, the name of no European is held in as high esteem in Kerala as Gundert's and not only among the large Christian community. See also: Caldwell, Robert; Ziegenbalg, Bartholomaus; Missionaries.
Bibliography Frenz A 1991 Dr Hermann Gundert: Biography. D C Books, Kottayam Frenz A, Zacharia S (eds.) 1993 Dr Hermann Gundert and Malayalam Language. Centre for Kerala Studies, Changanassery Gundert H 1868 A Grammar of the Malayalam Language, 2nd edn. complete [and edited, with preface, brief headings in English and other additions, by K A E Diez]. Basel Mission Press, Mangalore Gundert H 1872 A Malayalam and English Dictionary. C Stolz, Mangalore, 3rd edn., 1992, with critical introduction by Scaria Zacharia, D C Books, Kottayam Gundert H 1983a Schriften und Berichle aus Malabar: mil Meditationen und Studien, Frenz A (ed.) J F Steinkopf. Stuttgart Gundert H 19835 Tagebuch aus Malabar, 1837-1859. Frenz A (ed.) J F Steinkopf, Stuttgart Kunjan Pillai S 1965- (in progress) Malayalam Lexicon. University of Kerala. Trivandrum Gundert H 1986 Calwer Tagebuch, 1859-1893. Frenz A (ed.) J F Steinkopf, Stuttgart Kurup K K N, John K J (eds.) 1993 Legacy of Basel Mission and Hermann Gundert in Malabar. Gundert Death Centenary Committee, Calicut
Guthrie, Malcolm (1903-72) M. Mann
Professor Guthrie is known chiefly for his contributions to the comparative study of the Bantu languages of Africa. Born in 1903 into a strict Baptist family, he studied engineering at Imperial College, London, and theology at Spurgeon's College, and served three years as a pastor in Rochester before leaving for Kinshasa, Zaire, as a Baptist missionary in 1932. Jointly in charge of the mission school, he mastered Lingala, and through its medium started investigating some of the 120 languages represented in the school, notably those of the Teke group, transferring after furlough in 1935 (when he renewed contacts with the School of Oriental and African Studies in London) to Upoto, 600 miles upstream, where he produced a much reprinted Grammaire et Dictionnaire de Lingala (1939) and translated the New Testament (published 1942). Returning to England in 1940, he accepted after some hesitation a senior lectureship at the School of Oriental and African Studies, becoming Reader in 1947, Professor in 1951, and serving as head of the 430
department of Africa 1950-68. He died in 1972, two years after his retirement. In an eighteen-month study tour (1942-44, including a month in Zanzibar to master Swahili), he amassed firsthand material on a large number of Bantu languages, using carefully constructed grammatical and lexical questionnaires, and made a detailed study of Bemba. His corpus of field data is richly reflected in his The Classification of the Bantu Languages (1948), which associates the Bantu languages in 80 groups, and then further into 16 (later 15) zones. This yields a widely used reference system (best known through Bryan 1959) in which each language is identified by a letter (representing the zone) and two digits (group and language). The work itself however is rendered somewhat inaccessible by Guthrie's failure to explain his descriptive categories. Much of Guthrie's work is clearly argued from first principles, frequently in blind disregard of the contributions of predecessors. Comparative Bantu (1967-71) assembles over 2000 series of vocabulary items drawn from over 200 languages, each series
Hayyuj, Judah (ca. 940-1010) with a common meaning and connecting 'starred form,' to which all valid entries are related by regular sound-correspondences ('skewed' entries are clearly distinguished, with a note of the nature of their irregularity); insistence on strict regularity leads to a considerable number of—frequently overlapping— 'osculant' series differing slightly in form or meaning. A notable innovation is the attempt to codify the geographical distribution of individual series. Guthrie insists that the presentation of the comparative series is strictly formal and synchronic; only when it was completed did he attempt historical interpretation, which is set out in a parallel commentary. Few people now accept his conclusion that the first Bantu-speakers were iron-using boat-people who
expanded from southeastern Zaire, which would leave unexplained the connection of Bantu with other Niger-Congo languages of West Africa. See also: Christianity in Africa; Missionaries. Bibliography Bryan M A 1959 The Bantu Languages of Africa. Oxford University Press, London Guthrie M 1948 The Classification of the Bantu Languages. Oxford University Press, London Guthrie M 1967-71 Comparative Bantu: An Introduction to the Comparative Linguistics and Prehistory of the Bantu Languages. Gregg Press, Farnborough Guthrie M 1970 Collected Papers on Bantu Linguistics. Gregg Press, Farnborough
Hayyuj, Judah (ca. 940-1010) E. Gutwirth
Known as Abu Zakharyah Yahya ibn Dawd or Judah ben David, Hayyuj established the principle of the trilateral roots of Hebrew verbs. Medieval writers considered him 'the first of the (Hebrew) grammarians.' He was probably born not later than 940 in Fez and died around 1010 after having spent most of his life in Cordoba. He wrote his grammatical works in Judeo-Arabic. His Kitab al tanqlt or Kitab al-nuqat was translated into Hebrew by Abraham ibn Ezra as Sepher haniqqud (The Book of Vocalization). His Kitab al-af'al dhawat hurufal-lin (The Book of the Quiescent Letters and the Prolonging) was translated into Hebrew by Moses ha-Kohen ibn Chiquitilla as Sepher' Otiot hanah we-ha-meshekh and by Abraham ibn Ezra as Sepher ha-nuah. It has also been paraphrased by Ishaq ha-Levi ben Eleazar in the Sephat Yeter. Fragments of an anonymous translation have also been found. The book deals with the problem of identifying the roots of verbs when these include 'weak' letters (for example, 'aleph, he, waw, yodh). His Kitab al-afal dhawat al-mithlayn was translated into Hebrew as Sepher po'ale ha-kephel and by Abraham ibn Ezra as Sepher ha-kephel (The Book of Geminate Verbs). His declared purpose is 'to help people... to understand .the language of the ancient Hebrews for people... think that when the second consonant is geminate the root has only two letters and the third one repeats the second one...' (Sepher Hayyuj: 99). He analyzes these verbs and lists them,
making reference to the biblical passages where they occur. The Hebrew translations by Abraham ibn Ezra were edited by L. Dukes in 1844. Moses ha-Kohen ibn Chiquitilla's translations and ibn Ezra's translation of the Sepher ha-niqqud were published in 1870 by J. W. Nutt with an English translation. Divided into three parts, the first one attempts to classify roots whose first letter is aleph or yodh; the second deals with roots whose second letter is waw or yodh, and the third with those roots whose final letter is he. Hayyuj explains that with the help of his book it will be possible to discern the root of the verbs in the Bible and understand the Word of God. He establishes the principle of triliteral roots. His Kitab al-natf seems to be identical with the so-called Sepher ha-qorhah (Book of Baldness), only known through fragments. In the Middle Ages his work was mainly known through the Sepher Hayyuj, which contained his two main treatises: Kitab al-af'al dhawat al-mithlayn and Kitab al-af'al dhawat hurufal-Hn. See also: Ibn Ezra, A; Hebrew Linguistic Tradition. Bibliography Hayyuj J 1870 (ed. and trans. Nutt J W) Two Treatises on Verbs containing Feeble and Double Letters. London Israelsohn I 1889 L'ouvrage perdu de Jehouda Hajjoudj. Revue des etudes juives 19: 306-10
431
Biographies
Heidegger, Martin (1899-1976) L. P. Hemming
Martin Heidegger was born in the small village of MeBkirch in Germany on September 26, 1899. He died at Freiburg in May 1976. Heidegger is arguably the most influential philosopher in the twentieth century, having a profound effect on the development of philosophy, theology, critical and literary theory, as well as fields far removed from his immediate concerns, like architecture and law. His public works began with the publication of Being and Time where he lays out a philosophical and phenomenological analysis of the being (Sein) of human existence or Dasein. Being and Time was the only work he wrote as a book that was published in his lifetime, although he also published several of his lecture courses, notably An Introduction to Metaphysics and Nietzsche by Martin Heidegger. Educated through the structures of the Catholic Church and Freiburg University, he undertook his doctorate in 1913 and his Habilitationsschrift on a text believed (erroneously) to be by Scotus in 1916. He married Elfride Petri in 1917, and in 1919 broke formal ties with the Catholic Church and transferred to the Freiburg Philosophy Faculty, to begin teaching as a Privatdozent at Freiburg. He was for some years a close collaborator with Husserl, working in Freiburg as his assistant, although their friendship later cooled. He went to Marburg in 1923, but returned to Freiburg in 1929 to the chair of philosophy. He remained in Freiburg all his life, retreating periodically to a hut at Todtnauberg to write. Notoriously he joined the Nazi Party in 1933, and was elected Rector of Freiburg at the same time, although he resigned as Rector in 1934. He never formally resigned from the Nazi Party and was banned from teaching between 1946 and 1951, although there is no evidence that he subscribed to the biologism or anti-semitism of National Socialism. He continued to write and teach almost to the end of his life, notably with the philosopher Eugen Fink and psychologist Medard Boss. Heidegger's innovative use and command of the German language has been compared to Luther's, and his use of word-play makes him very difficult to translate. Heidegger's work is rooted in a deep and sympathetic understanding of ancient Greek thought, and he is a masterful interpreter of Aristotle and Plato. His knowledge of the Western philosophical tradition is breathtaking, with, amongst others, transformative understandings of Descartes, Kant, Schelling, Hegel, and Nietzsche. In his later work he developed the understanding of the 'history of being' (Seinsgeschichte) which is an analysis of the whole 432
history of metaphysics from its origins in Parmenides and Heraclitus to its 'fulfilment' in Nietzsche and Hegel, a fulfilment which he suggested would continue to dominate thinking perhaps for centuries to come. He has had an astonishing effect on numerous thinkers, especially in France. His work is very far from being fully understood, although thinkers as diverse as Jacques Derrida, Michel Foucault, Jean Beaufret, Hanah Arendt, Hans-Georg Gadamer. Jacques Lacan, Luce Irigiray, Emmanuel Levinas, and John Macquarrie as well as many others have acknowledged their indebtedness to him. Although most of his written texts and lecture courses have now been published, his collected works are as yet incomplete, and less than half of them have been translated into English. The full effect of his philosophy is yet to come. See also: Gadamer, Hans-Georg; Derrida, Jacques; Kant, Immanuel; Foucault, Michel; Lacan, Jacques; Irigary, Luce.
Bibliography Gadamer H-G 1994 Heidegger's Ways. State University of New York Press, New York [Translation of 1983 Heideggers Wege: Studien zum Spatwerk. Mohr Siebeck. Tubingen] Guignon C 1993 The Cambridge Companion to Heidegger. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge Heidegger M 1976 Gesamtausgabe Vols. 1-121. Klostermann, Frankfurt. In press Heidegger M 1987 Nietzsche by Martin Heidegger (4 vols.). Harper Collins, London [Translation of 7967 Nietzsche. Neske, Pfullingen] Heidegger M 1993 (1977) Basic Writings. Routledge, London Heidegger M 1997 (1962) Being and Time. Blackwell, Oxford [Translation of 1997 (1927) Sein and Zeit. Niemeyer, Tubingen] Heidegger M 2000 Introduction to Metaphysics. Yale University Press, New Haven [Translation of 1987 (1953) Einfuhrung in die Metaphysik. Niemeyer, Tubingen] Neske G, Kettering E 1990 Martin Heidegger and National Socialism: Questions and Answers. Paragon House, New York [Translation of 1988 Martin Heidegger im Gesprdch. Neske, Pfullingen] Petzet H W 1993 Encounters and Dialogues with Martin Heidegger 1929-1976. Chicago University Press, Chicago [Edited translation of 1983 Auf einen Stern zugehen: Begegnungen und Gesprdch mil Martin Heidegger. 1929-1976. Frankfurter Societats, Frankfurt] Philipse H 1998 Heideggers Philosophy of Being: A Critical Interpretation. Princeton University Press, New Jersey
Holder, William (1616-98) Safranski R 1998 Martin Heidegger: Between Good and Evil. Harvard University Press, Cambridge, MA [Translation
of 7997 Ein Meister aus Deutschland: Heidegger und seine Zeit. Fischer, Frankfurt]
Herder, Johann Gottfried (1744-1803) P. B. Salmon
Herder, in his early adult years a leading figure in the German Storm and Stress movement of the 1770s, is known to linguists primarily for his essay on the origin of language (Abhandlung tiber den Ursprung der Sprache 1772). His early writings include studies in folk literature and the advocacy of simple language based on the vernacular. Common to these and to later works, such as the Ideen zur Philosophic der Geschichte der Menschheit (1784—91), is an interest in continuity and development, which is accompanied throughout his writings by another in origins. In the Fragmente (1766-68) a set of mainly literary essays, he suggests, much as Condillac had done, that language originated from a combination of gesture and natural reflex cries, which developed into irregular utterances, and thence into poetry. In social use language evolved further into oratory, before declining eventually into the dull regularity of 'philosophical' (i.e., scientific) language. His view of a language as a key to the national character of its speakers—also anticipated by Condillac—is often seen as a source of similar ideas expressed by Humboldt (see Humboldt, Wilhelm von). The treatise on the origin of language, unlike other writings of the time, asserts unequivocally that language is not God-given, but man-made. However, instead of Condillac's scheme of development it suggests a specifically human quality of 'reflection' (Besonnenheif), nature's compensation for man's weak instinctual endowments, which enables man to identify an object by selecting one of the set of features which characterize it. For example, a lamb is identified by its bleat; the observer bleats mentally on seeing it again; this event alone is sufficient to constitute language, even without a listener. What a listener hears is not a reflex sound, but Herder also denies it is merely imitative. Later passages speak of a
gestural component in language, and of the mutual reinforcement of reason and language. The recognition of an object by a distinguishing mark is also used as the initial stage of identification in the mental processes set up in the Metacritique to the Critique of Pure Reason (1799), an empiricist attack on Kant's Critique, paralleling the increasingly complex perceptions of identity, quality, and activity by the progressive introduction of nominals, adjectives, and verbs in grammar. While Herder is best known to linguists for his views on the origin of language, the Abhandlung is perhaps more important for its vigor than its views; his most influential contribution may lie rather in his sense of the organic growth and decay of language, in his consciousness of the distinctive national quality of languages, and in his propagating the use of simple unaffected German. See also: Myths About Language; Kant, I.; Romanticism.
Bibliography Clark R T 1955 Herder: His Life and Thought. University of California Press, Berkeley, CA Haym R 1958 [1st edn. 1877-85] Herder. Aufbau-Verlag, Berlin Heintel E (ed.) 1964 J G H Sprachphilosophische Schriften, 2nd edn. Meiner, Hamburg Herder J G 1877-1913 (ed. Suphan B) Samtliche Werke. Weidmann, Berlin Moran J H, Code A (transl.) 1966 On the Origin of Language: Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Essay on the Origin of Languages; Johann Gottfried Herder, Essay on the Origin of Language. Ungar, New York Stam J H 1976 Inquiries into the Origin of Language. The Fate of a Question. Harper and Row, New York
Holder, William (1616-98) J. A. Kemp
Holder was born in Nottinghamshire. Having studied at Pembroke Hall, Cambridge, he took his MA in
1640, and was elected a fellow of his college. He became rector of Bletchington, Oxfordshire in 1642, 433
Biographies and in subsequent years moved to other parishes in the south of England. He held the post of canon in Ely Cathedral and later in St Paul's Cathedral and became sub-dean of the Chapel Royal. His wife was the sister of Sir Christopher Wren. Holder graduated DD at Oxford, and was elected FRS in 1663. He died on January 24, 1698. William Holder was a pioneer in the investigation of speech, and in the teaching of the deaf. In 1659 he taught Alexander Popham, who had been deaf from birth, to speak. He published an article (An Experiment concerning Deafness) in 1668, and in 1669 his book Elements of Speech appeared. In it Holder sets out to explain what are the various elements which make up speech. What is particularly striking is his independent approach, clearly based on his personal experience of the problems of the deaf, and not on previous authorities. John Wallis had published his own Tractatus de Loquela (Treatise on Speech) in 1653, which contains many interesting observations, but there is no doubt that Holder surpasses him in his analysis. As Abercrombie (1986) points out, Holder adopts the 'hylomorphic' distinction between 'matter' and 'form.' In his application of it to speech, matter is divided into four kinds: firstly, it may be 'spirital' (i.e., breath) or 'vocal' (i.e., voice), and secondly it may be 'nasal' (involving modification by the nose) or 'oral' (not involving nasal modification). Form is imposed on this matter by the various articulations between movable and other organs, such as tongue, lips, palate, gums, jaw, and teeth, to give specific
speech sounds. The most interesting and novel aspect of this is Holder's logical deduction that, as any sound may have spirital (breathed) matter, a place must be allocated in analysis to breathed (i.e., voiceless) nasals and liquids, even though they may be rare or nonexistent in languages. Similarly, nasal matter is not confined to [m n n] but may be at any place of articulation, and may not necessarily involve an oral closure. His attempt to describe the mechanism of voicing comes nearer to a correct understanding than any of his contemporaries did, and also his account of the 'formal' aspect of speech. Apart from his quarrel with John Wallis over who should take the credit for teaching Alexander Popham to speak, Holder seems to have lived a life free from controversy. John Aubrey called him 'a perfect good man.' Apart from his contribution to speech he was a musician, and an accomplished writer of shorthand. The fact that his contribution to phonetics has not been widely recognized may be due to the fact that he provided little evidence about contemporary English pronunciation.
Bibliography Abercrombie D 1986 Hylomorphic taxonomy and William Holder. JIPA 16: 4-7 Holder W 1669 Elements of Speech; An Essay of Inquiry into the Natural Production of Letters. J. Martyn, London; facsimile reprint, Scolar Press, Menston, 1967 Subbiondo J L 1978 William Holder's 'Elements of Speech' (1669). Lingua 46: 169-84
Humboldt, Wilhelm von (1767-1835) J. A. Kemp
Wilhelm von Humboldt, elder brother of the famous scientist and explorer Alexander von Humboldt, was born on June 22, 1767 in Potsdam, Prussia, and died in Tegel (now in Berlin) on April 8, 1835. Distinguished as a statesman and diplomat, he is generally regarded as one of the profoundest thinkers on linguistic matters, though the difficulty of his style often makes his meaning hard to interpret. After private tuition at home Wilhelm attended Gottingen University (1788). Completing his legal studies, he traveled in Europe and pursued further studies in Greek language and civilization, which epitomized for him the versatile and harmonious way of life and remained a strong influence throughout his career. 434
His marriage into a wealthy family in 1791 meant that he was able to devote his time and energies to developing to the full the individuality and independence of mind which from an early age he had striven for. In Jena from 1794 he enjoyed a close and intellectually stimulating friendship with Schiller and Goethe. During a period in Paris he visited Spain, and contact with the Basque language was an early stimulus to the study of languages in general. In 1801 he reluctantly moved to Berlin and the next year to Rome, as Prussian ambassador to the Vatican from 1802 to 1808. State service claimed his full attention on his recall to Germany in 1808, and he was responsible for important educational reforms. It was not until 1819 that disagreements with other
Humboldt, Wilhelm von (1767-1835) members of the Prussian government led him to retire from public life and to devote himself to his study of languages. By temperament he was throughout his life reluctant to commit himself to writing, or to complete works he had begun, but he realized that his search for the nature of language, and its importance in the life of man, could only be based on a knowledge of a wide variety of languages. To his knowledge of Greek and Latin and other languages of Europe he added Sanskrit in 1821, which had a powerful influence on his view of language. In the same year he helped to secure the appointment of Franz Bopp, one of the great pioneers of comparative linguistics, to a professorship in Oriental and General Linguistics in Berlin. From grammars of the native languages of America, acquired by his brother, Wilhelm had extended his knowledge to the American continent; and Remusat's work on Chinese led him to publish in this area also. Searching for a link between languages from different parts of the world he studied the Polynesian languages and the languages of Malaya. The search culminated in his great work, published posthumously, On the Kawi Language on the Island of Java (Humboldt 1836-39), with its lengthy introduction entitled 'On the Diversity of Human Language-Structure and its Influence on the Mental Development of Mankind.' What perhaps caused Humboldt to select the Kawi language for such close examination was not only the geographical position of Java, but the mixed nature of the Kawi language, combining a Sanskrit vocabulary with a Malayan structure. Although he believed that vocabulary and grammatical structure are inseparable and interdependent parts of language (except for the linguistic analyst), he thought the differences between languages to be most evident in their grammatical structure. Greek and Sanskrit were for him the most perfect languages—at one extreme of a typological scale, exemplifying the supreme type of inflecting language. At the other extreme he placed Chinese, as an isolating language, lacking inflections or affixes. In between came the so-called 'agglutinating' languages, which he regarded as having an inferior variety of inflection, involving 'mechanical adding, not a truly organic accretion.' Similar classifications can be found earlier in Friedrich von Schlegel (see Schlegel, (Carl Wilhelm) Friedrich von) and his brother August Wilhelm von Schlegel (see Schlegel, August Wilhelm von). Humboldt, however, identified in the 'Mexican language' (Nahuatl) a new category of sentence form, called 'incorporating'. In this the main elements in the structure of the sentence are 'incorporated' into a single word. The superiority of languages such as Greek and Sanskrit for Humboldt lay in what he perceived as the organic nature of their grammatical structure, where inner modifications
and inflections are welded into the root, which contains the crucial concept; but at the same time the unity of the word is maintained. Languages of very different types, such as Chinese and Mexican, clearly could also express the thoughts of their speakers, but are constrained by their structure to do this less perfectly. The relationship of language with thought is crucial. Humboldt believed that all languages contain certain universal features, arising from the laws of thinking, shared by all men. But without language, he maintained, thinking is not possible, because only through expression in language is a concept given objectivity. Language, however, is not a fixed object or product (Humboldt uses the Greek word ergon) but involves constant creation, or activity (Greek energeid). This creativity of language is limited in particular languages by the structure or form they have developed. The creativity is constantly at work, but it can only act on what material is available to the speaker at a particular time. So particular languages acquire their individual character, which may be more or less imperfect, as a result of their being animated by 'a more or less fruitful principle of mental development.' Thus Humboldt ranks languages on a scale, at the top of which are those of the Sanskritic type (i.e., Indo-European). The form of Chinese is accepted as exhibiting perhaps more than any other language 'the power of pure thought,' but falls short in versatility and harmony. Humboldt proceeds to associate the particular national character of each language with a particular out-look of its speakers on the world—a thesis that was later to be developed by Sapir and Whorf (see Whorf, Benjamin Lee}. Among nineteenth-century writers, Pott acknowledges his debt to Humboldt, and Steinthal and Wundt were certainly influenced by him in developing the notion of 'national psychology' (Volkerpsychologie). However, Humboldt's influence on linguistics has been more apparent in the twentieth century than in the nineteenth, e.g., in so-called 'neoHumboldtian' trends (see Basilius 1952), and in controversial claims as to the similarities between Humboldt's well-known, but variously interpreted, idea of the 'inner form of language' (innere Sprachform) and the rules of generative grammar (see Coseriu 1970). For the influence on Humboldt of earlier linguistic philosophers see Manchester (1985). See also: Myths About Language; Romanticism. Bibliography Basilius H A 1952 Neo-Humboldtian ethnolinguistics. Word 8: 95-105 (repr. in Fishman J A (ed.) 1968 Readings in the Sociology of Language. Mouton, The Hague) Coseriu E 1970 Semantik, innere Sprachform und Tiefenstruktur. FoL 4: 53-63 435
Biographies Humboldt W von 1836-39 Ober die Kawi Sparache auf der Insel Java, nebst einer Einleitung fiber die Verschiedenheit des menschlichen Sprachbaues und ihren Einfluss auf die geistige Entwickelung des Menschengeschlechts. Konigliche Akademie der Wissenschaften, Berlin. (The introduction is translated by P Heath as On Language: the Diversity of Human Language Structure and its Influence on the Mental Development of Mankind, with an introduction by H Aarsleff. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1988)
Humboldt W von 1903-36 Gesammelte Schriften, 17 vols. Koniglich Akademie der Wissenschaften, Berlin Koerner E F K 1990 Wilhelm von Humboldt and North American ethnolinguistics: Boas (1894) to Hymes (1961). HL 17(1-2): 111-28 Manchester M L 1985 The Philosophical Foundations of Humboldt's Linguistic Doctrines. Benjamins. Amsterdam Sweet P R 1978-80 Wilhelm von Humboldt: A Biography, 2 vols. Ohio State University Press, Columbus, OH
Hus, Jan (c. 1372-1415) G. L. Jones
Jan Hus, Czech religious reformer, was born in Husinec, Bohemia, and educated at Prague's Charles University, graduating MA in 1396. After his ordination to the priesthood, he was appointed preacher of Bethlehem Chapel at Prague in 1402, a post which he combined with the deanship of the Philosophy Faculty at the university. Influenced by Wycliffe (see Wycliffe, /.), whose writings had become popular in Bohemia during the final decade of the fourteenth century, he protested at the public burning of the latter's books by the Archbishop of Prague in 1410. Having been excommunicated in 1411, he went into voluntary exile the following year, but in 1414 he was summoned to attend the Council of Constance to answer an indictment concerning the Wycliffite nature of his beliefs. Though guaranteed safe conduct, he was imprisoned and put on trial for heresy. His refusal to recant led to his condemnation, and he was burned at the stake on July 6, 1415. Hus' reforming tendencies first appeared when he became preacher at Bethlehem Chapel. Into what had been no more than a vernacular preaching station he introduced a daily sung mass with hymns, many of which he wrote himself, he preached biblically based sermons on a regular basis, and advocated frequent communion. He revised and improved existing texts of the Czech Bible, wrote several commentaries, and translated some of Wycliffe's work into Czech. (Incidentally, he introduced the use of diacritics or accents into written Czech.) But the reform for which he called was moral and practical, rather than theological. He denounced abuses within the Church, especially amongst the religious orders and the hierarchy. It was his passionate preaching against the immorality of the clergy and his challenge to the authority structure of the mediaeval Church which led to his excommunication; the charge of heresy came later. In spite of his motto 'Search the Scriptures,' he based his authority not on sola 436
scriptura but on Scripture, tradition and reason—in that order. The most important of his 15 books is De Ecclesia (1412) in which he critiques the ecclesiastical system, the papacy, and the definition of the Church. The fact that the first ten chapters of this work are taken almost verbatim from Wycliffe has fuelled the debate about his intellectual ancestry. Was he an original thinker and a product of the Czech reform tradition, or was he entirely dependent on Wycliffe? Though he was undoubtedly drawn to the sacramental and social reforms advocated by Jan Milic (d. 1374), the undisputed father of the Bohemian reformation, it seems certain that without Wycliffe's writings he would not have possessed the zeal necessary to demand reform. But he was drawn to Wycliffe as an individual rather than as a theologian. He demonstrated at Constance that he agreed with Wycliffe on matters of morals and ecclesiastical authority, but not theology. When asked by his accusers to comment on 45 of Wycliffe's propositions, which had already been condemned by the university in 1403 and by the Church in 1408, he agreed with only four of them. Hus has been regarded as a forerunner of the Radical Reformers of the sixteenth century. His followers, the Hussites, were also known as Calixtines or Utraquists because of their insistence that the laity should partake of the chalice (calix) at the Mass, or be permitted to take communion in both kinds (in utraque specie), though Huss himself never demanded this. Bibliography Fudge T A 1998 The Magnificent Ride: The First Reformation in Hussite Bohemia. Scolar Pres, Chico, CA Holeton D R 1987 Sacramental and liturgical Reform in late mediaeval Bohemia. Studio Liturgica 17: 87-95 Leff G 1986 Wyclif and Hus: A doctrinal comparison. In: Kenny A (ed.) Wyclif in his Times. Clarendon Press. Oxford, pp 105-126
Ibn Janah (ca. 990-1050) Spinka M 1968, 1983 Jan Hus: A Biography. Princeton University Press, Princeton, NJ
Zeman J K 1977 The Hussite Movement: A Bibliographical, Study Guide. Michigan University Press, Ann Arbor, MI
Ibn Ezra, Abraham (ca. 1089-1164) E. Gutwirth
Born in Toledo, Ibn Ezra spent his youth in the south, in Andalusia. In 1140 he left Spain bound for other European countries. From Italy (Rome and Lucca) he went to France in 1148, visiting Provence and later the north, where he met R. Tarn. In 1158 he went to London, and subsequently returned to Narbonne, France. Although not an original linguist, he was able to disseminate and popularize the grammatical work of the Hispano—Jewish grammarians through translations and treatises. In 1140 he wrote his first grammatical work, while in Rome—Sepher Moznayim (The Book of the Scales). It includes an introduction on the history of his linguistic predecessors, an explanation of 59 philological terms, and
a study of verbal conjugations. Some time later, but before 1145, he wrote the Critique of Saadya while in Lucca. His Sepher ha- Ye sod was lost. It contained a grammatical and an exegetical section. His Ye sod hadiqdwq or Sephat Yeter (The Principles of Grammar), deals with the main questions of Hebrew grammar, while his Sepher Sahot (The Book of Clarity) is his most mature work, and contains, apart from the questions of grammar proper, a section on the meter of Hebrew poetry. See also: Hebrew Linguistic Tradition. Bibliography Diaz F 1990 Abraham ibn Ezra and his Age. Madrid
Ibn Janah (ca. 990-1050) E. Gutwirth
Known as R. Yonah, his Arabic name was Abu-1Walld Marwan ibn Janah. He was the first to elaborate a complete and systematic grammar of the language of the Bible. He was probably born between 985 and 90. He left Cordoba for Saragossa around 1010-13. His Sepher Ha-riqma must have been written after R. Hai Gaon's death in 1039. He studied in Lucena where he heard such masters as R. Ishaq ha-Levi b. Mar Shaul or Abu Walid ben Hasday and he calls Ishaq ibn Chiquatilla his teacher. But most of his work was written in Saragossa. His first work, the Kitab al-mustalhaq was written in order to complement the work of Hayyuj. It was translated into Hebrew in the twelfth century by Ovadiah ha-Sefardi as Sepher ha-hassaga (The Book of Criticism). In it he adds some roots and verbal forms to those provided by Hayyuj. The Risalat altanbih is a response to a work written in Saragossa, 'The Complementary Book,' in which ibn Janah had been attacked. It was translated into Hebrew in the thirteenth century by Solomon b. Joseph ibn Ayub. The Risalat al-taqnb wa al-tashil 'The Book of Approach' was written for students so that they
should understand Hayyuj's principles as set forth in the introductions to his treatises but ibn Janah adds comments of his own. It consists of four parts. In the first part he treats the vowels. The rest of the book is devoted to verb roots whose second letter is weak and to verb roots with double letters. The Kitab al-taswfa (translated into Hebrew by Judah ibn Tibon in the thirteenth century as Sepher ha-tokhaha), 'The Book of Admonition' is another polemic work in which ibn Janah responds to criticisms of his work and attributes them to envy and ignorance. Kitab al-tashwir 'Book of Confusion' is divided into four parts. The first treats certain weak roots; the second the formation and meaning of conjugations such as niph'al, and hitpa'el; the third the imperative and passive verbs; and the fourth difficult forms. His main work is the Kitab al-tanqlh, known in Hebrew as Sepher ha-diqduq 'The Book of Grammar.' This influential work is divided into two parts: Kitab al-luma': Sepher ha-riqmah and Kitab al-usul: Sepher ha-shorashlm. Sepher ha-shorashlm 'The Book of Roots' is a synthesis of the knowledge in the field of Hebrew lexicography up to its period. He 437
Biographies attempted to collect almost all the Hebrew roots preserved in the Bible. His introduction explains the criteria of his arrangement of the roots and surpasses Sa'adya and Menahem's Mahberet in its usefulness, because he not only gives the root but attempts to present the various forms. He cites the Targum, Mishnah, and Talmud, Geonic literature [especially Sa'adya] and compares Hebrew and Arabic. The Sepher ha-riqma 'Book of the Flourishing Gardens,' is the grammatical part of the 'Book of Grammar.' The motivation for writing it is that God created man and taught him how to speak so that he should be able to recognize Him. Hebrew is the superior language. The knowledge of language is a prerequisite for all knowledge. The study of language includes syntax, morphology but also rhetoric and hermeneutics. He advocates comparative study (i.e., with Arabic). The book consists of 46 chapters in which he deals with parts of the sentence, the Hebrew letters
arranged according to the points of articulation, the composition of the roots, the form of nouns, the conjugation of verbs, and the interchanging consonants and vowels. See also: Sa'adya Gaon; Hebrew Linguistic Tradition.
Bibliography Bacher W (ed.) 1896 Sepher Haschoraschim: Wurzelworterbuch der hebrdischen Sprache von Abulwalid Merwan ibn Ganah (R. Jona). Aus dem Arabischen ins Hebrdische iibersetzt von Jehuda ibn Tibbon. Berlin Derenbourg J, Derenbourg H 1880 Opuscules el traites d'Abou ''l-Wal'id Merwan ibn Djanah (Rabbi Jonah) de Cordoba. Imprimerie nationale. Paris Tene D, Ben-Hayim Z 1964 Sefer ha-riqmah le-R. Jonah ibn Janah be-tirgumo ha-'ivri shel R. Judah ibn Tibbon. Jerusalem
Ibn Mada' al-Qurtubl (1120-96) M. Y. I. H. Suleiman
Ibn Mada' al-Qurtubl, Ahmad Ibn 'Abd al-Rahman Ibn Muhammad, is best known in the Arabic grammatical tradition for his incisive critique of what he regarded as the speculative elements in the Arabic grammarians' approach as represented by the notions 'ami! (regent), qiyas (analogy), and ''ilia (cause, reason). In offering this critique Ibn Mada' relies principally on Zahirite theology which advocates a surface-oriented and literalist interpretation of the text of the Qur'an as a framework for protecting it against falsification, especially in view of its status as the prime legal document in Islamic juridical thinking. In addition to his reliance on jurisprudence as a theoretical frame of reference, Ibn Mada' utilizes his experience as a language teacher to undermine the pedagogic value of what he regards as metaphysical elements in Arabic grammar. It is this dimension of his work which explains his pre-eminent position as an inspirational figure in the various attempts to simplify pedagogic grammar in the twentieth century, particularly the two proposals by Mustafa Ibrahim in Ihya1 al-Nahw (1937), and Shawql Dayf in Tajdld al-Nahw (1982) and Tayslr alNahw al-Ta'llml Qadlman wa Hadlthan ma'a Nahji Tajdldihi) (1986). In his slim but now famous Kitabu al-Raddi "ala alNuhat (Book in Refutation of the Grammarians) Ibn Mada' rejects the two types of regent lafzi (expressed) and malnaw~i (abstract) as well as the notion of hadhf (deletion), idmar (suppression), and taqdlr (supple438
tive insertion)—which are closely related to the notion of regency—on the grounds that they presuppose a speculatively oriented approach to the study of language, instead of an empirically based one. In the latter approach, emphasis is placed on what might be called the surface structures of attested data as opposed to reconstructed data which form a necessary component of the former approach. Ibn Mada' also criticizes what he regards as the overzealous commitment to the use of analogy in Arabic grammatical thinking, directing his most scathing remarks at the predominant application of this notion to generate what he calls 'hypothetical utterances' which cannot be matched with any legitimate data in the speech of the Arabs. The tendency to apply analogy in this fashion is said to be especially characteristic of pedagogic grammars in, particularly, the formation of the morphophonological bases of surface data at the word level. In a similar manner, Ibn Mada' criticizes the practice of ta'lll (explanation) in Arabic grammar because it is not always consistent with his view of this discipline as an empirical enterprise. In outlining his position, Ibn Mada' divides the "ilia into three types: ula (primary), thaniya (secondary), and thalitha (tertiary). He accepts the validity of the primary "ilia on the grounds that it amounts to what may be called 'grammatical rule,' in the sense that it captures what is essentially a significant generalization or irregular feature of the language. In addition to its primary
Irigaray, Luce (1930s- ) descriptive function, a primary 'ilia may be used prescriptively in pedagogic grammars, thus corresponding in this regard to 'ilia taTimiyya (pedagogic 'ilia) in Zajjaji. Ibn Mada' divides the secondary 'ilia into three subcategories: maqtu'un bihi (absolutely certain), fihi iqna'un (generally convincing), and maqtu'un bifasadihi (absolutely corrupt). The difference between these subcategories of 'ilia can be explained by saying that the first refers to an empirically testable explanation, the second to a 'plausible explanation,' and the third to a 'metaphysical' explanation. Ibn Mada' rejects the application of the first subcategory of secondary 'ilia in grammar on two grounds: (a) it answers a 'why' question which is not the concern of Arabic grammar as a purely descriptive discipline whose main function is to deal with the 'how' dimension of linguistic data; and (b) it does not serve any relevant purpose in
pedagogic grammar. This position on the part of Ibn Mada' shows that he adopts a narrow interpretation of empiricism in grammatical theory and, furthermore, that he does not totally separate descriptive from pedagogic grammar. Ibn Mada' rejects the second subcategory of the secondary 'ilia on the basis of the fact that: (a) it does not answer the definition of empiricism he advocates; (b) it is not characterized by certainty (yaqiri); and (c) it is not directly relevant to pedagogic grammar. He also rejects the third subcategory of the secondary 'ilia mainly because it is totally speculative in nature. It is, however, not clear how the latter subcategory differs from the tertiary 'ilia which is left more or less undefined by Ibn Mada', particularly in view of the fact that both seem to be rejected on the same grounds. See also: Arabic Linguistic Tradition.
Irigaray, Luce (1930s- ) T. Beattie
Luce Irigaray was born in Belgium and has lived in France since the early 1960s. A practising psychoanalyst, she holds doctorates in linguistics and philosophy, and is Director of Research in Philosophy at the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique in Paris. Her second doctoral thesis, published in 1974 as Speculum de I'autre femme, resulted in her dismissal from the Ecole Freudienne de Paris directed by Jacques Lacan (see Lacan, Jacques), and from her teaching post at the University of Vincennes. In the 1980s she was active with women's political groups in Italy. She has had a mixed reception among English-speaking feminists, some of whom criticize her for essentialism or elitism. Irigaray offers a sexually transgressive psycholinguistic philosophy based on Freudian and Lacanian psychoanalysis and Derridean deconstruction. She credits Sigmund Freud with exposing the psychological dynamics by which patriarchy is perpetuated, but criticizes him for not recognizing the historical and political determinants of his theory. Although Jacques Derrida's (see Derrida, Jacques) influence is mainly implicit, his desconstructive strategies inform her feminized interventions in the texts of the philosophical canon. Irigaray argues that since Plato the western tradition has been dominated by a universalized form of masculine subjectivity in which sexual
difference is elided, and the primal relationship to the maternal body and nature is repressed in favour of an androcentric and disembodied culture. This hom(m)osexual economy is transmitted through language, and the creation of a culture of sexual difference therefore requires the restructuring of language. The phallogocentrism of a linear logic with a singular masculine subject modelled upon a father God, is relativized through the Feuerbachian projection of a feminine divine, the reclamation of maternal genealogies, and the morphology of a pluralized subjectivity symbolised by the two lips of the female sexual/speaking body. Irigaray seeks to speak as (a) woman, parler-femme, through the parodic mimesis of the language of the unconscious, associated with repressed desire for the mother but also with femininity, hysteria, death and, in Lacan, female mysticism. Irigaray's concept of a feminine divine is balanced by her use of the term sensible transcendental to describe a non-linguistic sense of divinity constituting a space of symbolic sexual exchange. Her feminization of religious language appeals to values of fecundity and desire rather than of sacrifice and repression associated with Freud's and Rene Girard's accounts of religion. She proposes alternative religious paradigms through the reclamation of the mother daughter figures of Greek mythology, and the
439
Biographies subversive reinterpretation of Christian incarnational symbolism. Irigaray's poetic linguistic experiments use psychoanalytic methods of transference and counter-transference to draw the reader into a polysemous exchange. Interpreters sometimes read her too literally, because they fail to recognize her techniques of parody and mimesis. See also: Christian Views on Language; Postmodernism; Feminism.
