A SIMPLE PRIMER ON SACRAL ENGLISH

 Our priest, Fr. Chori Seraiah of St. George Catholic Church, was kind enough to share these lessons with us.

A SIMPLE PRIMER ON SACRAL ENGLISH

pronounced SAH-krell English

LESSON ONE

What is Sacral English?  Sacral English is a specialized form of the English language that was intentionally designed for use in religious settings.  When we think of Sacral English, we often think of older versions of the Bible (King James Bible and Douay-Rheims Bible) as well as older versions of the Book of Common Prayer.  Many assume that this is just how people spoke when these older books were written.  However, that's not entirely true.  At the time these books were written (or translated into English), people didn't speak this way at all.  There were, of course, older ways to speak English, but Sacral English wasn't one of them.  So, if that's the case, why was this form of English used?  Why not use the newer, and more common, form of the English language?  The answer is a bit shocking.  Sacral English was designed this way specifically because it was (and remains) superior.  That's right, Sacral English is superior to all common forms of English, because it does something that common forms of English don't do.  It keeps track of who is speaking to whom, without the need to constantly remind the reader.  Every sentence of the language does this.  We see this done not only in ancient languages, but in some modern languages too.  Unfortunately, common English isn't one of them.  So, when translating religious text, or writing religious prayers (particularly liturgy), the sacred (holy) form of English is used, and this is why it's called "Sacral English."  It's called that because it's particularly used when dealing with sacred (holy) things.  Granted, people use similar forms of it for poetry, song, and other artistic things.  That's all well and good, but it is used primarily for religion.

Rather than explaining this further, it's probably better to just dig down into the language itself, and let the reader learn on his/her own once the basics are understood

LESSON TWO

Second Person Singular

thou, thee, thy, thine

Thou is the second person singular when used as the subject of a sentence.

Thee is the second person singular when used as the object of a sentence.

Thy is the second person singular when used as the subject possessively.

Thine is the second person singular when used as the object possessively.

Second Person Plural

ye, you, your, yours

Yours is the second person plural when used as the object possessively.

So right from the start you can see two things.  (1) Sacral English distinguishes the second person of every sentence as either singular or plural.  (2) By dropping the Second Person Singular (thou, thee, thy and thine) from our vocabulary, Common English now has difficulty distinguishing whether the second person is singular or plural.  We simply use "you" for everything now, singular or plural, and as a result we have to add more words to a sentence to make a distinction.  Now, in Common English, if we are talking to more than one person, we can say "you" and hope everyone understands.  Or we can say "you all."  If we live in the American South, however, we're likely to use the contraction "y'all" instead.  In the American North, and Western States, the term "you guys" is more popular, whether the people being addressed are male or female.  Sacral English uses the archaic solution to this by having two completely different terms for Second Person Singular (thou, thee, thy and thine) and Second Person Plural (ye, you, your and yours).  Since Hebrew and Greek also have different terms to make this distinction, we can begin to see why it would be important to use a form of English that does that too, especially when translating these ancient religious texts.

LESSON THREE

Verb Conjugations

-st, -th

I come.

Thou comest. / You comest.

He cometh. / She cometh. / They cometh.

English is a Germanic language with a duel Germanic and Latin vocabulary.  (That's why it seems we have two words for everything.)  Very common to all Germanic languages, verbs are conjugated to determine who is doing the action.  When the First Person (I or me) is doing the action, the verb remains unaltered.  When a Second Person (singular or plural) is doing the action, the conjugation is -st.  To help remember this, look at the "s" in -st, and think: "s" as in "second" or "second person."  When a Third Person (or persons) is doing the action, the conjugation is -th.  To help remember this, look at the "t" or "th" in -th, and think: "th" as in "third" or "third person."  These conjugations help the reader know exactly who is doing the action.

LESSON FOUR

Fun Vocabulary Words

Sacral English has some fun vocabulary words that just aren't in use anymore.  They're not difficult to understand, and they have some poetic value...

