- Aug 27, 2014
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Hi everybody,
I didn't want to derail the other thread, but it made me wonder about something sort of related to it (particularlu Buzuxi02's point about there being no hymns or commemorations for particular Western saints, even if they're within the time when they could be recognized): How would you respond to the idea that as Western saints and churches were "next door", so to speak, to Greek-speaking churches in North Africa, the Easterners are painting an unrealistic picture of the influence of Western saints on the East?
The argument goes something like this: it is unrealistic to suppose that the Latins and the Greeks (and Copts, Syrians, etc.) would not have been in contact with each other and hence exchanged theological ideas and influenced each other when there were clearly a mix of Latins and all of these other peoples in North Africa, and some of the Latin saints like St. Augustine are recognized in the Eastern Church. So it is wrong to downplay them by saying "Yes, they're a saint, but XYZ" (complaints about how they differ from the Greeks). It makes it seem like everyone lived in hermetically-sealed bubbles where no one could influence each other, when that's not true, or that they're somehow "lesser" saints because they're not Eastern.
Basically it's an idea that Easterners (by which they usually mean you guys, not my communion, who are generally an afterthought, but the case is made concerning saints we hold in common anyway) are so into the 'Greekness' of their Christianity that they don't want to admit Western influence when it should be there because the Latins were a big part of early Christianity, particularly in North Africa.
I know my response to that (and it's primarily as a linguist, not a Coptic Orthodox Christian; Latin was not an important language in Egypt outside of perhaps the military in some respects; the available epigraphical evidence shows that it was incredibly restricted; there's an essay that touches on this in the book Multilingualism in the Graeco-Roman Worlds, edited by Alex Mullen and Patrick James and published by Cambridge a few years ago, but it's late here and my eyes are tired so I don't want to look for it), and that it's hogwash, but it did make me wonder in relation to the other thread, because of course there are plenty of Latin saints who we in the Coptic Orthodox Church do recognize with entries in the synaxarium, hymns, icons, etc. One of our most famous monasteries in the Monastery of the Romans (Deir El Baramous), in reference to the saints St. Maximus and St. Domatius, the children of the Roman emperor Valentinian. It seems like the Coptic Orthodox Church for its part does quite a bit of praising of the Roman saints we see as Orthodox. Heck, I don't remember even hearing about HH St. Pope Felix when I was actually Roman Catholic, but he's there in our synaxarium.
So I don't know what it is the Western churches want. Recognition that they too were in Africa? That seems obvious, but is it not also the case that the Councils of Carthage were her own (not presided over by or attended by Easterners)?
I don't know. I don't hear this argument all the time or anything, but it's one I have heard and I feel I have been largely unsuccessful in explaining why it is incorrect, because simply repeating "That's not how it was; read this essay on the cultural and linguistic situation in Egypt in the fourth and fifth centuries" tends to make people's eyes glaze over, so I figured I'd ask you all how you'd tackle it.
Thanks.
I didn't want to derail the other thread, but it made me wonder about something sort of related to it (particularlu Buzuxi02's point about there being no hymns or commemorations for particular Western saints, even if they're within the time when they could be recognized): How would you respond to the idea that as Western saints and churches were "next door", so to speak, to Greek-speaking churches in North Africa, the Easterners are painting an unrealistic picture of the influence of Western saints on the East?
The argument goes something like this: it is unrealistic to suppose that the Latins and the Greeks (and Copts, Syrians, etc.) would not have been in contact with each other and hence exchanged theological ideas and influenced each other when there were clearly a mix of Latins and all of these other peoples in North Africa, and some of the Latin saints like St. Augustine are recognized in the Eastern Church. So it is wrong to downplay them by saying "Yes, they're a saint, but XYZ" (complaints about how they differ from the Greeks). It makes it seem like everyone lived in hermetically-sealed bubbles where no one could influence each other, when that's not true, or that they're somehow "lesser" saints because they're not Eastern.
Basically it's an idea that Easterners (by which they usually mean you guys, not my communion, who are generally an afterthought, but the case is made concerning saints we hold in common anyway) are so into the 'Greekness' of their Christianity that they don't want to admit Western influence when it should be there because the Latins were a big part of early Christianity, particularly in North Africa.
I know my response to that (and it's primarily as a linguist, not a Coptic Orthodox Christian; Latin was not an important language in Egypt outside of perhaps the military in some respects; the available epigraphical evidence shows that it was incredibly restricted; there's an essay that touches on this in the book Multilingualism in the Graeco-Roman Worlds, edited by Alex Mullen and Patrick James and published by Cambridge a few years ago, but it's late here and my eyes are tired so I don't want to look for it), and that it's hogwash, but it did make me wonder in relation to the other thread, because of course there are plenty of Latin saints who we in the Coptic Orthodox Church do recognize with entries in the synaxarium, hymns, icons, etc. One of our most famous monasteries in the Monastery of the Romans (Deir El Baramous), in reference to the saints St. Maximus and St. Domatius, the children of the Roman emperor Valentinian. It seems like the Coptic Orthodox Church for its part does quite a bit of praising of the Roman saints we see as Orthodox. Heck, I don't remember even hearing about HH St. Pope Felix when I was actually Roman Catholic, but he's there in our synaxarium.
So I don't know what it is the Western churches want. Recognition that they too were in Africa? That seems obvious, but is it not also the case that the Councils of Carthage were her own (not presided over by or attended by Easterners)?
I don't know. I don't hear this argument all the time or anything, but it's one I have heard and I feel I have been largely unsuccessful in explaining why it is incorrect, because simply repeating "That's not how it was; read this essay on the cultural and linguistic situation in Egypt in the fourth and fifth centuries" tends to make people's eyes glaze over, so I figured I'd ask you all how you'd tackle it.
Thanks.