Bibliography Irigaray L 1985 Speculum of the Other Woman. Cornell University Press, Ithaca, NY Irigaray L 1985 This Sex Which Is Not One. Cornell University Press, Ithaca, NY Irigaray L 1993 An Ethics of Sexual Difference. The Athlone Press, London Whitford M 1991 Luce Irigaray—Philosophy in the Feminine. Routledge, London and New York Whitford M (ed.) 1994 The Irigaray Reader. Blackwell Publishers, Oxford and Cambridge, MA
Jerome (c. 346-420) G. L. Jones
St Jerome, linguist and exegete, was one of the greatest minds of the Early Church. Born to Christian parents at Stridon in Dalmatia, he was educated in Rome where he studied under the famous Latin grammarian Aelius Donatus. In 374, after spending some time in Trier and Aquileia, he renounced city life and joined the hermits in the Chalcis desert east of Antioch. In 382 he returned to Rome where he became secretary to Pope Damasus and acted as a spiritual guide to several prominent women. From 386 until his death he lived in Bethlehem as the leader of a monastic community. Jerome's voluminous correspondence testifies to his role as a fierce opponent of Arianism and Pelagianism, and as a spiritual director renowned for his extreme asceticism. But he is best known as a translator of the Bible and a biblical commentator. In both of these enterprises he was able to make full use of his linguistic expertise, references to which are scattered throughout his writings. Having perfected his Latin style and learned Greek during his student days in Rome, he began studying Hebrew when he was in the Syrian desert. Though he complains of initial difficulties, he persisted, and with the help of a converted Jew became a competent Hebraist. In contrast to the negative assessment of some critics, his proficiency in Hebrew must be stressed. The description of him as a vir trilinguis is entirely justified. During his period of seclusion he also made some headway in Aramaic (which he calls Chaldaic) and claims to have become a fluent speaker of Syriac. There is also some evidence that he had a basic knowledge of Arabic. These linguistic attainments made Jerome the exception to the rule in the Early Church and equipped him for the task of translating and expounding the scriptures. Though encouraged by Damasus to assess critically early Latin versions of the gospels, most of Jerome's biblical work was done during the period he 440
spent in Bethlehem. He insisted that a translation of the Old Testament had to be based on the Hebrew original, which he calls the hebraica veritas, not on the LXX (see Septuagint). His study of the Hebrew Bible persuaded him that only those books found within it should be regarded as canonical by Christians, thereby excluding what later came to be called The Apocrypha (see Apocrypha, Christian). During the period he was involved with the translation (390-404) he was in close contact with Palestinian Jews and sought their assistance in procuring manuscripts and in pursuing further studies in Hebrew. His knowledge of Semitic languages was incorporated into the Vulgate, with the result that it is far closer to the original than was once supposed. His biblical commentaries also contain much exegetical material derived from his Jewish teachers. But in spite of the example which he set, Jerome's immediate successors in the Church's scholarly circles were not such enthusiastic Semiticists with the result that the study of Hebrew and cognate languages by Christians lapsed for centuries during the Dark Ages. See also: Vulgate; Bible Translations, Ancient Versions; Church Latin; Apocrypha, Christian. Bibliography Barr J 1966 St Jerome's Appreciation of Hebrew. BJRL 49: 281-302 Kelly J N D 1975 Jerome: His Life, Writings and Controversies. Duckworth, London Rice E F 1985 St Jerome in the Renaissance. Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore Sparks H F D 1970 Jerome as a Biblical Scholar. In: Ackroyd P R and Evans C F (eds.) The Cambridge History of the Bible. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, I: 510-540 Sutcliffe E F 1969 Jerome. In: Lampe G W H (ed.) The Cambridge History of the Bible. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, II: 80-102
Kant, Immanuel (1724-1804)
Kant, Immanuel (1724-1804) R. C. S. Walker
Immanuel Kant was born on April 22, 1724 in Konigsberg, East Prussia (now Kaliningrad, Russia), where he spent his whole life, becoming Professor of Logic and Metaphysics in 1770 and eventually Rector of the University. In his lifetime he achieved a revolution in German philosophical thought, opening the way to the idealism of Fichte, Schelling, and Hegel. Elsewhere his influence was felt more slowly (though Coleridge was an early admirer), but its effect was again profound. He died on February 12, 1804. 1. Transcendental Idealism
The Critique of Pure Reason (1781) is concerned with how knowledge is possible. The rationalist tradition (then dominant in Germany) held that humans possess certain concepts innately, and can recognize as self-evident certain truths from which can be deduced substantial knowledge about the world. The empiricists, in contrast, held that concepts and knowledge of the world could only be derived from experience, though Hume—the most consistent of them—argued that the only way of deriving from experience the concepts of cause and physical object showed them to be inherently confused. Kant believes they are not confused, and not derived from experience. He also holds that humans have substantial knowledge which could not have been derived from experience: in his terminology, synthetic a priori knowledge. It includes mathematical truths, and truths like 'Every event has a cause.' We can know these truths, Kant thinks, only because we ourselves make them true: i.e., read them into the world. Mathematics he takes to be about space and time, which however are not real independently of us, but forms which our mind imposes upon data it receives. Similarly concepts like those of cause and object are so read by us as to guarantee they will apply within the world as we experience it, and in such a way that principles like 'Every event has a cause' will be true within that world. The world of 'appearances' or 'phenomena' is thus partly the product of our mind's activity. Yet truth in that world (the familiar world of space, time, and causality) is not just a matter of what we happen to believe. The concepts and principles which we ourselves supply provide standards for distinguishing true from false beliefs, and allow us to assign to physical objects a reality distinct from our perceptions of them. Because he treats objects in this way, and not (like Berkeley) as sets of perceptions, Kant calls himself an empirical realist; he calls himself also
a transcendental idealist, because the phenomenal world as a whole is partly the product of our minds. Kant does not simply postulate that our minds supply these elements to the world. He argues that they must, for experience would be impossible otherwise. Perhaps other beings could impose forms different from space and time, but some such forms are required for any experience of sensible particulars. Twelve fundamental concepts or 'categories' he argues to be indispensable, including that of cause, and he claims that principles like 'Every event has a cause' must hold for spatio-temporal experience to be possible. Arguments of this kind, that something must be so if experience is to be possible, are often called transcendental arguments. The phenomenal world is only partly the product of our minds. Minds work on data supplied by things as they are in themselves (or 'noumena'). Things in themselves are wholly independent of us, and about them we can know nothing. We can know nothing about them empirically, since we do not experience them, nor a priori, for a priori knowledge is possible only in virtue of what we read into what is known. The failure to realize these limits to knowledge leads, Kant holds, to the errors of metaphysicians, and to natural mistakes in our thinking about the self, the world as a totality, and God—though the tendencies that lead to these natural mistakes have great heuristic value. 2. Judgment and Truth
Kant regards language as the expression of thought, though he also describes thinking as inner speech. Thought consists in making judgements, and he claims that logic, by revealing that there are twelve fundamental types of judgment, shows there are twelve ways in which the mind can act. It is because concepts also involve mental activity that he thinks there must correspondingly be twelve fundamental concepts, the categories. Judgments may be either analytic or synthetic. Analytic judgments are those whose truth can be determined 'in accordance with the Principle of Contradiction,' or by means of logical laws and conceptual analysis: such as 'All unmarried men are unmarried,' or, equivalently, 'All bachelors are unmarried.' All other judgments are synthetic. Kant considers mathematical, as well as metaphysical, judgments to be synthetic, though also a priori. Truth is correspondence: 'the agreement of knowledge with its object.' Judgments about things in themselves may be true, but there is no way for us to know they are. Judgments about the phenomenal 441
Biographies world, however, can be shown to 'agree with their objects' by establishing their coherence with what is given to us empirically in sensation, in accordance with those forms and principles which our minds supply. 3. Aesthetics and Moral Philosophy The appreciation of beauty is a matter of feeling, not reason, but in The Critique of Judgment (1790) Kant argues that it can be expected of everyone nonetheless. It arises whenever something appears welladapted to our cognitive faculties, without our being able fully to capture why. The moral law, in contrast, is purely rational. In Groundwork of the Metaphysic of Morals (1785) and Critique of Practical Reason (1788), he argues it is an imperative which is 'categorical' in that it must be obeyed for its own sake, not for the sake of any further end to be achieved by it (like the promotion of happiness). Only actions performed out of respect for the moral law have genuine moral worth; actions which accord with the law, but are done for some other motive (e.g., because one feels generous), do not. Being purely rational, the categorical imperative must bind all rational beings universally. It can be formulated, 'Act only on those principles of action which you can rationally will as universal law.' 4. Kant Today Kant's influence is pervasive, but one or two points may be specially noticed. In moral philosophy his
conception of the law as a rational motive has often been dismissed, but in the twentieth century there were interesting attempts to give a greater place to rational motivation along roughly Kantian lines. Transcendental idealism also has its supporters, but since Kant's own day people have often been unconvinced by his retention of things in themselves. Many, also, have been unconvinced by the idealistic aspect—the conception of the phenomenal world as in part a product of our minds. The most trenchant of these has been Strawson, who nevertheless finds the key to metaphysics in Kantian transcendental arguments.
Bibliography Allison H E 1983 Kant's Transcendental Idealism. Yale University Press, New Haven, CT Kant I 1929 (trans. Kemp Smith N) The Critique of Pure Reason. Macmillan, London Kant I 1984 Groundwork of the metaphysic of morals. In: Paton H J (ed. and trans.) The Moral Law. Hutchinson. London Kemp J 1968 The Philosophy of Kant. Oxford University Press, London Korner S 1955 Kant. Penguin, Harmondsworth Langton R 1998 Kantian Humility. Clarendon Press, Oxford Scruton R 1982 Kant. Oxford University Press, Oxford Strawson P F 1966 The Bounds of Sense. Methuen, London Sullivan R J 1994 An Introduction to Kant's Ethics. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge
Kilwardby, Robert (ca. 1215-79) F. P. Dinneen
Robert Kilwardby was a philosopher, theologian, logician, and Archbishop of Canterbury. He died in 1279. Other dates in his career are less certain. He was probably born in England about 1215 and won his Master of Arts in Paris in 1237. His next 8 years of lecturing there on grammar and logic assured his scholarly repute. His commentaries on Priscian and Donatus may have been written during this period. Discussions in both of these works are more philosophic than grammatical. Kilwardby's De ortu et divisione scientiarum ('On the origin and division of sciences') was a commentary on Avicenna written as a preface to his exposition of Petrus Hispanus' Summulae Logicales. It was an extensive partition and evaluation of secular branches of knowledge (mechanics appears as 'active philosophy') and theology and was considered the most important introduction to
442
scholastic philosophy. While contemporary De modis significandi (on modes of signifying) tracts mixed logical, grammatical, or philosophic sophistries (see Linguistic Theory in the Later Middle Ages), Kilwardby distinguished the grammatical from logical ones. He returned to England around 1245 and entered the Dominican Order in Oxford. After 8 years of study, he lectured there on theology and scripture until elected Provincial of the English Dominicans in 1261. It was he who divided Augustine's work into chapters, prefixing short analyses to them. He was made Archbishop of Canterbury in 1273, and in 1277 condemned 30 theses of Averroes taught in Oxford which were considered erroneous in logic, natural philosophy, and grammar. One held that / runs, you runs, and (/) run (ego currit, tu currit and curro) are equally perfect and congruous.
Kimhi, David (1160-1235?) Renowned among his contemporaries for the development of syllogistics, his works are models of logical form. Notable publications include his De Tempore, De Universal!, De Relatione. Two manuscripts of his commentary on Priscian's De Constructione are preserved in Oxford and an edition of his commentary on Donatus' Ars Minor was published in 1984. In that work he says that a logician defines parts of speech in terms of what they mean (formally), while a grammarian defines them in terms of what they are composed of (materially). In 1278 he was made a cardinal-bishop of Porto in Italy and required to reside in Rome. He resigned his
English see, taking all its registers and judicial papers with him. Canterbury's oldest records begin with those of his successor, Peckham. He died and was buried in Viterbo in 1279. See also: Philology and History.
Bibliography Schmucker L (ed.) 1984 Robertus Kilwardby O P In Donati Artem Maiorem. Weger, Brixen, South Tirol Weisheipl J A 1967 Robert Kilwardby. In: New Catholic Encyclopedia, vol. xn, p. 533. New York
Kimhi, David (1160-1235?) J. Weinberg
David Kimhi (popularly known by his Radak) was probably the most widely read of the Jewish medieval grammarians. His work superseded all previous writings on Hebrew grammar. Born in Narbonne, France, in 1160 into a family of grammarians (both his father Joseph and brother Moses wrote grammatical treatises), Kimhi regarded the study of Hebrew grammar as a prerequisite for correct use of the language in writing, both prose and verse, as well as an indispensable tool for the interpretation of the plain meaning (peshaf) of Scripture. Apart from his Bible commentaries in which he raises many points of grammar, Kimhi wrote one major grammatical work, the Mikhlol (Summa), one section of which contained an exposition of Hebrew grammar, the other a lexicon of the Hebrew Bible. The second section was later taken as a separate work and published first in Rome (1469-72) under the title Sepher HaShorashim (Book of Roots), while the title Mikhlol was exclusively used for the section on grammar (first printed in Constantinople 1532-34). The aim of the Mikhlol was to provide a concise and systematic review of earlier grammatical works, most of which had been written in Arabic, and to synthesize divergent sources. Although Kimhi does not lay claim to originality—'I come like the gleaner after the reaper'—and makes constant reference to Hayyuj, ibn Janah and his father, he does advance some original ideas particularly in the presentation of the material. Thus, for example, while he uses his predecessors' division of Hebrew into nouns, verbs, and particles, he devotes the major part of his work to the verb and begins his discussion with it. He appears to have been the first to have distinguished
the 'waw-consecutive' from the waw-copulative. While later Hebrew grammarians were critical of the Mikhlol, it became the standard Hebrew grammar for many centuries. It was extensively used by Christian Hebraists such as Johannes Reuchlin and Sebastian Miinster and was translated into Latin. An anonymous grammatical work Petah Debharai (The Beginning of My Words), the bulk of which was devoted to the verb, was attributed to Qimhi, but this attribution was rejected by Bacher, although accepted by Hirschfeld. The Sepher Ha-Shorashim was based on the lexicon of ibn Janah of the same name, but was more comprehensive. He illustrates the entries with quotations from the Hebrew Bible, explanations of grammatical forms, references to post biblical Hebrew and to Aramaic and Arabic and gives translations into Provencal. The lexicon was also used by Christian Hebraists and translated into Latin with additions by Sebastian Miinster in Basel in 1535. See also: Hebrew Hayyuj, J.
Grammarians;
Ibn
Janah;
Bibliography Bacher W 1974 Die hebrdische Sprachwissenschaft vom 10. bis zum 16. Jahrhundert. Benjamins, Amsterdam Kimhi D 1847 Sepher-Ha-Shorasfam, Radicum liber sive hebraeum bibliorum lexicon. Bethge, Berlin Kimhi D 1952 David Kimhi''s Hebrew Grammar (Mikhlol). Bloch, New York Talmage F 1975 David Kimhi: The Man and the Commentaries. Harvard University Press, Cambridge, MA Tauber J 1867 Standpunkt und Leistung des R. David Kimchi als Grammatiker. Selbstverlag des Verfassers, Breslau
443
Biographies
Kittel, Gerhard (1888-1948) G. L. Jones
Gerhard Kittel, German biblical scholar, studied at Leipzig, Tubingen, and Berlin. After gaining his doctorate at Kiel in 1913, he taught at various German universities including Tubingen where he was made professor in 1926. He moved to Vienna in 1939, but returned to Tubingen in 1943. An expert in ancient Judaism and its relationship to Christianity, he enjoyed an international reputation as one of the most distinguished and influential NT scholars of the 1930s. His elucidation of the connection between Christianity and Judaism, and his insistence that Rabbinic Judaism was the proper context for understanding the origin and development of NT Christianity, constitutes, his main contribution to scholarship. On this issue he disagreed fundamentally with W. Bousset who played down the importance of Judaism. Though his early work earned him Jewish admirers, Kittel was no philosemite. Influenced by Nazi propaganda, he maintained that the revolution of 1933 was God's gift to Germany and immediately became an active member of the National Socialist party. In 1945 he was imprisoned for 17 months because of his political sympathies and did not teach again. His antisemitic leanings appear in the several contributions he made to Forschungen zur Jtidenfrage, a journal founded by Walter Frank, president of the National Institute for the History of the New Germany. He became an even more active critic of the Jews in his book Die Judenfrage (1993) in which he accepted that 'the Jewish question', created by dispersion and emancipation, posed a problem for
Germany. For him the authentic symbol of the Jew was that of the homeless wanderer whose status reflected God's judgement on a disobedient people. Undoubtedly Kittel's best-known work is his monumental Theological Dictionary of the New Testament which he edited from 1932 until his death. The work concentrates on those words in the NT which have any theological significance and discusses the close connection between philology and Christian theology. Despite the adverse criticism of scholars such as James Barr, who believes that it contains 'great and sweeping linguistic misconceptions,' and despite the accusation that the editor's negative attitude towards Judaism is reflected in the views of his some of his collaborators, this continues to be an indispensible reference work for those engaged in biblical studies. See also: Barr, J.; Bible.
Bibliography Barr J 1961 The Semantics of Biblical Language. SCM. London, pp. 206-272 Ericksen R P 1985 Theologians under Hitler. Yale, London, pp. 28-78 Ericksen R P 1989 Christians and the Holocaust: the Wartime Writings of Gerhard Kittel. In: Bauer Y et al. (eds.) Remembering for the Future. Pergamon, Oxford. Vol. 3, pp. 2400-14 Johnson M D 1986 Power Politics and NT Scholarship in the National Socialist Period. Journal of Ecumenical Studies 23: 1-24
Koelle, Sigismund Wilhelm (1823-1902) M. Schladt
Koelle, a German missionary and linguist, is considered to be one of the pioneers of the classification and description of African languages. He was born on July 14, 1823 in Cleebronn (Wurttemberg). After attending the Basel Missionary Seminary, he was transferred to the CMS (Church Missionary Society) college at Islington, London. In 1847, he was ordained a priest; after a course in Arabic he was sent to Sierra Leone, where since 1807 the British fleet had brought captured slaveships back 444
to the naval base at Freetown. By 1850, some 70,000 released slaves had settled there. In view of this, the CMS chose Freetown as one of their first mission fields in Africa. When Koelle arrived in Freetown there already existed a tradition of research into African languages. Their study had two aims: first, to bring Christianity to the Africans; second, to show the essential humanity of African tongues: 'It has often been observed that the Negro race is not a genuine branch of the human family... The genuine
Krapf, Johann Ludwig (1810-81) humanity of the Negroes can be proved in a variety of ways: and one of them is the philological' (Koelle 1854b). Koelle taught English, Greek, theology, pastoral training, mathematics, and Hebrew at the Fourah Bay Institute of the CMS in Freetown. Besides his teaching duties, he undertook a unique linguistic documentation. In 1849, he reported on the indigenous writing system of the Vai. After his return to England in February 1853 he published grammars of Vai and Kanuri and his major work, the Polyglotta Africana, which in the 1990s is still regarded as the basic pioneer work of African linguistics. On the basis of 296 terms, Koelle compared 200 vocabularies, which, according to late twentieth-century classification, correspond to about 120 African languages. The carefully selected terms included both basic (e.g., body parts, numerals) and cultural words. The publication showed Koelle's considerable grammatical understanding of African languages. Although he did not mark tones and did not differentiate between voiced and voiceless sounds, his orthography was consistent and based on a standard model. There, in his 'Introductory Remarks,' Koelle attempted a mainly geographical classification of the languages. Many of the terms he proposed such as Westatlantic, Mande, Kru— were still in use in the 1990s. In the following years Koelle became an internationally recognized linguist. He contributed to the
writing down of languages such as the production of a standard 'universal' orthography and the marking of tone in Chinese. In 1856, the French Academy of Sciences awarded him the first prize of the Volney fund for philological research. He completely turned away from the field of African languages when he was sent by the CMS to the Eastern Mediterranean where his major works—including a translation of the Book of Common Prayer (1883)—were in Turkish. Most of these manuscripts have never been published. Koelle returned to England in 1883, and died on February 18, 1902 in London. See also: Christianity in Africa; Missionaries.
Bibliography Hair P E H 1963 Koelle at Freetown, an historical introduction. In: Koelle S W Polyglotta Africana. Akademische Druck-und Verlagsanstalt, Graz Koelle S W 1854a Outlines of a Grammar of the Vei Language, together with a Vei-English Vocabulary. Church Missionary House, London. Koelle S W 1854b Grammar of the Bornu or Kanuri Language. Church Missionary House, London Koelle S W 1854c Polyglotta Africana. Church Missionary House, London-Salisbury Westermann D 1953/54 Sigismund Wilhelm Koelle: Ein Pionier der afrikanischen Sprachforschung. Afrika und Ubersee 37: 49-51
Krapf, Johann Ludwig (1810-81) E. D. Elderkin
Krapf was one of the pioneer missionary linguists whose work provided basic data on which Western scholars could base their discussions of the structure and classification of African languages. He was born in Wurttemburg in 1810. He received missionary training at Basel before becoming associated with the Church Missionary Society, under whose auspices he travelled to Eastern Africa in 1837. He considered that the key to the conversion of that part of Africa lay in the widespread Qroma (Eastern Cushitic) linguistic group (then referred to as Galla), and he believed that evangelization should be conducted directly in the language of the people, rather than working through interpreters. After travelling in Ethiopia, where the majority of the Oromo lived, it was realized that work there would be impracticable and he turned his attention to the
East African coast, in what became Kenya, where the most southerly speakers of Oromo were located. Once there he applied himself to the study of the indigenous Bantu languages. He attempted Bible translations into both Oromo and the East African Bantu languages. Linguistically, his best remembered works are the six-language Vocabulary and his Swahili dictionary, which was compiled both during his stay in East Africa and with the assistance of missionaries in the field, especially Johann Rebmann, after his return to Europe in 1855. Between 1855 and his death in 1881, he made only two brief visits to East Africa. His Swahili dictionary, based on the Mombasa dialect, despite its transcription which predates the establishment of a phonemic script (and which Edward Steere working in Zanzibar had called 445
Biographies 'confused and inexact') is still valuable for its encyclopaedic entries and for its recordings of words and meanings which escaped later lexicographers working chiefly with Zanzibar Swahili. It was in manuscript form at the time of his death and published posthumously. See also: Christianity in Africa; Missionaries.
Bibliography Krapf J L 1850 Vocabulary of Six East African Languages: Kisudheli, Kinika, Kikdmba, Kipokomo, Kihidu, Kigdlla. Tubingen Krapf J L 1860 Travels, Researches, and MissionaryLabours. Trubner, London Krapf J L 1882 Dictionary of the Suahili Language. Trubner, London
Kristeva, Julia (1941- ) T. Beattie
Julia Kristeva moved to Paris from her native Bulgaria in 1966, becoming a critical voice in the structuralist and poststructuralist movement associated with the influential Tel Quel group through whom she met her husband, Philippe Sellers. Her doctorate in French literature was published in 1974 as La Revolution du Langage poetique. Kristeva is Professor of Linguistics at the University of Paris VII and a visiting professor at Columbia University in New York. She has published several novels. Personal events in the 1970s, including the birth of her son and the completion of her psychoanalytic training, led to the depoliticization of her work and a greater emphasis on the individual in psychoanalysis, philosophy and literary and cultural theory. Drawing on Freudian psychoanalysis and Saussurean (see Saussure, Perdinand-(Morigin) de) linguistics, Kristeva developed the science of semanalysis. Meaning is a signifying process in which the symbolic, associated with grammar, structure and subjectivity, develops in creative or disruptive tension with the semiotic, comprising the rhythms, inflections and poetics of speech through which the biological drives are discharged and the body is incorporated into language. The semiotic is sometimes expressed as the chora, which in Plato's Timaeus suggests a fluctuating primal receptacle with maternal connotations. Following Melanie Klein, Kristeva argues that the process of self-differentiation from the maternal body precedes the Oedipus complex and the Lacanian (see Lacan, Jacques) mirror stage, so that language originates in the bodily relationship to the mother. She questions the psychoanalytic reduction of the father's role to that of a threatening oedipal figure who enforces separation from the mother, and proposes an imaginary, pre-oedipal father as a loving presence who facilitates individuation and socialization. Kristeva advocates a maternal discourse dissociated from femininity, womanhood, and the socia446
lized mother-child relationship, which might express abjection and love, horror and fascination, associated with the alienated other of language and the psyche. The maternal body, divided between self and other, symbolizes this intrinsic heterogeneity. The unified, masculine subject of post-Enlightenment culture is constructed on the repression of otherness, which is projected in the nationalisms and intolerances of modern society. A transformed ethics entails a recognition that as subjects in process, we are Strangers to Ourselves (1991). Kristeva suggests that religion is a cultural anachronism that has been replaced by psychoanalysis, but her work is deeply influenced by Christianity. She accords central significance to the Christian understanding of love, particularly in the Gospels and the writings of Thomas Aquinas (see Aquinas, Thomas). She is critical of aspects of feminism and is not generally regarded as a feminist thinker, but she has had a far-reaching influence on feminist theory. See also: Feminism; Christian Views on Language
Bibliography Fletcher J, Benjamin A (eds.) 1991 Abjection, Melancholia and Love-the Work of Julia Kristeva. Routledge, London Kristeva J 1982 Powers of Horror—An Essay on Abjection. Columbia University Press, New York Kristeva J 1987 Tales of Love. Columbia University Press, New York Kristeva J 1987 In the Beginning Was Love—Psychoanalysis and Faith. Columbia University Press, New York Kristeva J 1991 Strangers to Ourselves. Harvester. Hemel Hempstead Kristeva J 1995 The Kristeva Reader. Moi T (ed.). Blackwell, Oxford, UK, Cambridge, MA, USA Oliver K (ed.) 1997 The Portable Kristeva. Columbia University Press, New York
Kuiper, Franciscus Bernardus Jacobus (1907-
)
Kuiper, Franciscus Bernardus Jacobus (1907- ) A. G. Menon
Franciscus Kuiper was born on July 7, 1907 to Franciscus Bernardus Jacobus Kuiper Sr, a schoolteacher, and his wife Anna Maria van Dijck, in the Hague, the Netherlands. He pursued his university education at Leiden with classical languages as his main subjects, besides Sanskrit, Old Germanic, Baltic, Slavic, and Old Iranian. His most important teachers were C. C. Uhlenbeck and N. van Wijk. In 1928 he took his first bachelor's degree and in the following year got his second bachelor's degree in Indology, both cum laude. In the six months between the last bachelor's degree and the start of his military training he wrote his third long article (116 pp.) which was published in 1934, and studied the Vedic Brahmanas under W. Caland in Utrecht. In 1934 he took his master's degree in the classical languages and Russian. Two weeks after this he got his doctor's degree cum laude for his dissertation on Die Indogermanischen Nasalprdsentia, a complete edition of which appeared in 1937. At the end of 1939 he was appointed as professor of Sanskrit at Leiden University as successor to J. Ph. Vogel, where he served until 1972. During the German occupation of the Netherlands (1940-45) the University of Leiden was closed, which gave him the opportunity, besides philological work, such as collating a Sanskrit manuscript, to deepen his knowledge of Tamil (Dravidian), which he had studied with a native speaker in Batavia, and Munda (particularly Korku). On the IndoEuropean side he published in those years 'Notes on Vedic noun-inflexion' (1942), whereas his later publications particularly dealt with the development of the PIE laryngeals in Indo-Iranian, at that time a novel branch of study. Throughout his academic career Kuiper has shown a keen interest in the influence of and interaction between languages belonging to different language families and his belief in language as a means for cultural studies was strengthened by his findings of foreign loanwords in the Rigveda. His publications from 1931 up till 1992 reflect his continuing interest in all the language families mentioned above. The tenor of his research is historical and comparative. His studies are not marked by shifting interest, but by a combination of different viewpoints leading to acceptable solutions to linguistic and cultural diffusion. His interest in Vedic studies brought him closer to the other language families such as Dravidian and Munda, because he strongly believed in the process of convergence in the Indie area when Indo-Aryan
started to develop independently and free from its Iranian cognate. For example, Proto-Munda words in Sanskrit (1948), 'Rigvedic loanwords' (1954) and 'the Genesis of a linguistic area' (1967) are clear evidence of his unconventional and daring research directed at finding a suitable explanation for the deviating structure of the Vedic language. He stressed that early Indo-Aryan was not a language spoken in a vacuum. The same holistic approach continues up to his latest publication Aryans in the Rigveda (1991). The unexpected structural similarities between the three major language families of the Indian subcontinent lead to the study of the Dravidian origin of the Vedic retroflexion, the similarity of the Dravidian gerunds to the Sanskrit krtva, and of the function of the Dravidian verb ena to the Sanskrit syntactic quotative form /// (1967). The two important subjects which formed the center of his research deal with the genesis of the cosmos and the genesis of a linguistic area. The name of Professor Kuiper is also associated with the International Association for Tamil Research of which he was a President. In addition to his membership of the Royal Dutch Academy of Sciences and Letters he is a foreign or honorary member of Academies and Societies in America, Austria, Denmark, and India. In the 1950s he founded, along with his then colleague Jan Willem de Jong, the Indo-Iranian Journal, the first issue of which appeared in December 1957. Up to 1992 Kuiper had published 122 items in the form of books and articles. Bibliography Heesterman J C et al. (ed.) 1968 Pratidanam. Mouton, The Hague Jong J W de 1977 F B J Kuiper: Bibliography 1967-76. Indo-Iranian Journal 19: 1-4. Jong J W de 1987 F B J Kuiper: Bibliography 1978-87. Indo-Iranian Journal 30: 159-60 Kuiper F B J 1967 The Genesis of a linguistic area. Indo-Iranian Journal 10: 81-102 Kuiper F B J 1979 Varuna and Vidusaka. On the origin of the Sanskrit drama, Verhandelingen der Koninklijke Nederlandse Akademie van Wetenschappen. North Holland, Amsterdam Kuiper F B J 1983 Ancient Indian Cosmogony. Vikas, New Delhi Kuiper F B J 1991 Aryans in the Rigveda. Rodopi, Amsterdam Kuiper F B J 1992. Viskali- name of an accouching deity Amrtamahotsava. Annals of the Bhandarkar Oriental Research Institute, Jubilee Volume, Pune
447
Biographies
Kumaraj iva P. Williams
Kumarajiva (probably 344 413 CE) was the single most important translator of Indie Buddhist texts into Chinese. He was born in Kucha, an area of Central Asia where Indian and Chinese culture met. He studied in Kashmir, and later at Kashgar in Central Asia. At both these places he would have been thoroughly trained in Sarvastivada (The doctrine that all [fundamentally real things (dharmas) continue to] exist [in the three times—past, present, and future]'). While in Kashgar KumarajTva adopted the vision of Buddhism known as Mahayana (the 'Great Way'). This teaches that the ultimate aspiration should be to attain the superior state of a Perfect Buddha in order better to be able to help others. His ontological position was that of Madhyamaka (the 'Middling'), which held that all things whatsoever—including socalled 'fundamentally real things' (dharmas)—are actually just pragmatic mental constructs. They are completely empty (sunya—void) of any fundamental reality. KumarajTva's translations, and works such as his correspondence with Hui-yiian, are important sources for how Mahayana and Madhyamaka were understood in Central Asia and China at that time. His reputation as a Buddhist monk was sufficiently high for him to be captured by a Chinese expeditionary force that conquered Kucha in 383. At a time of political turmoil KumarajTva was held for almost twenty years, during which he learnt Chinese, before being carried-off again in 401 to the Chinese imperial capital of Ch'ang-an. Under imperial patronage KumarajTva presided over a great translation bureau, with disciples such as Seng-chao who were to become important in the Chinese interpretation of Madhyamaka. Working with a team of translators, comparing previous translations, KumarajTva made the definitive Chinese translations of many central Mahayana Buddhist
texts. It is Kumarajiva's translations that are used of the main 'Perfection of Wisdom' (Prajnaparamiia) and Madhyamaka texts. To the present day his is by far the preferred Chinese version of the 'Lotus (Saddharmapundarlka) Sutra.' KumarajTva revised and immensely improved the translation of technical terms, avoiding terms with e.g. prior Taoist significance. He preferred carefully to transliterate Sanskrit where a Chinese equivalent could not be found. On the other hand he was sometimes willing to omit material in his Chinese translations, and also added glosses to make a text more easily understandable by Chinese. Occasionally the translation team chose or used the wrong Chinese word for a Sanskrit expression. It is possible that KumarajTva's translation choices may themselves have influenced Chinese understanding of the technicalities of e.g. Madhyamaka philosophy. Nevertheless while there were later translators who were central in transmitting other Buddhist philosophies to China, and their translations may sometimes be more literal than those of KumarajTva, KumarajTva's translations remain very often the preferred ones for both Chinese readers and Western translators. See also: Apocrypha, Buddhist; Buddhism, Chinese; Buddhism, Indian; Buddhist Canons: Translations; Chinese; Translation: History. Bibliography Bagchi P B 1927 Le canon Bouddhique en Chine. Librairie Orientaliste Paul Geuthner, Paris Robinson R H 1967 Early Madhyamika in India and China. Wisconsin University Press, Madison, Milwaukee, and London Ziircher E 1972 The Buddhist Conquest of China. EJ Brill, Leiden
Lacan, Jacques (1901-81) J. C. Maher
Jacques Marie Emile Lacan, the French psychiatrist, suggested the importance of linguistic awareness in psycho-analytic theory. The son of a businessman, he was born and educated in Paris and received at PhD for this thesis on paranoia (1932) from the Faculte de
448
Medecine. He subsequently worked there from 1934. He underwent psycho-analytic training with Rudolph Loewenstein, joining the staff of St Anne's Hospital in 1953 and later the Ecole Normale Superieure. Known as the 'French Freud,' Lacan attempted to
Lancelot, Claude (1615/16-95) reinterpret the whole of psychoanalytic theory and practice from the viewpoint of language, in particular that of structural linguistics. Following the ideas of Ferdinand de Saussure (see Saussure, Ferdinand (-Mongin) de) and influenced by Roman Jakobson, Lacan excoriated the dominant school of AngloAmerican ego-psychology and taught that psychoanalysis revealed the entire structure of language. Lacan argued for a 'return' to Freud's original principle that psychoanalysis is the intersubjective communication between analyst and patient, its sole medium being the language provided by the patient. Lacan proposed that the unconscious mind operates as a linguistic system, expressed axiomatically as 'the unconscious is structured like a language.' Like the operation of meaning in language, meanings in the unconscious are combined, 'condensed,'or 'displaced' outwards towards the making of new meanings. Experience occurs in the form of three 'registers': 'symbolic,' 'imaginary,' and 'real.' Language encodes experience by means of the symbolic, i.e., through signs. The imaginary sphere of the ego is the realm of fantasy involving an absent 'I.' The real involves the raw experience of events before it is symbolized. Thus, following separation from the mother, the child experiences and becomes constituted by a 'loss.' Now alienated from itself, the self wanders through the unconscious as frustrated infantile desire. Lacan elaborated a dividedness at the heart of the symbolic structure in Saussurean terms: a splitting apart of the sign constituted as signified and signifier. The latter enters the unconscious where it is no longer understood by the
individual who possesses it. In psychoanalysis, the sign is once again reconstituted by recognition of the original desire and its destructive historical impact on the self. Lacan employed a rhetorically complex style of writing intended to show that knowledge about the unconscious is deeply embedded in the medium or metalanguage itself. He emphasized the importance of how to listen and how to intervene. There are affinities between Lacan's call for a proper reading of the 'text' provided by the analysand and the speech act theory of J. L. Austin. Having much in common with the deterministic aspects of Wittgenstein's (see Wittgenstein, Ludwig) view of language and the perspectives of Levi-Strauss (see Levi-Strauss, Claude) and Barthes (see Barthes, Roland), Lacan brought into focus the crucial influence of preexisting linguistic structures on behavior as found in the oft-quoted statement: 'it is the world of words that creates the world of things.' Lacan died in Paris in 1981. See also: Performative Utterances; Religions Symbolism. Bibliography Lacan J 1966 Ecrits, 2 vols. Editions de Seuil, Paris Lacan J 1977 The Four Fundamental Concepts of Psychoanalysis. Hogarth Press/Institute of Psychoanalysis, London Lemaire A 1977 Jacques Lacan. Routledge & Kegan Paul, London Turkic S 1979 Psychoanalytic Politics: Freud's French Revolution. Burnett/Deutsch, London
Lancelot, Claude (1615/16-95) P. Swiggers
Born in Paris, Lancelot entered the Saint Nicolas Seminary in 1627 and received tonsure in 1628, thus becoming a member of the clergy without being ordained a priest. Lancelot, who received a formal training in theology, philosophy, patristics, the classical languages (Greek, Latin, Hebrew), and some modern languages (Spanish, Italian), became a follower of Saint-Cyran and took up a career as 'solitaire,' assuming care of the education of noble youngsters. In 1646 the 'Petites ecoles' of Port-Royal (near Paris) were created. It was in this privileged environment, very different from that of the Jesuit colleges, that Lancelot conceived and wrote his
grammatical works for the instruction of his pupils who, grouped in small classes, benefited from daily contact with their preceptor. Lancelot wrote manuals for learning the classical languages (Nouvelle methode pour apprendre facilement & en peu de temps la langue latine, 1644; Nouvelle methode pour apprendre facilement la langue greque, 1655; Le Jardin des racines greques, 1651) and some modern languages which he taught to his classes (Nouvelle methode pour apprendre facilement et en peu de temps la langue italienne, 1660; Nouvelle methode pour apprendre facilement et en peu de temps la langue espagnole, 1660). His grammatical output is
449
Biographies one of the most impressive in modern times. Lancelot had keen ideas on language teaching, which he expounded in the introductions to his works: he preferred to start from the native language of the pupil, and he took care to summarize the grammatical information into synoptic tables. He also laid stress on a clear typographical presentation, on structural progression in grammar teaching, and on acquaintance with high-quality literary texts. His method was based on memorizing the grammatical rules (often given in the form of verses), and on the reading and imitation of classical authors. In 1660 Lancelot and Arnauld published, anonymously, the Grammaire generate et raisonnee, a treatise on the 'inner content' of grammatical structure, informed by Lancelot's thorough knowledge of classical and modern languages, and benefiting from Arnauld's logical insights, as applied to the categories of grammar. The work is a landmark in the history of general (or philosophical) grammar in modern times (see Arnauld, Antoine). In 1660 the Port-Royal schools were suppressed by order of Louis XIV. Lancelot then became a preceptor of the princes of Conti, but gave up this position in 1672. He became a Cistercian monk in the abbey of Saint-Cyran, and was ordained subdeacon in 1673. Life was made difficult for him at the abbey, and Lancelot went to Quimperle in Brittany,
to become a Benedictine. He died at Quimperle in 1695. See also: Philology and History.
Bibliography Brekle H E 1967 Die Bedeutung der Grammaire generate et raisonnee fur die heutige Sprachwissenschaft. Indogermanische Forschungen 72: 1-21 Cognet L 1950 Claude Lancelot, Solitaire de Port-Royal. Sulliver, Paris Donze R 1967 (2nd edn. 1971) La Grammaire generate et raisonnee de Port-Royal. Francke, Bern Gazier C 1932 Ces Messieurs de Port-Royal. Perrin, Paris Laporte J 1932-52 La doctrine de Port-Royal, 4 vols. Presses Universitaires de France, Paris Mertens F J, Swiggers P 1983 La Grammaire generale et raisonnee de Port-Royal: Notes bibliographiques. HL 10: 357-62 Padley G A 1976-88 Grammatical Theory in Western Europe: 1500-1700, 3 vols. Cambridge University Press. Cambridge Pariente J C 1985 L'analyse du langage a Port-Royal. Minuit, Paris Swiggers P 1984 Grammaire et logique a Port-Royal. A propos des fondements d'une linguistique generale. Sprachwissenschaft 9: 333-52 Weaver E 1978 The Evolution of the Reform of Port-Royal. Beauchesne, Paris
Lepsius, Carl Richard (1810-84) J. A. Kemp
Lepsius was born in Naumburg on the Saale on December 23, 1810, son of the Saxon Finance Procurator for the Thuringian district. His studies at Leipzig and Gottingen Universities (1829-32) included classical philology and archaeology. In 1832 he moved to Berlin University where he was strongly influenced by Franz Bopp's approach to grammatical analysis. His dissertation on the old Umbrian language was highly praised. In 1833 he went to Paris, and determined to concentrate on Egyptian studies. He won the Volney Prize with an essay entitled 'Palaeography as a means of etymological research', exemplifying what was to be an enduring interest in the relation between written and spoken language. He was fortunate to have influential patrons, notably Alexander von Humboldt and Carl Bunsen. Moving to Italy in 1836 he continued work on Oscan and Umbrian, but it was to be in Egyptology that he attained his greatest reputation. In 1842 he was appointed Professor Extraordinarius of Egyptology in the University of Berlin, and in 450
1846 Professor Ordinarius. In the intervening years he led a highly successful expedition to Egypt. His great twelve-volume account of the monuments of Egypt and Ethiopia was completed in 1856. In 1855 he became co-director of the Egyptian Museum in Berlin, and in 1869 Chief Superintendent. He continued to pursue linguistic interests, stimulated by his contact with African languages, and his articles include work on Nubian, Chinese and Tibetan, Arabic, and Ethiopian. His Nubian Grammar (1880) contains a survey of all African peoples, and a classification of their languages which is well worth attention even today. However, in linguistic circles it is probably for his Standard Alphabet that he is best-known. He was conscious from early on in his studies of the problems involved in converting spoken language into writing, and the need for a 'standard' method on which to base orthographies for languages as yet unwritten. This led to his being invited by the Church Missionary Society (CMS) in 1852 to devise a new alphabet for use by Christian
Levinas, Emmanuel (1906-95) missions. In 1854 an Alphabetical Conference was held in London on the initiative of Carl Bunsen, the Prussian Ambassador, precisely to try to agree on a universal alphabet, for both philological and missionary purposes. Competing systems were put forward by Lepsius and Max Muller (see Mutter, Friedrich Max), among others. Before the conference had reached its final conclusions the CMS had committed itself to Lepsius's scheme, and it was published in both German and English editions (1855). Lepsius was encouraged to produce a revised edition, which was published, in English only, in 1863. The most striking difference is that Part 2, his Collection of Alphabets was enlarged from 19 pages to 222, and from 54 languages to 117, with detailed notes on many of the languages. The Standard Alphabet did not become widely established, largely perhaps because of its excessive use of diacritics,
which made it expensive to produce and difficult for printers, writers, and readers alike. Lepsius received numerous honors in his later years. He made two further visits to Egypt (1866 and 1869) and in the second visit witnessed the opening of the Suez Canal. He died on July 10, 1884. See also'. Missionaries. Bibliography Lepsius C R 1981 (ed. Kemp J A) (1st edn. 1863) Standard Alphabet for Reducing Unwritten Languages and Foreign Graphic Systems to a Uniform Orthography in European Letters. Benjamins, Amsterdam Lepsius C R 1880 Nubische Grammatik mil einer Einleitung iiber die Volker und Sprachen Afrikas. Berlin Ebers G M 1966 (1st edn. 1885) Richard Lepsius: ein Lebensbild. O. Zeller, Osnabruck
Levinas, Emmanuel (1906-95) P. Fletcher
It was Emmanuel Levinas who introduced the thought of Edmund Husserl and Martin Heidegger (see Heidegger, Martin) to the French-speaking world and, as a consequence, instituted the phenomenological approach that has so dominated twentiethcentury French thought. Yet his literary output is split in two. On the one hand, there is a body of dense and elliptical philosophical work, on the other, a series of Talmudic readings and reflections. These two genres were kept apart by Levinas even to the extent that he chose different publishers with which to work on each project. Emmanuel Levinas was born in 1906 in Kovno, Lithuania. Although his family was not assimilated, he grew up in an atmosphere of liberalism with respect to study and the place of the intellectual life. In 1923 he moved to France where he studied in Strasbourg and from where he would travel to Freiburg to hear the lectures of Husserl and Heidegger. In 1930 he moved to Paris and taught at the Normal School for the Alliance Universelle Israelite, a school network for Jewish communities in Europe. As a member of the French army during World War Two, Levinas was captured in 1940 and spent the rest of the war as a prisoner in Germany. After the publication of his first major work, Totality and Infinity (1961), he moved to a University position
at Poitiers and then to Paris (Nanterre). His second major work, Otherwise than Being or Beyond Essence was published in 1974. Levinas died in Paris on 25 December 1995. Central to Levinas's concerns is the ethical relation to the other that occurs in what he calls the 'face-to-face' relation. There is a responsibility to respond to the face of the other (which commands in its' expression 'Thou shalt not kill!'). Here, the self who experiences the proximity of the other is not an 'I,' an ego, but a 'me.' Before the other one appears in the accusative, me void—'here I am' (with all its biblical overtones). Indeed, language itself, in the ethical relation, is an expression of this 'here I am.' It is evident, then, that Levinas pursues no traditional ethics. Ethics for him is first philosophy—it is prior to logic and ontology and any discourse that authoritatively represents the way things are. This distinction between ethics and thought is further reflected in Levinas's understanding of language. In Otherwise than Being or Beyond Essence (1978), Levinas distinguishes between two forms of language: le Dit (the Said) and le Dire (Saying). 'The Said' concerns those propositions and statements about truth, Being, identity and so forth which deal with verification and falsifiability. Much of our
451
Biographies discourse—both academic and non-academic—is related to 'the Said.' But this common discursive practice presupposes 'Saying' which is, according to Levinas, anterior or 'pre-original.' In other words, 'Saying' is the condition of the possibility of 'the Said.' This condition (Saying) is an event in which I am exposed to the face of the other in a place where the infinite (and God) is to be found. The infinite leaves a trace of its transcendence (which is totally other) in the 'Saying' which is the proximity of the other. In 'the Said' I secure my identity before the other; in 'Saying' I am a host for the other and the infinite.