Hither - to or toward this place

Thither - to or toward that place

Whither - to what place or state

Some others are as follows...

Asunder - apart

Aye - yes

Behold - see or observe

Betwixt - between

Brimstone - sulphur

Fourscore - eighty

Hearken - listen

Host - an army

Laud - praise

Laver - a basin or similar container used for washing oneself

Magnify - glorify; extol

Meet - suitable or proper

Morrow - the following day

Nary - not a one; not at all

Naught - nothing

Nay - no

Nigh - nearly; almost

Quick - the living

Quickening - the first movement of a living child in the mother's womb

Sepulture - burial

Sepulchre - grave; tomb

Smite - defeat; conquer

Suffer - endure; tolerate

Twixt - between

Yea - yes

Verily - truly; certainly; confidently

Yon - yonder; that over there; those over there

Yoke - the amount of land that one pair of oxen could plough in a day

Is it necessary to know all these fun words?  No. Usually, one can figure them out based on the context in which they are used.  It's just nice to have a little introduction to them ahead of time.

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For the complete contents of the Butter Rum Cartoon, click HERE.

TRADITIONAL CATHOLIC FLAGS

 My dream is to get all of these, and fly the appropriate one each month.  I would budget getting one a month.

JANUARY - HOLY NAME OF JESUS

FEBRUARY - THE HOLY FAMILY

MARCH - SAINT JOSEPH

APRIL - THE MOST BLESSED SACRAMENT

MAY - THE BLESSED MOTHER MARY

JUNE - SACRED HEART

JULY - PRECIOUS BLOOD

AUGUST - IMMACULATE HEART

SEPTEMBER - SEVEN SORROWS

OCTOBER - OUR LADY OF THE ROSARY

NOVEMBER - HOLY SOULS

DECEMBER - THE IMMACULATE CONCEPTION

You can order these from TradFlags.com

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For the complete contents of the Butter Rum Cartoon, click HERE.

BORDER PATROL, BLAINE COP, AND WASHINGTON STATE PATROL

 Back in the early '70's, when my hair was long and there were still draft dodgers, I hitchhiked up to my old hometown of Blaine, where I had gone through elementary school and had had all kinds of adventures.

But I was stopped and questioned by the Border Patrol, then later a Blaine cop, and when I was finally leaving and hitchhiking south out of town, a Washington State patrolman stopped to question me. 

I lost my temper and blew up at him: "Blaine is my hometown, where I went through grade school! My dad was a minister here! Now when after a lot of years I come to see the town again, you're the third cop to stop and question me!"

He gave me a studying look, and said, "Get in."

"Right!" I said, seething. Now I'm going to get taken to the station and harassed more than ever, I thought to myself, for revisiting my favorite town. I got into the back seat of his patrol car and slammed the door.

With neither of us saying a word, he drove further south down the highway a few miles, then pulled off on an off-ramp and stopped at the top. He motioned to the on-ramp and said, "You should have no trouble getting a ride here, and no cops ever come by here."

My fury turned into a smile and a hand-shake. And he was right. A friendly driver picked me up within minutes. And I headed home, thinking, Blaine's still a pretty neat place.

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For the complete contents of the Butter Rum Cartoon, click HERE.

DON FULCHER, THE HEARTBEAT OF SULTAN

 Once a week, in the late 1960's, there would be a knock on our back door. Everyone else came to the front. And when we opened the door, there would be Don Fulcher, with a bowed back and a big smile, holding a gallon jar of milk. He would get a gallon of raw milk for us from Vos' farm each week and carry it several blocks to our parsonage, giving it to us for free. After he left, Mom would scoop the cream off the top to save, leaving the best milk we've ever had for us to enjoy until Don came again. Don was a member of our church, and this was one of many blessings he brought the minister and his family.

We weren't the only ones he helped. Don was all over the little town of Sultan, Washington, helping everybody, from manual work to simply a big smile and wave. He was easy to recognize blocks away because his back had a severe forward bend to it, making him have to look up to look ahead. I never did know the cause of this, possibly kyphosis. It seemed like it would hurt, but Don kept energetically walking all over town without complaint.

