Literary bible musings

Last summer, while I was doing research in France, I stayed in someone's appartment, opposite the St Maurice Church, which I loved for a variety of reasons. The owner had left me all her furnitures and books for the summer, and I got to muse in her bible during that time: It was an old, literary one, translated in part by Blaise Pascal and incredibly poetic. The most incredible thing is that it was written in the "vous" form, which is the respectful way of adressing someone in French.

Reading of Jesus saying "vous" to folks is quite fun, it makes him sound like an educated French gentleman. The Bible translation by Lemaitre de Sacy used to be the most common Bible at the time, and these are the words that the eternal Victor Hugo would have read. But I was born in the twentieth century, so, like everyone else, I got a twentieth century oecumenical bible.

Another funky one is the French translation by Andre Chouraki, who tries to stay as contextual as possible and to keep the grammar and vocabulary close to the actual aramaic and hebrew. So the names of Yeschua, Matyah and Co. are rendered in a phonetic kind of way, and they're hilarious at times, not to mention the lively (and disorienting) idioms.

There, you just feel like reading your bible under an olive tree in the scorching sun somewhere in Corsica, pondering on the false teachings of the Sopherîm and Peroshîm. I find it a bit challenging, because I can't really imagine Christ outside of contexts I know, so French, Italian, Spanish and German all seem natural, but Hebrew, now that's exotic!

Still, I can't help calling to mind the songs from the Jewish Soc Shabbaths meals each time I read the word "Elohîm" (and I have been meaning to learn a couple of theses songs properly. Hava Nagila is about the only one I can master).

Je vous souhaite un fort agreable sabbat, dear readers, Shabbat Shalom!