Bibliography Levinas E 1979 Totality and Infinity [trans. A. Lingis]. Martinus Nijhoff, The Hague Levinas E 1978 Otherwise than Being or Beyond Essence [trans. A. Lingis]. Kluwer Academic, Dordrecht, The Netherlands Levinas E 1985 Ethics and Infinity [trans. R.A Cohen]. Duquesne University Press, Pittsburgh, PA Levinas E 1990 Nine Talmudic Readings [trans. A. Aronowicz]. Indiana University Press, Indiana Peperzak A 1995 Ethics as First Philosophy. Routledge, London Stone I F 1998 Reading Levinas/Reading Talmud. Jewish Publication Society, Philadelphia, PA
Levi-Strauss, Claude (1908- ) A. T. Campbell
Having graduated in law from the Paris Law Faculty and in philosophy from the Sorbonne in 1931, LeviStrauss visited Brazil in 1934. During a short spell teaching at the University of Sao Paulo he took the opportunity to do some fieldwork amongst Brazilian Indians. He returned to Brazil for another field trip in 1938-39. He left France after the German occupation and went to New York where he taught at the New School for Social Research and met Roman Jakobson whose work on phonology was to be one of his main intellectual inspirations. After the War he returned to Paris and held a post at the Musee de 1'Homme and in 1950 became directeur d'etudes at the Ecole Pratiques des Hautes Etudes. In 1959 the Chair of Social Anthropology was created for him at the College de France. In 1973 he became a member of the Academic fransaise. Levi-Strauss is credited with creating the intellectual movement called 'structuralism.' The massive, technical, Les Structures elementaires de la parente was published in 1949 but perhaps nothing would have come of structuralism had Levi-Strauss not published Tristes Tropiques in 1955. This was a personal account of his travels, written in a readable, but sophisticated style, and it became a best-seller. That set the stage for the publication of Anthropologie structurale (Structural Anthropology) in 1958 (a collection of essays written in the 1940s and 1950s). The popularity of the previous work guaranteed intense interest in this one. A new intellectual fashion had arrived. Structuralism replaced 'existen452
tialism,' and Levi-Strauss challenged Sartre's dominance as the star of Parisian intellectual life. Levi-Strauss declared that his three 'intellectual mistresses' were geology, psychoanalysis, and Marxism, the common idea being that in each of these enquiries what appears to be the case on the surface is determined by hidden (unconscious) structures, laws, or determinants. Among his other sources of inspiration were cybernetics, music, and above all linguistics. The original structuralist charter is set out in Chapter 2 of Structural Anthropology, originally published as an article in 1945 in one of the first issues of Word. Structural linguistics, through Trubetzkoy's phonology, was set to play a 'renovating role' in the social sciences. Edwin Ardener has pointed out that the specialized terminology of phonemic analysis was a red herring. It was the Saussurian principles lying behind phonology that Levi-Strauss required: a few simple distinctions (like langue/parole, syntagmatic/paradigmatic), related notions such as 'system' and 'value,' and above all, the idea that the building blocks of human logic and human thinking consist of binary oppositions. The guiding idea behind Levi-Strauss's work was to find fundamental structures behind the bewildering disparateness of phenomena. Elementary Structures was an attempt to show that a huge array of kinship systems could be seen to be based on two simple structural forms: restricted exchange and generalized exchange. From Totemism onwards the
Levita, Elijah (1469-1549) search is more explicitly for fundamental structures 'of the mind,' the idea being that by an examination of the structure of various 'objects of thought' (classifications, myths, designs) one can discover something of the structure of the mind that created them. Just as phonology had shown that language can be reduced to those 'distinctive features' expressed as binary distinctions (tense/lax, grave/ acute), so the logic of primitive classification and 'mythologic' can be reduced to endless structures of binary oppositions (wet/dry, honey/tobacco, raw/ cooked). While Levi-Strauss emphasizes his profound concern with linguistics, Chomsky's generative grammar passed him by. ('Transformation,' a key term in structuralism, is taken from D'Arcy Wentworth Thompson's On Growth and Form, 1917, a classic in zoology, and has nothing to do with transformational grammar.) Ironically, a short passage in Chomsky's Language and Mind provides an illuminating, terse, 'no nonsense' critique of Levi-Strauss's use of linguistic models. The work on classification, says Chomsky, reduces to the conclusion 'that humans classify, if they perform any mental acts at all.' Linguistics has long left Levi-Strauss behind. Structuralism, as a fashion, also looks rather dated, but because of the engrossing nature of the material LeviStrauss deals with (myths, masks, exotic names and habits) his writing is still found intriguing and he is
still revered as one of the leading intellectuels of France. Bibliography Ardener E (ed.) 1971 Social Anthropology and Language. Tavistock, London Hayes E N, Hayes T (eds.) 1970 Claude Levi-Strauss: The Anthropologist as Hero. MIT Press, Cambridge, MA Leach E R 1970 Levi-Strauss. Fontana, London Levi-Strauss C 1969 (1st edn. 1949) The Elementary Structures of Kinship, 2nd edn. Eyre & Spottiswoode, London Levi-Strauss C 1973 (1st edn. 1955) Tristes Tropiques. Atheneum, New York Levi-Strauss C 1963 (1st edn. 1958) Structural Anthropology. Basic Books Inc., New York Levi-Strauss C 1963 (1st edn. 1962) Totemism. Beacon Press, Boston, MA Levi-Strauss C 1972 (1st edn. 1962) The Savage Mind, 2nd edn. Weidenfeld & Nicolson, London Levi-Strauss C 1970-81 Mythologiques; Introduction to a Science of Mythology. English transl. Weightman J, Weightman D, 4 vols. Vol. 1: The Raw and the Cooked, 1970 (1st edn. 1964); Vol. 2: From Honey to Ashes, 1973 (1st edn. 1967); Vol. 3: The Origin of Table Manners, 1978 (1st edn 1968); vol. 4: The Naked Man, 1981 (1st edn. 1971). Cape, London Levi-Strauss C 1977 (1st edn. 1973) Structural Anthropology n. Cape, London Pace D 1983 Claude Levi-Strauss: The Bearer of Ashes. Routledge & Kegan Paul, London
Levita, Elijah (1469-1549) J. Weinberg
Elijah, son of Asher Halevi (Levita), also known as Bahur, was a pioneer in Massoretic studies and lexicology and a fine exponent of Hebrew grammar. Born in Neustadt in Germany in 1469, he spent most of his life in Italy and died in Venice in 1549. Levita taught Hebrew to Christians including the Cardinal Egidio da Viterbo and his work was adopted and disseminated by the greatest Christian Hebraists of his time such as Sebastian Munster and Paulus Fagius. Levita's grammatical treatises were mainly intended as manuals for beginners. He wrote a commentary on the grammar of Moses Kimhi, explaining the technical terms used by Kimhi and adding paradigms. He also wrote notes on the Mikhlol (Summd) of David Kimhi (see Kimhi, David) whom he regarded as the best of the Hebrew grammarians. He wrote three grammatical treatises: in the Bahur (Young Man or The Choice), he explains
the morphology of the noun and verb; in Sepher HaHarkabha (Book of Grafting), he discusses irregular forms and hybrid words in the Hebrew Bible; the Pirqe Eliyahu (Chapters of Elijah) contains useful rules on phonetics, gender and number of nouns, and particles. Levita's rule regarding the five classes of the shewa mobile is accepted today. In his epoch-making study of the Masorah, Masoret Ha-Masoret, he discusses the problem of Hebrew phonetics not as a grammatical category, but in relation to the Masoretic system through which it evolved. Following the model of David Kimhi's Hebrew lexicon Sepher HaShorashim (The Book of Roots), on which he also published his own glosses, Levita wrote a lexicon of Aramaic (he wrongly regarded Aramaic as a debased form of Hebrew), the Meturgeman, for readers of the Aramaic translations (Targumim) of the Bible. It includes quotations from verses and gives 453
Biographies translations into German and Italian. Like the eleventh-century lexicon of Nathan ben Yehiel of Rome, Levita's lexicon Tishbi (Tishbite) is mainly a dictionary of rabbinic Hebrew and Aramaic. It is not a dictionary in the modern sense of the word, but contains notes for each entry, sometimes correcting previous interpretations or adding new explanations. At the request of Egidio da Viterbo, Levita composed a concordance to the Bible, the Sepher Zikhrdnot (The Book of Remembrances). He ordered the work alphabetically according to root, giving verbal forms and nouns, grammatical explanations, and references to the Massorah. It was intended as a guide to punctuation for scribes and to enable preachers to find appropriate verses as subjects for sermons, to teach the art of writing clear biblical Hebrew, and as a source of scriptural verses for use in
polemics. Levita's lexicon, the Shemot Debhdrun (Nomenclature), was also written at the request of a Christian Hebraist, Paulus Fagius, who wanted a work which could be used by scholars wishing to write and speak Hebrew. The words were presented in four columns alphabetically ordered. The columns in Judeo-Hebrew and Hebrew were written by Levita, those in German and Latin by Fagius. See also: Hebrew, Biblical and Jewish; Masoretic Tradition.
Bibliography For a full list of Levita's works, see: Weil G E 1963 Elie Levita Humaniste el Massorete (1469-1549). Brill, Leiden
Lowth, Robert (1710-87) I. Michael
Lowth's A Short Introduction to English Grammar: with Critical Notes, published anonymously in 1762, was highly regarded and influential until well into the nineteenth century. Lowth was born on November 27, 1710, and educated at Winchester and New College, Oxford, of which he was a fellow. He was made Professor of Poetry at Oxford in 1741 and his lectures, delivered in Latin, were published in 1753 as De Sacra Poesi Hebraeorum Praelectiones. His Hebrew scholarship was much admired, both in this work and in his translation of Isaiah (1779). In 1752 he married Mary Jackson, by whom he had eight children, only two of whom survived him. Although he was given his first living in 1753 it was as a scholar and churchman, not as a parish priest, that Lowth made his career. In 1767 he was made Bishop of Oxford, in 1777 Bishop of London. It is not known what led him to write an English grammar, his only work of that kind. It may have been suggested by his brief experience tutoring the sons of the Duke of Devonshire or, later, by the needs of his own children. He describes the work as 'intended merely for a private and domestic use,' but it is clear that he was careful to make it suitable for a wider field: it was 'calculated for the use of the Learner even of the lowest class.' The grammar itself contains nothing new, except for his treatment of the sentence. It was intended, like so many, as a preparation for Latin, but Lowth's good linguistic sense avoided most of the absurdities of the latinate approach to English. The grammar was popular 454
because it was simple, well-written, and authoritative. The preface, in particular, gave clear and weighty support for those opinions which needed it: namely that grammar was badly taught, and syntax neglected, because teachers underestimated the difficulty of controlling a mother tongue; that 'Universal Grammar cannot be taught abstractedly,' only 'with reference to some language already known.' The notes to the grammar illustrated the text by quoting from established authors' expressions which Lowth judged incorrect. These notes have been adversely criticized for being prescriptive, but their prescriptiveness follows from Lowth's acceptance of the generally held belief that there were grammatical principles applying to all languages and that the student of English grammar met, and should respect, these principles 'exemplified in his own Language.' Bibliography Alston R C 1974 A Bibliography of the English Language 1: English Grammars, corrected reprint of 1965 edn. Janus Press, Ilkley Anon 1787 (obituary memoir of Lowth.) Gentleman's Magazine 57: 1028-1030; 1123-1124; 1155-1156 Howatt A P R 1984 A History of English Language Teaching, corrected impression. Oxford University Press, Oxford Lowth R 1967 A Short Introduction to English Grammar, facsimile of a copy of the first edn. containing the author's manuscript additions and corrections. Scolar Press, Menston Pullum G K. 1974 Lowth's Grammar: A re-evaluation. Linguistics 137: 63-78
Luther, Martin (1483-1546)
Luther, Martin (1483-1546) C. J. Wells
The Germany of Martin Luther was split by intellectual and political factions, and German itself was regionally and socially diverse. The early phase of printing, if anything, enhanced the chaos, since the first German books sometimes reproduced older manuscripts from different areas: Johannes Mentel's first German Bible (1466), for instance, was based on an 'East Central German' text of some one and a half centuries earlier, refracted through the 'Low Alemannic' linguistic habits of fifteenth-century Strasbourg compositors. No standard language had yet emerged, and through the fluctuating local written/ printed norms, only the broader outlines of regional forms of language are discernible. Luther's output was extensive, and he became the first writer to publish on a modern scale, thanks to the controversial politico-religious scope of his ideas and to his spectacularly successful German Bible translation. Indeed, he used printing for propagandistic, proselytizing purposes, part of his deep conviction that the biblical message should speak directly to the individual Christian unalloyed by doctrine or dogma. Such was the dissemination of his writings, both through 'official' printers and via pirated editions, that Luther's reputation was extended to his very use of language. Contemporaries praised his linguistic purity, and the myth of Luther's German was accepted virtually unquestioned by nineteenth-century German scholars. A distinction should be made between Luther's own German, preserved in his manuscripts, and the 'Luther German' disseminated in printed form. Only the latter could be influential, and it has constantly, if imperceptibly, been changing since Luther's day. In fact, the orthographical and pronunciational codifications which followed the political unification of Germany in the late nineteenth century, achieved relative stability in forms often very different from those used by Luther and his printers. Nevertheless, Luther's style and vocabulary were and remain influential. Writers from Goethe to Brecht have turned to Luther's German Bible. Its powerful idiom would have been familiar to their audiences from a lifetime of churchgoing, if not from private Bible reading, and one seventeenth-century reader, E. D. Pithan, probably no exception, read it from cover to cover as many as 104 times. The patina of archaism which inevitably built up over the centuries dignified and poeticized it, making it attractive to politicians and occasional speakers in search of a trenchant or proverbial phrase. Intervening centuries have enriched German with philosophi-
cal, literacy, technical, and social styles of expression which lie outside the biblical sphere, and the Luther text is now less read and heard than hitherto, competing as it does with clearer yet infinitely less expressive modernized versions. But Luther's influence is still apparent. Luther was not seeking to create a standard German language, but he appreciated the need to communicate as widely as possible in the most accessible language. Oddly enough, he looked to the Electoral Saxon and Imperial chanceries for a 'koine,' not to the printers. In this he was manifestly out-of-date. The short polemical tract Ein Sendbrief vom Dolmetschen (1530) ('On Translation') presents his approach to biblical language. The work was an apology for his translation of the New Testament (1522) and a defense against accusations that he was both a paraphrast and a literalist. Like any competent translator, he was both, always adhering strictly to the original text when the biblical meaning required, but not afraid to bring out the sense idiomatically. Translation was for Luther a religious act, where faith alone permits fidelity. The indispensible equipment of the translator/interpreter of the divine word includes an 'upright, devout, loyal, industrious, reverential, Christian, experienced and practiced heart.' Luther always went back to the original Greek and Hebrew sources. In this, as in his preference for the Vulgate rather than the old 'Itala' or Vetus Latina, he was a humanist for whom textual-critical study formed the basis of translation. The Catholic theologians of his day preferred to elucidate the Bible via the accreted patristic secondary literature, which removed the scholars from the text and the text from the laity who could not equal theologically trained exponents of anagogical, allegorical, and tropological interpretation. Luther sought to prune back theological /scholastic ramification and let the Bible speak for itself, plainly and accessibly to all Germans in their mother tongue. Although faith and piety furnished the translator with understanding, Luther acknowledged each language's own structure and character ('der sprachen art'), and saw that failure to render the message accurately from one language to another might pervert the intention. The Latin penitentiam agite 'do penance' appeared to support the abuse of selling pardons, whereas the original Greek meant only 'be penitent.' Philological study of sources helped to discover the sense of the biblical message and to render it precisely into uncluttered, direct, and idiomatic German. On occasion, he did not shrink
455
Biographies from adding his own emphasis to the German, as in the famous verse of Romans 3: 28, where he adds the work allein '(by faith) alone.' Justification through faith, not works, one of the principal tenets of Lutheranism, may therefore have been reinforced, if not actually suggested to Luther, through the activity of Bible translation. Luther's acute ear for the inflections of his native German was doubtless sharpened by his early contact with Low German and his total familiarity with Latin. His interest in vocabulary is well attested, from enquiries about German technical terms for cuts of meat, or for the names of animals and birds. He collected proverbs, published a small tract on thieves' cant, speculated about the meaning of old German names, ridiculed some of the more bureaucratic chancery words, and so forth. Much of his table talk and correspondence is in Latin, sometimes mixed with German. A more polemical style, robust and occasionally coarse, as in the Sendbrief itself, contrasts with his Bible, which he constantly revised in both phrasing and vocabulary. Even after his death, changes were made in the 1546 version to reflect his last wishes. As Luther's language has receded into the past, it has become unnatural or 'stylized,' despite its vividness. Attempts to modernize Luther's Bible inevitably fail, not because they result from 'committee-work' (Luther's Old Testament was also the product of a 'sanhedrin,' including Melanchthon, Goldhahn, and others) but because they lack spirit. Luther's striking freshness stems from the unmistakeably spoken rhythms of his text. He gives us speech, apparently close to the colloquial, but in heightened, rhetorical form, captured from the pulpit, not copied from the printed page. His text has a vigor and robustness alien to less oral ages, and more akin to the original Bible. Luther wanted his Bible to speak 'pure and clear' German accessible to all: 'it's no good asking the letters in the Latin language how one should speak German, as these donkeys [ = Catholic translators] do, but instead you have to ask a mother at home, children in the street or ordinary people in the market place about it. Observe their chatter and translate accordingly, and then they'll understand it and realize that you're speaking German to them' (Sendbrief p. aiiij b).
See also: English Bible; Christianity in Europe. Bibliography Arndt E, Brandt G 1983 Luther und die deutsche Sprache: wie redel der Deutsche man im solchem fall? VEB, Bibliographisches Institut, Leipzig Bach H 1974-1985 Handbuch der Luthersprache, 1974 vol. 1: Vokalismus, 1985 vol. 2: Druckschwache silben. Konsonantismus. G.E.C. Gad, Copenhagen Bainton R S 1955 Here I Stand. Mentor Books. New York Besch W 1999 Die Rolle Luthers in der deutschen Sprachgeschichte [Schriften der Philosophisch-Historischen Klasse der Heidelberger Akademie der Wissenschaften; Bd. 12 (1999)] Universitatsverlag C. Winter, Heidelberg Besch W et al. (eds.) 1998 Sprachgeschichte: ein Handbuch zur Geschichte der deutschen Sprache und ihrer Erforschung: 2., vollstandig neu bearbeitete und erweiterte Aufl. [Handbiicher zur Sprach- und Kommunikationswissenschaft; Bd. 2.1] W. de Gruyter, Berlin (vol. 1) Bluhm H 1965 Martin Luther—Creative Translator. Concordia, St Louis, MI Reinitzer H (ed.) 1983 Biblia deutsch, Luthers Bibelubersetzung und ihre Tradition. Ausstellungskatalog der HerzogAugust-Bibliothek, Wolfenbuttel, Nr. 40, WaisenhausBuchdruckerei und Verlag, Braunschweig Schildt J (ed.) 1983-1984 Luthers Sprachschaffen, Gesellschaftliche Grundlagen, Geschichtliche Wirkungen [ = papers from the Eisenach Conference. 21-25 March. 1983]; AdWdDDR (ZfS), Linguistische Studien Reihe A. Arbeitsberichte 119/1-3, Berlin 1984 Schwarz W 1955 Principles and Problems of Biblical Translation. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge Wells C J 1985 German: A Linguistic History to 1945. Oxford University Press, Oxford Wells C J 1993 Orthography as Legitimation. Christoph Walthers Observations on Luther's German Bible and the Printers of Frankfurt on Main 1560-1577. In: Flood J L, Salmon P, Sayce O, Wells C (eds.) Das unsichtbare Band der Sprache. Studies in German Language and Linguistic History in Memory of Leslie Seiffert, Verlag Hans-Dieter Heinz/ Akademischer Verlag. Stuttgart, pp. 149-88 Wells C J 1999 Nicht-Lutherisches in der Orthographic der nach-Lutherschen Bibel- und Psalmenausgaben des 16. Jahrhunderts. In: Besch W, Hoffmann W (eds.) Das Fruhneuhochdeutsche als sprachgeschichtliche Epoche: Werner Besch zum 70. Geburtstag. P. Lang, Frankfurt am Main, pp. 209-40 Wolf H (ed.) 1996 Luthers Deutsch: sprachliche Leistung und Wirkung. P. Lang, Frankfurt am Main
Malinowski, Bronislaw Kaspar (1884-1942) A. T. Campbell
Malinowski was born in Cracow, Poland. He was the son of a well-known Slavic philologist (Lucyan 456
Malinowski). After a PhD in physics and mathematics, he turned to anthropology, inspired, he said.
Matilal, Bimal Krishna (1935-91) by a reading of Frazer's Golden Bough. In 1910 he arrived at the London School of Economics, and in 1914 began anthropological fieldwork in New Guinea. Between 1915 and 1918 he did two years fieldwork on the Trobriand Islands (off Papua New Guinea). After some years teaching at the LSE he was appointed to the first Chair of Anthropology there (1927). In 1938 he went to the USA where he was appointed professor at Yale. He died in New Haven at the age of 58. In the three great ethnographies of the Trobriand Islands (Argonauts, Sexual Life, and Coral Gardens), Malinowski established the tradition of intensive fieldwork, participating in the life of the society being studied, emphasizing the effort to appreciate a total view of the society and to understand matters 'from the natives' point of view.' He constantly emphasized the importance of learning and working with the indigenous language. The vivid style of writing and the colossal amount of detail have established these ethnographies as classics. The account of the kula ring, a complex system of formal gift giving described in Argonauts, is one of the most celebrated cases in anthropology. In terms of sociological theory, Malinowski's functionalism and his ideas about 'basic needs' are pretty banal, and are only of interest as indicating an important shift in anthropology away from questions about origins and evolution which had previously been so dominant. On the other hand, his concern with language is much more fruitful. He was proud of his ability to pick up languages quickly, and, as well as insisting on the importance of conducting field research in the native language, he shows an intense concern with the processes and details of translation (Coral Gardens, vol. 2). He laments the lack of sound ethnolinguistic theory. Although his attempt to provide one does little with regard to phonetics, phonology, or grammar, his writing on meaning is original. In a remarkable essay (1923) appended to Ogden and Richards' The Meaning of Meaning, he
coined the phrase 'phatic communion' (gossip, pleasantries, and so on) to make the point that language should not just be seen as a vehicle for thought through which to communicate ideas, but as a mode of action which, in this example, establishes personal bonds between people. Also in this essay he claims originality for the notion of 'context of situation' in an argument which prefigures Wittgenstein's 'the meaning of words lies in their use', developed in Philosophical Investigations. J. R. Firth wrote: 'I think it is a fair criticism to say that Malinowski's technical linguistic contribution consists of sporadic comments, immersed and perhaps lost in what is properly called his ethnographic analysis' (1957: 117). But beyond a strictly 'technical' contribution, his expertise in translating from Trobriand and his writing on meaning and translation deserve a more generous judgment. See also: Translation: History.
Bibliography Malinowski B K 1922 Argonauts of the Western Pacific. Routledge, London Malinowski B K 1923 The problem of meaning in primitive languages. In: Ogden C K, Richards I A (eds.) The Meaning of Meaning (suppl. I). Harcourt Brace, New York Malinowski B K 1929 The Sexual Life of Savages. Routledge, London Malinowski B K 1935 Coral Gardens and their Magic, 2 vols. Allen and Unwin, London Malinowski B K 1948 Magic, Science and Religion and Other Essays. Free Press, Glencoe, IL Malinowski B K 1967 A Diary in the Strict Sense of the Term. Routledge and Kegan Paul, London Firth J R (ed.) 1957 Man and Culture: An Evaluation of the Work of Bronislaw Malinowski. Routledge and Kegan Paul, London Kuper A 1983 Anthropology and Anthropologists: The Modern British School. Routledge and Kegan Paul, London
Matilal, Bimal Krishna (1935-91) J. Ganeri
Bimal Krishna Matilal (1935-1991) is best known as a pioneer of the study of the Indian philosophical and linguistic traditions using the methods and techniques of contemporary analytical philosophy. His life's work was to counter the myths and stereotypes about Indian philosophy, and to bring India's philosophical past and rich linguistic heritage into conversation with contemporary debates.
Matilal was born in Joynagar, West Bengal, leaving for Calcutta at the age of fourteen, where he studied first at the Islamia College and then at the Sanskrit Department of the University of Calcutta. In 1957 he was appointed as lecturer in the Government Sanskrit College. He continued to study Nyaya there with a number of eminent pandits, and under their guidance completed a traditional degree, 457
Biographies that of Tarkatirtha, Master of Logic and Argument, in 1962. For some time prior to this, Matilal had been in correspondence with Daniel Ingalls, who suggested to him the possibility of moving to Harvard in order to acquaint himself with the work being done by W. V. O. Quine in philosophical and mathematical logic and philosophy of language. Breaking with his tradition, Matilal followed this advice, completing his Ph.D. at Harvard in 1965 having taken Quine's classes and continued his studies in mathematical logic with D. Follesdal. In his doctoral thesis, The Navya-Nyaya Doctrine of Negation, published by Harvard University Press in 1968, he gives voice to his growing conviction that 'India should not, indeed cannot, be left out of any general study of the history of logic and philosophy.' This was to be the first statement of a thesis to the defence of which he devoted his academic life, that our philosophical understanding of fundamental problems is enriched if the ideas of the linguists and philosophers of classical India are brought to bear in the modern discussion. In 1976, he became Spalding Professor of Eastern Religions and Ethics at the University of Oxford and Fellow of All Souls College, positions he held until the end of his life. India's highest honour, the Padma Bhusana, was bestowed on him in 1991. Matilal's collected essays (Philosophy, Culture and Religion: The Collected Essays of B. K. Matilal 2001) reveal the extraordinary depth of his philosophical interest in India. His reputation is as one of the leading exponents of Indian logic and epistemology. His book on Indian philosophy of language, The Word and the World: Indians Contribution to the Study of Language (1991) dealt with all aspect of India's linguistic traditions. Yet those who know of him through his major books in these areas, The NavyaNyaya Doctrine of Negation (1968), Epistemology, Logic and Grammar in Indian Philosophical Analysis (1971), Perception: An Essay on Classical Indian Theories of Knowledge (1986; 2nd edition 1991) and The Character of Logic in India (1998), may be surprised to discover the range of his other writings. His work deals, in general, with every aspect of the relation between philosophical theory and Indian thought: from analysis of the arguments of the
classical philosophers to evaluation of the role of philosophy in classical Indian society; from diagnosis of western perceptions of Indian philosophy to analysis of the thought of past Indian intellectuals like Bankimchandra and Radhakrishnan. Matilal, strikingly, is willing to look in a great range of sources for philosophical theory. As well as the writings of the classical Indian philosophical schools, he uses material from the linguistic literature, the epics, dharmasastras, medical literature, poetics, and literary criticism. This eclecticism is no accident. Matilal argues that it is only in the study of such diversity of literature that one can discover the mechanisms of the internal criticism to which a dynamic culture necessarily subjects itself in the process of revising and reinterpreting its values and the meaning of its fundamental concepts, and to be sure that one's own evaluation and criticism is immersed in, and not detached from, the practices and perceptions of the culture. He also observes that a selective attention to particular aspects of Indian culture is part of what has generated a set of myths and misperceptions about Indian philosophy, most notably the popular idea that Indian philosophy is primarily spiritual and intuitive, in contrast with the 'rational' West. See also: Hindu Views on Language; Sanskrit (Paninian) Linguistics; Tamil Linguistic Tradition.
Bibliography Matilal B K 1968 The Navya-Nyaya Doctrine of Negation. Harvard University Press, Cambridge, MA Matilal B K 1971 Epistemology, Logic and Grammar in Indian Philosophical Analysis. Mouton. The Hague Matilal B K 1985 Logic, Language and Reality. Motilal Banarsidass, Delhi (2nd edn. 1990) Matilal B K 1991 Perception: An Essay on Classical Indian Theories of Knowledge. Clarendon Press, Oxford (2nd edn. 1991) Matilal B K 1998 The Character of Logic in India. SUNY Press, Albany, NY Matilal B K 2001 Philosophy, Culture and Religion: The Collected Essays of B. K. Matilal. Oxford University Press, Delhi
Meinhof, Carl Friedrich Michael (1857-1944) M. Schladt
Meinhof, a German pastor and linguist, is considered to be the founder of comparative African linguistics 458
and the great authority on the analysis and classification of the Bantu languages. He published various
Mesrob (c. 361-c. 439) language monographs and textbooks and was the first to establish the teaching of African languages in German universities. He was born on July 23, 1857 in Barzwitz (near Rugenwalde). After studying Theology, Germanic Philology, and Hebrew in Halle, Erlangen, and Greifswald, Meinhof worked as a teacher in Wolgast and Stettin. In 1882, he married Elly Heyer, who died in 1894. In 1895 he married Anna KloB (died in 1944). He was appointed to the parish of Zizow (near Riigenwalde) in 1886. Influenced by the neogrammarians' method as applied to the Indo-European languages, Meinhof began working on a comparative grammar of the Bantu languages. His main informants were missionaries on home leave. In 1899, he published Grundrifi einer Lautlehre der Bantusprachen which brought him a grant from the Kaiser. He spent it on his first field research in East Africa in 1902-03. He was then appointed to the School of Oriental Studies in Berlin as a teacher of African languages. In 1905 he was awarded a professorship. In 1909, he became the director of the Seminar fur Kolonialsprachen in Hamburg. The following year Meinhof founded the Phonetics Laboratory and the periodical Zeitschrift fiir Kolonialsprachen (1920-55, renamed Zeitschrift fur Eingeborenensprachen, since 1951-52 published under the name of Afrika und Ubersee). At that time Meinhof concentrated his efforts on the teaching of languages. Between 1909 and 1912 he wrote textbooks on Nama, Herero, Swahili, and Duala. In 1912 Meinhof published Die Sprachen der Hamiten, his most controversial work. Here he tried to establish a genetic group of Hamitic languages claiming that the African noun class systems were an early stage of these languages. Meinhof partially retracted his statements in later publications.
In 1914 he traveled with his then assistant, Herrmann August Klingenheben, to the Sudan. In 1919 he became the first German to be appointed full professor for African languages at the University of Hamburg. In 1927 Meinhof went to South Africa where he held language courses at various universities. Meinhof retired in 1935. During his last years he continued with his life's work, the exact description and classification of the Bantu languages. His minor contributions on religion, politics, and legal interpretations in Africa showed Meinhof as an enthusiastic advocate of missionary work and colonial politics. For this reason most postwar African linguists avoid referring specifically to Meinhofs works, although his scientific achievements are beyond doubt. Meinhof died on February 10, 1944 in Greifswald, working on the second edition of his grammar of the Bantu languages. See also: African Traditional Religions; Christianity in Africa.
Bibliography Klingenheben A 1937 Uberblick iiber das literarische Schaffen Meinhofs. In: Brevier Meinhof Lukas J 1943-44 Nachruf Carl Meinhof. Zeitschrift fur Eingeborenensprachen 34: 81-93 Meinhof C 1910 (1st edn. 1899; Grundrifi einer Lautlehre der Bantusprachen nebst einer Anleitung zur Aufnahme von Bantusprachen. Reimer, Leipzig Meinhof C 1948 (1st edn 1906) Grundzuge einer vergleichenden Grammatik der Bantusprachen. Reimer, Berlin Meinhof C 1912 Die Sprachen der Hamiten. Friedrichsen, Hamburg
Mesrob (c. 361^c. 439) Archimandrite Ephrem
Armenia was the first nation formally to adopt Christianity as its religion under King Trdat, traditionally in 301, but more probably about a decade later with the consecration as bishop of Gregory the Enlightener in 314. In around 387 Armenia was divided into a small Roman-Byzantine sector and a considerably larger Iranian one, in which the patriarchal see was established at Ejrm'acin. The details of this early period are obscure because Armenian was not at the time a written language and it was not until the reign of King Vramsapuh at the beginning of the fifth century under the Catholicos
Shahak (Isaac) III that the Armenian language was provided with an alphabet of its own. This was the work of a missionary monk named Mastoc', who had studied at Antioch. He knew not only Greek, but also Syriac and Persian. The name Mesrob, or Mesrop, by which he is commonly known is not found in any writings before the eighth century. The first original work to be composed in Armenian was a life of Mastoc', written by his disciple Koriun. The history of Armenia by Moses Khorenats'i despite its claim to be contemporary, was probably written in the eighth century. 459
Biographies It was during his missionary work in Golt'n that Mastoc' seems to have conceived the idea of composing an alphabet for Armenian. His project received royal approval and he visited Edessa to pursue his researches, finally devising an alphabet with vowels and consonants, which accurately represented the sounds of the language, unlike the purely consonantal systems of Syriac and Hebrew. The King had heard of an Aramaic script that had been adapted for Armenian by a Syrian bishop, Daniel. However, it was realized, 'that it was not possible through these letters to render accurately the syllables of Armenian words in a satisfactory way because the script was a foreign one' (Moses History of Armenia III.52). The final forms of the letters were worked out with the help of a well-known calligrapher at Samosata, Rufinus. The motivation for this work was not simply religious; it was also inspired by a desire to defend Armenia from cultural assimilation to either of its powerful neighbours, Byzantium and Persia. It has been claimed that there was a pre-Christian form of Armenian script using Greek or Syriac letters, but there is no evidence for this. The creation
of the alphabet was the spring board for a huge work of translation, of the Scriptures and other Christian literature from Greek and Syriac, undertaken by Mastoc' and a group of collaborators. The Armenian Bible has been called the 'Queen of the versions.' He also wrote homilies and a series of Troparia (hymns) for Lent. One of his disciples, Eznik of Kolb, wrote an important theological treatise, The Refutation of the Sects. Later Mastoc' also created alphabets for the Georgians and the Albanians of the Caucasus. He founded monasteries and schools and, as a result of a visit to Constantinople, received the support of the Emperor Theodosios II for his educational work. He died in his late seventies in 439. See also: Armenian; Christianity in the Near East. Bibliography Thomson R W 1999 Armenian Christianity. In: The Blackwell Dictionary of Eastern Chritianity Mesrob 1997 In: The Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church, 3rd edn. Zekiyan B L 1980 Mesrop. In: Dictionnaire de Spiritualite, Vol. 10
Muller, Friedrich Max (1823-1900) R. Sohnen-Thieme
F. Max Muller, the first professor of Comparative Philology in Oxford, was born in 1823 in Dessau, the son of the poet Wilhelm Muller (1794-1827), wellknown on account of the celebrated cycles of songs, set to music by Franz Schubert. 'Die schone Mullerin' and 'Winterreise.' After taking his final school examinations in 1841, Muller entered Leipzig University, where he studied Classics, philosophy, and Oriental languages, and obtained his PhD in 1843. In 1844 he went to Berlin, attracted by Franz Bopp and Scheling (Philosophy), and also studied Persian with Friedrich Riickert, who helped him with his translation of Meghaduta (publ. 1847). In 1845 he migrated to Paris, where he was inspired by Eugene Burnouf to copy and collate manuscripts of the Rgveda (which, though one of the most ancient and most important texts in an Indo-European language, had not yet been printed anywhere). In order to collect more manuscripts in East India House in London, Muller traveled to Britain in 1846. Here he found the support of the German Ambassador Baron Bunsen, who was able to interest the directors of the East Indian Company in the project of publishing the Rgveda, together with Sayana's commentary, at 460
the Oxford University Press; consequently Muller, in order to supervise the publication, moved in 1848 to Oxford, where he lived until his death in 1900. In 1849 the first volume of the Rgveda appeared, followed by five other volumes in 1854, 1856, 1862. 1872, and 1874 (2nd edn. in 4 vols. 1890-92, repr. Varanasi 1966). In Oxford, he had been appointed deputy Taylorian professor of Modern European Languages in 1850, and obtained the full professorship in 1854, but had been denied the Boden professorship of Sanskrit in 1860 (since his ideas did not conform to the principles of its founder so well as those of M. Monier-Williams), before he obtained the chair of Comparative Philology, which was created for him in 1868 and which he held until 1875. Muller not only contributed to the study of Sanskrit language and literature (e.g., with his Ancient Sanskrit Literature (1859), and A Sanskrit Grammar for Beginners (1866), 2nd edn. by M. Macdonell (1886), and to Indian thought and culture in general (e.g., with his probably best-known book India: What Can It Teach Us, London 1883, and his later publications on Indian philosophy), but he also
Nida, Eugene Albert (1914- ) introduced the new disciplines of Comparative Religion and Comparative Mythology. In each of these fields he succeeded in exciting the interest of a broader public, mainly by his lectures on various occasions in the UK, such as the 'Hibbert Lectures on the Origin and Growth of Religion' at Westminster Abbey 1878, and the famous 'Gifford Lectures' at Glasgow 1888-92 (4 vols., London 1889-92) in the field of Comparative Religion. He also advanced this field by initiating and editing the Sacred Books of the East, a series of translations, by outstanding scholars, of the most important religious texts in Oriental Classical languages. So also, for Comparative Philology, which was made attractive to his audience by his lectures on 'The Science of Language,' delivered at the Royal Institution in 1861 and 1863 (second series), the Sir Robert Rede's lecture 'On the Stratification of Language' in Cambridge 1868, the Three Lectures on the Science of Language and its place in General Education, at Oxford University 1889, etc. His interest in language was mainly centered on the more theoretical or philosophical aspects such as its origin and 'growth' according to laws similar to the laws of nature, its impact on the development of human thought, etc., but he also discussed the etymology of many words in Indo-European languages and used those common to several of them in establishing a comparative mythology and a 'home of the Aryas,' as he called the ancient Indo-Europeans (insisting,
however, on using the term only in the linguistic, not in the racial sense). See also: Sanskrit, Discovery by Europeans; Myths About Language. Bibliography Miiller F M 1885a The Science of Language, new edn. Lectures delivered at the Royal Institution of Great Britain in April, May, and June 1861 in London. Longman, London Miiller F M 1885b The Science of Language, new edn. Lectures delivered in February, March, April, and May 1863, London. Second series, Longman, London Miiller F M 1888 Biographies of Words and the Home of the Aryas. Longman, New York Miiller F M 1889 Three Lectures on the Science of Language. Longman, London (Repr. 1890 Open Court, Chicago, IL. Vol. 1: Difference between Man and Animal. No Mystery in Language; vol. 2: Analysis of Language. The Lesson of the Science of Language; vol. 3: Thought Thicker than Blood. The Cradle of the Aryas. The Importance of Sanskrit) Chaudhuri N C 1974 Scholar Extraordinary: The Life of Professor the Rt. Hon. Friedrich Max Miiller. Chatto and Windus, London Macdonell A A 1901 Max Miiller, Friedrich. In: Lee S (ed.) Dictionary of National Biography, supplement, vol. in: 151-57 Rau H (ed.) 1974 F. Max Mueller—What Can He Teach Us? Bombay Voigt J H 1967 F. Max Miiller: The Man and his Ideas. Firma K. L. Mukhopadhyay, Calcutta
Nida, Eugene Albert (1914- ) R. E. Longacre
Nida was born in 1914 in Oklahama City, Oklahoma, USA. He received a BA at the university of California, Los Angeles in 1936, MA in patristics in 1939 at the University of Southern California, and PhD in linguistics in 1943 at the University of Michigan; also numerous honorary degrees and awards from institutions in the USA and other countries. He was professor of Linguistics at the Summer Institute of Linguistics (which eventually located for many years at the University of Oklahoma) 1937-53 (see also Summer Institute of Linguistics). Nida has had a continuing involvement with agencies interested in the translation of the Christian scriptures. Besides his involvement with the early work of the Summer Institute of Linguistics in Mexico he has been Executive Secretary for Transla-
tions, American Bible Society (1943-84), consultant for the United Bible Societies (1947-90), and continues as consultant for the American Bible Society 1984 to the present. In these various capacities he has succeeded in lifting translation concerns from those of a specialist group onto the plane of broad linguistic and cultural concerns. Nida's early linguistic interests centered around grammar, which in the 1940s and 1950s was conceived of largely as morphology. Both Nida's 1946 Morphology and his larger 1949 volume of the same title (both University of Michigan Press, Ann Arbor, MI) reflect shifting currents in American structural linguistics—from the process orientation of Edward Sapir—to the flat morphemes-and-theirallomorphs orientation of Zellig Harris and Bernard Bloch. Nida has never lost his interest in words; some 461
Biographies of his most mature and recent work has been his exploration of the lexical resources of the Greek New Testament (see below). Perhaps Nida's greatest contribution lies in the field of translation theory and practice. In his role as a teacher of future linguists and translators as well as in his more global role of consultant for missionary translators his influence has been profound—exceeded perhaps only by the influence exerted by the constant flow of his writings. He has done fieldwork in over 85 countries and in over 200 languages. Nida early came to emphasize dynamic and functional equivalence across languages and cultures as the key to successful translation. As linguistics has evolved during his scholarly life he has interacted with and made his own contributions to such developments as discourse analysis (textlinguistics) and sociolinguistics. From his early 1947 work Bible Translation a steady stream of publications has followed. Running rather to books than articles his production has been of two sorts: (a) such general works as those already mentioned and exemplified in the bibliography; and (b) special manuals for translators of given books of the Bible (not indicated in the bibliography). The latter have been variously authored, coauthored, and/or edited by Nida, and cover a dozen or so books of the New Testament as well as the book of Ruth. In these manuals Nida has displayed a fine sensitivity to and uncanny prescience of passages where translators of the scriptures are likely to encounter lexical problems, cultural mismatches, syntactic tangles, and problems in textual cohesion and coherence. Nida's outstanding achievement latterly has been The Greek Lexicon of the New Testament based on Semantic Domains (1988). This embodies a new
departure in lexicography. Here words of similar semantic domains are so grouped as to give insight into the lexical structure of the Koine Greek. Nida has belonged to a number of learned societies which reflect his varied interests. Besides the American Anthropological Association, the Linguistic Society of Canada and the United States, The American Association for Applied Linguistics, and the Society of Biblical Literature, they include the Linguistic Society of America (President 1968) and the Society for Textual Scholarship (President 1987-88). In addition to the works already mentioned, representative pieces of his work are cited below. See also: Bible; Bible Translations, Modern Period.