Calvin Vos (whose farm we got milk from) and I were the paperboys in Sultan. Calvin delivered the Everett Herald to his east side of town and I delivered to my west side. While we rolled up the newspapers each day in front of Dale's Market on Main Street, Don would occasionally come by and help us. He was good company. But despite all our talking and ribbing each other, I never really got to know Don Fulcher.

He lived in a house down the street, but I never visited him. I wasn't even sure if he lived alone, but assumed he did because he was most often out and about. To me he was the symbol of Sultan. Everyone knew him without knowing him. He was the town's heartbeat.

Don did have a car, a big boat of a car that he seldom drove. When he did drive it, we'd see a big car go slowly by with Don's head peeking over the dashboard. One Sunday afternoon he drove over to our house and invited us on a drive in the countryside northwest of town. So Mom and Dad and I got in his car, Dad in the front seat and Mom and I in the back, and off we went. Little did we know that Don was a terrible driver!

He didn't speed, even tended to go slow, but hardly slowed down for turns; so we had to brace ourselves as we slid around the corners. But the worst problem was distraction. As we traveled along through the beautiful scenery, Don would point things out to us and gaze at the view, while the car drifted to the left or right. It turned out that Don was the only one enjoying the sights; the three of us were staring directly ahead in terror. But we all made it home okay.

Long after we moved away from Sultan, Don passed away. Born on my mother's birthday, five years earlier, he was in his sixties when we shared his little town. He lived to 94 years of age, outliving both my parents, and passed away in March of 1998. His body lies in the Sultan Cemetery, without a marker.

Whenever we visit my old hometown of Sultan nowadays, how I miss that bowed-backed character crossing the street a block down, with a big grin and hearty wave, shouting out something to me that I'm too far away to hear. Once he took us along with him, and brought us safely home.

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For the complete contents of the Butter Rum Cartoon, click HERE. 

GIANT MADAGASCAR HISSING COCKROACHES

 

In 1995 I ordered two giant Madagascar hissing cockroaches, a male and a female, from the Carolina Biological Supply Company, and they were so huge and impressive when they arrived (3" long by 1" wide) that I was across the room even before they crawled out of the container. The males really do hiss, and these critters are largely used in gross-out movie scenes like in the insect scene of "Indiana Jones: Temple of Doom."  But these critters don't bite, don't hurt people at all.

We kept them in a large terrarium (5 gal. aquarium with a wooden cover). But, in a short time, they proved to us that they "breed like cockroaches." Soon we had scores of them, growing fast, and when I cleaned their cage I was afraid to touch them and so moved them with a stick, one by one, into a temporary cage so I could clean the main one. It took forever to move them!  But necessity being the mother of invention, and me being lazy, I finally got to where I'd just reach into the pile of them and picked them up, many at once, by hand. It was neat how their little hooks gripped onto me and each other; not one ever fell. To this day I'd have no qualms about reaching my bare hand into a huge pile of crawling giant Madagascar hissing cockroaches.

But finally, after several months or a year or so, the terrarium was swarming with them (it's amazing watching them being born). We had several hundred of them, and the babies were small enough to crawl out the cage's air holes. I advertised them online, but no one wanted them. So finally on a nice hot Madagascar-like day, I drove south of Branson and onto the Graham Clark road, pulled off into the woods, and let them go. Within one minute, I couldn't see one of them, they hide so well. It was sad. They're not allowed in Florida, because they can survive there, but I knew they'd never survive a winter here, unless they took refuge in somebody's home.

I miss them now.  When we visited the Smithsonian Institute in Washington D.C. after taking part in the March for Life, we found a lady on the 2nd floor who was showing people giant Madagascar hissing cockroaches and letting whoever dared to hold one.  I was so happy to see my old friends and delighted to hold one again.

If you want to buy one, or three, for your very own, you can still order them from the Carolina Biological Supply Company.  Enjoy!

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For the complete contents of the Butter Rum Cartoon, click HERE.