Bibliography Louw J P, Nida E A (eds.) 1988 The Greek Lexicon of the New Testament based on Semantic Domains, 2 vols. United Bible Societies, New York Nida E A 1947 Bible Translation. American Bible Society, New York Nida E A 1950 Learning a Foreign Language. National Council of Churches, New York Nida E A 1952 God's Word in Man's Languages. Harper. New York Nida E A 1975 Exploring Semantic Structures. Wilhelm Fink Verlag, Munich Nida E A 1975 Componential Analysis of Meaning. Mouton. The Hague Nida E A, Reyburn W 1981 Meaning Across Cultures. Orbis, Maryknoll, NY Nida E A 1983 Style and Discourse. United Bible Societies. Cape Town Waard J de, Nida E A 1986 From One Language to Another: Functional Equivalence in Bible Translating. Nelson. Nashville, TN
Nobili, Roberto de (1579-1656) F. X. Clooney
Roberto de Nobili, a member of the Society of Jesus and a Catholic priest, arrived in India in 1605. Soon thereafter he was sent to the city of Madurai in the interior of Tamil Nadu, an area beyond Portuguese control and in which only one Jesuit was working. Early on de Nobili observed that there were few conversions, particularly among the high class brahmins, recognized as the traditional leaders of society. He decided that the problem was the alien mode in which the Christian message reached the Indian context. Because the missionaries were largely 462
ignorant of Indian culture and clumsy in their characterizations of what they did know, they were unable to approach learned Indians in a way that would be intelligible and persuasive. In response, de Nobili devised a strategy for better communication. He drastically transformed his appearance and lifestyle, adopting as his own the customs of sannyasins, i.e., renunciant figures widely respected for their austerity and spirituality. He also immersed himself in the study of Sanskrit, the classical language of brahmanical religion and culture, and Tamil, the
Noldeke, Theodor (1836-1930) local vernacular language. He seems to have become proficient in both, and possibly in Telugu, another vernacular language, as well. His more specific contributions to the area of religion and language are three. First, de Nobili authored numerous works in Tamil, including theological treatises and a multivolume catechism. Though not as famous a stylist as the eighteenth century Jesuit Constantine Beschi, S. J., de Nobili's Tamil prose is clear and straightforward and served well as a tool for communication. Second, while we have no certain examples of his Sanskrit writings, we can say with certainty that de Nobili was proficient in reading and interpreting Sanskrit. He seems to have read widely in Sanskrit literature, despite the difficulties attendant upon obtaining access to texts. For example, The Report on Indian Customs is a Latin treatise in which de Nobili defends his view of Indian culture; in it he closely analyzes portions of the Sanskrit-language texts such as The Laws of Manu, and shows himself to be an astute interpreter of the subtleties of the language. Third, de Nobili saw his linguistic expertise as in the service of his philosophical and religious conviction that truth is universal and objective; cultural and linguistic differences, however large, are always less potent than universally shared realities. Accordingly, de Nobili held that language is a reliable vehicle for
cross-cultural communication; properly used, every sophisticated language is a reliable vehicle for explaining reality objectively. Even complex philosophical and theological ideas could be successfully translated from language to language, technical Latin vocabulary rendered in technical Sanskrit. While we have no independent reports of Hindu reactions to de Nobili's writings, contemporary Christian accounts suggest that he was successful in communicating his ideas, winning the respect of Hindu listeners, and in persuading at least some to accept the truth as he expressed it. See also: Sanskrit, Discovery by Europeans; Missionaries.
Bibliography Amaladass A, Clooney F X 2000 Preaching Wisdom to the Wise: Three Treatises by Roberto de Nobili, S. J., Missionary and Scholar in 17th Century India. Institute of Jesuit Sources, St. Louis Sauliere A 1995 In: Rajamanickam S (ed.) His Star in the East, de Nobili Research Institute, Madras and Gujarat Sahitya Prakash, Anand, Gujarat Rajamanickam S 1972 The First Oriental Scholar, de Nobili Research Institute, Tirunelveli Zupanov I G 1999 Disputed Mission: Jesuit Experiments and Brahmanical Knowledge in Seventeenth-Century India. Oxford University Press, Delhi
Noldeke, Theodor (1836-1930) A. Shivtiel
Noldeke was one of the leading Orientalists and, according to H. J. Polotsky (see Polotsky, Hans (Hayyim) Jacob), 'the master of Semitists,' in the world. He was born in Harburg, Germany, and taught Oriental philology first at Kiel University (1864-72) and later at the University of Strasburg (1872-1906). He was awarded, at the age of 23, one of the special prizes of the Academic Fran?aise for his important work Geschichte des Qordns (1860) which is still considered one of the fundamental studies on the history of the Qu'ran. Noldeke is well-known for the 'series' of grammars of the Semitic languages he published, of which the most important are Grammatik der neu-syrischen Sprache (1868), Manddische Grammatik (1875), Kurzgefasste Syrische Grammatik (1880), Zur Grammatik des classischen Arabisch (1897), and also for his monographs Die semitischen Sprachen (1887), Beitrdge zur semitischen Sprachwissenschaft (1904), and Neue Beitrdge zur semitischen Sprachwis-
senschaft (1910). His article on the Semitic languages included in the eleventh edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica, though out-of-date, is also regarded as an important introduction to the Semitic languages and literatures known at the time. Ugaritic, Eblaite, and several dialects of the various Semitic languages are not dealt with in this article because they were discovered just before or after Noldeke's death. He published also a large number of works on Biblical and post-Biblical themes including works on various cultures mentioned in the Old Testament and the history of its peoples. Among those which are worth mentioning are his article on the Moabite Inscription known as the Mesha Stele, which was discovered in Jordan in 1868; The Old Testament Literature (1868; French translation 1873); and Study of the Old Testament Criticism (1869). Noldeke's wide scope of research contains also works on the History of the Jews in Arabia (1864);
463
Biographies Sketches from Eastern History (1892), which include articles on Semitic themes (appeared also in English); and the Aramaic documents from Elephantine (1907). His interest in the Oriental languages, literatures, and cultures had exceeded the limits of Semitica, since among his prolific crop are works on Persian themes (1892), the national Persian epic (1896), and the history of the Persians and the Arabs in the Sasanid period (1879). In addition, he published many book reviews, various translations of texts, mainly from Arabic and Persian, and provided the introductions for several important works published by some of his contemporary scholars. Noldeke's contribution to the field of Oriental studies is invaluable and his multifarious and variegated research puts him in the front rank of the world's most famous philologists of the Near East. He was an acknowledged scholar on Semitica whose expertise is reflected by his monumental works, mainly on the languages of the East, which continue to serve as essential tools in the hands of linguists, historians, and scholars dealing with
religions and cultures of the Orient. Noldeke's writings are characterized by their erudition and great precision. This is, as J. Flick (p. 217) says, thanks to his common sense and his ability to say 'I do not know' whenever he was not certain. Finally, some contemporary Jewish and Israeli scholars, who all acknowledge Noldeke's scholarly achievements, like to note with Schadenfreude his skepticism, expressed in his article on the Semitic languages published in the eleventh edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica, regarding the success of the attempts of the revival of Hebrew and the establishment of a Jewish state in Palestine. See also'. Semitic Languages. Bibliography Bezold C (ed.) 1906 Orientalische Studien Theodor Noldeke zum siebzigsten Geburtstag, 2 vols. Verlag von A Toperman, Giessen Encyclopedia Judaica 1971 Noldeke, Theodor. Keter Publishing House, Jerusalem. Fuck J 1955 Die arabischen Studien in Europa. O. Harrassowitz, Leipzig
Oldendorp, Christian Georg Andreas (1721-87) G. G. Gilbert
Oldendorp was born in Grossenlafferte, Germany, in the bishopric of Hildesheim, the son of the local pastor, and died in Ebersdorf. He attended the Gymnasium in Hildesheim and the University of Jena. In 1743, he joined the Unitas Fratrum in Marienborn, and was sent by them to the Danish Virgin Islands in 1767-68 to prepare a history of the mission there. The only known likeness of him was done by Hamerich in Amsterdam in 1777, an oil painting preserved in the Moravian Archives in Herrnhut, Germany. In the same year, his Geschichte der Mission (Virgin Islands) was published, abridged to about one-third of its original length by a Moravian editor. After his return from the Virgin Islands, he married Sister Anna Cornelio Labelingh at Hennersdorf; two sons were born to them. In his later years, he lived and preached at Amsterdam, Kleinwelle, Gnadau, Barby, and Ebersdorf. Churchman, writer, scholar, naturalist, anthropologist, Africanist, Creolist, and artist, the manyfaceted Oldendorp was an astute observer who was both very much a product of his age and yet distinctly in advance of it. He was sent to the Danish Virgin Islands for the sole purpose of preparing a history of the mission there, but in line with his many interests, took the opportunity to prepare a many464
sided description of their natural, political, ecclesiastic, and human history, as well as of contemporary life in the islands as he was able to observe it at firsthand. His original 3,273-page handwritten report (the original and a copy are preserved in the Moravian Brethren Archives, Herrnhut) was whittled down to about one-third its former size and finally published in a multilated state. The original work, which is without doubt the finest surviving eighteenth-century description of any part of the West Indies, remains unpublished. For the history of Creolistics, Oldendorp's insightful account of Negerhollands is nothing short of sensational. Grammatical and sociolinguistic information is provided in a 53-page section of the original manuscript, as well as in a separate German-Negerhollands dictionary (Criolisches Worterbuch. Erster zu vermehrender, und, wo no tig, zu verbessernder Versuch). The four bland pages devoted to Negerhollands that found their way into the published version do no justice to Oldendorp's original. No wonder that neither Schuchardt nor Hesseling was able to detect anything of interest in the book. Oldendorp's numerous sociolinguistic observations, together with the formal grammatical description and what he calls his 'first try' at a
Panini dictionary of Negerhollands, are an indication of his importance to the study of pidgins and Creoles. More so than Schumann and Magens, and perhaps even Schuchardt, Oldendorp can be seen as the father of Creolistics. See also: Caribbean Syncretistic Religions 1: Cuban Santeria and Haitian Voodoo; Caribbean Syncretistic Religions 2: Jamaican Cumina and Trinidadian Shango; Macumba; American Spirituals. Bibliography Gilbert G G 1986 Oldendorp's History and other early Creole materials in the Moravian Brethren Archives, Herrnhut. The Carrier Pidgin 14(1): 5-7 Highfield A R, Barac V 1987a Translators' introduction. In: Highfield A R, Barac V 1987b Highfield A R, Barac V 1987b A Caribbean Mission. English transl. of Oldendorp 1777. Karoma, Ann Arbor, MI
Markey T 1982 Report on the Moravian Brethren Archives in Herrnhut, and Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. The Carrier Pidgin 10(4): 4-5 Oldendorp C G A 1752-57 Imanuelsburg (an epic poem of 584 pages). Unpublished ms. Orellan, Livonia Oldendorp C G A 1767-68 51 Sketches of Life in the Virgin Islands. Only 3 were published, in the Geschichte der Mission 1777; the remainder are in the collections of the Moravian Brethren Archives, Herrnhut Oldendorp C G A 1777 Geschichte der Mission der evangelischen Briider auf den caraibischen Inseln S. Thomas, S. Croix und S. Jan, 2 vols. Herausgegeben durch Johan Jakob Bossard. Christian Friedrich Laur, Barby. English transl. Highfield A R, Barac V 1987b Oldendorp C G A Unpublished poetry, letters, diary (apparently lost), and an 80-page critique of Bossard's revision of his published book. Moravian Brethren Archives, Herrnhut Oldendorp C G A 1987 Lebenslauf (begun by Oldendorp and completed by an unknown person). English transl. in Highfield A R, Barac V 1987b
Panini F. Staal
Panini, the greatest grammarian of all time, author of the 'Eight Chapters' or Astadhyayi with its various accessories, was born probably in the fifth or fourth century BCE at Salatura on the Upper Indus, at that time part of the Achaemenid Empire but now in Pakistan, not far from Kashmir. The information about Panini's birthplace is largely based upon traditional accounts and references of much later date, but the Chinese pilgrim Hsiian Tsang visited Salatura in the seventh century BCE and saw a statue there erected in his memory. The date of Panini has been much discussed in the light of the two kinds of evidence that are available. The first is that the state of the Sanskrit language that Panini describes corresponds most closely to late Vedic prose, that is, the Aranyakas early Upanisads, and sutras of the domestic ritual (grhyasutra). Panini composed his grammar at a time when Vedic prose works were still being composed. This would put him around, or a little after, the middle of the last millennium BCE, not too distant from the date of Buddha (who seems later than the earliest Upanisads but earlier than the others). The second kind of evidence is chronology relative to the date of the commentators. Panini's sutras were the subject of an analysis by Katyayana, which was taken up by Patanjali in his Great Commentary (Mahabhasyd). Patanjali's date is known: he lived
around 150 BCE, the date of the king Pusyamitra, who is quoted in his illustration of the use of the present tense: We are now officiating at Pusyamitra's ritual.
Scholars have doubted the value of this attribution and argued that Patanjali might have taken the illustration from an earlier source, but it is unlikely that a grammarian of his distinction could have done so unthinkingly and without adapting existing examples to the time in which he lived. The language described by Patanjali has changed in some respects from the language described by Panini, but since it is not known how fast or slowly languages change in general or under specific circumstances, speculation sets in at this point. If the gaps between Panini and Katyayana and between Katyayana and Patanjali are believed to be each about a century or a century and a half, Panini's date can be set at about the fifth or fourth century BCE, which would support and be supported by the first kind of evidence. O. von Hiniiber (1989: 34) has argued for a later date within that period on the strength of numismatic evidence. Invoking J. Cribb, according to whom punch-marked coins of the Greek-Iranian type appear in northwest India only after 400 BCE, and Panini (5.2.120), which accounts for the formation of 465
Biographies rupya in the sense of 'punched, punch-marked,' he has concluded that Panini's date must be later than 400 BCE. Panini mentions 10 predecessors by name, and the type of linguistic analysis of the Pratisakhyas obviously antedates him. It may also be assumed that he stood on the shoulders of giants whose work was eclipsed by his own. The most important respects in which the scientific methodology of Panini differs from the particularistic and corpus-oriented approach of the Pratisakhyas are that his grammar applies to the spoken language and indiscriminately to all the Vedic schools, and that it is based upon the insight that language is infinite. At the same time, Panini's method has much in common with that of the Vedic ritualists. Renou (1941-42), who was the first to study in detail the terminological and stylistic similarities between these two sciences, wrote: When dealing with a particular term, it is not easy to establish whether it originated with the grammarians or the ritualists: in the absence of a fixed chronology of texts, and with the general parallelism of techniques in ancient India, such a search becomes arbitrary. However, in the majority of cases it is clear that the point of departure lies in the religious texts. Grammar appears as a specialized investigation within the larger domain of explicit ritual science. The extent and importance of the religious literature, the undeniable priority of the mantras and of the ritual forms which they presuppose, invite us to look for origins in that domain.
In one important respect, the evidence that confirms Renou's view is very specific: the concepts of sutra and paribhasa, basic ingredients of Panini's linguistics, were introduced by the Vedic ritualist Baudhayana, who was earlier than Panini (see Sutra). Baudhayana's work is known as pravacana, which, according to Caland's universally accepted interpretation, refers to 'the fixation of ritual in the oral tradition.' Panini's work, then, is rooted in two oral traditions: that of the ritual sutras and that of the Padapatha and the Pratisakhyas. Although his Sivasutras intentionally deviate from it, Panini was obviously familiar with the scientific arrangement of sounds in the Pratisakhyas, which, unlike the haphazard ABCS of the west which depend on writing, originated not in spite of the absence of writing but because of it. The Vedic and ritual background of Panini's linguistics has led to the idea that Indian linguistics is rooted in religion and magic and is therefore something altogether different from 'modern science.' If this magic approach were correct, comparisons with late twentieth-century linguistics would seem to be anachronistic. The magic view is based, however, 466
upon three misconceptions. First, any effort at understanding a different point of view is unavoidably comparative (Staal 1970). Second, the Indian preoccupation with ritual was not only magical or religious but also scientific. And third, a science is measured by its results and consequences, not by its background or origins. If the hypothesis were adopted that science depends on context and circumstances such as the beliefs of the people who help to create it, then Pythagoras theorem would be rejected because he believed in reincarnation, Kepler's astronomy because of his astrology, Newton's physics because of his theology, and most of chemistry because of alchemy. On the contrary, and in accordance with the principles of selection that govern biological evolution, what people do is remember the science and, unless they are historians, forget about the rest. Panini adhered to the erroneous belief that Sanskrit was eternal and unchanging. He never imagined that Vedic was older than, or a precursor of, classical Sanskrit or Prakrit. These beliefs did not prevent him from creating the conceptual tools that enabled Western scholars to account for sound laws explaining the vowel shifts between early IndoEuropean, English, German, and other languages. Panini's beliefs, moreover, led to a grammar that was the very embodiment of the system of synchronic analysis that Saussure envisaged but did not create. Panini, then, was not an ancient and nebulous precursor of a science in which everything has since been done better, but a distant colleague of genius from whom linguists are still able to learn. Bibliography Bronkhorst J 1981 The orthoepic diaskeuasis of the Rgveda and the date of Panini. Indo-Iranian Journal 23: 83-95 Cardona G 1969 Studies in Indian Grammarians I: The Method of Description Reflected in the Sivasulras. American Philosophical Society, Philadelphia, PA Cardona G 1980 Panini: A Survey of Research. Motilal Banarsidass, Delhi Deshpande M M 1994 Sanskrit and Prakrit: Socio-linguistic Issues. Motilal Banarsidass, Delhi Hiniiber O von 1989 Der Beginn der Schrift und fruhe Schriftlichkeit in Indien. Franz Steiner Verlag, Stuttgart Liebich B 1891 Panini: Ein Beitrag :ur Kenntnis der indischen Literatur und Grammatik. Haessel, Leipzig Renou L 1941-42 Les connexions entre le rituel et la grammaire en Sanskrit. Journal asiatique 233: 105-65 Renou L 1969 Panini. In: Sebeok T A (ed.) Current Trends in Linguistics, vol. 5. Mouton, The Hague _ Staal F 1970 Review of Cardona 1969. Lg 46: 502-07 Staal F 1972 A Reader on the Sanskrit Grammarians. MIT Press, Cambridge, MA Staal F 1988 Vniversals: Studies in Indian Logic and Linguistics. Chicago University Press, Chicago, IL Staal F 1989 The independence of rationality from literacy. European Journal of Sociology 30: 301-10
Pike, Kenneth Lee (1912-2000)
Petrus Hispanus (c. 1210-76) F. P. Dinneen
Hispanus was a logician, physician, and churchman of the thirteenth century. Born in Lisbon between 1210 and 1220, Peter Julian did his university studies in Paris (where he acquired 'Hispanus'). He studied logic, Aristotle's Physics and Metaphysics under Albert the Great, and Medicine, as well as Theology under John of Parma. After 1245, he taught Medicine in Siena. As physician to Pope Gregory X from 1272, his Thesaurus Pauperum became an authoritative medical text. He became a bishop, a cardinal, then Pope John XXI in 1276. He died 8 months later when a newly built study collapsed on him. His Summulae Logicales was a standard introduction to dialectic's basic rules and sophistical examples for five centuries, in very many editions. Dialecticians assume what is said is to be interpreted literally ('Dogs bark so a seadog must bark') and they exploit language logic to defend their own expressions and expose an opponent's contradictions. The Summulae treated logical implications of the grammatical properties of words as a modern addition to the traditional logic of Aristotle's Organon. Such properties included 'supposition' (what men stands for in Men are mortal), 'copulation' (are links men and mortal), 'appellation' (7 and you must exist, men may not), and 'ampliation' (all adds reference to possible men to that of actual ones in all men are mortal). Supposition (reference) varies with linguistic structure while a fixed signification (sense) does not. A categorematic expression (like men and mortal) is a referring term and can be a logical subject or predicate. Syncategorematics (like all and nearly)
are nonreferring expressions. They are not terms as Hispanus defined them for logic, so they cannot function as subjects or predicates. Syncategorematics vary a term's supposition (as in nearly tall men) as do categorematics by mutually determining how many things words refer to when in construction with each other (like tall blond honest men). While the Summulae''?, dialectic purpose was practical, Hispanus also made metalogical distinctions (like the function of subject versus what is the subject) and stressed that dialectic focuses on nominals and verbals, while the grammarian's data is broader. His mainly lexical semantics may have been extended by a tract on syncategorematic expressions attributed to him. That included the semantic import of conjunctions like quin 'without' in expressions like It cannot be a man without being an animal. See also: Linguistic theory in the Later Middle Ages; Aquinas, T.; Aristotle and the Stoics on Language. Bibliography Bochenski I M 1961 (trans. Thomas I) History of Formal Logic. Notre Dame University Press, South Bend, IN Dinneen F P (trans.) 1990 Peter of Spain: Language in Dispute. Benjamins, Amsterdam Mullaly J P 1964 Peter of Spain Tractatus Syncategorematum. Marquette, Milwaukee, WI Rijk L M de 1972 Petrus Hispanus Portugalensis. Van Gorcum, Assen
Pike, Kenneth Lee (1912-2000) R. E. Longacre
Pike was born in 1912 in Woodstock, Connecticut. He graduated BA from Gordon College, Boston, Massachusetts; and PhD in Linguistics 1942 from the University of Michigan. While his immediate mentor was Charles Fries, as a graduate student he studied under Edward Sapir and Leonard Bloomfield at Summer Institutes of the Linguistic Society of America, where he also made the acquaintance of prominent American structuralists, such as Swadesh, Trager, Bloch, Hockett, and Harris. Pike became an associate professor at the University of Michigan in 1948, a full professor in 1955, and continued there
until his retirement in 1978 (as professor emeritus), and his subsequently becoming an adjunct professor at the University of Texas in Arlington. Much of Pike's earlier work was shaped by his experience with native languages of Mexico. He began the study of Mixtec in 1935 as a member of a group which eventually became known as the Summer Institute of Linguistics (SIL) (see Summer Institute of Linguistics) and the Wycliffe Bible Translators. Pike not only contributed to the translation of the New Testament into Mixtec, but has served on many occasions as consultant to 467
Biographies linguist translators throughout the world. Pike served as President of SIL from 1942 to 1979, and as President of the Linguistic Society of America in 1961. In the 1940s Pike published four works on phonology, of which Phonetics (1943) is the bestknown; it remains the most encyclopedic compendium of speech sounds encountered in languages (other works from this decade are Pike 1945, 1947, 1948). In the 1950s Pike's interests shifted to grammar and human behavior in general, as exemplified in his monumental work Language in Relation to a Unified Theory of the Structure of Human Behavior. What is perhaps his most far-ranging contribution was made at this time, i.e., the coining of the terms 'etic'/ 'emic'—as clips from (phon)etic and (phon)emic. The opposition indicated by the two terms is that between the outside/universalistic/observer-oriented description of a culture trait or complex (including language), versus the inside/particularistic/participant-oriented description. This distinction, as embodied in the terms 'etic'/'emic,' while not having attained wide currency among linguists, has been adopted by scholars in many other disciplines, especially anthropology. The spread of the terms led to a public debate at the AAA meeting in Tucson, 1987 as to their use and significance (Headland et al. 1989). The variety of grammar theory which Pike has developed since the 1950s has come to be called 'tagmemics'. Pike redefined Bloomfield's tagmeme and treated it as a paradigmatic slot-filler unit within a syntagmatic unit (cf. Saussure; see Saussure, Ferdinand (-Mongiri) de), but the theory has been elaborated considerably beyond its starting points. Pike's wife, Evelyn, coauthored with him Grammatical Analysis (1972), based on tagmemics and used as a textbook in various countries. A cogent and brief statement of Pike's linguistic creed is the volume Linguistic Concepts (1982).
Such a summary as this gives little evidence of the breadth of Pike's research and publications; the latter total up to some 20 books and 150 articles, some of which are coauthored. 'Grammatical prerequisites for phonemic analysis' (Word3: 55-72, 1947) came in a day when most linguists insisted on a categorical separation of phonology from grammar. 'A problem in morphology-syntax division' (Ada Linguistica 5: 125-38, 1949) challenged another rigid dichotomy made by many in his day. His volume on rhetoric with Young and Becker (1970) provided a textbook for applying his theory to rhetoric and composition. Further works ranged over into comparative reconstruction, Christian apologetics, theology, ethics, and poetry. Pike's most recent interest is in the field of philosophy and language (see, e.g., Pike 1987). Bibliography Brend R 1972 Selected Writings to Commemorate the 60th Birthday of Kenneth Lee Pike. Mouton, The Hague Headland P, Pike K L, Harris M 1989 Ernies and Etics: The Insider/Outsider Debate. Sage, Beverley Hills, CA Pike E G 1981 Ken Pike, Scholar and Christian. Summer Institute of Linguistics, Dallas, TX Pike K L 1943 Phonetics: A Critical Analysis of Phonetic Theory. University of Michigan Press, Ann Arbor, MI Pike K L 1945 The Intonation of American English. University of Michigan Press, Ann Arbor, MI Pike K L 1947 Phonemics: A Technique for Reducing Languages to Writing. University of Michigan Press. Ann Abor, MI Pike K L 1948 Tone Languages. University of Michigan Press, Ann Abor, MI Pike K L 1967 Language in Relation to a Unified Theory of the Structure of Human Behavior. Mouton, The Hague Pike K L 1982 Linguistic Concepts. University of Nebraska Press, Lincoln, NB Pike K L 1987 The relation of language to the world. International Journal of Dravidian Linguistics 16: 77-98 Pike K L, Pike E G 1982 Grammatical Analysis, rev. edn. Summer Institute of Linguistics, Dallas. TX Young R E, Becker A L, Pike K L 1970 Rhetoric: Discovery and Change. Harcourt, Brace and World, New York
Planudes, Maximus (1260-1310) R. H. Robins
Planudes was a Byzantine linguistic scholar living in the later years of the Eastern Empire. Like a number of other prominent Byzantines, he served as a teacher, writer, diplomat, and ecclesiastical authority. He was one of the few later Greek scholars having a full command of Latin, and among his writings are several translations of Latin philosophical and literary works. 468
He was sent to Italy in 1295-96 to present the Greek case in Venice during the period when Byzantium was seeking reconciliation and assistance from the West as the Turkish threat grew ever stronger. On the theological controversy about the nature of the Trinity he appears to have been ambivalent, first taking the Latin position and later moving back to the Eastern Orthodox view.
Polotsky, Hans (Hayyim) Jacob (1905-91) His publications were numerous on a variety of topics; his Anthology is the best-known. But as far as linguistics is concerned his two extant works are the Dialogue on Grammar and On Syntax (both edited by Bachmann 1828). Like other Byzantine grammarians he saw it as his duty to provide teaching material for those engaged in maintaining and transmitting the traditional Greek language and its Classical literature. But Planudes went further than other Byzantines into the abstraction of some fundamental concepts and relations within the structure of the language. His principal theoretical achievements were a subtle analysis of the semantics of the Greek verbal tense system and a comparable analysis of the meanings of the nominal cases. The meanings of the Greek tenses involve more than the time references past, present, and future, and, as in many languages, formal expression is given in the verbal morphology to the aspectual distinction of complete and incomplete, as is indicated by the terms 'perfect' and 'imperfect.' The Stoics had made a full analysis of this, but, despite the use of some Stoic terminology, the later grammarians tried to force the distinctions of meaning in every tense into the temporal framework originating in Aristotle. Planudes came as near to an explicit account of the temporal and the aspectual senses as was possible within the unidimensional theory of tense meanings. Planudes is also considered by some linguists to have made the first coherent formulation of what has come to be known as the localist theory of case, in which the various oblique case meanings are referred back to the locational concepts: whence, where, and whither, ideas that had been treated in a less
systematic and coherent form by grammarians of later Antiquity and earlier Byzantine times. Others, who are unwilling to give any credit to Byzantine originality, reject this judgment. Each viewpoint is set out in Murru (1979) and in Blank (1987), with full bibliographies up to their dates of publication. A localist theory has been supported by Wullner (1827), Bopp (1833: 136), and Anderson (1977). A succinct account of the theory is given in Hjelmslev (1935: 13-32). There is no biography separately written on Planudes, but reference may be made to the article on him in Pauly-Wissowa's Realenzyklopddie der Altertumswissenschaft, where a full bibliography of his works is given. See also: Byzantine Greek; Linguistic Theory in the Later Middle Ages. Bibliography Anderson J M 1977 The Grammar of Case. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge Bachmann L (ed.) 1828 Anecdota Graeca. Hinrichs, Leipzig Blank D L 1987 Apollonius and Maximus on the order and meaning of the oblique cases. In: Taylor D J (ed.) The History of Linguistics in the Classical Period. Benjamins, Amsterdam Bopp F 1833 Vergleichende Grammatik des Sanskrit, Zend, Griechischen, Lateinischen, Lithauischen, Gotischen und Deutschen. Dummler, Berlin Hjelmslev L 1935 La Categorie des Cas. Universitetsforlaget, Aarhus Murru F 1979 Sull'origine della teoria localista di Massimo Planude. L'Antiquite Classique 48: 82-97 Wullner F 1827 Die Bedeutung der sprachlichen Casus und Modi. Coppenrath, Minister
Polotsky, Hans (Hayyim) Jacob (1905-91) A. Shivitiel
Polotsky, an Israeli Orientalist and philologist, was born in Zurich and studied in the universities of Berlin and Gottingen. After his participation in the Septuagint Project in Gottingen and the publication of Manichaean texts, he decided to emigrate to Palestine where he began to teach at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem (1934), and later became a professor of Egyptology and Semitica (1948). His profound knowledge of philology and general linguistics, his 'text analysis ability,' and his amazing mastery of numerous languages made his contribution to many areas invaluable. A rough count of the languages with which he was conversant exceeds 40, from East and West, including dead languages, but not including the scores of various dialects of the
languages with which he was familiar. Polotsky published invaluable material on Ancient Egyptian and Coptic, Latin and Greek, Hebrew and Arabic, Syriac and neo-Syriac, Turkish, and other UralAltaic languages, and the various languages of Ethiopia. His wide knowledge of all European languages and some of the languages spoken in central Asia and the Far East helped him in his comparative studies, quite often between languages of different origins, such as Amharic and Turkish (1960). He published short monographs such as Etudes de grammaire gourage (1938) (an English version entitled Notes on Gurage Grammar appeared in 1951) and Etudes de syntaxe Copte (1938). His collected papers published in one volume (1971) 469
Biographies contain a wide scope of languages and their grammar and syntax. Polotsky's originality in reaching some of the most remarkable conclusions regarding the structures of the grammars investigated was achieved mainly thanks to the living and up-to-date material he collected assiduously. He was well known for his private collections of data (vocabulary and grammar) on all the languages he studied, as well as those he knew but did not write about. He received the Israel Prize (1965) for his important work in the fields of linguistics and Semitica, and many other tokens of acknowledgment in recognition of his contribution to the development of the disciplines handled by him. Polotsky's list of publications is relatively small in comparison with the number of areas and disciplines of which he had a firm knowledge, but his writings are characterized by terseness and precision. His descriptions, definitions, and presentation of the problems are always succinct and concise, and the solutions offered are both original and convincing, reflecting his analytical mind and his profound knowledge. These qualities can easily be concluded from general articles such as 'Semitics' (1964), in which he guides the reader through the often unmarked territory of Semitica, or his article 'Aramaic, Syriac and Ge'ez' (1964), in which he
establishes precisely the relationship between these three languages and demarcates the unmistakable influence of Aramaic on ecclesiastical Ge'ez (Ullendorff 1973: 134). Moreover, Polotsky's typical methods of investigation have always linked the past with the present, as the solutions offered were not only concluded from comparative analysis with other languages but also through comparative analysis of the various strata of which the language or the dialect consists. As E. Y. Kutscher (1972: 838) says, '[Polotsky] proved that synchronic problems of certain dialects can be solved by comparative dialectology plus the diachronic approach.' See also: Semitic Languages; Ullendorff, E. Bibliography Kutscher E Y 1872 Polotsky, H. J. In: Encyclopaedia Judaica, vol. 13. Keter Publishing House, Jerusalem Rosen H B (ed.) 1964 Studies in Egyptology and Linguistics in Honour of H J Polotsky. Israel Exploration Society, Jerusalem Smith H S, Johnson P V 1973 Review of Polotsky's Collected Papers. Journal of Semitic Studies 18: 129-40 Ullendorff E 1973 The Ethiopians, 3rd edn. Oxford University Press, Oxford
Postel, Guillaume (1510-81) R. E. Asher
Author of numerous books in French and Latin, more than 40 of which were published and many of the rest of which are still extant in manuscript form in the Bibliotheque Nationale in Paris, the British Library in London, and elsewhere, Guillaume Postel was one of the most remarkable figures of the Renaissance. While there is no doubt that he died on September 6, 1581, the date of his birth is less certain. The most widely accepted year is 1510, but stories that he lived well into a second century have led to claims that he was born as early as 1475. This would make him a very late developer as an author, in that his first book was published in or about 1538. A man of great eccentricity and wild enthusiasms, Postel was not without enemies, both real and imagined, yet he was a much loved personality and a profoundly esteemed scholar who could count among his admirers J. J. Scaliger (see Scaliger, Joseph Justus). Because of his ideas—seen variously as visionary, outrageous, and insane—Postel's life was one of constant vicissitudes. He was dismissed from a lectureship at what is now known as the College de 470
France in 1542, expelled from the Jesuit order in 1545, forbidden to teach in public 1553, wrongly arrested for murder in 1555, and imprisoned for suspected heresy later the same year. He found being declared mad in this last instance a poor compensation for not being judged a heretic. For the last 19 years of his life he was detained in a monastery with only limited freedom of movement. One of Postel's lifelong obsessions was his scheme for a universal Christian monarchy with the King of France at its head. This goal he saw as dependent on the defeat of the Turks. Yet he was far from seeing the Turks as barbarians and he had a deep respect for their religion (see Asher 1993: 55-6). His aim was the concord of the world (see Bouwsma 1957) and his preoccupation with this aspect of his plan has led some modern scholars to see his thought as anticipating the ecumenism of the late-twentieth century (see Cousins 1985). Postel's knowledge of Islam was based on an ability to read Arabic texts, for he was one of the most accomplished linguists of his day. One major
Priestley, Joseph (1733-1804) project in which he was involved was the Polyglot Bible, following a proposal he made in 1565 that this sacred text should be translated into five languages. Yet when the resulting edition of the Bible in Hebrew, Chaldaic, Greek, and Latin was eventually published by Plantin in Antwerp in 1571, Postel's name did not appear in the preface, the reason being that he was still suspect to the more orthodox elements in the Church. He had, nevertheless, made a major contribution both directly and through the training of those of his students who were involved. Many of Postel's writings, whatever their subject, display an interest in language and part of his argumentation for a universal Christian monarchy is based on his linguistic theories. He believed that world unity was more likely to be achieved if there was a wider knowledge of languages, and he went so far as to recommend that Arabic should be taught in schools. A number of his earliest publications were devoted exclusively to linguistic matters, for he saw language as being innate in man, God's greatest gift to man, and that which distinguishes mankind from all other living beings. Among languages he was particularly fascinated by Hebrew (1538a) and Arabic (1538c), and he wrote about their particularly close relationship—a fact that has led to his being described as the first comparative linguist. In his book on Hebrew, however, he does take it as the source of all languages. His most daring endeavor was a book on 12 different languages (Postel 1538b),
in the introduction to which he writes favorably of the study of grammar by such scholars as Lefevre d'Etaples, Erasmus, and Thomas Linacre. See also: Myths About Language. Bibliography Asher R E 1993 National Myths in Renaissance France: Francus, Samothes and the Druids. Edinburgh University Press, Edinburgh Bouwsma W J 1957 Concordia Mundi: The Career and Thought of Guillaume Postel (1501-81). Harvard University Press, Cambridge, MA Cousins E H 1985 The principle of plenitude applied to world religions: Bonaventure, Postel and contemporary ecumenism. In: Guillaume Postel 1581-1981. Actes du Colloque International d'Avranches 5-10 septembre 1981. Editions de la Maisnie, Paris Kuntz M L 1981 Guillaume Postel, Prophet of the Restitution of All Things: His Life and Thought. Martinus Nijhoff, The Hague Postel G 1538a De originibus seu de Hebraicae linguae & gentis antiquitate, deque variorum linguarum affinitate, liber. Apud Dionysium Lescuier, Parisiis Postel G 1538b Linguarum duodecim characteribus dijferentium alphabetum, introductio, . . . . Apud Dionysium Lescuier, Parisiis Postel G 1538c Grammatica arabica. Apud Petrum Gromorsum, Parisiis Postel G 1543 Alcorani seu legis Mahometi et evangelistarum concordia liber, in quo de calamitatibus orbi Christiana imminentibus tractatur. Petrus Gromorsus, Parisiis
Priestley, Joseph (1733-1804) I. Michael
Priestley considered himself a theologian and a scientist, but circumstances required him for a time to teach languages and literature. His elementary English grammar was popular for its simplicity and common sense. He was born on March 13, 1733, in Yorkshire, but was adopted at the age of 9 years by a prosperous relation. In 1751 he entered Daventry Academy, a nonconformist institution of high standing. After a short time as minister to a congregation in Nantwich he was appointed in 1761 as a tutor at Warrington Academy, where he lectured in belles lettres, languages, history, and other subjects. He was ordained in 1762 and married Mary Wilkinson in the same year. In 1767 he moved to Leeds as minister
of Mill Hill Chapel, and in 1773 to Bowood as librarian to Lord Shelburne, with whom he remained until 1780, when he was appointed a minister to the New Meeting in Birmingham. He moved in 1791 to a chapel in Hackney, and in 1794 he emigrated to Pennsylvania, where he died in 1804. Priestley's enquiring, liberal, and restless mind carried his religious beliefs through a succession of dissenting positions, all reflected in his numerous writings. His final stance was that of Unitarianism. His scientific work, for which he is most famous, showed his imaginative and enquiring qualities but, as did most of his theological writing, it suffered from a restless disinclination to follow through its implications. His liberal political views involved him in a 471
Biographies period of active persecution, but he was by nature happy and open, and his scientific work was supported throughout his life by many friends. Priestley's linguistic works were all composed during a period of a few years. The Rudiments of English Grammar (1761) was written for a school in Nantwich; in a second edition, 1768, it was supplemented by more advanced notes derived from his teaching at Warrington. Seven editions followed up to 1798; in two nineteenth-century editions the grammar was combined with other works by him. The book was simple and short. Priestley was ready to question the Latinate tradition, but it was common sense and a respect for the English language rather than linguistic theory which prompted his unorthodox views about, for example, tense. Priestley thought of his lectures on the theory of language and universal grammar, 1762, as being in some degree scientific, but they show the customary preconceptions about the nature of a 'primitive' language: that it had few abstract terms and was spoken loudly and slowly, in short sentences. His speculations about the
psychological foundations of various linguistic forms are the most original part of the lectures. The lectures on oratory and criticism, given in 1762 but not printed until 1777, draw on both traditional rhetoric and contemporary belles lettres, influenced especially by his admiration for David Hartley and James Harris. Bibliography Crook R E 1966 A Bibliography of Joseph Priestley 1733-1804. Library Association, London Michael I 1970 English Grammatical Categories and the Tradition to 1880. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge Priestley J 1969 [1761] The Rudiments of English Grammar. Adapted to the Use of School: With Observations on Style, Facsimile repr., Scolar Press, Menston Priestley J 1970 [1762] A Course of Lectures on the Theory of Language and Universal Grammar. Facsimile repr., Scolar Press, Menston Priestley J 1968 [1777] A Course of Lectures on Oratory and Criticism, Facsimile repr., Scolar Press, Menston
Rajarajavarma, A. R. (1863-1918) V. R. Prabodhachandran Nayar
Easily the most authoritative of grammarians in Malayalam in his times and after, A. R. Rajarajavarma hailed from a princely family of erstwhile Travancore. He was a pioneer of the renaissance of Malayalam at the beginning of the twentieth century. A gifted poet in both Malayalam and Sanskrit and a skilled translator of Sanskrit poetry and prose into Malayalam, he excelled as a farsighted contributor to the overall planning and development of the Malayalam language. A great teacher who produced distinguished students, he was referred to as the Panini of Kerala after his magnum opus Keralapaniriiyam, which presents a descriptivecum-historico-comparative treatment of the Malayalam language on the lines of the Paninian tradition and that of western grammarians such as Robert Caldwell (see Caldwell, Robert). The first edition of Keralapaniriiyam (1968) was in sutravrtti-bhasya (aphorism, gloss, and commentary) style (see Sutra); it contained 357 formulaic rules and their explanation in detail. The work was thoroughly recast in its second edition (1917) in the karikabhasya (verse and commentary) style, comprising 194 rules. Statements in the Keralapaniriiyam pertain to 472
sociocultural and historical matters; separation of Malayalam and Tamil; phonology, sandhi, parts of speech, inflectional and derivational morphology, differences between case suffixes and postpositions; nominal and verbal compounds; syntactic relations; and etymology. Rajarajavarma evinces a remarkable insight into fundamental principles of coining technical terms acceptable to the speech community. His other writings include graded grammars of Malayalam, restatements of Sanskrit grammar, textbooks on literary composition, poetics, and metrics; annotation of a Kathakali play; translations in simple Malayalam of famous Sanskrit poems and plays; and original compositions in Malayalam of varying length from single quatrains to an historic epic. Born in the Lakshmipuram palace in Changanachery, Rajarajavarma spent his formative years in the Anantapuram palace in Haripad, studying Sanskrit grammar and literature, poetics, astrology, and logic under his illustrious uncle, Keralavarma, reputed as the Kalidasa of Kerala. He was the first from the princely class to attend a public school and have formal education in English. So was he to take a BA
Reinisch, Simon Leo (1832-1919) degree and to join the government service. A graduate in chemistry, he won the prestigious Ross gold medal for his MA in Sanskrit (1891) from the University of Madras. He held, successively, the positions of Inspector of the Sanskrit School; Principal, Sanskrit College; Professor of Sanskrit and Dravidian languages and the first Indian Principal of the Maharaja's College, Trivandrum. He also served on various boards and committees, including the one that considered the establishment of the first University in Kerala. His influence in shaping the sensibilities of the Keralite in
matters of literary appreciation, education, and culture was considerable. See also: Sanskrit; Tamil; Panini. Bibliography Ezhuthachan K N 1975 The History of the Grammatical Theories in Malayalam. Dravidian Linguistics Association, Trivandrum Sankaranarayanan Qhandrika] 1985 A. R. Rajarajavarma—malayalattinte rajasilpi. State Institute of Languages, Trivandrum
Reinisch, Simon Leo (1832-1919) D. L. Appleyard
Simon Leo Reinisch has been called the 'father of Egyptology and Africanistics in Vienna' and is still considered as the pioneer and creator of Cushitic linguistics (see Ancient Egyptian and Coptic). He was born on October 26, 1832 in Osterwitz, Styria, the fifth child of Josef Reinisch and his second wife Elisabeth Spieler. At an early age he showed himself to be an especially gifted child and, after completing his schooling at the Gymnasium in Graz, in 1854 he was enrolled at the University of Vienna. There he began his involvement with Oriental languages, and in particular Ancient Egyptian, to which he was to devote the rest of his life. In 1864, three years after graduating, Reinisch was invited by Archduke Ferdinand Maximilian, the younger brother of the Emperor, to catalog his collection of Egyptian artifacts housed at Miramar. Shortly after that, when Maximilian became Emperor of Mexico, he sent Reinisch to Egypt to add to his collection, and then in 1866 called him to Mexico to be his private secretary. During the year that Reinisch spent there in Maximilian's service, he worked on the indigenous languages of Mexico, with a particular interest in pre- and early post-Columbian manuscripts, which he cataloged. He also prepared a number of grammars of Mexican languages, none of which, unfortunately, ever reached publication. In 1868 he was appointed lecturer in Egyptian archaeology, and in 1873 Professor in Egyptian language and archaeology, at the University of Vienna. During this time he used his profound knowledge of a wide range of languages—Classical European, Ancient Oriental, and now Native American—to embark upon the question of the common
origin of human languages. To his lectures on Egyptian and Coptic in Vienna he began to add unofficial classes on African languages, notably those of the Sudan and the Horn of Africa. The first of his African journeys took place in 1875-76, to the Bogos in Eritrea, to which he returned in 1879-80. The linguistic data that he collected during these journeys provided the material for over 20 books and articles, including several grammars, such as those of Bilin, Chamir, Quara, Kunama, Saho, and Beja, some of which are still the most extensive descriptions of these languages to date. Reinisch had begun his studies at a time when modern linguistic science was in its infancy and much of the methodology that he used is necessarily now out of date. This is true not only in phonological analysis, but also in the fields of language comparison and historical linguistics. Nonetheless, the actual language data that Reinisch recorded are still invaluable. Reinisch's service to the field of Oriental languages was recognized by his country when, first, in 1884, he was elected a full member of the Academy of Sciences and then, in 1899, he was awarded the title of Hofrat. He retired in 1903 to his estate in his native Styria, where he died on December 24, 1919.
Bibliography Mukarovsky H G (ed.) 1987 Leo Reinisch—Werk undErbe. Osterreichische Akadamie der Wissenschaften, Vienna Zaborski A 1976 Cushitic overview. In: Bender M L (ed.) The Non-Semitic Languages of Ethiopia. African Studies Center, Michigan State University, East Lansing, MI
473
Biographies
Renou, Louis (1896-1966) R. E. Asher
A prolific and versatile scholar, Louis Renou was one of the foremost indologists of the twentieth century. Born on October 28, 1896, he took his agregation in 1920, his academic career having been interrupted by service in World War I. His first important publications appeared in 1925. These included two doctoral theses, the main one on the prefect tense in the Vedic hymns (Renou 1925) and the subsidiary one comprising a critical edition and French translation of the section on India in Ptolemy's Geography. Renou's interest in India had been aroused by the Sanskrit scholar Sylvain Levi and his first important appointment was to the chair of Sanskrit and Comparative Grammar at the University of Lyon (1925-28). In 1929 he became professor at the Ecole des Hautes Etudes and in 1937 in the Faculte des Lettres at the Sorbonne. He was Membre de ITnstitut and Chevalier de la Legion d'Honneur. His doctoral research proved to be an indication of the direction Renou was to take subsequently. In the broad pattern of his work there are two main strands: the study of the Vedas and the study of grammar. His study of the language of the Vedas led to the publication of a grammar of Vedic (Renou 1952). As with his work of a similar sort on classical Sanskrit, this was intended to be purely descriptive and deliberately avoided a discussion of the prehistory of the language or indeed of any questions of historical linguistics. He published several translations of Vedic hymns and conceived as a major task a complete translation of the Rgveda. Sadly he died before this was completed. Published work by Renou on classical Sanskrit language is essentially of two sorts. First, there are teaching grammars (e.g., Renou 1930) and monographs on aspects of the grammar of Sanskrit. Second, he produced studies on the work of the Sanskrit grammarians. An important publication emerging from this research was a new translation of Panini's Astadhyayl (1947-54; see Paninf). His translation was based on the seventh-century exegetical work, Kasikavrtti, and in collaboration with
a Japanese scholar, Yutaka Ojihara; he published a translation of this (1960-67), completed after his death. Published over a longer period than either of these was his translation of the twelfth-century grammatical treatise Durghatavrtti of Saranadeva (1940-56). One offshoot of these studies was a book on Sanskrit grammatical terminology (Renou 1942). A major combined outcome of his work on Vedic and classical Sanskrit was the series of Etudes vediques et panineennes, which was started in 1955 and the sixteenth volume of which appeared in the year after his death. The wide range of Renou's other publications includes lexicographical and bibliographical works. There are also important works to which his main contribution was that of editor. Among these are editions of the text of the Upanisads with a French translation, and general studies of Indian civilization. His interests also extended to Indian religion and this led to his being invited to deliver the Jordan Lectures in Comparative Religion in the University of London in 1951 (Renou 1953). See also: Indian Linguistic Tradition; Ritual; Sanskrit; Sanskrit, Discovery by Europeans; Sanskrit (Paninian) Linguistics. Bibliography Filliozat J 1967 Louis Renou et son oeuvre scientifique. Journal asiatique 255: 1-30 Renou L 1925 La valeur du parfait dans les hymnes vediques. Champion, Paris Renou L 1930 Grammaire sanscrite, 2 vols. AdrienMaisonneuve, Paris Renou L 1942 Terminologie grammatical du Sanskrit. 4 parts. Champion, Paris Renou L 1947-54 La grammaire de Panini, traduite du Sanskrit avec des extraits des commentaires indigenes. 3 parts. Klinck-sieck, Paris Renou L 1952 Grammaire de la langue vedique. I AC. Lyon and Paris Renou L 1953 Religions of Ancient India, tr. Asher R E. Raeside I M P. University of London. London
Reuchlin, Johann (1455-1522) G. Lloyd Jones
The three areas of language, literature, and mysticism provide a suitable framework for a brief review of the 474
German savant Johann Reuchlin's lasting contribution to Semitic studies.
Ricci, Matteo (1552-1610) First, there is his expertise as a Hebraist. Under the influence of Pico (1463-94), the 'father' of Christian Kabbalah, Reuchlin developed a consuming interest in Jewish mysticism. In order to gain access to the Kabbalah he resolved to perfect his knowledge of Hebrew by employing Jewish teachers. Thanks to his instructors, Reuchlin's passion for all things Hebraic remained undiminished for the rest of his life. He never tired of stressing the importance of Hebrew for a proper understanding of the Bible. 'I assure you,' he wrote in 1508, 'that not one of the Latins can expound the Old Testament unless he first becomes proficient in the language in which it was written. For the mediator between God and man was language, as we read in the Pentateuch; but not any language, only Hebrew through which God wished his secrets to be made known unto man.' To encourage and help students, he published a grammar-cum-dictionary, the De rudimentis hebraicis (1506). This was followed in 1512 by the Hebrew text of the seven penitential psalms, with translation and commentary (in septem psalmos poenitentiales), likewise intended for beginners. Finally, six years later, he published the De accentibus et orthographia linguae hebraicae, a treatise on accents, pronunciation, and synagogue music. Reuchlin's importance for linguistic study is that he established philology as a recognized discipline, independent of theology, an approach which led him to criticize and correct the Vulgate at several points. Reuchlin's high regard for postbiblical Jewish literature emerged in 'the battle of the books,' a bitter controversy which raged for almost a decade. In 1510, the Emperor Maximilian at the instigation of the Dominicans, ordered the destruction of all Hebrew books inimical to Christianity. Reuchlin was asked to assist by deciding which ones should be condemned. He reacted by coming to the defense of Jewish literature. This concern for the preservation of the Jewish literary heritage sprang not from any philo-Semitic feelings, for he was no friend of the Jews, but from educational and humanitarian motives. He was convinced that the loss of the Hebrew language would harm Christian biblical scholarship. As an ex-lawyer, he also knew that the Jews had
rights. Whatever their disabilities, they had received guarantees from popes and emperors that their books would not be destroyed. Though he claimed that he was defending Christian rather than Jewish interests in the action he took, Reuchlin had the satisfaction before he died of knowing that he had won 'the battle of the books,' a victory for Jews and Christian humanists alike. Pico studied Kabbalah for two reasons: to confirm Christian truth and to confute the Jews from their own literature. When he was prevented by death from pursuing further studies, his mantle fell upon Reuchlin who expressed the hope that he would 'soon accomplish precisely what Pico promised.' His first contribution was the De verbo mirifico (1494), where he demonstrates the practical value of Jewish mystical techniques for attaining union with Christ. The 'wonder-working word' of the title is YHSVH, the letters of the Hebrew form of the name 'Jesus.' This was followed by the De arte cabalistica (1517), the author's magnum opus, which represents the climax of his Kabbalistic studies. Written in dialogue form, it is essentially an apologia for the Christian study of Kabbalah. Reuchlin's contribution in the three areas of language, literature, and mysticism marks a turning point in the Church's attitude towards Hebrew and Jewish literature. See also: Hebrew, Biblical and Jewish; Mysticism; Hebrew Grammarians; Semitic Languages. Bibliography Geiger L 1871 Johann Reuchlin: sein Leben und seine Werke. Duncker and Humbolt, Leipzig. Goodman M, Goodman S 1983 Johann Reuchlin: On the Art of the Kabbalaha. (Eng. transl.). Abaris Books, New York Herzig, Schoeps, Rohde (eds.) 1993 Reuchlin und die Juden. Sigmaringen, Germany. Series: Pforzheimen Reuchlinschriften 3 Overfield J M 1984 Humanism and Scholasticism in Late Mediaeval Germany. Princeton University Press, Princeton, NJ Rhein, King (eds.) 1996 Tolerance and Intolerance in the European Reformation. New York
Ricci, Matteo (1552-1610) J. H. Grayson
Matteo Ricci, the most influential of the early Jesuit missionaries to China, was resident there from 1582 until his death. Born in Macerata in east central Italy, Ricci went to Rome in 1568 originally to study law
but instead joined the Society of Jesus in 1571. He came under the tutelage of two key figures in the order—Alessandro Valignano (1539-1606) proponent of Christian accommodation to local culture 475
Biographies and Visitor to the East (responsible for all Jesuit missions in Asia), and the renowned scientist and mathematician Christophorus Clavius (Christoph Klau, 1537-1612). Ricci, having asked to serve as a missionary in Asia, was sent to Goa in 1578 where he was ordained in 1580. Sent on to Macao in 1582, he and a colleague Michele Ruggieri (1543-1607) were able to enter China itself in 1583 and established themselves in Chaoch'ing near Canton. Subsequently, Ricci lived in Nanjing and other cities in central China and eventually made his residence in the capital Beijing from 1598. Ricci's mission policy, which was to gain the support if not the adherence of the elite sector of society in order to obtain tolerance for Christian missions, was successful in gaining the support of many of the Confucian literati class and even of the Emperor himself. His mission method was twofold: to use the concepts of classical Confucianism to explain Christian doctrine, and to use Western scientific and technological developments to demonstrate to the literati class that Europeans were not inferior barbarian peoples. Ricci's mission methods had a profound impact on Jesuit and subsequent missionary activity in China. His views on the appropriate form of Christian participation in Confucian ancestral memorial rites became the model of a sophisticated Christian approach to Chinese culture. Ricci was a prolific writer and his literary impact was immense. He devised the first system of Romanising the Chinese language, introduced the form 'Confucius' for the name of the founder of Confucianism, and translated the Four Books of the Confucian canon (The Analects, The Mencius, The Doctrine of the Mean, The Great Learning) into Latin, thus laying the foundation for European scholarship on China.
Excluding cartographic works, Ricci's writings encompass thirteen works, several of which are in multiple volumes. Among his non-religious writings are, Chiao-yu lun (On Friendship, 1595), Erh-shih-wu yen (Twenty-Five Sayings, 1604), and a translation of Euclid's Elements (1607). Perhaps his most important work was the T'ien-hsueh shih-lu (True Record of the Heavenly Religion) of 1595 which was revised as the T'ien-chu shih-i (True Meaning of the Lord of Heaven) in 1601. In its revised form, this work had an immense impact in China, and through a study of the document in the late eighteenth century became the source for the Catholic Church in Korea. Other works introducing religious themes would include the Ch'i-jen shih-p'ien (Ten Dialogues with an Eccentric, 1608). Ricci also influenced Chinese language usage. From the 1580s, he began to use the word T'ien-chu (Lord of Heaven) as the correct term for God which subsequently became the standard Roman Catholic word for God in China and Korea. See also: Christianity in East Asia; Missionaries; Chinese Translation of Theological Terms; Confucianism.
Bibliography Bernard H 1973 (1935) Matteo Ricci's Scientific Contribution to China. Hyperion Press, Westport, CT Gallagher L J 1953 China in the Sixteenth Century: The Journals of Matthew Ricci. 1583-1610 [trans.]. Random House, New York Malatesta E J (ed.) 1985 The True Meaning of the Lord of Heaven (T'ien-chu shih-i). Institute of Jesuit Sources. St Louis, MI Spence J 1983 The Memory Palace of Matteo Ricci. Faber. London
Ross, John (1842-1915) J. H. Grayson
Ross, John (1842-1915) was a missionary of the United Presbyterian Church of Scotland to Manchuria who worked there from 1871 to his retirement in 1910. Although not the first Protestant missionary to Manchuria, Ross was the effective father of the Protestant Christian churches in Manchuria and also in Korea. He was born in Balintore on the Moray Firth near Inverness, Scotland. He originally trained for ministry amongst the Gaelic-speaking people of northern Scotland and the Hebrides, serving for a few years in various churches before settling on overseas missions as a vocation. He originally 476
intended to go to India, but was persuaded to go to China. In 1910, he returned to Edinburgh where he died in 1915. A native speaker of Gaelic, Ross knew 10 other languages including English, French, German, Greek, Hebrew, Latin, spoken Mandarin Chinese, written Chinese, Manchu, and Korean of which he spoke four fluently (Gaelic, English, Mandarin, and Manchu). Ross was a prolific and seminal writer, contributing to the later translation of the Bible in standard Chinese, and commentaries in Chinese on various books of the Bible. Among his books are a
Saadya Gaon (882-942) two-volume connected history of Northeast Asia, The Manchus, or the Reigning Dynasty of China (1880) and History of Corea, Ancient and Modern (1881), and Mission Methods in Manchuria (1903), The Original Religion of China (1909), and The Origin of the Chinese People (1916). He wrote a basic textbook for Mandarin Chinese, Mandarin Primer (1876), and the first European textbook for the Korean language, Cor eon Primer (1879), which was revised as Korean Speech with Grammar and Vocabulary (1882). His most important work, however, was the translation of the Bible into Korean, the first portions of which were published in 1882, the whole New Testament appearing in one volume in 1887. Ross worked with a team of educated Koreans in Manchuria, translating the books of the New Testament from the Chinese version which was then checked with the Greek Bible. The importance of this translation is immense because it simultaneously became the source for the self-propagation of the Protestant Christian church in Korea, and the modern revival of the use of the indigenous Korean alphabet (now called Harfgul). It was a mission
principle for Ross that the Korean translation of the Bible should be written entirely in the Korean alphabet and use where possible pure Korean terms rather than terms borrowed from Chinese. Most of the theological and scriptural terms used in contemporary Korean, especially the choice of the term for God, were selected by Ross. In cases where later usage differed from his work, the most recent translations of the Bible have gone back to using the terms selected by Ross as being the most appropriate, for example the Korean title for the Book of the Revelation of St. John. See also: Christianity in East Asia; Missionaries; Korean. Bibliography Choi Sung-il 1992 John Ross (1842-1915) and the Korean Protestant Church. Unpublished doctoral dissertation, University of Edinburgh Grayson J H 1982 Na Yohan (John Ross): Han'gug- ui ch'ot sorfgyo-sa [John Ross: Korea's First Missionary]. Taegu Kyemyong UP. In Korean Grayson J H 1999 The Legacy of John Ross. International Bulletin of Missionary Research 23: 167-172
Saadya Gaon (882-942) J. Weinberg
Saadya Gaon, son of Joseph Gaon, was born in Upper Egypt and became the religious leader (Gaon) in Babylon. He was a polymath and innovator in many disciplines including Hebrew grammar, and is generally regarded as the first Hebrew grammarian. His linguistic writings show familiarity with contemporary Arabic philology. He was the author of the first Hebrew lexicon, Ha-Egron, which is only partially extant. Its purpose was to assist poets in constructing acrostics and finding rhymes. To this end, he arranged the dictionary in two lists alphabetically; one according to the initial letters, the other according to the final letters of words. Each word is illustrated with quotations from biblical and rabbinic texts. Under the influence of Arab philologists, he later reissued the dictionary with a new title Book of Poetics: Books of Languages in a revised form, adding an Arabic preface, translating the Hebrew terms into Arabic, and including a section on the consonants. In an extract from this last section quoted in his commentary to the mystical work Sepher Yesira (Book of Creation), he discusses the 'guttural'
letters—Aleph, He, Heth, Ayin. In this commentary, he also suggests the distinction between the eleven unchanging consonants and the other eleven and discusses the pronunciation of the letter Resh in Babylon and Palestine. His work entitled Book of Elegance of the Language of the Hebrews (also known as the Books on the Language or simply Twelve Parts), which has not been preserved in its entirety, constitutes the first study of Hebrew grammar as a separate discipline independent of Massoretic studies. The first part of the work appears to have included a study of the permutation of the twenty-two consonants according to phonetics and lists the precluded combinations of letters. The extant fragments cover the following subjects: augmentation and contraction of Hebrew stems (i.e., when root letters are doubled or elided—he did not recognize the triliterality of the Hebrew stem); inflection of nouns, verbs, and particles; the dagesh (a dagesh is a dot in the letter indicating either that the consonant is doubled or the plosive pronunciation of the letters bgdkpf); 477
Biographies vowels and phonetics; the quiescent and vocal shewa; laryngeal (or 'guttural') letters and the changes in their vocalization; interchangeable letters. This work, despite its rudimentary nature, laid the foundation of the scientific treatment of Hebrew grammar. Saadya Gaon also wrote a glossary of ninety hapax legomena in the Hebrew Bible, bringing analogies from postbiblical Hebrew, as well as a treatise on the obscure words in the Mishnah (see Talmud). See also: Hebrew Linguistic Tradition; Masoretic Tradition.
Bibliography
(For a full list of publications of fragments of Saadya Gaon's works, see Tene D 1971.) Allony N (ed.) 1969 Saadya Gaon Ha-Egron Kitab ^ 'Al-Shfr 'al-'Ibranl. The Academy of the Hebrew Language, Jerusalem Hirschfeld H 1920 Literary History of Hebrew Grammarians and Lexicographers. Oxford University Press, Oxford Malter H 1921 Life and Works of Saadia Gaon. Jewish Publication Society of America, Philadelphia, PA Skoss S L 1955 Saadiah Gaon, the Earliest Hebrew Grammarian. Dropsie College Press, Philadelphia. PA Tene D 1971 Linguistic literature, Hebrew In: Encvlopaedia Judaica, XVI, pp. 1364-65; 1367-69. Keter, Jerusalem
Saussure, Ferdinand(-Mongin) de (1857-1913) E. F. K. Koerner
Saussure was born on November 26, 1857 in Geneva, and died on February 22, 1913, at Chateau Vufflens near Geneva. He is best known for the posthumous compilation of his lecture notes on general linguistics, the Cours de linguistique generate, edited by his former students and first published in 1916 (since translated into more than a dozen languages, including—in order of their first appearance since 1928—Japanese, German, Russian, Spanish, English, Polish, Italian, Hungarian). However, during his lifetime, Saussure was most widely known for his masterly Memoire of 1879, devoted to an audacious reconstruction of the Proto-Indo-European vowel system. It is generally agreed that his Cours ushered in a revolution in linguistic thinking during the 1920s and 1930s which is still felt today in many quarters, even beyond linguistics proper. He is universally regarded as 'the father of structuralism.' Although from a distinguished Geneva family which—beginning with Horace Benedict de Saussure, whose portrait adorns the Swiss twenty franc note— can boast of several generations of natural scientists, Ferdinand de Saussure was early drawn to language study, producing an 'Essai pour reduire les mots du grec, du latin et de Fallemand a un petit nombre de racmes' at the age of 14 or 15 (published in Cahiers Ferdinand de Saussure 32: 77-101 [1978]). Following his parents' wishes, he attended classes in chemistry, physics, and mathematics at the University of Geneva during 1875-76, before being allowed to join his slightly older classmates who had left for Leipzig 478
the year before. So in the fall of 1876 Saussure arrived at the university where a number of important works in the field of Indo-European phonology and morphology, including Karl Verner's (1846-1896) epoch-making paper on a series of exceptions to 'Grimm's Law,' had just been published. Saussure took courses with Georg Curtius (1820-1886) the mentor of the 'Junggrammatiker' and a number of the younger professors, such as August Leskien, Ernst Windisch, Heinrich Hubschmann, Hermann Osthoff, and others in the fields of Indie studies, Slavic, Baltic, Celtic, and Germanic. During 1878-79 Saussure spent two semesters at the University of Berlin, enrolling in courses with Heinrich Zimmer and Hermann Oldenberg. After barely six semesters of formal study, when just 21, he published the major work of his lifetime (Saussure 1879). In this 300-page work he assumed the existence, on purely theoretical grounds, of an early Proto-Indo-European sound of unknown phonetic value (designated *A) which would develop into various phonemes of the Indo-European vocalic system depending on its combination with various 'sonantal coefficients.' Saussure was thus able to explain a number of puzzling questions of IndoEuropean ablaut. But the real proof of Saussure's hypotheses came many years later, after his death, following the decipherment of Hittite and its identification as an Indo-European language, and after the Polish scholar Kurylowicz in 1927 had pointed to Hittite cognates that contained the sound
Saussure, Ferdinand(-Mongin) de (1857-1913) corresponding to Saussure's *A. These were identified as laryngeals, sounds previously not found in any of the other Indo-European languages. Having returned to Leipzig, Saussure defended his dissertation on the use of the genitive absolute in Sanskrit in February 1880, leaving for Geneva soon thereafter. Before he arrived in Paris in September of that year, he appears to have conducted fieldwork on Lithuanian, like Schleicher and others before him. In Paris Saussure found a number of receptive students, among them Antoine Meillet, Maurice Grammont, and Paul Passy, but also congenial colleagues such as Gaston Paris, Louis Havet, who had previously written the most detailed review of his Memoire, and Arsene Darmester. Michel Breal (1832-1915), the doyen of French linguistics, secured him a position as Maitre de Conferences at the Ecole des Hautes Etudes in 1881, a post he held until his departure for Geneva ten years later. During his lifetime, Saussure was best known for his Memoire and the paper on Lithuanian accentuation (1896). Since the 1920s, however, his influence and fame have been almost exclusively connected with the book he never wrote, the Cours de linguistique generale. This was largely based on notes carefully taken down by a number of his students during a series of lectures on the subject that he had given from 1907-11 at the University of Geneva (to which he had returned as a professor of Sanskrit and Comparative Grammar in 1891). One of them was Albert Riedlinger, whose name appears on the title page of the Cours, which was put together by Saussure's successors, Charles Bally and Albert Sechehaye, neither of whom had attended these lectures themselves (though it is frequently, but erroneously, stated in the literature that they had). The Cours was in fact never published in Geneva and was not published in 1915 but in Lausanne and Paris in 1916, that is, exactly 100 years after Franz Bopp's Conjugationssystem, which is usually regarded as the beginning of comparative-historical Indo-European linguistics. The ideas advanced in the Cours produced a veritable revolution in linguistic science; historicalcomparative grammar which had dominated linguistic research since the early nineteenth century was soon relegated to a mere province of the field. At least in the manner the Cours had been presented by the editors, Saussure's general theory of language was seen as assigning pride of place to the nonhistorical, descriptive, and 'structural' approach (Saussure himself did not use the last-mentioned term in a technical sense). This led to a tremendous body of work concerned with the analysis of the linguistic system of language and its function, and a neglect of questions of language change and linguistic evolution in general—a situation which remains characteristic of the linguistic scene to this day, in
particular the framework associated with the name of Noam Chomsky. From the 1920s onwards a variety of important schools of linguistic thought developed in Europe that can be traced back to proposals made in the Cours. These are usually identified with the respective centers from which they emanated, such as Geneva, Prague, Copenhagen, and Paris. In North America too, through the work of Leonard Bloomfield (1887-1949), Saussure's ideas became stock-intrade among linguists, descriptivists, structuralists, and generativists. At the core of Saussure's linguistic theory is the assumption that language is a system of interrelated terms which he called 'langue' (in contradistinction to 'parole,' the individual speech act or speaking in general). This 'langue' is the underlying code which ensures that people can speak and understand each other; it has social underpinning and is an operative system embedded in the brain of everyone who has learned a given language. The analysis of this system, Saussure maintains, is the true object of linguistics. The system is a network of relationships which he characterized as being of two kinds: syntagmatic (i.e., items are arranged in a consecutive, linear order) and associative, later termed 'paradigmatic' (i.e., the organization of units in a deeper fashion dealing with grammatical and semantic relations). Saussure's emphasis on language as 'a system of (arbitrary) signs' and his proposal that linguistics is the central part of an overall science of sign relations or 'semiologie' have led to the development of a field of inquiry more frequently called 'semiotics' (following C. S. Peirce's terminology), which deals with sign systems in literature and other forms of art, including music and architecture. Many of the ingredients of Saussure's general theory of language have often been taken out of their original context and incorporated into theories outside of linguistics, at times quite arbitrarily, especially in works by French writers engaged in 'structuralist' anthropology (e.g., Claude LeviStrauss) and philosophy (e.g., Louis Althusser), literary theory (e.g., Jacques Derrida), psychoanalysis (e.g., Jacques Lacan), and semiotics (e.g., Roland Barthes), and their various associates and followers. The trichotomies (usually reduced to dichotomies) which have become current in twentieth-century thought, far beyond their original application, are: langage-langue-parole (i.e., language in all its manifestations or 'speech'; language as the underlying system; and 'speaking'), signe-signifie-signifiant (sign, signified, and signifier), synchrony versus diachrony ('panchrony' would be a combination of these two perspectives), and syntagmatic versus paradigmatic relations. See also: Barthes, R.; Derrida, J.; Lacan, J.; LeviStrauss, C. 479
Biographies Bibliography (For a full bibliography of Saussure's writings see Koerner 1972a.) Engler R 1975 European structuralism: Saussure. In: Sebeok T A (ed.) Current Trends in Linguistics. Vol. XIII: Historiography of Linguistics. Mouton, The Hague, pp. 829-886 Engler R 1976-1998 Bibliographic saussurienne. Cahiers Ferdinand de Saussure 30: 99-138; 31: 279-306; 33: 79-145; 40: 131-200; 43: 149-275; 50: 247-295 and 51: 295-297 Godel R 1957 Les sources du Cours de linguistique generate de F. de Saussure. Droz, Geneva Koerner E F K 1972a Bibliographia Saussureana, 18701970: An Annotated, Classified Bibliography on the Background, Development and Actual Relevance of Ferdinand de Saussure's General Theory of Language. Scarecrow Press, Metuchen, NJ
Koerner E F K 1972b Contribution au debat post-saussurien sur le signe linguistique: Introduction generate et bibliographie annotee. Mouton, The Hague Koerner E F K 1973 Ferdinand de Saussure: Origin and Development of his Linguistic Thought in Western Studies of Language. Friedrich Vieweg Sohn, Braunschweig Koerner E F K 1988 Saussurean Studies]Etudes saussuriennes. Slatkine, Geneva Saussure F de 1879 Memoire sur le systeme primitif des voyelles dans les langues indo-europeennes. B. G. Teubner, Leipzig Saussure F de 1896 Accentuation lituanienne. Anzeiger of Indo-germanische Forschungen 6: 157-66 Saussure F de 1916 Cours de linguistique generate. Payot, Lausanne & Paris. (Harris R 1983 Course in General Linguistics. Duckworth, London) Saussure F de 1922 Recueil des publications scientifiques. C. Winter, Heidelberg
Scaliger, Joseph Justus (1540-1609) R. H. Bremmer Jr
Joseph Scaliger has entered history as one of the greatest Renaissance philologists, especially in the field of the Classical languages. Born in Agen, Lot-et-Garonne (Southern France) in 1540, a son of the renowned humanist Julius Caesar Scaliger, Scaliger received his Latin training mainly from his much-demanding father. In 1559 he went to Paris where he read Greek and various Semitic languages. In 1562 he embraced the Protestant faith and in the following years he traveled widely. Scaliger actively participated in the religious wars in France and in 1572 he fled from the country to Geneva where he lectured in philosophy at the Calvinist academy. In 1574 he returned to France and lived there until 1593, when he moved to Leiden where the University had offered him an attractive post free from lecturing duties. He remained in Leiden until his death in 1609, and bequeathed his books and invaluable manuscript collection to the University of Leiden. Scaliger's first book, an edition of Varro's De lingua Latino (1565) (included in Varro 1573), was an immediate success. In it he displays the philological methods to which he would thenceforth adhere and which were to exercise a lasting influence on contemporary and later scholars. He brought the method of presenting critical text editions to perfection by insisting on the consultation of as many
480
manuscript versions of a text as possible. Many of his conjectures and emendations still stand nowadays. Scaliger was a very prolific scholar, especially during his period at Leiden. There he also stimulated fellow scholars to explore the disciplines of history, epigraphy, Semitic, Slavonic, and Old Germanic studies, among others. Scaliger still is today esteemed for his insightful criticism of the many texts he edited, as well as for his major achievement in creating order in the chronology of world history (see Scaliger 1583). Finally, he must be counted as one of the founding fathers of comparative linguistics. See also: Philology and History. Bibliography Bremmer Jr R H 1996 Joseph Justus Scaliger. In: Stammerjohann H (ed.) Lexicon grammaticorum. Niemeyer, Tubingen Bremmer Jr R H 1998 The correspondence of Johannes de Luet (1581-1649) as a mirror of his life. Lias 25: 139-64 Grafton A 1983-93 Joseph Scaliger: A Study in the History of Classical Scholarship 2 vols. Oxford Scaliger J J 1583 Opus novum de emendalione temporum. M. Patissonius, Paris Varro M T 1573 M. Terentii Varronis opera ...In lib. de ling. Lot. conjecteana J. Scaligeri recognita. H. Stephanus. Geneva
Schlegel, (Carl Wilhelm) Friedrich von (1772-1829)
Schlegel, August Wilhelm von (1767-1845) K. Grotsch
Schlegel, August Wilhelm [from 1815:] von, writer, literary critic, translator, philologist, and student of the Sanskrit language and its literature, elder brother of Friedrich Schlegel (see Schlegel, (Carl Wilhelm) Friedrich von), was born in Hanover (Germany) on September 5, 1767. He studied theology and philosophy at the University of Gottingen, where he was mainly influenced by the philologist C. G. Heyne and the poet G. A. Burger. Between 1791 and 1795 he was a tutor in Amsterdam. From 1798 he was associate professor at the University of Jena. He moved to Berlin where he delivered courses of private lectures on literary history (1801-04). From 1804 till her death in 1817 he was secretary, traveling companion, and literary adviser to Madame de Stael (Anne Louise Germaine de Stael-Holstein, 1766-1817). In 1818 he was appointed professor of the history of art and literature at the University of Bonn, where he established Indie studies, thus becoming the founder of Indie philology in Germany. He died in Bonn on May 12, 1845. Schlegel was a prominent member of the Romantic movement in Germany and succeeded in transforming the genuine romantic interest in foreign cultures, languages, and literatures, into a systematic scientific approach. He produced excellent translations of Italian and Spanish authors and of the dramas of Shakespeare (in a project later continued by L. Tieck and Tieck's daughter Dorothea). His most influential contributions to the study of language lay in the fields of language typology and reflections on method. As early as 1798 he pointed out the difference between analytical and synthetic languages (Schlegel 1798: 60ff.; cf. Schlegel 1818: 16). By coining the term 'vergleichende Grammatik' (Schlegel 1803: 203) he paved the way for the linguistic theories of his brother Friedrich (e.g., Schlegel 1808: 28) and
significantly contributed to the theoretical evolution of comparative linguistics. He took up and refined Friedrich's theory of language classification (outlined in Schlegel 1808: 44ff. and elsewhere) by proposing three types of languages: those without any grammatical structure, languages using affixes, and inflectional languages (Schlegel 1818: 14ff.). This theory was much discussed throughout the nineteenth century. With his severe criticism of J. Grimm's early etymologies (Schlegel 1815) he gave a decisive impulse to strict methodological rigor in the study of the history of the Germanic languages. He also set the standards for the study of the Sanskrit language by applying the methods of classical philology to the analysis of its literature and the publication of Sanskrit texts (e.g., in his editions of the BhagavadGTta 1823 and parts of the Ramayana 1829-38). See also: Sanskrit; Indian Linguistic Tradition. Bibliography Muncker F 1890 Schlegel. Allgemeine Deutsche Biographic 31: 354-68 Schlegel A W 1798 Die Sprachen; Bin Gesprach iiber Klopstocks grammatische Gesprache. In: Schlegel A W, Schlegel F (eds.) 1798-1800 Athenaeum: Eine Zeitschrift 1-3. Vieweg/Frolich, Berlin Schlegel A W 1803 Ankiindigung: Sprachlehre von A F Bernhardi. Europa: Eine Zeitschrift 2: 193-204 Schlegel A W 1815 Altdeutsche Walder. Heidelbergische Jahrbucher der Literatur 8: 721-66 Schlegel A W 1818 Observations sur la langue et la litterature provencales. Librairie grecque-latine-allemande, Paris Schlegel A W (ed.) 1820-30 Indische Bibliothek 1-2.1. Weber, Bonn Schlegel F 1808 Uber die Sprache und Weisheit der Indier: Ein Beitrag zur Begriindung der Alterthumskunde. Mohr und Zimmer, Heidelberg
Schlegel, (Carl Wilhelm) Friedrich von (1772-1829) E. F. K. Koerner
Schlegel was born in Hanover, March 10, 1772, and died in Dresden, January 12, 1829. In the annals of linguistic science he is usually accorded a minor role only. His strong involvement in the Romantic movement and his literary production may explain why he is usually seen as a poet and literary critic,
and hardly ever as a linguist. It is true that his interest in Oriental studies had originally been aroused by translations from Sanskrit and Persian literature. The book he wrote during 1805 and 1807 and for which he became famous, Ueber die Sprache und Weisheit der Indier, contains chapters of approximately equal 481
Biographies length on the philosophy and theology (Schlegel 1808: 89-153) and on the 'historische Ideer? concerning India (ibid. 157-230), with translations of Indian poetry into German (ibid. 231-324). Yet there is no doubt that the first part on language ("Von der Sprocket 1-86) attracted the most enduring interest among his contemporaries. The fact that the King of Bavaria granted two of his subjects, Othmar Frank and Franz Bopp, scholarships to pursue the study of Persian and Sanskrit in Paris a few years later, may serve as an indication of the importance that was soon attached to Oriental studies, and this largely as a result of Schlegel's book. His importance in the history of linguistic science rests on this one work; it appears, however, that once the year 1816, the date of Bopp's Conjugationssystem, had been chosen by historians as marking the beginning of linguistics, Schlegel's book was only mentioned as precursory. It was no longer read, although the socalled founding fathers of comparative-historical philology, Bopp, Rask, and Grimm acknowledged their indebtedness to his work. Schlegel is traditionally credited with the first use of the term "vergleichende Grammatik.'1 However, others, like J. S. Vater, had used it in 1801 and the elder Schlegel, August Wilhelm (see Schlegel, August Wilhelm von), used it in 1803 before his brother. But it is clear from Friedrich Schlegel's book (p. 28) that he had been inspired by the example of Blumenbach and Cuvier's Comparative Anatomy. By today's standards, Schlegel had a checkered career; following the study of law in Gottingen and Leipzig, he soon turned to literature as his main occupation, circulating among the Romantics as well as the people at the Court of Weimar, notably Goethe, Schiller, and Herder (see Herder, Johann Gottfried), who was largely responsible for creating the general climate of the time that expected new and profound ideas to come from the East ('ex Oriente lux"). Schlegel's exposure to the writings of Sir William Jones led him to travel to Paris, where Persian, Arabic, and other Oriental languages were taught. He was introduced to Persian by Antoine Leonard de Chezy soon after his arrival in 1802, and familiarized himself with the ancient language of India through Alexander Hamilton, from whom he took private lessons during 1803 and 1804. He copied Sanskrit manuscripts and translated literary texts; for a living, he gave lectures on German literature and philosophy. Ueber die Sprache und Weisheit der Indier was important for the development of comparativehistorical as well as typological linguistics in the nineteenth century. Schlegel's suggestion of comparing grammatical features in order to establish genetic relationships, though not entirely new, was influential. For instance, his suggestion of investigating the conjugation system of Sanskrit in comparison with
482
all the languages thought to be related to it led Bopp to his first work; his evolutionary view of language paved the way for Grimm's emphasis on the historical treatment of language, and his classification of languages according to morphological structure initiated an entire research program. This went from Wilhelm von Humboldt (see Humboldt, Wilhelm von) to Steinthal to Sapir, to Greenberg, and beyond, especially after his brother August had introduced the synthetic/analytic distinction in his 1818 essay on the history of the Romance languages. Timpanaro (1972: 77) has pointed out that, when Schlegel discussed at length questions of change and language mixture, he anticipated substratum theory, usually associated with Ascoli, Schuchardt, and others at the end of the nineteenth century. Schlegel maintained that language contact and the resulting borrowings made it difficult at times to identify all 'Sanskritic' languages, making it necessary to consider what we may call the external history of a given language, in addition to submitting it to close morphological analysis. In discussing linguistic contamination and the question of language descent. Schlegel drew particular attention to Armenian, in which he found many similarities with Latin, Greek. Persian, and German roots, and to agreements in grammatical structure. He was not quite ready to include Armenian among those belonging to the IndoEuropean language family, but in view of the material he had at his disposal, he made a great number of important observations which were borne out by subsequent generations of historical linguists. Schlegel undoubtedly deserves a place among the 'founding fathers' of comparative Indo-European grammar, and not only as an interesting 'philological instigator' (see Klin 1967). See also: Romanticism; Sanskrit; Sanskrit: Discovery by Europeans. Bibliography Klin E 1967 Friedrich Schlegel als philologischer Anreger (1802-08). Germanica Wratislaviensia 11: 83-103 Koerner E F K 1987 Friedrich Schlegel and the emergence of historical-comparative grammar. Lingua e Stile 22: 341-65 Niisse H 1962 Die Sprachtheorie Friedrich Schlegels. C Winter, Heidelberg Oppenberg U 1965 Quellenstudien :u Friedrich Schlegels Ubersetzungen aus dem Sanskrit. N G Elwert, Marburg Plank F 1987a The Smith-Schlegel connection in linguistic typology: forgotten fact or fiction? ZPhon 40: 198-216 Plank F 1987b What Schlegel could have learned from Alexander ('Sanscrit') Hamilton besides Sanscrit. Lingua e Stile 22: 367-84 Schlegel F von 1808 Ueber die Sprache und Weisheit der Indier. Mohr and Zimmer, Heidelberg Schlegel F von 1849 (trans. Millington E J. Bohn H G) The Aesthetic and Miscellaneous Works of Frederick von Schlegel
Sen, Sukumar (1900-92) Schlegel F von 1975 (eds. Behler E, Struc-Oppenberg U) Studien zur Philosophic und Theologie, Schoningh, Miinchen-Paderborn-Wien Schlegel F von 1977 Ueber die Sprache und Weisheit der Indier. New edn. prepared by E F K Koerner. Benjamins, Amsterdam Struc-Oppenberg U 1980 Friedrich Schlegel and the history of Sanskrit philology and comparative studies. Canadian Review of Comparative Literature 7: 411-37
Timpanaro S 1972 Friedrich Schlegel e gli inizi della linguistica indo-europea in Germania. Critica Storica 9: 72-105 Timpanaro S 1977 Friedrich Schlegel and the beginnings of Indo-European linguistics in Germany. In: Schlegel F von 1977 Twaddell W F 1943 Fr. Schlegel's criteria of linguistic relation. Monatshefte fur deutschen Unterricht 35: 151-55
Sen, Sukumar (1900-92) Pabitra Sarkar
Sukumar Sen was born on January 15, 1900 and died on March 3, 1992. He is probably the last major linguist in India to work within the historicalcomparative framework and one of the best. He was the most famous student of Suniti Kumar Chatterji, and the one also on closest terms with his illustrious teacher. Chatterji and Sen first worked together, and then Sen took over the former's mantle to give the department of comparative philology (now department of linguistics) at the University of Calcutta a dignity and distinction that attracted many scholars from India and abroad to study and carry on research there. This eventually led to many excellent works on the histories of various languages of this subcontinent, appropriately modeled after Chatterji's magnum opus The Origin and Development of the Bengali Language (or ODBL 1926). Sen's School career was replete with medals and prizes. He was awarded the Asutosh Gold Medal, the University Gold Medal, the Premchand and Roychand Scholarship, the Girish Memorial Prize (three times) and the Sarojini Medal—all from his own alma mater—the University of Calcutta. The Asiatic Society, Calcutta, awarded him the Jadunath Sircar Medal and, in 1984, the Gold Medal of the Royal Asiatic Society of London was bestowed on him as a fitting acknowledgement of his lifelong contribution to linguistics. His tenure as a teacher was long and distinguished. He served the same department for about 34 years. Early on he was appointed the Khaira scholar attached to the department of comparative philology at the University of Calcutta where he served as an honorary lecturer. He then became a full-time member of faculty and promotions followed naturally and deservedly. He became the chairman of his department in 1953, when he was already a professor, and held the position till he retired in 1964. During his long career as a teacher, he not only did excellent
research himself, but also supervised some 100 scholars, including several foreign students, who produced celebrated research works. Sen's early interest was historical syntax, and he was the first to explore the Old IndoAryan morphosyntax in his Use of Cases in Vedic Prose (1928) and Buddhist Hybrid Sanskrit (1928). This preoccupation with syntax continued when he proceeded to analyze Middle IndoAryan in An Outline of Syntax of Middle Indo-Aryan (1950). His Old Persian Inscriptions (1941) and A Comparative Grammar of Middle Indo-Aryan (1960), displayed his strong command of historical-comparative methodology and his meticulous concern for details in which etymological insights came to figure prominently. His Bhashara Itivrtta (1939) is the first book in Bengali on the historical evolution of the language. Although he acknowledges his debt to Chatterji's ODBL, his Itivrtta is not merely a condensed restatement of his teacher's book. Sen ventured beyond what his teacher had covered at several points, for example, in postulating the fifth dialect, i.e., Jharkhandi, for Bengali against Chatterji's four and also in suggesting various alternative etymologies for several lexical items. It is interesting to note that, by publishing the above books, and a number of others, he covered about 3500 years of the history of the Aryan languages. He also produced some descriptive studies, the most notable among which are Women's Dialect in Bengali (1923) and a description of standard colloquial Bengali published in Language Handbook (Census of India 1971). His history of Bengali Prose (1934) began and still remains the only example of a systematic stylistic description of the literary prose dialect of his language. Etymology, however, became his preferred area in the later years and his Etymological Dictionary of Bengali (2 vols, 1971), probably the largest work on historical etymology of any Indian language, and Banglar Sthana Nama 483
Biographies ('Place-names of Bengal' 1981) are works that show this concern. He also wrote a large number of English and Bengali articles on linguistic subjects bearing both a historical and descriptive orientation. Apart from the above, Sen published some 70 books on other subjects showing his wide and varied interests, ranging from the pop literature of Calcutta to an analytical history of crime fiction. He himself wrote five collections of crime stories and an autobiography in two volumes, but the work in Bengali that towers above all his other publications is his four-volume history of Bengali literature,
Bangala Sahityera Itihasa (1941-58; now issued in five volumes) which has made him the premier historian of this literature. It probably represents a desire to match his teacher's celebrated work of reconstruction of the history of the language, by a parallel and equally meticulous survey of that of the literature. His eminent success in this area has, however, pushed his excellence as a linguist into the background, at least for his compatriots in Bengal. See also: Indian Linguistic Tradition.
Sibawayhi (Eighth Century CE) M. G. Carter
Though not an Arab himself—his mother tongue was Persian—Abu Bishr 'Amr ibn 'Uthman ibn Qanbar Sibawayhi was the first to compile an exhaustive description of Arabic based on a coherent theory of language. Born in the second half of the eighth century CE, he came to Basra to study religion and law, but is said to have turned to grammar after committing a solecism himself. He died in about 793 CE, just after his great master al-KhalTl ibn Ahmad, aged forty or so. He left only one work, so singular that it never had a title but came to be known as Kitab Sibawayhi 'STbawayhi's Book' or simply al-Kitab The Book.' Although STbawayhi reveals a considerable debt to his predecessors, most clearly to al-Khalll, his originality cannot be doubted: he goes far beyond the speculations even of such a genius as al-Khalll and his innovative achievement is virtually unchallenged in the Arab tradition, where the Kitab has been called the 'Qur'an of grammar.' Drawing on an established technical vocabulary and a somewhat primitive grammatical legacy, as well as al-Khafil's teachings on phonology (some of which he evidently discarded) and substitutability, STbawayhi applied the fruits of his own study of the law to produce a descriptive grammar of Arabic which has not yet been superseded. Its underlying assumption is that kalam 'speech' is a form of behavior which can be regulated in the same way as the legal system regulates all social behavior. Linguistic acts are thus categorized by the following ethico-legal criteria: hasan/qablh 'good/bad' for the structurally correct/incorrect, mustaqim 'straight, right' for the semantically successful, and muhal 'wrong, absurd' for the incomprehensible utterance. Speech need not be 'good' to be 'right': ill-formed utterances can convey meaning and well-formed ones 484
can fail to do so. Every speech element has a 'status' manzila which determines its 'place' mawdr, that is its function in the utterance, exactly as lawyers determine the status and function of legal acts, with analogy qiyas as the organizing methodology in both domains. The most impressive development of these principles is unquestionably the theory of 'amal 'operation,' the idea that each element of an utterance acts upon its neighbor, from which it follows that on the level of surface structure speech falls naturally into binary units, one active 'operator', 'aw//, the other passive, 'operated on' ma'mul fihi. This purely horizontal metaphor has no connection at all, scientifically or etymologically, with the Latin regere 'to govern,' a misperception which has long obscured the nature of Arabic grammatical theory in the West. By the same token it is futile to look for Greek or other outside influences in the earliest Arabic grammar; STbawayhi establishes on the first page of the Kitab that there are only three parts of speech, ism 'noun,' '_/?'/' 'verb' and the semantically and morphologically indeterminate harf 'particle'. He has no tripartite tense system, no verbal moods, no passive voice in the modern sense, no adverbs, no prepositions, in short there is hardly a trace of foreign influence on STbawayhi. For him language was simply one 'way,' of behaving (compare with Sunna, the 'Way' of the orthodox 'Sunni' Muslim), and his word for 'way', nahw, in the end became the name for 'grammar' per se. However, the Kitab was too descriptive for the normative demands of Islamic civilization and prescriptive grammar subsequently triumphed: in the eventual displacement of STbawayhi's key behavioral term kalam 'speech' by the logically inspired concept of jumla 'sentence," a
Silvestre de Sacy, Baron Antoine-Isaac (1758-1838) completely different approach to language can be perceived. See also: Arabic Linguistic Tradition. Bibliography Carter M G 1973 An Arab grammarian of the eighth century AD JAOS 93: 146-57
Diem W 1983 Bibliographic/Bibliography: Sekundarliteratur zur einheimischen arabischen Grammatikschreibung. In: Versteegh C H M, Koerner K, Niederehe H-J (eds.) The History of Linguistics in the Near East. John Benjamins, Amsterdam Jahn G 1895-1900 Slbawaihfs Buck iiber die Grammatik, iibersetzt und erkla'rt. Reuther and Reichard, Berlin Troupeau G 1976 Lexique-index du Kitab de Sibawayhi. Klincksieck, Paris
Silvestre de Sacy, Baron Antoine-Isaac (1758-1838) M. V. McDonald
The French Orientalist, Silvestre de Sacy was born on April 21, 1758, the second son of a Paris notary. His father died when de Sacy was 7 and, because of his delicate health, he was educated at home, acquiring a deep knowledge of Greek and Latin, which latter he wrote fluently in his scholarly works. At the age of 12 he met the Benedictine Dom Berthereau, then engaged on a study of Arab historians of the Crusades, who fired his first enthusiasm for Eastern languages. De Sacy studied in succession Hebrew, Syriac, Chaldean, Samaritan, Arabic, and Ethiopic, and at the same time learned Italian, Spanish, English, and German. His first scholarly work was done on a Syriac MS, while his first published work was a Latin translation of two Samaritan letters originally written to J. J. Scaliger (1793; see Scaliger, Joseph Justus). He was then studying Persian and Turkish. In 1785 he was admitted to the Academic des Inscriptions, where he began work on two major studies on the breaking of the dam of Ma'rib and the earliest Arabic literature, only published much later. He was also given the task of preparing a descriptive catalogue of Arabic and Persian MSS in French libraries. While continuing to work in Samaritan studies, de Sacy was now led to an interest in pre-Islamic Persian antiquities, working on the inscriptions of Naqsh-i Rustam and BTsutun (the latter without success) and Pahlavi coinage. Next, he was drawn to what became a lifelong interest, the history and doctrines of the Druze. These years were spent in seclusion in the countryside, his scholarly work alternating with the cultivation of his garden. In 1795, the Terror was over and de Sacy was appointed Professor of Arabic at the new Ecole des Langues Orientales Vivantes. One of the conditions of the appointment was that he should write an Arabic grammar but the preparatory work led him first to study what was then known as 'universal grammar,' and in 1799 he published his Principles de
Grammaire Generate, which drew upon the ideas of the Port-Royal grammar and others. In 1806 he was made Professor of Persian at the College de France, but despite his new duties he continued with his work on Arabic. The first edition of his three-volume Chrestomathie arabe appeared in 1806, followed in 1810 by his Grammaire arabe. In the same year he published a translation of 'Abd al-Latlf al-Baghdadi's K. al-Ifada wa-al-Ptibar (Relation d'Egypte) and began work on a major series of studies on the law of property in Egypt from the Arab conquest. De Sacy had never hidden his royalist principles, and soon after the Restoration he was made Prefect of the University of Paris, and a series of academic honours followed, culminating in his ennoblement in 1832. Major publications of this period were his editions of KaFila wa-Dimna (1816), 'Afttar's PandNama (1819), and Harm's Maqamat (1822), a revised and expanded edition of his Anthologie (1829) and Grammaire (1831), an edition of the Alfiyya (1833), and his last work, the two-volume Expose de la religion des Druzes (1838). A projected third volume was cut short by his death on February 21, 1838. De Sacy's learned output was vast and varied, and in his youth especially his restless temperament took him from one field to another; his best work was done in later life. More even than this, however, de Sacy's main services to Middle Eastern studies probably lay in his textbooks and the outstanding scholars whom he taught. Among many others, these included Fliigel, Kosegarten, Quatremere, de Slane, and Fleischer. The enormous expansion of Arabic studies in the nineteenth century owed almost everything to the groundwork laid by Silvestre de Sacy. Bibliography Centenaire de Silvestre de Sacy 1938 Comptes rendus des seances de I'Academic des Inscriptions et Belles-lettres
485
Biographies Reinaud J T 1838 Notice historique et litteraire sur le Baron Silvestre de Sacy, lue a la seance generate de la Societe
Asiatique, le 25 juin 1838. Journal Asiatique 3(6): 113-95. (English transl. Asiatic Journal 27: 115-29; 182-97)
Trithemius, Johannes (1462-1516) R. E. Asher
Johann von Trittenheim, generally known as Trithemius, the name under which all his voluminous writings appeared, would appear to have been a remarkable child, in that he is reputed to have learnt to read German within a month of embarking on reading lessons, after having been illiterate for the first 15 years of his life. A little before reaching the age of 20, in 1482, he entered the Benedictine abbey of Sponheim, of which by the middle of the following year he found himself elected abbot. A most energetic young man, he set about reconstituting what had become a very rundown institution, extending the buildings and building up the library. This and his own scholarly interests made Sponheim a center of attraction for other humanists. The writings of Trithemius fall into two main categories, concerned with either religious or secular subjects. The former include lives of the saints and senior figures in the church, writings on the training of monks, and sermons. The latter are mainly historical works. Among these were two compendia intended to be the basis of a massive history of the Franks. Disliking gaps in a historical narrative, Trithemius was not above inventing material when available sources proved inadequate in this regard. More than that, he invented entire sources, as when for his Prankish history he claimed to have discovered a manuscript chronicle written by a certain Hunibald. The manuscript conveniently 'disappeared' and Trithemius is now universally believed to have invented Hunibald and other supposed earlier historians he refers to. One of the purposes of this deception was to provide what could be seen as proof of the widespread belief that the Franks, like a number of peoples of Europe, were descended from Trojans who had fled the city after the sack of Troy. Evidence of another kind to support this belief was to be found in certain linguistic facts, including a great similarity between Greek (the language spoken by the Trojans) and German, a similarity less striking than it had been because of the passage of time (see Brann 1981: 326). The main results of Trithemius's interest in linguistic matters, however, are two cryptographical handbooks, both published posthumously but widely circulated in manuscript during the author's lifetime.
486
They are the Polygraphia (1518; written in 1508) and the Steganographia (1606; written in 1500), of which a detailed account is provided by Brann (1999), Shumaker (1982: 91-131), and Arnold (1971: 187-95), and which have given Trithemius the reputation of being the first theoretician of cryptography. Steganographia, because of the framework in which coded messages are set, also led to a view that Trithemius involved himself in demonic magic (Walker 1958: 88-89), though this is disputed by Shumaker. The work was on the Index from 1609 to 1900. Some of his inventions were borrowed, if not acknowledged, by later writers (Muller 1971: 11). a circumstance which is by no means surprising, for some of Trithemius's ciphers are extremely complex (for an example of a relatively straightforward one, see Magic). See also: Linguistic Theory in the Later Middle Ages; Myths About Language. Bibliography Arnold K 1971 Johannes Trithemius (1462-1516). Kommissionsverlag Ferdinand Schoningh, Wurzburg Brann N L 1981 The Abbot Trithemius (1462-1516): The Renaissance of Monastic Humanism. E J Brill, Leiden Brann N L 1999 Trithemius and Magical Theory. A Chapter in the Controversy over Occult Studies in Early Modern Europe. State University of New York Press, Albany, NY Muller A 1971 Les Ecritures secretes Le Chiffre. Presses Universitaires de France, Paris Shumaker W 1982 Renaissance Curiosa: John Dee's Conversations with Angels; Girolamo Cardanos Horoscope of Christ; Johannes Trithemius and Cryptography; George Dalgarno's Universal Language. Center for Medieval and Early Renaissance Studies, Binghamton. New York Trithemius J 1518 Polygraphia libri VI. M Furter. Basle Trithemius J 1606 Steganographia: Hoc est. ars per occultam scripturam animi sui voluntatem absentibus aperiendi certa. Frankfurt Trithemius J 1982 The Steganographia of Johannes Trithemius. Book I tr. by F Tait and C Upton; Book I I I . . . [tr. by J W H Walden]; McLean A (ed.) Magnum Opus Hermetic Sourceworks, Edinburgh Trithemius J 1987 De origine gentis Francorum compendium. An Abridged History of the Franks. The Latin Text with an English Translation. Kuelbs M, Sonkowsky R P (eds.) AQ Verlag, Dudweiler Walker D P 1958 Spiritual and Demonic Magic from Ficino to Campanella. Warburg Institute, London
Ullendorff, Edward (1920- )
Tyndale, William (1494-1536) D. Daniell
The first to translate the Bible into English from the original Hebrew and Greek, William Tyndale was a significant figure in the English Reformation, and in the history of the English language. He was executed in 1536 before he could finish his work; nevertheless it has lived on in successive Renaissance English Bibles, particularly the much-admired Authorized ('King James') Version of 1611, and largely in most modern versions. Tyndale was a scholar of languages at a time when Hebrew was known to few English speakers, and Greek not widely. His greatest work was in giving the English-speaking world a Bible language both accurate to the originals and close to common speech, for everyone—even 'a boy that driveth the plough'—to understand. After Oxford University he may have been at Cambridge, not long after Erasmus. He hoped to print his intended translations in London, under Cuthbert Tunstall, Bishop of London. Snubbed by him, he left for the continent, never to return. His attempt to print a New Testament in Cologne in 1525 reached only Matthew 22 before he was betrayed. In Worms he printed in 1526 six thousand copies of his New Testament (NT). In England, however, Tunstall organized thorough searches, and publicly burned all the copies he found: only two survive today. Tyndale learned Hebrew and in 1530 printed his Pentateuch, which became the foundation of all later English versions. He went on to complete the Old Testament (OT) historical books, which were not printed until after his death. His 1534 NT is the crown of his endeavor: it makes up ninety percent of the Authorized Version NT. Tyndale wrote much else. His Obedience of a Christian Man (1528), for example, came to the
approving notice of Henry VIII: it includes a passionate defense of the English language, remarkable for its time. As Tyndale's pocketbook translations spread in England, Tunstall brought in Henry's Chancellor, Sir Thomas More, to attack Tyndale. More, for all his hundreds of thousands of often intemperate words against Tyndale, comes off worse from their exchanges. Tyndale's constant aim as a translator was clarity. To this end he coined works, like 'Passover' and 'mercy-seat.' Very many of his phrases are still in everyday use: 'the salt of the earth,' 'the signs of the times,' 'to make light of it,' 'the scales fell from his eyes,' 'full of good works,' 'the powers that be,' 'a man after his own heart,' and countless others. Though modern understanding of the Hebrew and Greek originals is greater, no Bible translator since has shown Tyndale's skill in writing an English which addresses the reader so memorably, and speaks so immediately to the heart. See also: English Bible.
Bibliography Tyndale W 1848-50 Doctrinal Treatises, 3 vols. The Parker Society, Cambridge Tyndale W 1989 Tyndale's New Testament in a Modernspelling Edition. Yale, London. Tyndale W 1992 Tyndale's Old Testament in a Modernspelling Edition. Yale, London Daniell D 1994 William Tyndale: a Biography. Yale, London Tyndale W 2000 The Obedience of a Christian Man. Penguin, London
Ullendorff, Edward (1920- ) A. K. Irvine
Born in Switzerland on January 25, 1920, Edward Ullendorff studied Semitic languages at Jerusalem in the late 1930s. Among his teachers was H. J. Polotsky (see Polotsky, Hans (Hayyini) Jacob), who was to have a profound influence on his philological method and thinking. During World War II, service from 1942 to
1946 with the British Military Administration in Eritrea enabled him to consolidate his knowledge of the Semitic languages of Ethiopia, particularly of Tigrinya, which was then in the early stages of establishing itself as a literary language and of which he subsequently published a chrestomathy with useful annotations
487
Biographies (A Tigrinya (Tagrznna) Chrestomathy, Stuttgart, 1985). (It was preceded by a comparable work for Amharic, An Amharic Chrestomathy, Oxford, 1965.) After further administrative work in Palestine, he proceeded to Oxford in 1948 to further his researches into the phonology of the Ethiopian Semitic languages, his dissertation being published as The Semitic Languages of Ethiopia: Comparative Phonology (London, 1955). Although UllendorfFs conclusion that all the modern Ethiopian Semitic languages share a common descent from classical Ethiopic has subsequently been challenged, his study remains the standard exposition of the subject. After nine years at the University of St Andrews, he proceeded to the Chair of Semitic Languages and Literatures at Manchester, which he occupied from 1959 to 1964, when he took up the first, and only, Professorship of Ethiopian Studies at the School of Oriental and African Studies in the University of London. This he retained until 1979, when he became Professor of Semitic Languages until his retirement in 1982. UllendoriFs research interests are many and varied, and cover a wide range of linguistic, philological, and historical topics involving Ethiopia, Biblical Hebrew, Aramaic, Ugaritic, and comparative Semitic studies. He made an important contribution to S. Moscati et al. (1964) An Introduction to the Comparative Grammar of the Semitic Languages:
Phonology and Morphology, and wrote a number of articles on various aspects of comparative Semitics. Frequently, his penetrating insights into linguistic arcana are to be found in the numerous reviews and personal appreciations which he wrote, or in annotations to publications of a more cultural or historical nature. His major contribution to the field of Semitic and Biblical studies may be felt to lie in the profound influence that he has exercised on the contemporary British approach to these studies generally. In earlier years, theological considerations had been very much at the center of Semitic studies in Britain, and these were heavily influenced by the classical exposition of Biblical Hebrew, being promoted in terms of their usefulness in understanding the text of the Bible. Arabic stood largely independent of this trend, and Ethiopian Semitic languages are hardly known. UllendorfTs profound experience of the complete range of the Semitic languages, together with his wide and eclectic knowledge and application of modern linguistic methods, has left its mark on a generation of British Orientalists and persuaded them to take a more holistic approach to their areas of interest. See also: Semitic Languages.
Weber, Max (1864-1920) G. Oakes
Max Weber, the German social theorist generally regarded as one of the seminal figures in the history of the social sciences, was born on April 21,1864 in Erfurt. Weber, a child of the pre-1914 German upper middle class of culture and property, was raised in a bourgeois villa in the fashionable Charlottenburg district of Berlin. As a schoolboy, he developed the voracious reading habits that were to mark his career as a scholar, plowing through Classical literature and philosophy as well as Spinoza, Schopenhauer, Kant, and the forty-volume Cotta edition of Geothe's works. In 1882, he entered Heidelberg University, where his primary studies in law were supplemented with lectures in economics, history, philosophy, and theology. As a student, Weber followed the usual practice of the time, spending a few semesters at several universities and attending lectures by famous professors before he returned to Berlin to complete his doctorate (1889) and Habilitation (1891), the research monograph required for appointment to a teaching post in a German university. In 1893, he 488
married a distant cousin, Marianne Schnitger, and accepted a professorship in economics at Freiburg University, a position he resigned in 1896 to assume the chair in economics at Heidelberg. By the autumn of 1898, Weber began to suffer from a nervous disorder that left him incapable of teaching and virtually unable to pursue scholarly work. This illness effectively ended his professorial career, which was not resumed until 1918, only two years before his premature death in 1920 due to the complications of a lung inflammation. However, it marked the beginning of the work for which he is remembered. Weber's mature work elaborates a series of themes, hypotheses, and modes of analysis that frame an agenda and chart a course for sociology in the twentieth century. The main question of Weber's research center on the unique character and development of modern Western rationality, the various conditions and consequences of which he explored in an astonishing range of social formations and cultural configurations: ascetic Protestantism and
Weinreich, Uriel (1926-67) the genesis of the modern professional ethos; the Western city and its distinctive occupant, the independent burgher; Western law as elaborated by an autonomous status group of jurists; harmonic music, which is tied to the development of Western science and its basis in both mathematical and experimental methods; and the Western state and its distinctive form of domination, the bureaucratic organization that functions according to purely formal and impersonal rules. In his investigations of rationalization processes, Weber developed a comparative sociology of religion of unprecedented scope and sophistication. In his essays on the sociology of religion, he explored the qualifications of different types of religious elites and virtuosi, the conditions for the development of a religion of the masses, the styles of life and political and economic profiles that differentiate adherents of the major religions of salvation, the role of class constellations and social stratification in general as determinants of religious development, and the relations among economic, political, and religious rationalism in Protestant Christianity, Confucianism, Hinduism and Buddhism, and ancient Judaism. In his investigations of the various institutional and value spheres of culture—economics, politics, religion, erotics, science, and art—Weber stressed the uneven development of these spheres in the same social formations; the circumstances under which one sphere may penetrate and condition another, and the relative autonomy of value spheres and their corresponding orders of life; the progressive mutual isolation produced by the development of value spheres, the tensions, and conflicts generated by this development, and its effects upon alternative strategies for the rationalization of life.
These inquiries were carried out primarily in Weber's series of studies on the economic ethics of the world religions and in his massive unfinished manuscript posthumously entitled Economy and Society, the plan for which he outlined in a letter to his publisher dated December, 1913. Noting that he had worked out a 'complete theory' linking all the major social groups to the economy, a sociology of salvation religions and religious ethics, and a 'comprehensive sociological theory of the state and domination,' Weber concluded by claiming that 'nothing of the kind has ever been written, not even as a "precursor"' (Schluchter 1989: 419-20). Seventy years after the death of Max Weber, this claim still holds true.
Bibliography Bendix R 1960 Max Weber: An Intellectual Portrait. Doubleday, Garden City, NY Bendix R, Roth G 1971 Scholarship and Partisanship: Essays on Max Weber. University of California Press, Berkeley, CA Gerth H H, Mills C W (eds.) 1946 From Max Weber: Essays in Sociology. Oxford University Press, New York Kasler D 1988 (trans. Hurd P) Max Weber: An Introduction to his Life and Work. Polity Press, Cambridge Schluchter W 1989 Rationalism, Religion, and Domination: A Weberian Perspective. University of California Press, Berkeley, CA Weber M 1958 The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism. Scribners, New York Weber M 1978 Roth G, Wittich C W (eds.) Economy and Society: An Outline of Interpretive Sociology. University of California Press, Berkeley, CA
Weinreich, Uriel (1926-67) T. Hill
When Uriel Weinreich died, aged 41, he left a record of remarkable distinction in three diverse fields: Yiddish studies, linguistic geography and sociology, and semantics. Born in Vilnius, the main center of Ashkenazic Jewish culture, he was the son of the Yiddish scholar Max Weinreich, who in 1940 took the family to the USA, joining the faculty of New York City College. Uriel Weinreich studied, and later taught, at Columbia University, graduating with a PhD in 1951 and going on to become the first Atran Professor of Yiddish studies, chairman of the linguistics department, and joint editor of Word.
Weinreich stimulated and contributed to modern Yiddish studies in many ways, beginning early with the textbook College Yiddish (1949). He founded and edited the collections of occasional papers entitled The Field of Yiddish (1954), and with his wife Beatrice Weinreich published the bibliography Yiddish Language and Folklore (1959). In his Modern English/ Yiddish, Yiddish/English Dictionary (1968) his theories on systematic lexicography found concrete application, including the definition and application of the distinctive Yiddish register system. At the time of his death he was engaged upon the Language and 489
Biographies Culture Atlas of Ashkenazic Jewry, based on data on their ancestral communities gathered from American Yiddish speakers. Weinreich's doctoral thesis was on language contact, supervised by A. Martinet, with guidance during a year's field research in Switzerland from J. Jud and E. Dieth. Published as Languages in Contact (1953), it presented a systematic framework for categorizing mutual influence and mixing between languages, and quickly became a recognized basic text. The comparison of (mainly phonological) systems between dialects was already accepted practice in many surveys, though rejected by others. Weinreich's article 'Is a structural dialectology possible?' (1954a) expounded its theoretical basis, and initiated a discussion that received interesting contributions from, among others, W. G. Moulton and R. I. McDavid Jr. In the 1960s, Weinreich's attention turned to the study of linguistic variation and change at the level of idiolect and speech situation, his conclusions being presented in the article, posthumously completed by his pupil W. Labov and M. I. Herzog, 'Empirical foundations for a theory of language change' (Weinreich et al. 1968). Weinreich's writings on semantics express his conviction that a valid (and necessarily complex) theory of meaning requires close study of how diverse languages meet the communicative demands made on them, within their cultures, in actual situations. Accordingly, though he had enthusiastically em-
braced TGG as a whole, his lecture 'Explorations in semantic theory' (1964; published 1966 in Current Trends in Linguistics) was a critique of inadequacies in the Katz-Fodor model, which led to further debate with Katz. Regarding lexicography, Weinreich endorsed the Soviet linguists' view of it as being a distinct discipline, and contributed to it in theoretical papers, as well as in his Yiddish dictionary. His semantic and lexicographical writings were posthumously edited in Weinreich (1980). See also: Judaism; Yiddish. Bibliography Malkiel Y 1967 Uriel Weinreich. Lg 43: 605-10 Moulton W G 1968 Structural dialectology. Lg 44: 451-66 Schaechter M 1971 Weinreich, Uriel. In: Encyclopaedia Judaica, vol. 16, p. 406. Keter, Jerusalem Weinreich U 1949 College Yiddish. YIVO, New York Weinreich U 1953 Languages in Contact: Findings and Problems, Linguistic Circle of New York, I. Mouton. The Hague Weinreich U 1954a Is a structural dialectology possible? Word 10: 2-3 Weinreich U (ed.) 1954b. The Field of Yiddish, 1st collection. Linguistic Circle of New York, New York Weinreich U 1980 On Semantics. University of Pennsylvania Press, Philadelphia, PA Weinreich U, Labov W, Herzog M I 1968 Empirical foundations of a theory of linguistic change. In: Lehmann W P, Malkiel Y (eds.) Directions for Historical Linguistics. University of Texas Press, Austin, TX
Welmers, William E. (1916-88) R. G. Schuh
William Welmers was the preeminent Africanist of the American structuralist school. He underscored the importance of tone in African languages. He was also a pioneer in African language pedagogy. Welmers was born on April 4, 1916 in Orange City, Iowa and grew up in Holland, Michigan, where he graduated in 1935 from Hope College with a degree in philosophy. He received ThB and ThM degrees at Westminster Theological Seminary, and he entered the University of Pennsylvania intending to pursue study of the languages of the Ancient Near East. However, World War II created the need for specialists in 'lesser known' languages, and supervised by Zellig Harris, he completed his PhD in 1943 with a dissertation 'A descriptive grammar of Fanti.' Welmers remained at Penn two more years as an instructor in Chinese and Japanese for the Army. In 1946, he went to Liberia with his wife Beatrice, whom 490
he had married in 1940, to do research for the Lutheran Mission. Between 1946 and 1950 he worked on Kpelle, which resulted in several publications and an abiding interest in Mande languages. Supported by an American Council of Learned Societies grant, he traveled overland as far as Ethiopia, doing research on Mande, Gur, Benue-Congo, and Cushitic languages. In the 1950s he taught at Cornell and the Hartford Seminary Foundation. In 1960 he went to UCLA as the first faculty member specializing in sub-Saharan African languages. He remained there until his retirement in 1982. He died in 1988 in Lakeview, Arkansas. The range of Welmers's work is best exemplified in his encyclopedic African Language Structures. The most detailed chapters of this book involve descriptions of the tonal systems of several languages.
Westermann, Diedrich Hermann (1875-1956) Welmers was particularly attentive to the typology of tonal systems, tonal alternations, and the grammatical role of tone. He appears to have coined the term 'terrace level' to refer to tone systems in which a lowered high tone, as opposed to the mid tone of 'discrete level' systems, establishes a new, lowered tonal register. Welmers stressed the necessity of understanding African language grammars from the internal patterns of the languages rather than Eurocentrically, as exemplified in his chapters on verbal systems and (non)-adjectives. In addition to African Languages Structures, Welmers produced book-length works on Igbo (coauthored with his wife, Bee), Jukun, Efik, and Vai, and he wrote numerous historical and descriptive articles on African languages as well as articles on
language pedagogy. (A fuller biography and a complete bibliography of his works up to 1976 can be found in Hyman et al. 1976.) In addition to his linguistic career, Welmers was an ordained minister in the Orthodox Presbyterian Church. See also: Christianity in Africa; Missionaries; African Traditional Religions. Bibliography Hyman L M, Jacobson L C, Schuh R G (eds.) 1976 Papers in African Linguistics in Honor of Wm. E. Welmers, Studies in African Linguistics, Supplement 6. UCLA African Studies Center, Los Angeles, CA Welmers W E 1973 African Language Structures. University of California Press, Berkeley, CA
Westermann, Diedrich Hermann (1875-1956) M. Schladt
Westermann, a German missionary and linguist, is credited with being one of the founders of modern African linguistics. Besides detailed language studies, his major contribution is the attempt at a historical reconstruction of the Western Sudanic languages. He was born on June 24, 1875 in Baden (near Bremen). In 1895 he joined the Norddeutsche Missionsgesellschaft (NMG). Until 1899 he studied in Basel and Tubingen. In 1901 he was sent to Togo as a teacher, and it took him only a few months to learn the Ewe language. In addition, he carried out studies on Logba, Ful, Hausa, and Twi (Akan). In 1903 poor health forced Westermann to return to Germany, where Carl Meinhof called him to the School of Oriented Studies in Berlin as a teacher of Ewe. After a second visit to Togo in 1907. Westermann taught Ewe, Hausa, Ful, and Twi in Berlin. In 1908, he left the missionary service. In 1910, Westermann took over Meinhof s position as director of the School of Oriental Studies. From the time he left the missionary service until his death, Westermann concentrated on various topics of African studies: language documentation, language comparison, anthropological and religious as well as historical studies. In 1911, he published Die Sudansprachen, an attempt at a historical classification of the Sudanic languages. Apart from Meinhof s similar endeavor at a classification of the Bantu languages, Die Sudansprachen is one of the first genetic classifications of languages covering a large area. In the revised 1927 edition (Die westlichen
Sudansprachen und ihre Beziehungen zum Bantu), he restricted himself to the Western Sudanic languages. Various visits to Africa resulted in linguistic and cultural documentation, e.g., on the Shilluk, Gola, and Kpelle. In 1925, Westermann was appointed the first director for African Languages and Cultures at the University of Berlin. In 1926, he became codirector of the newly founded International African Institute (IAI). His Practical Orthography of African Languages (1927)—commonly known as the 'Westermann-script'—became the guideline for many conferences on the orthography and writing of languages, e.g., of Shilluk, Dinka, Nuer, Bari, Lotuko, Madi, and Zande. In 1928, Westermann was one of the founders of Africa, the mouthpiece of the IAI, and was its editor until 1940. He inspired the founding of many other periodicals. His non-linguistic publications of the 1930s and 1940s show that Westermann was at that time strongly influenced by the national socialist Zeitgeist. After World War II, Westermann continued writing on African topics. The Languages of West Africa (1952) which he published with M. A. Bryan, was the continuation of Westermann's linguistic life's work, the classification of the Western Sudanic languages. Geschichte Afrikas (1952) must be considered to be his main non-linguistic work. Westermann was working on its new edition, when he died on May 31, 1956 in Baden.
491
Biographies See also: Missionaries; African Traditional Religions.
Bibliography Dammann E 1976 Die Bedeutung von Diedrich Westermann. Internationales Afrikaforum 12(2): 174-80 Hintze U 1957 Diedrich Westermann. Schriftenverzeichnis und einige biographische Da ten. Mitteilungen des Instituts fur Orientforschung 5: 45-83
Westermann D H 1902 Worterbuch der Ewe-Sprache. Vol. 1: Teil Ewe-Deutsches Worterbuch. Vol. 2: Teil DeutschEwe Worterbuch. Dietrich Reimer, Berlin Westermann D H 1907 Grammatik der Ewe-Sprache. Dietrich Reimer, Berlin Westermann D H 1927 Die westlichen Sudansprachen und ihre Beziehungen zum Bantu. Walter de Gruyter & Co, Berlin Westermann D H 1952 Geschichte Afrikas. Staatenbitdungen su'dlich der Sahara. Greven, Cologne
Whitney, William Dwight (1827-94) E. F. K. Koerner
Whitney was born in Northampton, Massachusetts, on February 9, 1827, and died in New Haven, Connecticut, on June 7, 1894. He is best known as a general linguist and Sanskrit scholar. He was the brother of the geologist Josiah Dwight Whitney (1819-96), after whom the highest mountain in the USA (excluding Alaska), Mount Whitney, California, is named, and William Whitney's early interests lay in the natural sciences, notably ornithology and geology. It is therefore not surprising that he introduced into linguistic theory and practice notions derived from geology, which he had absorbed from Charles Lyells voluminous Principles of Geology (1830-33) and other scientific writings, notably the concept of 'uniformitarianism.' His education included a period at Williams College, New Haven, Connecticut (1842-45), after which he devoted himself for three years to bird- and plant-collecting. Part of his collections subsequently went into the Peabody Museum of New Haven. However, books on comparative philology, especially Sanskrit, which his elder brother has brought back from Europe, attracted his interest, and after another stint in the United States Geological Survey, he enrolled at Yale College in 1849. A year later, he left for Germany, studying at the University of Berlin with Franz Bopp, C. Richard Lepsius (see Lepsius, Carl Richard), and Albrecht Weber, and at Tubingen with Rudolf von Roth for almost three years (late 1850-July 1853). Whitney worked in particular with Weber and Roth on Sanskrit texts, which culminated in his editions of several important Atharva-Veda texts between 1860 and the end of his life. On his return to America he was appointed Professor of Sanskrit at Yale University (1854), and when he was approached by Harvard in 1869, Yale also offered him the professorship of comparative philology. Whitney remained at New Haven for the
492
rest of his life except for several trips to Europe, in particular Germany, where he completed his Sanskrit grammar (1879). He was the most important figure in nineteenth-century American linguistics, dominating the field for almost four decades, both as a scholar and organizationally, for example, as librarian (1855-73), corresponding secretary (1857-84), and finally president (1884-90) of the American Oriental Society. His influence on academic appointments throughout the USA appears to have been enormous; his service as editor-in-chief of the Century Dictionary (New York 1889-91) was another means of leaving his imprint on American science. He received many honors during his career, beginning with Doctor of Philosophy from the University of Breslau in 1861, and followed by honorary doctorates from his alma mater (1868), College of William & Mary (1869), St Andrews, Scotland (1874), Harvard (1876), Columbia (1887), Edinburgh (1889), memberships in many scholarly societies and academies, and other distinctions such as the Bopp Prize (1871) and Foreign Knight of the Prussian order 'pour le merite' for arts and sciences. Whitney's chief claim to distinction came from his work in Indie philology, both text editions and the Sanskrit Grammar of 1879, and from his two books on general linguistics (1867; 1875); his ongoing polemic with Max Miiller of Oxford may have detracted from his importance as a sound methodologist of linguistic science, but as the testimonies of the greats of nineteenth-century scholarship in the field, delivered at the 1894 Whitney Memorial Meeting, show (Lanman 1897), he was regarded by them as a significant influence on their work (Jakobson 1971). The importance of some of his pronouncements on matters of general linguistic theory for Saussure, notably his emphasis on the social nature of language and the conventional and
Whorf, Benjamin Lee (1897-1941) arbitrary character of the linguistic sign, has become generally recognized (cf. Koerner 1973: 74-100, for details). See also: Sanskrit; Sanskrit: Discovery by Europeans. Bibliography For a full bibliography, see Lanman C R (ed.) 1897 Jakobson R 1971 The world response to Whitney's principles of linguistic science. In: Silverstein M (ed.) 1971 Koerner E F K 1973 Ferdinand de Saussure: Origin and Development of His Linguistic Thought in Western Studies of Language. F. Vieweg and Sohn, Braunschweig Koerner E F K 1992 William Dwight Whitney and the influence of geology on linguistic theory in the 19th century. In: Naumann B, Plank F, Hofbauer G (eds.) Language and Earth: Elective Affinities Between Linguistics and Geology in the 18th and 19th Centuries. Benjamins, Amsterdam Lanman C R (ed.) 1897 The Whitney Memorial Meeting. Ginn, Boston, MA Seymour T D 1894 William Dwight Whitney. American Journal of Philology 15: 271-98
Whitney W D 1867 Language and the Study of Language: Twelve Lectures on the Principles of Linguistic Science. Scribner, New York Whitney W D 1873 Oriental and Linguistic Studies: The Veda; the Avesta; the Science of Language. Scribner, Armstrong and Co, New York Whitney W D 1874 Oriental and Linguistics Studies, vol. II. The East and West; Religion and Mythology. Scribner, Armstrong and Co., New York Whitney W D 1875 The Life and Growth of Language: An Outline of Linguistic Science. D. Appleton and Co., New York and H. S. King, London Whitney W D 1879 Sanskrit Grammar, Including Both the Classical Language and the Other Dialects of Veda and Brahmana. Breitkopf and Hartel, Leipzig (2nd Revised edn. 1889.) Whitney W D 1885 William Dwight Whitney. In: Whitney W D (ed.) Forty Years' Record of the Class of 1845, Williams College, New Haven. Tuttle, Morehouse and Taylor, New Haven, CT Whitney W D 1892 Max Miiller and the Science of Language. D. Appleton and Co., New York Whitney W D 1971 Whitney on Language: Selected Writings, Silverstein M (ed.) MIT Press, Cambridge, MA
Whorf, Benjamin Lee (1897-1941) J. H. Stam
Benjamin Lee Whorf was an amateur linguist who speculated on the relation of language to culture and thought. He is associated with the so-called 'Principle of Linguistic Relativity' or 'Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis.' Whorf was born in Winthrop, Massachusetts, April 24, 1897. His parents descended from early American settlers and his father, Harry Church Whorf, was a commercial artist, stage designerdirector, and amateur geologist. Benjamin exhibited a comparable range of curiosity as a youth and graduated from Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1918 with a BS in Chemical Engineering. In 1919 he was hired by the Hartford Fire Insurance Company as a fire prevention engineer, then a field without academic recognition. Equally new was Hartford's notion that fire inspection and prevention could be a customer service, and Whorf became the recognized expert in this area. He ultimately became assistant secretary of the company, which generously allowed him leaves to follow his linguistic and anthropological interests. He worked there until his death from cancer on July 26, 1941. He and his wife Celia Inez Peckham had three children. An autodidact in linguistics, Whorf began to study Hebrew in 1924, inspired by Fabre d'Olivet's La
langue hebraique restitute (1815-16), a work that revived a kabalistic conceit which saw in Semitic sounds and characters mystical meanings. His original motivation was a desire to reconcile modern science with biblical authority: he was brought up Methodist Episcopal, had questioned the theory of evolution, and completed a lengthy manuscript on science and religion in 1925. Whorf expanded his interests to study Aztec and then Mayan hieroglyphics. Using the collection at the Watkinson Library in Hartford, Whorf extended his pursuits to anthropology and archeology. By 1928 he was working at many other collections in the northeast; he had begun correspondence with scholars of ancient Mexican language and culture; and he published his first article. 'An Aztec account of the period of the Toltec decline.' Whorf started attending scholarly conferences and delivering papers. Although he did not accurately decipher Mayan ideograms, he correctly proposed that they were a system for writing spoken language. In 1929-30 the Social Science Research Council granted him a fellowship, which allowed him to visit Mexico and do further study of Mexican languages. In 1931 Whorf began to study with Edward Sapir, the prominent anthropological linguist and student
493
Biographies of Franz Boas, who had come to nearby Yale University. Although he remained an amateur, Whorf now worked in the company of leading professional linguists and found particular resonance between his own ideas and those of Sapir. His study of Hopi, begun in 1932, led to his fullest formulations of the theory that different languages express different understandings of the world, the so-called 'Linguistic Relativity Principle,' particularly in 'Some verbal categories of Hopi' (1938) and The relation of habitual thought and behavior of language' (1941).
Whorf was a popular lecturer and wrote accessible versions of his thesis in Technology Review—'Science and linguistics' (1940), 'Linguistics as an exact science' (1940), 'Languages and logic' (1941)—and in the The Theosophist—'Language, mind, and reality' (1942). Bibliography Carroll J B 1956 Language Thought and Reality: Selected Writings of Benjamin Lee Whorf. Technology Press of Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA
Wilkins, John (1614^72) J. Subbiondo
John Wilkins's scholarly interests reflected the panorama of seventeenth-century British thought: in addition to his work in linguistics, he distinguished himself in education, lexicography, oratory, science, theology, and taxonomy. His principle contribution to the intellectual life of seventeenth-century Britain was his role as principal founder of the Royal Society, and his contribution to the history of linguistics was his leadership in developing the most comprehensive universal or philosophical language to date. Born in 1614, Wilkins was educated at Magdalen Hall, Oxford; and upon graduation, he was appointed tutor there in 1634. He was ordained in 1637 and appointed Vicar of Fawsley, and later served as private chaplain first to Lord Berkeley and then to Prince Elector Palatine Charles Louis. In 1648, he was appointed Warden of Wadham College, Oxford, and there received his Doctorate of Divinity. He was appointed Master of Trinity College, Cambridge in 1659; Bishop of Chester in 1668; and, after his resignation, he held a variety of clerical positions in London until his death in 1672. A significant promoter of the scientific activities of his day, he led the philosophical or universal language movement which attempted to invent an artificial language to remedy the deficiencies of natural languages. There was considerable concern on the part of seventeenth-century scientists that the imprecision of natural languages threatened the advancement and preservation of science. In his Mercury (1641), Wilkins advanced a system of cryptology in which he designed a secret language. Expanding the theoretical construct of that design. Wilkins developed the most extensive philosophical language ever devised in his monumental Essay towards a Real Character, and a Philosophical 494
Language (1668). In the initial phase of his project, Wilkins worked closely with George Dalgarno; but soon after, he decided not to collaborate with Dalgarno because their goals grew incompatible. Wilkins's first task in the development of his philosophical language was to compile detailed charts reflecting the knowledge of the universe shared by his colleagues in the Royal Society. He then designed a graphemic system, a 'real character,' and a phonetic system capable of signifying each element in his charts. The symbols of the elements were formed into words and the words were placed in logical order into sentences. He arranged the elements according to meaning—an approach later adopted by Peter Roget who credited Wilkins in the preface of his famous thesaurus. Wilkins provided a dictionary which served as an alphabetical index for locating elements in his charts. Dolezal (1985) has convincingly pointed out that this dictionary merits recognition in the history to lexicography. In late-twentieth-century scholarship, Wilkins draws growing attention as a significant thinker of his time and also as a substantive pioneer in semiotic theory. Bibliography Dolezal F 1985 Forgotten but Important Lexicographers: John Wilkins and William Lloyd. M. Niemeyer, Tubingen Salmon V 1988 The Study of Language in SeventeenthCentury England, 2nd edn. Benjamins. Amsterdam Shapiro B 1969 John Wilkins: 1614-1672. University of California Press, Berkeley, CA Slaughter M 1982 Universal Languages and Scientific Taxonomy in the Seventeenth Century. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge Subbiondo J 1992 John Wilkins and 17th-century British Linguistics. Benjamins, Amsterdam
Wittgenstein, Ludwig (1889-1951)
Wittgenstein, Ludwig (1889-1951) C. Travis
Ludwig Wittgenstein, arguably the most original and influential philosopher of the twentieth century, took up philosophy as a vocation in 1911, having first studied engineering. His choice was prompted by interest in the philosophy of mathematics, a subject on which he lectured and wrote extensively until the end of his life. He also wrote extensively, over long periods, on philosophy of mind, epistemology, and other areas. This article concentrates on his philosophy of language. No area in Wittgenstein's philosophy can be called the foundation, or core, of all the rest. There are many mutual dependencies. His philosophy of language, for example, cannot get started without the proper epistemology—one that can only be understood completely in the light of the resultant view of language. But in Wittgenstein's treatment of language there are keys to much of the rest. 1. The Influence of Frege and Russell on Wittgenstein's Early Work
In his first years in philosophy, Wittgenstein was greatly influenced by ideas of'Gottlob Frege and Bertrand Russell, changing earlier Schopenhauerinspired views. (On choosing philosophy, he visited Frege, who directed him to Cambridge to study with Russell.) Two leading ideas of Frege and Russell were fundamental to Wittgenstein's early views, as epitomized in Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus (completed in 1918), although they also remained important in his later work: the idea of 'logical form' and the idea of an 'ideal' language. 1.1 Logical Form The idea of 'logical form,' and relatedly 'logical analysis,' is roughly this: for each meaningful proposition (one that actually says something in particular to be so), or thought (one that is actually of things being in some definite way), or any proper component of these, there is a unique true logical form which it really has—a way that is constructed out of some unique stock of constituents, where the rules by which it is thus constructed show the contribution each constituent makes to what the whole says, and to what it requires for truth. Logical form may be discovered by thoroughgoing logical analysis which involves, for each bit of an expression, examining the systematic effect of its presence or absence on the conditions of which the whole would be true. Wittgenstein extended these ideas by arguing that a fully analyzed, simple proposition, if it is meaningful, will picture a possible state of affairs with which it shares a form, and also that all complex
meaningful propositions are truth-functions of simple 'atomic' propositions. The paradigm for a successful search for logical form was taken to be Russell's analysis of sentences containing definite description (in Russell 1905), which became a sort of oblique manifesto for those who thought discovering such form to be the main business of philosophy. 1.2 An Ideal Language The other leading idea, strongly promoted by Frege, was that of an ideal language 'suitable for scientific purposes.' Such a language would, first, be totally without ambiguity. So it would never call for disambiguation. What this seems to mean is: the question whether some bit of it is to be understood in this way or that could never arise as a question to be resolved by some fact outside of the language itself. Any such question would be decided uniquely and effectively by the properties already conferred on the language's bits in setting it up, or in specifying which language it is; all this while for any bit, since it has a semantics, there is such a thing as 'the way in which it is to be understood.' (One might see in this Frege's fondness for tertium non datur elevated to a creed.) So an ideal language is a sort of self-propelled linguistic perpetual motion machine: everything it does, it does quite independently of outside help, or of any surroundings in which it might occur. If P is one of its predicates, and V an arbitrary item, then P is true of V or it is not, with no thanks to us, or to anyone; and quite apart from anyone's reactions to P. That is the sort of meaning conferred on P by its place in the ideal language; and it is what having a proper meaning would look like. One might regard such an ideal language as a 'language of thought(s),' provided one understands that in an appropriately Fregean, nonpsychologistic way. The point is not that the language is realized in the brain, though in fact Frege sometimes seems committed to that too (see Frege 1918: 26). The point is this: consider the maximally expressive ideal language that it is humanly possible to construct, or to grasp. Then each thought that we can think, each thing that we can state, will be said by exactly one item in that language, which, conversely, will say nothing but that. (Thoughts here are logical, not psychological, objects; individuated by the situations of which they would be true.) Since an ideal language is completely perspicuous, the item will reveal what the structure and essence of that thought really is. Natural language, being defective, may fail to be univocal: there may fail to be any one thing fixed by the ideal language which is correctly said to be the
495
Biographies thought some natural sentence expresses. Still, Frege insists, we may understand such a sentence in one way or another, as saying this or that. Any of us, on hearing it, may take it to state thus and so, even if, strictly speaking, it does not univocally do that. The maximal ideal language reveals what we do in doing that: it exhibits all the understandings it is possible to have, the ways in which words may be understood, in taking them to say something in particular. To take them to say something specific to be so is always to associate them with an item in that language. That is the sense in which it is a language of thought, or better, of thoughts. Wittgenstein's early interest centered on the question of what an ideal language would be like, leading him to another early and abiding interest: the bounds of sense, or the distinction between sense and nonsense. Both ideas are prominent in the Tractatus. Within the picture just sketched, a sentence of one of our defective natural languages expresses nonsense just in case there is nothing in the maximal ideal language which says what it does, if anything. In that case, there is nothing which it says, or says to be so. To express nonsense is to express, and say, exactly nothing. The interesting sort of nonsense is that where, so to speak, 'syntax outstrips semantics'; we produce words which seem grammatically in order, but they lack the semantic properties they must actually have if they are to say something. That notion is central in Wittgenstein's later, as well as in his early, philosophy. But in the later philosophy he has very different ideas as to the specific causes of such failure. In 1914, Wittgenstein entered the Austrian army. In 1918 he became a prisoner of war in Italy. Between 1919 and 1929, he remained quasi-retired from the philosophical arena. He returned to Cambridge in 1929 with a new view of philosophy and of language; with ideas in terms of which the old leading ideas may be seen as false ideals. (It is important to keep in mind that, like any philosopher, Wittgenstein had to struggle with, and thereby develop, the new ideas. He did not always see clearly what they were, and certainly did not see the same thing in them from 1929 on. Nor did he always have the words, or the uses of them, to state those ideas perspicuously, whether to himself or to others. To think otherwise would be idolatry.)
Wittgenstein's rule was thus: do not try to solve a problem by drawing technical distinctions between different types of items that might bear semantic properties, as between 'proposition' and sentence, or between concepts and predicates. He had various reasons for the rule. The one that matters here is that the same sorts of problems which arose for the original items (words, for example, which may bear various understandings) are bound to arise for the newly introduced items as well; fresh items are not the means for solving problems. That rule, combined with his insights about the false Fregean/Russellian ideals just discussed, yielded a truly radical approach to semantics, and to understandings.
2. Wittgenstein's Later Work on Language The old leading ideas remained central to Wittgenstein's later philosophy, though his new concern was to exhibit in detail what is wrong with them. Thus, for example, he aims to show exactly why it is wrong 'to think that if anyone utters a sentence and means or understands it he is operating a calculus according to definite rules' (Philosophical Investigations, Sect. 81). Or why it is not 'as if our usual forms
2.1 Naming and Meaning To see what the new view is, we should look at the beginning of the of the Philosophical Investigations. Here Wittgenstein's first concern is, ostensibly, with the relation between naming and meaning. (Meaning thus and so is what words of a language do. Though Wittgenstein sometimes uses 'meaning', or a word that so translates, to apply to words as used on a particular occasion, here he does not.) Take the
496
of expression were, essentially unanalyzed, as if there were something hidden in them that had to be brought to light... as if we were moving towards a particular state, a state of complete exactness; and as if this were the real goal of our investigation' (Sect. 91). Or exactly what the mistake is in the following: The essence is hidden from us": is the form our problem now assumes. We ask: ' What is language?,' ' What is a proposition?' And the answer to these questions is to be given once and for all; and independent of any future experience.' (Sect. 92)
Wittgenstein was also guided continuously during his later period by another thought, which G. E. Moore reports as follows: One chief view about propositions to which he was opposed was... that a proposition is a sort of 'shadow' intermediate between the expression... and the fact... he said... [this view] was an attempt to make a distinction between a proposition and a sentence.... it regarded the supposed 'shadow' as something 'similar' to the fact in question; and he said that, even if there were such a 'shadow' it would not 'bring us any nearer to the fact,' since 'it would be susceptible of different interpretations...' ... 'No interpolation between a sign and its fulfillment does away with a sign.' He said... 'the expression of an expectation contains a description of the fact that would fulfill it,' pointing out that if I expect to see a red patch my expectation is fulfilled if and only if I do see a red patch (Moore 1959: 260-61) (Compare Sects. 95, 429)
Wittgenstein, Ludwig (1889-1951) English word 'blue.' We might say that that names a certain color, namely, blue. What is the relation between its doing that and its meaning what it does? Perhaps, for it to do that just is for it to mean what it does; in saying that it names the color blue, one states exactly what it means. (What extra fact should one mention? What fact not determined by that one is determined by what 'blue' means?) But if that is so, as it seems to be, then Wittgenstein's next question arises. What has all that—either what it means or what it names—got to do with the standards for its correct use or, inter alia, with what it would be true of? Here Wittgenstein uses his notion of a language game to make the point. (A language game is defined by its rules. By contrast with actual words, it is thus explicit which rules set its standards or correctness for words and responses that are moves in it.) A language game is an object of comparison: we may sometimes view some properties of our words as modeled in one or another such game. There is no such thing as 'the language game we are playing' in speaking given words (see Sects. 81, 130). That a word, e.g., 'blue,' names what it does is compatible with its figuring in an indefinite variety of language games, with indefinitely many different, and sometimes conflicting, standards or correctness. So its naming what it does does not settle what it could truly apply to. Now all of these remarks about what naming does not do apply intact to meaning. That 'blue' means what it does not fix what it would be true of. Take the sky. Is it blue? If you said so, in the wrong surroundings, someone might be very disappointed when he looked at it for the first time from close up, in an airplane. Sometimes it counts as blue—in some surroundings, for some purposes—and it is then true to say that it is blue. Sometimes it does not so count, and it is false to say so. What changes from one case to another is not what 'blue' names, not what it means. Throughout it speaks of the color blue, and does so by and in meaning what it does. By now, the above point has been widely taken, even by those who, not long ago, still thought that meanings of words could be stated by specifying what they were true of. The most usual way of assimilating the point is to echo J. L. Austin in saying that an English sentence is precisely not what can be true or false (it doesn't say anything), then positing some other item (a thought, a proposition) that may be. The point then becomes: an English sentence expresses different thoughts on different speakings, an English predicate different concepts, etc. But a thought has just the sort of truth condition a sentence was originally supposed to. 2.2 Semantic Properties and Occasion-sensitivity It is just here that Wittgenstein's second guiding idea—the avoidance of 'shadows' between us and the
world—leads to major innovations. The principle is: do not try to solve the problem (accounting for variation in what words with fixed meaning say) by postulating new bearers of semantics, since the same problem will arise for them. They, too, will be governed by difference standards of correctness in different surroundings. (We cannot cancel out the sign.) If we are debarred from this solution, what solution remains? The answer is to treat semantic properties as normal properties, on a par with ground-level ones. Consider the property of being blue. Having it, we have just seen, is, or may be, an occasion-sensitive affair. Sometimes the sky counts as having it, sometimes it does not. Now shift to the property of being true, or true of the sky. If that behaves normally, then having it is an occasionsensitive affair too. Whatever the semantic item—say, a sentence—if that item may ever count as having that property, then the basic state of affairs is: in some circumstances it would, in others it would not. More generally, the having of a semantics (some set of semantic properties) is an occasion-sensitive affair: which semantics an item counts as having varies with the occasions for counting it as having, or lacking, any. If an item may count, in different surroundings, as having different semantics, then something more than just the item's occasion-independent nature is required for fixing which semantics it counts as having in any given surroundings. The surroundings must help, of course. But, Wittgenstein points out, there being a result depends also on there being such a thing as the reasonable way of understanding the item, or assigning it a semantics, in those surroundings. Facts as to what is reasonable depend, in some way, on facts about us, beginning with the simple fact that we are very often capable of seeing what is reasonable. Without the right background of facts about users, or treaters, or evaluators, of an item, there would also be no facts as to the semantics it counted, in given surroundings, as having. If the above sort of sensitivity to occasions or surroundings is intrinsic to semantic properties, thus a feature of any item that has a semantics, then the Fregean ideal language is ruled out. Any language would be, necessarily, dependent on the reactions of us, or its users, for the semantic facts about it, particularly those about its applications, being what they are. Languages cannot, in principle, be selfpropelled, as they would be on Frege's view. Wittgenstein argues for the pervasiveness of semantic occasion-sensitivity in two ways: first in his discussion of rules and what they require (see especially Sects. 84-7); and second in the private language discussion (roughly Sects. 243-72). The first is a direct argument, relying on facts as to the conceivable ways of specifying which rule a given rule is. Any specification leaves at least conceivable
497
Biographies doubts as to whether in this case, this, or perhaps rather that, would be in compliance with the rule. ('Can't we imagine a rule determining the application of a rule, and a doubt which it removes—and so on?' (Sect. 84).) The private language discussion proceeds by stripping away the background of a user's reactions (except for a degenerate and futile case: the lone private linguist), and examining what happens. The upshot is that a language that got along entirely on its own steam would be no genuine language at all. No intelligible language could, in principle, conform to Frege's ideal. 3. More General Issues
With this outline of a new view, some questions that run persistently through all of Wittgenstein's philosophy will now be addressed. First, perspicuity. Wittgenstein remarks in a different connection: 'It is so difficult to find the beginning, Or better: it is difficult to begin at the beginning. And not try to go further back' (On Certainty, Sect. 471). We may always make fresh demands for further perspicuity, pushing the identification of an understanding farther back. But if we do so indefinitely, we will never arrive at anything. We are not en route to the Fregean ideal. So: It is not our aim to refine, or complete, the system of rules for the use of our words in unheard-of ways. For the clarity that we are aiming at is indeed complete clarity. But this simply means that the philosophical problems should completely disappear. (Sect. 133)
Within or without philosophy: an explanation serves to remove or avert a misunderstanding—one, that is, that would occur but for the explanation; not every one that I can imagine. (Sect. 87)
Complete perspicuity is achieved by our ordinary explanations (inter alia of meaning or content) when they achieved their goal; that is, when they leave no real or live doubt as to whether what was said/meant is this or that. Perspicuity so conceived is, of course, an occasion-sensitive affair. Finally, nonsense. Nonsense, on this view, comes in many varieties. The most significant one is this. The view is that words depend on their surroundings, or the facts of their speaking, for bearing the sort of semantics words would bear where they said this or that to be so. Their mere semantics (meaning) as words of such and such language (say, English) is not enough for them to do this. The English sentence, 'The sky is blue,' viewed merely as an English sentence, in total abstraction from surroundings, says nothing in particular to be so. There could be no such thing as isolating those states of affairs which
498
would be: things being as that sentence, so viewed, says things to be. For though 'is blue' speaks of being blue, there are various 'sometimes-correct' ways of counting such things as the sky as being, or failing to be, that. Meaning alone does not show which of these ways to rely on in evaluating the truth of those words. We must rely on surroundings to show this— typically those of a speaking—or the project of evaluation cannot begin. There is, then, a substantive burden on the surroundings in which words are used. Since it is a substantive one, some surroundings may fail to provide what is needed from them (see Sects. 117, 501, 514, 515). Words spoken in such surroundings may be fully grammatical and meaningful. Their semantics may be perfectly coherent. They will still have said nothing to be so, or at least nothing could count either as their being true or as their being false. This is a new conception of a way in which syntax may outstrip semantics: not by outrunning it entirely, nor by getting words paired with an incoherent or internally contradictory semantics (the English sentence is not incoherent), but rather by outrunning the situations in which words would have an adequate semantics—notably, adequate for evaluating them as to truth. This sort of nonsense is what one produces by ignoring the contribution surroundings must make, or by failing to foresee how surroundings may fail to do so. Since philosophers tend to overlook the ways in which their words depend for their semantics on surroundings, assuming that a meaningful sentence, used any old time, will say something, this is one typical sort of philosophical nonsense. It is epitomized not by patently opaque and turgid metaphysical prose, but rather by a philosopher who, clutching his nose says, 'I know I have a nose,' or, pointing at the ground. 'I am here," or who, for no reason, remarks. 'Hamburger is red'— or who, for no reason, says of Jones, whose accomplishments he has briefly sketched 'Jones understands the words "Aardvarks live in Africa".' The profound implications of Wittgenstein's views on language and meaning have been felt in nearly all areas of philosophy from, for example, philosophy of science to ethics and aesthetics. A ceaseless outpouring of commentary and debate followed his death in 1951 and not only his ideas but many of his illustrative terms—'picture' from his early work or later 'game,' 'form of life,' 'family resemblance'— have become common currency in discussions of language. Bibliography Cavell S 1979 The Claim of Reason. Oxford University Press, Oxford Kenny A 1973 Wittgenstein. Harvard University Press, Cambridge, MA
Wulfila (Ulfilas) McGuinness B (ed.) 1967 Ludwig Wittgenstein und der Wiener Kreis. Blackwell, Oxford Pears D 1988 The False Prison. Oxford University Press. Oxford Rhees R (ed.) 1981 Recollections of Wittgenstein. Oxford University Press, Oxford Travis C 1989 The Uses of Sense. Oxford University Press, Oxford Wittgenstein L 1956 (trans. Anscombe G E M) Remarks on the Foundations of Mathematics. Blackwell, Oxford Wittgenstein L 1958 The Blue and Brown Books. Blackwell, Oxford
(3117-382?)
Wittgenstein L 1961 (trans. Pears D, McGuinness B) Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus. Routledge and Kegan Paul, London Wittgenstein L 1967 (trans. Anscombe G E M ) Philospohical Investigations, 2nd edn. Blackwell, Oxford Wittgenstein L 1969 (trans. Paul D, Anscombe G E M) On Certainty. Blackwell, Oxford Wittgenstein L 1974 (trans. Kenny A) Philosophical Grammar. Blackwell, Oxford Wright von G H Wittgenstein. University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis, MN
Wulfila (Ulfilas) (3117-382?) J. M. Y. Simpson
Wulfila (also known by the Greek forms of his name 'Ulfila' and 'Ulfilas') was the translator of the Bible into Gothic. He was born in Dacia, in Visigothic territory (present-day Romania north of the Danube), probably in 311. His forebears had been brought as prisoners from Cappadocia some 50 years earlier by Gothic invaders of Asia Minor and it is possible that these ancestors had already been converted to Christianity. Wulfila went to Constantinople as a young man and in 341 was consecrated bishop of the Gothic Christians by Eusebius of Nicomedia, Bishop of Constantinople, an Arian. He returned to evangelize and minister to his people for the rest of his life, carrying to them the Arian form of Christianity. The first seven years or more were spent in Dacia; thereafter, as a result of persecution Wulfila and his congregation crossed the Danube, settling in Moesia (present-day Bulgaria). Arianism, part of Wulfila's legacy, a national characteristic not only of the Visigoths but of Ostrogoths, Vandals and Burgundians, caused a long-standing rift between these Germanic peoples and the post-Nicene Roman Empire. In 381, the Roman emperor, Theodosius the Great, an upholder of Nicene Trinitarian orthodoxy, summoned Wulfila to Constantinople for discussions; in the course of these he died. Wulfila reputedly translated the whole of the Bible, except for the Books of Kings, allegedly omitted in order not to incite the bellicose Goths to further deeds of war (Philostorgius Historia Ecclesiastica II, 5). The New Testament was translated from the original Greek, the Old Testament from the Septuagint. In carrying out his translation, Wulfila was inevitably faced with the two problems that have confronted Bible translators down to the present day. The first, peculiar to those translating into a hitherto unwritten language, was that of inventing a suitable writing system. Wulfila carried out a phonemic analysis of Gothic (however he himself might have
described this task) and produced an alphabet that appears to be totally appropriate. This was based on the Greek alphabet and certain fourth century Greek spelling conventions were carried over into Gothic, for example the notation of the vowels /e/ and /ii/ as < ai > and < ei > respectively and of the sequence /rjg/ as < gg >. His other task was that of extending the vocabulary of Gothic so that it could convey the new concepts of Christianity. This he did in the three ways familiar to Bible translators. The first is by borrowing: thus Greek euaggelion 'gospel' was simply taken over into Gothic as aiwaggeljo. The second is by loan-translation (caique): Greek synagoge 'synagogue' (literally 'gathering together') is formed from syn 'together' and agein 'to bring' and this compound was reproduced in Gothic dress as gaqumf>s, made up of ga, a prefix that forms a collective noun, and qiman 'to come.' The third is by extending the use of an already existing word, thus naseins 'rescue' was used to convey the meaning 'salvation'. There is Greek influence in Wulfila's Gothic syntax. These points illustrate the general principle that the receptor or target language may itself be changed by translation. Unfortunately most of Wulfila's translation has been lost. Just over half of the Gospels are preserved in the surviving pages of the splendid Codex Argenteus, an Ostrogothic manuscript dating probably from the fifth century and now in Uppsala. Other portions of the Gospels and of the Pauline Epistles, together with three chapters of Nehemiah, survive in various other manuscripts, the majority of them in Milan. See also: Gothic. Bibliography Braune W 1961 Gotische Grammatik 16. Auflage neu bearbeitet von Ernst A. Ebbinghaus, Tubingen Ebbinghaus E A 1992 Some remarks on the life of Bishop Wulfila. General Linguistics 19: 15-29
499
Biographies
Wycliffe, John (1330-1384) G. L. Jones
John Wycliffe, described as 'the last of the Schoolmen and the first of the Reformers,' was born in Yorkshire and educated at Oxford. He became a Fellow of Merton (1356), Master of Balliol (1360), and Warden of Canterbury Hall, later incorporated into Christ Church (1365-1367). Though he continued to live at Oxford until 1381, he also held the livings of Fillingham (1361-1368), Ludgershall (1368-1384) and Lutterworth (1374-1384), where he died during a celebration of the Mass on December 31, 1384. A prolific author, he penned over 40 major works on philosophy, theology, and biblical exegesis. As a philosopher he was a Realist, and therefore opposed the Nominalism of the Schoolmen. As a theologian he was not as radical as some have supposed; he advocated Augustine's doctrines of predestination and grace. His study of the Bible led him to appreciate its significance and to call for a vernacular version so that its message would be accessible to everyone. Four aspects of his teachings aroused the hostility of his superiors: his rejection of the doctrine of transubstantiation, his refusal to acknowledge ecclesiastical authority, his criticism of clerical abuses, and his promotion of an English translation of the Scriptures. Because he regarded Scripture as the only criterion of Christian teaching, he felt obliged to condemn transubstantiation in favour of a belief closer to Luther's doctrine of consubstantiation. In lengthy arguments against the Scotists and the Thomists in the De Eucharistia and the De Apostasia, in which he claims that it was unknown in the Church before the twelfth century, he describes transubstantiation as unscriptural, idolatrous, and based on an unsound philosophy. It served no purpose but to encourage superstition among worshippers. His consuming commitment to Scripture and his belief in its
sufficiency as a guide for Christian living led him to regard canon law as secondary. He resisted the political power of the hierarchy and challenged the claims of the papacy. The authority of the pope was binding only if it could be demonstrated that he held office in conformity with biblical teaching. The religious orders, especially those of the friars, had no foundation in Scripture. It was the ignorance of the Bible among the clergy which led to pastoral infidelity and abuse. Because God's law was not known it was not kept. Part of the problem was the clergy's poor command of Latin which meant that the Bible was a closed book. The remedy was a vernacular version of the Vulgate. The first translation appeared in c.1384 and a revision in c.l 395. It cannot be stated with certainty that Wycliffe was responsible for translating any part of the original work himself, but it was inspired by him and executed under his guidance. Greeted enthusiastically by his followers, the Lollards, it was rejected by the religious authorities. Though many of Wycliffe's ideas were adopted by Jan Hus and the Czech reformers, his forthright views eventually led to the charge of heresy. The Lollards were condemned at the Council of Constance in 1415 and in 1428 their mentor's bones were disinterred and burnt. See also: Hus, J.; English Bible; Linguistic Theory in the later Middle Ages.
Bibliography Kenny A 1985 Wyclif Press. Blackwell, Oxford Kenny A (ed.) 1986 Wyclif in his Times. Clarendon Press. Oxford Robson J A 1961 Wyclif and the Oxford Schools. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge
Young, Thomas (1773-1829) J. D. Ray
English scientist and pioneer of linguistics, Young was born at Milverton, Somerset, and brought up in the Quaker tradition. Educated at Edinburgh, Gottingen, and Cambridge, he practiced as a physician in London and Worthing until his death. 500
Young was a polymath, and showed exceptional ability even in his earliest years; by the age of 14 years he had mastered the elements of 12 European and Near-Eastern languages, but his main discoveries were to be in the realm of medicine and the physical
Ziegenbalg, Bartholomdus (1682-1719) sciences. He is celebrated as the founder of modern optics, and of the wave-theory of light, as well as making important contributions to the theory of vision and the workings of the human eye. He also worked on navigation, and laid down the principles of life insurance. On the strength of these discoveries he was appointed Professor of Natural Philosophy at the Royal Institution, of which he also became the Foreign Secretary. Young also found time to pursue his interest in languages, and he reviewed some 400 of them for the Encyclopaedia Britannica. It was during the course of these researches that he first coined the word 'Indo-European' to describe the language family discovered by William Jones. In a sense he is the last of the universal philosophers of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, and the first of the scientists of the nineteenth and twentieth. Young's main contribution to linguistic knowledge lies in the field of Egyptology. The Rosetta Stone (see Rosetta Stone), discovered in 1798, held out the promise of deciphering the lost secrets of the hieroglyphs, and Young was the first scholar to reject the traditional belief that Ancient Egyptian Writing (see Egyptian Hieroglyphs) was symbolic and mystical. He went on to show the phonetic nature of the script, and drew up an alphabet which was
partially correct. This was published in 1819. Young's work on hieroglyphs was the essential background to the decipherment by Champollion (see Champollion, Jean-Francois). In the field of demotic, his achievement was greater, and his last work was Rudiments of an Egyptian Dictionary, published after his death. Young was the first person since the Roman Empire who could read a demotic text, and he deserves to be known as the decipherer of this script. His work in linguistics falls into the same pattern as his scientific achievements: Young made the decisive breakthrough, leaving the details to others and moving on to new problems. But even if he did not always develop his ideas, the range of his discoveries is unique. Bibliography Dictionary of National Biography, vol. LXIII. Oxford University Press, London Dawson W R, Uphill E P 1972 Who was Who in Egyptology, 2nd edn. Egypt Exploration Society, London Ray J D 1991 The name of the first: Thomas Young and the decipherment of Egyptian writing. Journal of the Ancient Chronology Forum 4: 49-54 Wood A, Oldham F 1954 Thomas Young: A Memoir. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge
Ziegenbalg, Bartholomaus (1682-1719) R. E. Asher
The contribution of European missionaries to the knowledge in the west of both major and minor languages of India is enormous. Bartholomaus Ziegenbalg was an important figure in the history of this contribution, for his grammar of Tamil in Latin (1716) was the first comprehensive description of Tamil in a European language to appear in print. Jesuit missionaries had written short accounts of aspects of the sounds and grammar of Tamil as early as the sixteenth century. Most of these, however, were never published, though some are still extant in manuscript form. Ziegenbalg left for India along with another German member of the Danish mission, Heinrich Pliitschau, in the autumn of 1705. After an eightmonth voyage they landed at Tranquebar on July 9, 1706. One of the many difficulties they immediately faced was that of communicating with the people among whom they wished to propagate the teaching of Christ, for they managed to find no one who knew both Tamil and a language which they themselves
understood. Their first lessons are recounted in a letter which Ziegenbalg sent home soon after his arrival in India: they sat with a group of schoolboys tracing letters in the sand. They thus learnt the shapes of the Tamil letters and the sounds associated with each—but without understanding the meaning of the words which they were repeating. It therefore seemed a matter of real good fortune to meet a Tamil who knew not only Portuguese, which by then was by no means a rare circumstance, but also Danish, Dutch, and German. Diligent study, at the level of eight hours of intensive work a day, followed and within a year their proficiency was such that they were able to preach in 'Malabarick' (i.e., Tamil) three times a week. Ziegenbalg studied the language of poetry as well as colloquial Tamil, and he prepared translations of parts of the corpus of early 'ethical' literature of some 1500 years ago, though these were not published until long after his death (Ziegenbalg 1930). Ziegenbalg's work was very well known in London, where several books under his name were published between 1710 501
Biographies and 1718: translations of letters sent home to Germany, the story of the work of the Danish mission, and books on south Indian customs and religion. His many writings in Tamil include a translation of the New Testament and the part of the Old Testament, a life of Christ, a number of hymns, and translations of sermons by distinguished theologians. His work on Tamil led to the production of a Tamil primer, a dictionary of more than 40,000 words, a separate dictionary of poetic language, and his grammar. Only the last of these has survived. An earlier version of what was to become the Gramtnatica Damulica was written, not later than 1710, in German, but Ziegenbalg decided to prepare a revision in Latin so that it might be accessible to speakers of other European languages. It was written in 1715, during a return voyage to Europe, and published the following year in Halle, where there was a stock of Tamil type. One of the most interesting aspects of Ziegenbalg's grammar is his presentation of colloquial forms, for these provide a clear indication that the diglossia which is a feature of modern Tamil was also a characteristic of the language in the early eighteenth century. Many of the forms he uses to illustrate grammatical points (e.g., palatal rather than dental consonants as one of the exponents of past tense) had not traditionally appeared in Tamil grammars and were not to be thought worthy of serious study again for more than two centuries. They provide valuable information about the history of the spoken language.
502
See also: Tamil; Missionaries. Bibliography Beyreuther E 1956 Bartholomaus Ziegenbalg, Bahnbrecher der Weltmission, 2nd edn. Evang. Missionsverlag, Stuttgart Jeyaraj D 1996 Inkulturation in Tranquebar. Der Beitrag der friihen ddnisch-halleschen Mission :um Werden einer indisch-einheimischen Kirche (1706-1730). Verlag der Ev. Luth. Mission, Erlangen Settgast A-C 1986 Der Mann in Tranquebar: ein Portrdt des Bartholomaus Ziegenbalg, gestattet nach alien Vrkunden und Briefen, 2nd edn. Evangelische Verlagsanstatt, Berlin Singh B 1999 The First Protestant Missionary to India. Bartholomaeus Ziegenbalg (1683-1719). Oxford University Press, New Delhi/Oxford Ziegenbalg B 1716 Grammatica Damulica, qua per varia paradigmata, regulas & necessarium vocabularium apparatum, viam brevissimam monstrat, qua Lingua Damulica seu Malabarica, qua inter Indos Orientates in usu est. & huiusque in Europa incognita fuit, facile disci possit: in usum eorum qui hoc tempore gentes illas ab idololatria ad cultum veri Dei, salutemque aternam Evangelio Christi perducere cupiunt:.. .Litteris & impensis Orphanotrophei, Halas Saxonum Ziegenbalg B 1930 Ziegenbalgs kleinere Schriften, Verhandelingen der Koninklijke Akademie van Wetenschappen. Afd. Letter-kunde, Nieuwe reeks, dl. 29, no. 2. Amsterdam Ziegenbalg B 1985 Grammatica damulica (Brentjes B, Callus K (eds.)) Martin-Luther-Universitat Halle-Wittenberg, Halle Ziegenbalg B, Schulze B, Gruendler J E (eds.) Biblia damulica, 1714-28, Tranquebariae
SECTION VIII
Glossary M. Dareau
ablative absolute A type of absolute construction (see absolute clause) found in some inflecting and agglutinating languages, e.g., Latin, specif, a phrase consisting of a noun in the ablative case and a modifier, usu. a participle, in agreement with it, e.g., Regibus exactis, consules creati sunt ('Kings having been abolished, consuls were elected'). ablative In inflecting and agglutinating languages, the case expressing locative and instrumental meanings, separation, origin, etc.; equivalent to prepositions 'by,' 'with,' 'from.' ablaut A systematic variation of a root vowel signaling a change in grammatical function, e.g., sing I sangI song I sung.
absolute clause (phrase, construction) A nonfinite adverbial clause or other adverbial construction not linked syntactically to the main clause, e.g., Other things being equal, we leave at nine. However, the train was late. Cf. ablative absolute. absolute state see status constructus.
accusative-and-infinitive A construction such as Bertie thought Gwen to be intelligent, because in a Latin translation Gwen would be in the accusative case and to be would be an infinitive. (This in fact is the normal Classical Latin way of expressing 'Bertie thought that Gwen was intelligent.') active In the analysis of voice, a sentence or clause in which the subject is also the actor, e.g., Mary drove the car, the verb form in such a sentence or clause. (Contrasts with passive.) adjective A member of the word class whose main function is to specify an attribute of a noun, e.g., a fat cat, The cat is fat', in many languages displaying contrasts of degree: fat, fatter, fattest. advanced Of a vowel: pronounced further forward in the mouth than the symbol used to notate the sound would indicate. adverb A member of the word class whose main function is to specify the mode of action of a verb, e.g., She ate quickly; other functions include sentence connector, e.g., Besides, it's blue, and intensifier, e.g., very good.
accent 1 Features of pronunciation which, taken together, identify a speaker's regional or social group. Cf. dialect. 2 The emphasis, due to loudness, pitch, or duration which gives prominence to particular words or syllables in speech. 3 In metrics the regular beats in a line of verse, e.g., Fair daffodils we weep to see. 4 also word accent The stress on a particular syllable of a word, sometimes signaling a difference in meaning, e.g., record (v) vs record (n). 5 A mark added above or below a letter in written language, e.g., acute (e), grave (e), etc., indicating a particular pronunciation, etc.
affix A formative capable of being added to a root or stem to make a more complex word, e.g., unfriendly. See also infix, prefix, suffix.
accusative, objective In inflecting and agglutinating languages, the case of the noun when it is the object of a verb; trad, applied to the object in English (the inflected pronomial forms him, her, etc., are now usually said to be in the objective case).
Afroasiatic, Afro-Asiatic The name of an extensive family of languages, spoken in Northern Africa and the Near East, which itself includes the following families; Berber, Chadic, Cushitic, Omotic, and Semitic, as well as Ancient Egyptian.
adverbial An element of structure functioning like an adverb, said esp. of phrases or clauses, e.g., He telephoned at once/last year/when he got home. affirmative Said of a sentence or verb which is not negative (see negation), i.e., which expresses an assertion, e.g., It is raining.
503
agglutinating language agglutinating language A language in which words are made up of a sequence of morphs, each expressing a separate item of meaning as, number, person, tense, etc. Cf. inflecting language, isolating language. agreement also concord A formal relationship in which the form of one element requires a corresponding form in another, e.g., between subject and verb: the cat sits, the cats sit. allative In inflecting and agglutinating languages, the case expressing the meaning of motion 'to' or 'towards' a place. allegorical Describes a text with more than one level of meaning, e.g., Pilgrim's Progress has a religious meaning beside the superficial story of a journey. alliteration A number of words beginning with the same sound, typically in a line of verse, e.g., Radio romance. allomorph One of a number of alternative realizations of a morpheme which are, e.g., conditioned by their phonetic environment, as in the case of the plural morpheme in English, realized by the allomorphs /s/, /z/ and /iz/. alphabet A set of symbols representing the sounds of a language; a writing system. alveolar Of a consonant, produced by contact or a close approximation of the tongue with the alveolar or teeth ridge (in English [t, d, 1, n, s, z]). aniconic Symbolizing without aiming at resemblance. antithesis The contrast of ideas by means of parallel arrangements of words, phrases, etc., e.g., They gave not bread, but a stone. aorist In some inflecting languages, the aspect of the verb denoting an action without reference to completion, duration, or repetition. (Contrasts with imperfect and perfect.) apical Of a consonant: pronounced with the tip of the tongue against e.g. the alveolar ridge or upper teeth or upper lip; often contrasted with lamina). apophatic Describing by means of negatives, that is, by saying what the thing being described is not, e.g. God is invisible, immortal, intangible, unchanging... Cf. cataphatic. apposition Two or more noun phrases having the same referent and standing in the same syntactical 504
Glossary relation to the rest of the sentence, e.g., Dylan Thomas, poet, playwright, drunk. approximant A consonant during which the articulators are brought together but without friction resulting from the air passing between them. archaism A word or phrase no longer in general use. Arian Applied to the doctrine in Christianity that Jesus the Son, though divine, was neither equal with God the Father nor eternal. (From Arms, a presbyter of the church of Alexandria in the fourth century CE.) Cf. Trinitarian. article A determiner which differentiates nouns according to their definiteness: the is the definite article in English, a(n) the indefinite. articulator One of the organs of speech involved in the production of a speech-sound. aspect A category of description referring to the way in which the performance of an action, esp. its duration or completion, is denoted by the verb, e.g., / am going// go. Other possible aspectual distinctions include habitual, inceptive, iterative, progressive, etc. aspiration The audible breath accompanying the articulation of some sounds, esp. the voiceless plosive. [h] as in [phat], such sounds are sometimes called aspirates. assimilation The modification of a speech sound by its proximity to another in that it becomes more similar or identical to the influencing sound. See also progressive assimilation, regressive assimilation. automatic writing Writing performed without the volition of the writer.
back of tongue That part of the tongue which, when in a position of rest, lies under the velum. back vowel A vowel articulated towards the back of the vowel area, that is, in the back of the mouth, i.e. one in which the back of the tongue is brought nearer to the uvula or in which the tongue is lying more or less flat, e.g. [u], [o], [o], [a] as in you, rope (Scottish pronunciation), awe and calm (Southern English pronunciation). bhakti Devotion to a god, as a path to salvation.
componential analysis
Glossary bilabial A speech-sound in which the primary articulation is a narrowing between or a closure of the lips. bilingualism The use by an individual or speech community of two (or more) languages. blade of tongue That part of the tongue which, when at rest, lies under the alveolar ridge. borrowing = loan(word) boustrophedon Writing or text having alternate lines written in opposite directions. breathy voice A type of phonation in which the glottis is in vibration but air escapes through it in such a way that a murmur is imparted to the resulting voiced sound. caique = loan translation canon The works of an author, literary movement, etc. regarded as authentic and hence authoritative or standard. canonical Belonging to the canon, nondeviant, standard. cantillation Chanting or intoning, especially of Hebrew scriptures in Jewish liturgical services. cardinal vowel One of a set of standard reference points, based on articulatory and auditory criteria, used to identify vowel sounds; four tongue positions (open, half-open, half-close, close) and three parts of the tongue (front, center, and back), with presence or absence of lip rounding (see rounded), produce two sets (primary and secondary) of standard vowel sounds by comparison with which the sounds of a language may be accurately transcribed. case In inflecting and agglutinating languages, the inflectional forms of the noun, pronoun or adjective used to identify syntactic relationships within the sentence, e.g., the nominative case identifies the subject, the accusative the object, the genitive the relation of possession, etc. cataphatic Describing by affirmation, that is, by stating what the thing being described is Cf. apophatic. central vowel A vowel articulated with the highest point of the tongue raised toward the back part of the hard palate or the front of the velum, e.g. [3] as in Southern English bird.
clause A syntactic unit consisting of subject and predicate which alone forms a simple sentence and in combination with others forms a compound sentence or complex sentence. click A consonant produced on a velaric ingressive airstream, e.g. the noise sometimes written as tut-tut or tsk! used to indicate disapproval in English. close approximation In the articulation of a consonant, the bringing together of the articulators so closely that friction results when air passes between them. close vowel A vowel in which the highest point of the tongue approaches the roof of the mouth most closely, e.g. [i], [u], as in see and you', it stands in contrast to close-mid, open-mid, and open vowels. closed Describes a syllable ending in a consonant. close-mid A vowel in which the highest point of the tongue approaches the roof of the mouth less closely than in a close vowel, but more closely than in an open-mid or open vowel, e.g. [e], [o] as in hair and hope in a Scottish pronunciation, or in French, de, eau. cognate Deriving from a common ancestor as, e.g., English and German from Common Germanic or French and Italian from Latin. cognitive (space) grammar A theory based on a view of language as facet of cognition, grammar being the means whereby conceptual content is structured and functioning solely as a link between phonological and semantic structures. cohesion The phonological, grammatical, or lexical means of linking sentences into larger units, paragraphs, chapters, etc., e.g., The girl went out. She shut the door. comparative method The comparison of forms between cognate languages as a means of establishing historical data about one or all of the related languages. comparative philology see philology comparison = degree complementary distribution Sounds in complementary distribution cannot occur in the same phonetic context environment. componential analysis The analysis of lexical items or lexemes in terms of sense-components (or semantic 505
componential analysis
Glossary
features), e.g., male/female, young/adult, human/ nonhuman, etc.
declension A set of nouns, pronouns or adjectives
concord = agreement
deep structure In transformational grammar, the abstract representation of a sentence specifying the syntactic facts which govern how the sentence is to be interpreted, disambiguating, e.g., Flying planes can be dangerous as between planes which fly and the flying of planes; or assigning the same underlying form to, e.g., active and passive sentences such as John loves Mary and Mary is loved by John. Cf. surface structure.
conjugation In inflecting and agglutinating languages
the set of verbs that vary according to the same model of formation or paradigm. conjunction One of the class of words whose main function is to connect clauses, phrases or words; trad. coordinating conjunctions, e.g., and, but; and subordinating conjunctions, e.g., that, when, see Subordination.
consonant A speech sound produced with constriction to a degree where audible friction is produced or closure of the vocal tract, e.g., [s], [r], [k], etc. 2 The unit of sound which occurs at the margin of the syllable, e.g., /sik/. 3 A letter or group of letters representing a consonant in senses 1 or 2 above, e.g., (sick). construct state see status constructus
construction The syntactic arrangement or patterning within a grammatical unit. context 1 The stretch of utterance or text in which a linguistic element occurs, e.g., in [pin], [p] and [n] are the phonetic context of [i]. 2 The discourse around a word or expression which clarifies its meaning in that environment, e.g., in Even foxes have holes in which to lay their heads, holes may be identified as meaning 'lair'. 3 The extralinguistic setting of an utterance or the nonlinguistic information contributing to the meaning, e.g., in the above example, the fact that the reference is biblical. corpus Written texts, transcriptions, recorded data, etc. used as a basis for any sort of linguistic or language related investigation; a computer or computerized corpus is a body of such data in a machinereadable form. creaky voice A phonation in which the glottis is in vibration, but in such a way that a 'creak' or noise like a stick being drawn along railings is imparted to the resulting voiced sound. cuneiform A writing system of the ancient Near East employing symbols composed of wedge shapes (from Latin cuneus 'wedge'). dative In inflecting and agglutinating languages, the case expressing the relationship of indirect object or
the meanings to or for.
506
which have the same inflections.
definite article see article
degree A grammatical category specifying the level of comparison of an adjective or adverb, specif, positive, comparative, and superlative, e.g., hot, hotter, hottest, also equative, e.g., as hot as. demonstrative (adjective, pronoun) An adjective or pronoun which serves to distinguish between members of a class, specif, this (these), that (those), e.g., This rose not that one, or these if you prefer. No Fll have those. dental Of a consonant (sense 1), produced by contact or close approximation of the tongue with the upper teeth. determiner A sub-class of modifiers cooccurring with nouns and pronouns to express semantic contrasts such as number or quantity, e.g., specifying count or mass nouns; specif, the articles a/the, also, items which occur in 'article position' in the noun phrase, e.g., some, every, much, this, etc. In some approaches the term is extended to cover other sorts of modifier. diachronic (historical) linguistics The study of languages as they change through time. dialect A variety of language distinguished 1 on geographical, 2 on social grounds by differences of grammar, vocabulary and accent. diglossia The cooccurrence of two distinct varieties of a language within a speech community, each performing a separate social function on differing levels of formality; a diglossic situation occurs, e.g., in Switzerland between Standard German (Hochdeutsch), the formal or high variety, and Swiss German, the low variety. discourse analysis A methodological approach to the analysis of language above the level of the sentence, involving criteria such as connectivity (see cohesion).
Glossary distinctive feature A piece of phonetic information distinguishing one sound from another; the minimal unit of a sound system capable of making such distinctions, e.g., labiality, roundness, etc.
front of tongue euphemism A less unpleasant or direct locution, e.g., pass away used in place of die. exegesis A critical interpretation or explanation of a text.
downstep A gradual descent of the pitch of the highpitched tones throughout a stretch of speech. dual(ity) A contrast of number in some languages, referring to 'two'. egressive Applied to the air moving out from the mouth during the production of a speech-sound. ejective Of a consonant (sense 1) produced by means of the glottalic egressive airstream mechanism, e.g., globalized stops [p', t', k', etc]. elision The omission of sounds (freq. unstressed vowels or medial consonants) in connected speech or verse, e.g., bacon '«' eggs; o'er. ellipsis The omission of that part of a linguistic structure which would be repetitive, hence is recoverable from the context, e.g., Where are you going! Home. (Home being an abbreviated form of / am going home.) emphatic consonants A series of phonemes in Arabic, very typical of that language; the sounds involved are characterized by velarization and/or pharyngealization (and perhaps other articulatery phenomena). (See Arabic.) epiglottal Made with the epiglottis, that is, the plate of cartilage that closes over the glottis during swallowing. epigraph An engraved inscription.
feminine see gender First Sound Shift A historical development affecting consonants, and peculiar to the Germanic languages in the Indo-European family; it explains, for example, why the initial sounds (which have remained unshifted) of the Latin piscis, tres, and cornu correspond to those of English fish, three [0], and horn. flap A consonant made with a flick of the tongue, the tip of which strikes the alveolar ridge in passing; the movement made is of a greater extent than that used in a tap. foot, group A basic unit in the rhythm of speech, consisting of one stressed syllable and subsequent syllables, up to but not including the next stressed syllable. formalism 1 An artificial language whose purpose is the precise characterization of other languages, artificial or natural, specif, in linguistic theory as a method of defining explicitly the grammatical properties of individual languages. 2 Applied to various literary movements concerned with the study of literature as formally autonomous works, rather than, say, literary history, e.g., New criticism. formative 1 A bound form which is part of a word, e.g., complex Latin verb endings such as -abat, -abit or minimal forms such as the English plural ending -s. 2 More generally, a grammatical element not further reducible to other elements, i.e., a morpheme.
ergative 1 Said of a language (e.g. Basque), construction, etc. where the object of a transitive verb and the fortis Sometimes applied to a speech-sound that is subject of an intransitive verb display the same case. 2 said to be pronounced with greater muscular effort In such a language, said the subject of a transitive and/or tension, e.g. [i] in seat or [th] in tar respectively, verb. 3 In transferred use, applied to languages not as compared with [i] in sit and [t] in star, the latter traditionally regarded as 'ergative,' relating sentences are said to be pronounced with less muscular such as The glass broke and The boy broke the glass in effort and/or tension and are termed lenis sounds. a similar fashion, the agent of the action being referred to as the 'ergative' subject. fricative Of a consonant, produced with audible etymology 1 The history of a linguistic form (esp. a friction, e.g., [f], [v], [0], etc. word) delineated by tracing its antecedents or etymons recorded in earlier stages of the language it friction In the definition of consonants, the sound of is in, or has come from, cognate forms in related air passing through a constriction in the vocal tract. languages and reconstructed forms (indicated by *, as Gmc *skirmjari). 2 The branch of linguistics con- front of tongue That part of the tongue which, when at rest, lies under the palate. cerned with the history of linguistic forms.
507
front vowel front vowel A vowel articulated toward the front of the vowel area, in which the tip or blade is raised in the direction of the alveolar ridge or the palate, e.g. [i], [e] as in see and head respectively. function How a constituent works, its relationship with the other constituents in a larger unit, as a noun or noun phrase in relation to a sentence can work or function as subject, object, complement, modifier, etc., freq. seen in contradistinction to form 1. 2 A mathematical expression connecting a number of arguments in a particular relationship and dependent on the individual values of the arguments for its own value, e.g., a+b is a function whose value is dependent on the values of a and b. 3 The role played by language in the social situation, how it is used to express attitudes, communicate feelings, etc. See also register, variety. 4 In the analysis of narrative, specif, in plot analysis, the sort of action performed by a type of charater, e.g., 'here rescues innocent victim.' future (tense) see tense geminate verb In Semitic languages, a verb with a triliteral root in which the second and third consonants are the same, e.g. SBB 'to encircle'. gemination The analysis of a sequence of identical segments as the repetition of the segment rather than as an example of length because of the occurrence of a syllable division, e.g., Italian none /notte/ rather than */not:e/. gender A grammatical category in which nouns are classified as belonging to a number of subclasses based on properties related to some extent to natural properties: the trad, genders are masculine, feminine, and neuter, others are also required (based, e.g., on shape, edibility, animacy, in, e.g., the Bantu languages). Gender concord may be required between noun and adjective, etc. and in the selection of pronouns. Note the distinction between natural gender where the sex of the referent is taken into account and grammatical gender where the classification is arbitrary. Elle est belle, le nouveau professeur illustrates both sorts. genetic classification The classification of languages according to their historic relatedness, illustrated by a family-tree of related languages. genitive In inflecting and agglutinating languages, the case expressing possession or origin and related concepts, e.g., the dog's bone, a nighfs fishing. genizah Hebrew term for a storeroom, usually attached to a synagogue, where damaged or heretical manuscripts are stored. 508
Glossary glossolalia 'Speaking in tongues', the production of pseudo-linguistic utterance in certain religious sects. glottal Of a consonant, made in the larynx by narrowing or closure of the glottis. glottalic Applied to an airstream in the mouth and pharynx which is generated by a rapid upward or downward movement of the closed glottis. glottis The aperture between the vocal cords. government In inflecting and agglutinating languages, the morphological control imposed by a word (class) on another, e.g., in Latin, prepositions govern or determine the case of the following noun: ad Romam but ab Roma. grammar 1 The study of language and the rules that govern its usage. 2 A description of the forms of words and the manner in which they combine to form phrases, clauses or sentences, = morphology + syntax. 3 A systematic and explicit account of the structure of (a) language according to the tenets of one or other of the theories of modern linguistics. grammatical meaning The aspect of meaning conveyed in the grammatical parts of linguistic structures, e.g., in the form -ing (verbal + nominal or + participial), -ed (past tense), -s (plural), etc. graph The smallest discrete segment of written or printed material, e.g., g, (7, etc. group see foot habitual Describes a form or aspect expressing repetition, e.g., He comes frequently, He leaves at six. Hamitic A term (deriving from Ham, one of the sons of Noah) formerly applied to some non-Semitic members of the Afroasiatic family. Hamitosemitic, Hamito-Semitic Another name for Afroasiatic, also Semito-Hamitic. Hebraism A locution in a language other than Hebrew, modeled on a Hebrew construction or idiom, e.g. All flesh shall see it together. hieroglyphic Describes a pictorial writing system used esp. in ancient Egypt. hiragana, katakana The Japanese syllabic writing systems, collectively known as kana.
Glossary hollow verb A Hebrew verb whose root contains two consonants separated by a Yod ( = y) or Waw ( = w), e.g. SYM 'to put', MWT 'to die'. homographs Words which have the same spelling but different pronunciation or meaning, e.g., row (a boat)/r0w (quarrel) or tear (rend)/tear (as in teardrop). homonymy The circumstances of two lexical items which have the same spelling and pronunciation but differ in meaning, e.g., bear (the animal/carry). homophones Words with the same pronunciation but differing in meaning, e.g., rough/ruff. hypotaxis A variety of subordination, specif, of clauses, where a dependent construction is connected to the main clause by a subordinating conjunction, e.g., I will go home when the bus comes. (Contrasts with parataxis.) ideogram, ideograph A symbol in a writing system representing a word or concept. idiom A phrase or other sequence of words which has a meaning beyond or other than the sum of the meanings of the individual words, e.g., throw over the traces (= free oneself of restrictions);^ off the handle ( = become angry), and which do not participate in the usual possible range of variations, e.g., He threw over the traces but *He threw over the trace. illocutionary act, speech act In the theory of speech acts, an act performed in saying something, i.e., making a promise, asking a question, giving a name; the illocutionary force of an utterance is its status as a promise, inquiry, etc. Cf. locutionary act, perlocutionary act. imperative 1 The inflectional mood which expresses the will to control or influence, e.g., in Latin ama, the command 'love!' Cf. indicative, subjunctive, etc. 2 The sentence type or verb form typically used in commands, exhortations, entreaties, etc. imperfect A form of the verb in some languages expressing past time usually with some aspectual element of duration or continuity. Cf. perfect, aorist.
International Phonetic Alphabet glottis which creates an ingressive airstream, e.g., /6/, /cf/, etc. Cf. ejective. inceptive A type of aspect where the beginning of an action is marked grammatically, indicated in English by e.g., be on the point of. indefinite article see article indicative The inflectional mood expressing factivity and simple assertion used in the verb forms of statements and questions (declarative and interrogative sentence types), e.g., in Latin amat (he is loving). Cf. imperative, subjunctive, etc. indirect object The recipient or beneficiary of the action of the verb, usu. so termed when no preposition is present, as / gave/got my daughter a cat, the equivalent of or equated with to/for my daughter in / gave/got a cat to/for my daughter (= dative function in inflecting and agglutinating languages and sometimes trad, so termed in English). infinitive The nonfinite form of the verb regarded as the unmarked or base form and used to cite a particular verb, e.g., the verb go (= the bare or zero infinitive) or, in English, with the particle to, the verb to go (= the to-infinitive). infix gram An affix inserted within a root or stem, e.g., in Tagalog sumulat (wrote) < sulat (write). inflecting language A language in which words cannot be readily separated into morphs, the inflections indicating grammatical changes being to some extent fused with the stem. inflection, inflexion A change made in the form of a word (chiefly by the addition of a suffix or prefix) to indicate variations in the grammatical relations between words in a sentence without changing the class to which they belong, e.g., in the declension of nouns and conjugation of verbs. ingressive A sound made on an inward-moving or ingressive airstream, e.g., an implosive. (Contrasts with egressive.) inherent vowel In Northern Indian alphabets, the vowel traditionally employed in pronouncing the names of consonant letters.
imperfective An aspect of the verb indicating noncompletion or continuation of an action. (Contrasts with perfective.)
instrumental The case taken by a noun phrase expressing 'by means of.'
implosive Describes a (usu. voiced) consonant made on a glottalic airstream by lowering of the closed
International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) The symbol system devised by the International Phonetic
509
International Phonetic Alphabet
Glossorv
Association to allow the accurate transcription of any spoken language. interrogative The sentence type or verb form typically used in asking a question e.g., Is John coming"? intonation The systematic rise and/or fall in the pitch of the voice in speaking. intransitive verb A verb which combines with only one nominal, e.g., Betsy sneezed. isolating language A type of language in which the words are invariable, syntactic relationships being organized chiefly through word order, e.g., Vietnamese. (Contrasts with agglutinating language, inflecting language.) iterative A type of aspect which expresses the repeated occurrence of an action on a single occasion, e.g., He kept on bouncing the ball, The ball kept bouncing. Japhetic Formerly applied to the Indo-European languages (from Japheth, one of the sons of Noah). kana see hiragana katakana see hiragana koine 1 Spoken or written Greek of the Mediterranean in the Hellenistic and periods. 2 The dialect or language of a which has become the standard language of area.
eastern Roman locality a larger
laminal Articulated with the blade of the tongue against e.g. the upper teeth or the alveolar ridge; often contrasted with apical. language 1 also natural language The principal signaling-system or instrument of communication used by humans for the transmission of information, ideas, etc., the central element of which is verbal but which contains as an essential component a substantial non-verbal element, e.g., intonation, stress, punctuation, etc. Communication by means of language is carried out in a number of media (see medium 1), viz., speech (regarded by modern linguists as primary), writing and traditionally less centrally, signing (sign language). Human language may be distinguished from the signaling systems of other species chiefly by its grammatical and semantic complexity and flexibility and by its descriptive and creative function but whether this is a difference of degree or kind is open to argument. 2 A variety of speech, writing, etc. used in particular circumstances, e.g., the language of literature, the courts, the streets, science, etc. 3 Non-verbal or artificially constructed communicative symbol systems, e.g., the language of bees, mathematics, computers. 4 An instance of 1 above, the verbal means of communication of a particular community; definable in linguistic or (in part) political terms, i.e., a language is the dialect of a nation, usu. (but not always) different enough from other languages to preclude mutual comprehensibility, e.g., English, Latin, Chinese. 5 The characters, conventions and rules used to convey information, e.g., in a programming language like BASIC or a machine language. laryngeal Of a speech sound, produced in the larynx. larynx The upper part of the trachea, containing the vocal folds.
labialized Produced with a secondary articulation of an approximation of the lips; it need not necessarily mean that the lips are rounded, though the term is often so used. labial-palatal Applied to a speech-sound produced with closure or the same degree of narrowing both of the lips and between the front of the tongue and the palate, e.g. [q] in French lui [Iqi].
lateral A consonant produced with central closure between the tip or blade of the tongue and the teeth or alveolar ridge, but with one side or both sides of the tongue lowered, leaving a passage clear for an ingressive or an egressive airstream. lateral approximant A lateral in which the side of the tongue is in open approximation with the roof of the mouth, so that no friction is heard, e.g. [1].
labial-velar Applied to a speech-sounds produced with closure or the same degree of narrowing both of the lips and between the back of the tongue and the velum, e.g., [w] as in English we [wi].
lateral fricative A lateral in which the side of the tongue is in close approximation with the roof of the mouth, so that friction is heard, e.g. [I] in Welsh Han [tan].
labiodental Articulated with closure or some degree of narrowing between the upper teeth and the lower lip, e.g. [fj, [v].
lateral release Applied to the release of a plosive not centrally but laterally, i.e. by lowering one side of the tongue, as [tL] in battle when pronounced [ batLl].
510
Glossary lenis see fortis lexeme The minimal distinctive unit in the semantics of a language, a word in the sense of a unit of meaning incorporating all the grammatical variations or forms in which it is liable to occur, e.g., the verb sing (incorporating sings, singing the present participle, sang, sung but not song, singer or singing the verbal noun); good (including better, best).
morph lowered A sound produced with a greater degree of opening than the symbol used to notate it would indicate. majuscule A style of writing consisting of capital letters; a capital letter. mantra see attached list masculine see gender
lexical item An item of vocabulary, commonly used as an equivalent of lexeme. lexicography The process of editing a dictionary; the principles and practice of dictionary making. lexicology The study of the meanings and applications of words. lexicon The vocabulary or word-stock of a language, a listing of this, as in a dictionary. lexis The vocabulary of a language. lingua franca A language used as a means of communication between speakers who have no native language in common, e.g., English and French in Africa, Hausa in West Africa. linguistics The study of language according to scientific principles. linguolabial Produced with the tip or blade of the tongue against the upper lip. lip-rounded see rounded lip-spread see unrounded loan translation, caique A compound or phrase borrowed into a language by translation of its constituent parts item by item, e.g., German Fernsprecher < telephone. loan (word), borrowing A word etc. taken from one language and assimilated into another, e.g., English formidable < French.
maxims of conversation, conversational maxims In the theory of speech acts, principles regulating communication, specif, quantity, quality, relation and manner, i.e., that a speaker's contribution to a conversation should be (a) as informative as is required but not more so; (b) truthful; (c) relevant; (d) perspicacious, avoiding obscurity, ambiguity, prolixity and muddle. medium 1 The means used in a communication, i.e., whether it is spoken, written, symbolic, color coded, etc., e.g., phonic, aural, visual medium. 2 A channel of communication, as in mass media. minuscule 1 A style of writing, e.g., Carolingian minuscule, consisting of small letters. 2 A small or lower-case letter. modernism A literary movement which rejected the traditional view of language and story telling, emphasizing instead the nature of language itself as a part of the literary creation, e.g., in the conscious use of unconventional syntax, ambiguity, etc. modification The limiting of a linguistic element by another dependent linguistic element (the modifier), restricted to the use of adjectives and adverbs, or extended to any dependent structure, e.g., in the small house on the prairie, house is modified by small, also, in some approaches, by on the prairie. modifier A limiting dependent structure, see modification. monob'ngual Having only one language.
locative In inflecting and agglutinating languages, the case expressing place.
mood The category whereby the attitude of the speaker towards what is said (uncertainty, etc.) is expressed by verbal inflections or the use of modal (auxiliary) verb forms, e.g., would, should, ought, etc. See indicative, imperative, subjunctive, etc.
locutionary act In the theory of speech acts the production of a meaningful utterance by the physical act of uttering words. Cf. illocutionary and perlocutionary acts.
morph The substantial exponent of a morpheme, e.g., in kicked two morphs represent the morphemes 'kick' and past tense 'ed', in went one morph represents 'go' and past tense. 511
morpheme morpheme The minimal unit of grammatical analysis one or more of which make up a word (sense 1), e.g., cat is one morpheme, cats (cat + s), catkin (cat + kin) two. morphology The study of the grammatical structure of words.
nasal release Applied to the release of a plosive not centrally through the mouth but through the nasal cavity by a lowering of the velum, as [pN] in open when pronounced [ opNm] nasal Of a sound, produced with nasality, i.e., passage of the airstream through the nasal cavity and closure of the oral cavity, e.g., [m], [n], [rj]. nasalization An alteration in the quality of a sound caused by part of the airstream passing through the nasal cavity, due to a lowering of the velum, during its production. negation The process of denial or contradiction of or dissent from something asserted, in English freq. by means of the negative particle not. negative Describes a word (adjective, pronoun, adverb), particle, sentence, etc. which exhibits negation, e.g., no, nobody, nothing, nowhere, not at all, I never went there, etc. neologism A recently devised word or usage.
Glossary number A grammatical category dealing with the analysis of word forms in so far as they express singularity, plurality or duality. object 1 also direct object The noun (phrase) following and dependent on a finite transitive verb, in simple declarative sentences freq. identified with the patient or goal, e.g., The cat chased the mouse. In inflecting and agglutinating languages freq. identified by the accusative case. Cf. indirect object. 2 The noun (phrase) governed by or following a preposition, e.g., between us, down the street. oblique In inflecting and agglutinating languages, applied to any case except the nominative. open approximation A degree of narrowing between two articulators which imparts a quality to the speech-sound produced, but without friction. open Of a syllable, ending in a vowel. (Contrasts with closed.) open vowel A vowel produced with the greatest degree of opening between the highest point of the tongue and the roof of the mouth, e.g. [a], [a] as in hat and hard; contrasts with close, close-mid, and open-mid. open-mid vowel A vowel in which the degree of opening between the highest point of the tongue and the roof of the mouth is not as great as in an open vowel, but greater than in a close-mid or a close vowel, e.g. [e], [o] as in help and awed.
neuter see gender
oral tradition The expression of a culture maintained in spoken form and transmitted by word of mouth, e.g., in songs and folktales.
Nicene Applied to the statement of Christian Trinitarian beliefs issued by the Council of Nicaea in 325 to combat the Arian doctrine, which it condemned.
orthography The spelling system of a language or dialect.
nominative also subjective In inflecting and agglutinating languages, the case of the subject of a verb.
palatal Of a speech sound, produced with the front of the tongue in contact with or approaching the hard palate, e.g., [9], [p] as in German ich and French vigne respectively.
nonfinite A form of the verb capable of functioning only in dependent clauses. In English, the infinitive, past and present participles, e.g., Togo to school John passed the park, Going to school John..., Gone to school by eight John went through the park. noun A member of the word class trad, denned as 'naming a person, place or thing', or, in modern linguistics, with reference to its distribution (preceding the predicate, etc.), function (as subject, object, etc. of a verb) and the morphological properties it displays (inflecting for case, number, etc.).
512
palimpsest Parchment or other writing material which has been used a second time after the erasure of previous writing. paradigm An example of pattern illustrating the inflectional forms of a part of speech, usu. set out in a table. parataxis The linking of clauses by juxtaposition, e.g., Go home. Ifs already dark. (Contrasts with hypotaxis.)
Glossary participle A form of the verb which participates in some characteristics of verb and adjective, e.g., in He was running and He was cheated, running and cheated are respectively present and past participles, or ingand ed- forms. particle An invariable word with a grammatical function and difficult to classify in terms of parts of speech, includes, e.g., the negative particle (see negation), not, to in the infinitive form to go, the adverbial component in phrasal verbs, e.g., away in Go away, etc. passive In the analysis of voice (sense 2), a sentence or clause in which the subject is the patient or recipient in relation to the action, e.g., The car was driven by Mary; the verb form in such a sentence or clause. past (tense) see tense perfect, present perfect A form of the verb, sometimes regarded as a tense, sometimes as tense + aspect, which expresses some variety of past time, in English, the verb form conjugated with have, e.g., He has written, and regarded as pastness having some relevance to the present, contrasting, e.g., with He wrote. Cf. pluperfect, imperfect, aorist. perfective An aspect of the verb indicating completion of an action. (Contrasts with imperfective.) perlocutionary act In the theory of speech acts, an effect caused by the way something is said, i.e., by using language to persuade, comfort, move to anger. Cf. illocutionary act, locutionary act. person A grammatical category used to identify the participants in a situation: first person, second person, third person referring respectively to the speaker (and associates) (7, we); hearer(s) (you); persons and things other than the speaker and hearer (it, they, someone, etc.). personal pronoun The pronoun referring to person, /, me, you, she, etc. pharyngeal 1 Refers to the cavity of the pharynx. 2 Of a consonant, produced by a close approximation of the root of the tongue with the wall of the pharynx, e.g. Pi], P].
pointing phonation The particular activity of the glottis in the production of voiced, breathy voiced, and creaky voiced sounds. phoneme In the theory of phonemics, the smallest contrastive unit in the sound system of a language. phonemics An approach to the analysis of the sound system of a language based on grouping the sounds or phones of the language into meaningful contrastive units, or phonemes, each of which indicates a difference in meaning between words, e.g., /t/, /d/, /s/ differentiate between tip, dip and sip phonetic Of or pertaining to phonetics. phonetics The study of sounds, esp. the nature and variety of sounds used in speech, particularly in terms of their manner of production (articulatory phonetics), acoustic properties (acoustic phonetics), and how they are perceived by the hearer (auditory phonetics). phonology The study of the sound systems or systems of meaningful distinctions of languages. phrase Two or more words in a syntactic relationship that function like a word (as opposed to a clause or sentence), specif, noun phrase, e.g., She wore the red hat, verb phrase, e.g., They have gone swimming, adjectival phrase, e.g., The tramp, wet and rejected turned away, adverb(ial) phrase, e.g., They cooperated very happily, prepositional phrase, e.g., 7 saw you on television. pleonasm A type of redundancy, the use of more words than are necessary to express a meaning, e.g., at this moment in time. plosive A type of stop, a complete closure and sudden release of a pulmonic airstream in an outward movement or plosion. Cf. implosive. pluperfect The perfect located in past time, i.e., a form of the verb expressing completion of an action in the past, e.g., He had written. plural(ity) A contrast of number referring to two or more than two, e.g., six cats.
pharyngealized Produced with a secondary articulation of narrowing between the root of the tongue and the pharynx.
poetic language The sort of language used in poetry, characterized esp. by creativity and, in comparison with other sorts of language, a high degree of deviant or irregular usage, richness of connotation, etc.
philology The historical or comparative study of language or languages.
pointing (of script) A system of accents (5) or diacritics inserted into the consonantal text of Hebrew 513
pointing and other Semitic languages to indicate the pronunciation of vowels, punctuation, and musical notation. Cf. vocalization. polysemy The circumstance in which a lexical item has more than one meaning, e.g., rough (coarse/ preliminary drawing). Cf. homonymy. positive The unmarked degree of adjectives or adverbs, implying no level of comparison, i.e., hot as opposed to hotter and hottest. postalveolar Articulated with the tip or blade of the tongue just behind the alveolar ridge. postposition A particle in, e.g., Japanese, Turkish, etc. which fulfils the functions of a preposition in English but comes after the noun it modifies, e.g., Japanese Tokyo e (to Tokyo). predicate In the analysis of the sentence, the second part of a two-part analysis: subject + predicate, specif, the verb + object + adjuncts (some approaches, however, would exclude the adjuncts from the predicate), e.g., in Susanna fell, fell \s the predicate, similarly ran away, ate an apple, lay on the grass in the park might fill that slot. prefix An affix attached to a root or stem in initial position, e.g., re- in return; in some languages inflections may be prefixed, e.g., in 36- in Old English or ge- in German. preposition A particle which has a grammatical or local function, acting usu. in combination with a following noun phrase, e.g., in the house, beyond reason, from Venice, etc. prepositional pronoun, pronominal preposition A word class in Arabic, Hebrew and Celtic languages containing single words meaning, e.g., 'to me,' 'to you,' 'with you,' etc. present tense The unmarked tense of the verb, referring to things as they are at the present moment (now), e.g., He takes his first extraterrestrial step, sometimes inclusive of past time, (up to and including now), e.g., He takes a packed lunch, and sometimes, also, future time, e.g., The dodo is extinct.
Glossorv sound e.g., in Dutch opvouwen, pronounced/Dpfauan/, progressive, continuous An aspect of the verb (trad. treated as a tense), expressing duration or frequency of repetition over time, e.g., / was traveling to Glasgow for three hours or every day. pronoun A word that can substitute for a noun or noun phrase (or clause) or words of similar type, e.g., it and what in WhatfelH It did, that clock on the shelf or he in John left work, he went home. proto-language The ancestor language of a family of languages, e.g., 'Proto-Indo-European'. pulmonic Applied to an airstream, either ingressive or egressive, produced by the lungs. punctuation A system of standardized marks or punctuation marks, used to structure or clarify written text. rebus principle In pictorial writing systems, the use of the picture of an object which sounds the same as the entity intended, e.g., a picture of a robin = robbing. reduplication 1 The repetition in a prefix or suffix of a sound found in the root, e.g., in Greek reduplication occurs in perfective forms such as /leluka/(XcA.uica) 'I have loosed' from /luo:/ (Xuco) 'I loose'. 2 The repetition that occurs in reduplicative compounds, e.g., shilly-shally. reference The relationship that obtains between a linguistic expression and what it stands for or denotes on any particular occasion of utterance, e.g., the cat may mean the cat I own / have just been talking about, etc. referential meaning The sort of meaning that identifies or refers to an entity in the real world (its referent), e.g., in / spoke to the sergeant whoever is sergeant is intended. reflexive Describes a construction where subject and object refer to the same entity, explicitly with the reflexive pronoun, e.g., John killed himself or implicitly, e.g., John never shaves.
primary articulation Applied to the greater degree of narrowing in those cases where a consonant is produced with two significant degrees of narrowing, both contributing to the quality of the sound.
regressive assimilation An assimilation where an alteration occurs in a sound because of the influence of a following sound, e.g., in Edinburgh, [n] -» [mj: [edimbra].
progressive assimilation An assimilation where a preceding sound causes an alteration in a following
relative clause A clause functioning as a modifier within a noun phrase, introduced in some languages
514
Glossary by a relative pronoun, e.g., the woman that wore the red hat. retracted Applied to a sound pronounced further back than the symbol used to notate it would indicate. retroflex Describes a consonant made with the tongue tip curling back to approach or strike the back of the alveolar ridge as in ft], pi], [§], etc. rhetoric 1 The art of public speaking as a means of persuasion elaborated by stylistic techniques, esp. figures of speech, etc. 2 Applied to technical aspects of discourse or text such as maxims of conversation, the techniques of telling a story, etc.
status constructus, construct state with the word as one of the two fundamental units of grammatical description. The sentence is classified formally as declarative, exclamative, interrogative, imperative types (corresponding to the functional classifications statement, exclamation, question and command). sequence 1 A linear succession of interdependent linguistic units, e.g., phonemes in /I e t/ (late), or words in the + black + cat. 2 Dependency among linguistic units 'following on' from one to another as in the sequence of tenses required between successive clauses, e.g., If I had gone, I would have seen you / If I go, I will see you I* If I had gone, I will see you; or the sequencing of a question and answer in discourse. sequence of tenses see sequence 2.
rhoticity 'R-colouring', caused by the tip of the tongue being curled back or retroflected. root also base The element in a word that cannot be further analyzed while still expressing some essential element of the meaning of the word; the core of a word to which affixes are added, e.g., feel, boy, -cipe (in recipe). Cf. stem. root of tongue That part of the tongue which, when at rest, faces the back wall of the naso-pharynx or, less technically, the back of the throat. rounded, Up-rounded Applied to a speech-sound produced with a secondary articulation of rounding of the lips. sandhi Phonological alternation in particular environments, specif, external sandhi functioning across word boundaries, e.g., English a/an in a man and an ostrich, French pot de terre [po:d9teR] / pot au feu [poto:f0]; and internal sandhi functioning within words, e.g., prescribe as against prescription. script The letter forms of writing systems or styles, e.g., the Roman or hieroglyphic alphabets; uncial, copperplate, etc.
sibilant A consonant sound, a fricative produced with a narrow groove-like stricture between the blade of the tongue and the alveolar ridge, e.g., [s], [/]. sigmatic Applied to Greek verbs or verbal forms that are characterized by the addition of a sigma (= <s», e.g. lusd 'I shall loose'. singular(ity) A contrast of number referring to 'one,' e.g., one/a cat. (Contrasts with plural(ity) (dual(ity).) sociolinguistics, sociology of language The study of how language functions in societies or speech communities, with reference, e.g., to language varieties, the linguistic identity of social or racial groups, multilingualism, etc. speech act = illocutionary act speech act theory An analysis of utterances which recognizes their function in doing something, i.e., that frequently utterances are not statements of truth or falsity, but actions, e.g., I apologize, I object, etc. The analysis includes the concepts of constatives, performatives, illocutionary acts, perlocutionary acts, locutionary acts. spread see unrounded
secondary articulation Applied to the lesser degree of narrowing in those cases where a consonant is produced with two significant degrees of narrowing, both contributing to the quality of the sound.
stanza A division of a poem, groups of lines organized in a repeating pattern, typically, four or eight lines.
semantics The study of meaning as between linguistic expressions and what these expressions describe; the study of the relation between sentences and the thoughts they express.
status absolutus, absolute state In Hebrew, Arabic and other Semitic languages, the form of a noun not followed by a genitive, e.g. Hebrew bayith 'house'. Cf. status constructus.
sentence The largest unit of structure in the organization of the grammar of a language, regarded, along
status constructus, construct state In Hebrew, Arabic and other Semitic languages, the form of a noun
515
status constructus, construct state followed by a genitive, e.g. Hebrew beth hammelekh 'the king's house'. Cf. status absohttus. stem The part of a word to which inflections are attached, e.g., feel/feeling, boy/boyish/boyishly. Cf. root. stop A consonant produced with complete closure of the vocal tract at the place of articulation, e.g., [p], [d]. stress The perceived prominence of a syllable relative to those around it due to its greater loudness or increased length or pitch, such a syllable is said to be stressed, e.g., remarkable. (Constrasts with unstressed.) strong verb A verb in which the past tense and past participle are formed by changing the stem vowel, e.g., sing, sang, sung. (Contrasts with weak verb where tense variation is achieved by suffixing, e.g., knit, knitted.) subject A major element of structure which with the predicate forms a typical sentence or clause, e.g., The cat ate a beetle, The beetle was eaten by the cat. In the latter example the cat is sometimes called the logical or underlying subject. subjunctive The inflectional mood expressing nonfactivity and possibility, e.g., in Latin amet 'let him love'; in English If I were in charge, I would do something about this. subordination A type of syntactic linking in which one linguistic unit, the subordinate one, is dependent on another, e.g., He said that he was ill or If you don't stop you will be ill. substantive A noun or noun-like item, e.g., goldfish, the young; also, sometimes applied to pronouns. suffix An affix added to the end of a word or stem, e.g., printable, crazily. suprasegmental Applied to a feature, such as intonation, which characterizes stretches of speech greater than one speech-sound. surface structure 1 In transformational grammar, the stage in the derivation of a sentence that comes after the application of transformational rules and pro-vides the input for the phonological component. 2 also surface grammar More generally, the form an utterance or sentence takes as spoken or as it appears on the page, freq. in relation to the ambiguities evident in such material, e.g., the surface
516
Glossary structures of Germs are too small to see without a microscope and They are too much involved in the affair to see without help are similar (though their deep-structures are not). syllabary A system of writing in which the symbols represent syllables. syllabic Of the nature of a syUable. syllable A minimal unit of sound in the phonological structure of the word; the syllable consists of a nucleus and (optionally) two margins, the onset coming before the nucleus and the coda after. syntax 1 The rules governing how words combine to form sentences. (Contrasts with morphology). 2 More generally, (the study of) the grammatical relationships entered into by linguistic units at any level, including morpheme and sentence. tagmemics An American structuralist model of linguistic description which proposes the phoneme, morpheme and tagmeme as the basic units, respectively, of phonology, lexicon and grammar, the tagmeme being used as a cover term for all grammatical units, which are distinguished in the analysis by differences in slots and the fillers which can fit into them, e.g., a noun/pronoun or subject in — wore a hat (e.g., She, Joan, The old man) or a clause/phrase in the boy — was caught (e.g., who skipped school, running away). tap A consonant produced by a single rapid contact of the tongue tip with the roof of the mouth, resembling a very short plosive. target language A language or variety which is the focus of some linguistic operation, e.g., in teaching or translation, the language being taught or into which material is translated. tense The category of the verb that places the action or state referred to in time, past, present or future in relation to the utterance, e.g., in Latin scripsi, scribo, scribam (I wrote, I am writing, I shall write). In English there are only two grammatical tenses, past and present, e.g., / wrote, I write; the many other trad, 'tenses', e.g., future, perfect, pluperfect, etc. are formed from combinations of tense and aspect. text linguistics The study of aspects of linguistics evident in texts (rather than clauses, sentences, etc,). text 1 A stretch of writing or utterance, large or small, which by reason of its structure, subject matter, etc. forms a unity, e.g., a story, poem, recipe.
Glossary road sign, etc. 2 Primarily seen as written material, freq. synonymous with book, e.g., 'As You Like It is a set text in second year'. thesaurus A compilation of words arranged according to their meanings, under such headings as, e.g., recreation, plants, etc. tip of tongue That part of the tongue which, when at rest, lies under the upper teeth. tone language A language, e.g., many SE Asian, African and American languages, which uses tone, i.e., different levels of pitch or rising or falling pitch in various combinations, to distinguish lexical and/or grammatical meaning. tone The pitch level of a syllable, specif, in tone languages, lexical tone is a means of distinguishing the meanings of words, e.g., in Thai maa with a high tone means 'horse', with a rising tone 'dog'. transformation transformational rule, transform In transformational grammar, one of a number of processes that act on the phrase-structure input (deep structure) of the grammar to reorder it in such a way as to produce the surface structure output, thereby expressing the perceived linkage between, e.g., active and passive, declarative and interrogative, etc. transformational grammar In generative grammar, a grammar which includes a transformational component in which, by means of transformations, elements of structure are reorganized, the deep structure of sentences thereby being linked to the surface structure; by this process structural relationships are confirmed, e.g., / love Lucy is shown to be closely related to Lucy is loved by me, and structural ambiguities are resolved, e.g., Flying planes can be dangerous is shown to be derivable from either planes which fly or people who fly planes.
velaric Trinitarian Applied to the Christian doctrine of the Trinity, that is, three Persons in one God: God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Ghost; following the Council of Nicaea in 325, this doctrine became orthodoxy in the Roman Empire and the Roman Catholic Church. Cf. Arian. typology, typological linguistics ( The study of) the classification of languages according to structural similarities without reference to historical considerations, e.g., in terms of its inflections Latin is closer to Finnish than it is to English though historically English and Latin are related, Latin and Finnish are not.
unpointed Applied to texts written in Hebrew and other Semitic scripts in which there are no special signs denoting vowels. Cf. pointing. unrounded, lip-spread, spread Articulated with spread, not rounded, lips. unvoiced = voiceless upstep A gradual rising of the pitch of the highpitched tones throughout a stretch of speech. Ursprache (German = 'original language') (1) = proto-language; (2) the source language in a translation. uvular Describes a consonant made with the back of the tongue against the uvula, e.g., [q], [N], [R], etc.
transitive verb A verb which combines with two nominals, e.g., James killed Adam.
variety A general term covering the concepts of dialect and language: the language of a group of people, or that used for a particular function, distinguished on any grounds and having the widest application, e.g., the language of NE Aberdeenshire, the law, the middle class, etc.
transliteration Replacing in a text the characters of one writing system by characters of another with equivalent phonetic values.
velar Describes a consonant produced by the back of the tongue with the velum or soft palate, e.g., [g], [x], [rj], etc.
trih'teral Applied to a common type of Semitic root that contains three consonants, as in Arabic salam, islam, muslim.
velaric Applied to an airstream produced by making complete closures both (1) between the back of the tongue and the velum and (2) somewhere towards the front of the mouth (either between the lips or between (1) the tip, blade or front of the tongue and (2) the teeth or the alveolar ridge or the palate); the air thus trapped in the mouth is rarefied by a sucking action; the front closure is then released, resulting in an ingressive airstream which produces a
trill, roll Describes a consonant made by the rapid tapping of one articulator against another or the vibration of the articulator (excluding that of the vocal folds), e.g., trilled or rolled r [r] or uvular r[R].
517
velaric click. An egressive velaric airstream can also be produced by compressing the mouth. velarized Applied to consonants produced with a secondary articulation of approximation between the back of the tongue and the velum. velum The soft palate.
Glossary voiceless, unvoiced Describes the absence of voice; said of, e.g., voiceless consonants, [p], [s], etc. (Contrasts with voiced.) vowel A speech sound produced without any constriction of the vocal tract sufficient to produce a closure or audible friction. 2 The nucleus of a syllable. 3 A symbol or group of symbols representing a vowel sound in a writing system, e.g., seal, yell.
verb A member of the word class trad, defined as a 'doing' word, denoting an action or state, e.g., Mary dances, Mary knows. In many languages, the verb is formally identifiable in that it displays contrasts of tense, aspect, voice (sense 2), mood, number and person and is in terms of function the most central element in a clause, able to occur on its own in the imperative, e.g., Hurryl and, as a minimal predicate, with a single noun as subject, e.g., Jane ran. It is the requirements of the verb that determine the nature of the rest of the predicate, e.g., give requires direct and indirect objects: Give Mary a present; put requires direct object and prepositional complement: Put the keys in your pocket; break requires no predicate: The glass broke.
weak verb (in Germanic languages) see strong verb.
vernacular The indigenous language or dialect of a speech community, e.g., Black English vernacular (BEV), the language of urban black Americans; the vernacular of Tyneside, etc.
weak verb (in Hebrew) A verb whose root contains only two consonants, or two consonants and one that disappears in some forms, e.g. natan 'to give', yitten 'he gives' (with initial n assimilated).
vocabulary 1 The range of lexical items evidenced in a text or available to an individual speaker. 2 = lexicon
word 1 One of the two fundamental units of grammar, the other being sentence. The linguistic unit that combines to form phrases, clauses and sentences and is otherwise distinguished as the smallest possible sentence unit, e.g., Hurry! and by its cohesiveness and by the fixed order of its internal structure, e.g., impossible but *possibleim or *possimible, 2 The realization in terms of sound or writing of the elements of expression or meaning that make up a word in sense 1, e.g., /drimd, dremt/are phonological realizations, and respectively.
Table 1. Transliteration of Arabic Vowels Short:
Long: | or <j J
Doubled -iyy- (final form: T) Diphthongs j aw (not au) (S ay (not ai)
Consonants j
C C
b t th j h kh d dh r
z
ir sh
J
1
z
j » J
n h w
ill
o
-a (in construct state: -at)
O*
S
(j* J,
d t
J»
t
f
519
Transcriptional Conventions and the IPA Alphabet Table 2. Transliteration of Ancient Greek Vowels & Consonants a a v
P 7 6 e
cn Q i X
X
£ o
b g d e sd e th i
7t P T U