WDTPRS – Pentecost: “We can’t read/savor/grasp them without knowing these things.”

Pentecost Sunday’s Collect is the same as we recite after chanting the Veni, Sancte Spiritus.

COLLECT – (1962MR):

Deus, qui corda fidelium Sancti Spiritus illustratione docuisti: da nobis in eodem Spiritu recta sapere, et de eius semper consolatione gaudere.

I am pretty sure that this ancient prayer, from at least the time of the Liber sacramentorum Gellonensis and probably older, survived the Consilium’s expert scalpels to live in the Novus Ordo only as the Collect for a Votive Mass of the Holy Spirit. ­

Sideline: What on earth is the Liber sacramentorum Gellonensis, or Gellone Sacramentary (LSGell hereafter).

There is a critical edition of the LSGell in the Corpus Christianorum Series Latina edited by A. Dumas, the guy who reedited Albert Blaise’s handy dictionary of Liturgical Latin I call Blaise/Dumas.

The manuscript of the LSGell is in the Bibliotèque National in Paris and dates to around 780.  It is part of the super complicated web of manuscripts descending from what we called the Gelasian Sacramentary, the source of so many of our ancient prayers found in the Roman Missal.

There are two types of Gelasians, “old” and “new”, which in turn descend from the far more ancient Roman Libelli.  The some dozen 8th century Gelasians that survive can be used to reconstruct a lost archetype sometimes called the Roman Sacramentary of King Pepin (+768 King of the Franks, son of Charles Martel and father of Charlemagne), thus showing the blending the Roman and Frankish influences in the Church’s prayer life. One of the keys to rebuilding the archetype is a manuscript called the Gellone Sacramentary, our LSGell, written perhaps in Meaux between 790-800.

King Pepin wanted a sacramentary, or missal, for use in his territory to promote liturgical unity. But this was later supplanted by what we call the Gregorian Sacramentary, a more prestigious book, which Pepin’s son Charlemagne obtained directly from Pope Hadrian in Rome between 784-791.  The Gregorian, put together by Pope Honorius (+638), was originally the book used by the Bishop of Rome.  It later developed into different versions, including the Hadrianum type, which Hadrian sent to Charlemagne.  In any event, the 8th century “new” Gelasians were later used to fill in gaps in the Gregorian.

So, Frankish developments from the more ancient Gelasians are exemplified in the LSGell which has 3024 prayers divided in two parts, the first mainly for Mass, and the second for other rituals.  The LSGell seems to have been an attempt at a complete book for liturgical services.  And now you know.

In any event, our old Pentecost Collect from the LSGell was shoved to the back of the bus in the Novus Ordo in favor of two Collects from the Gelasian, also existing in the Hadrianum version of the Gregorian.  See how those references make more sense now?  Maybe?

There is nothing especially challenging in the Latin vocabulary of the collect. The source of Latin consolation and wisdom, Messrs. Lewis & Short’s dictionary, says that sapio (infinitive sapere) means first of all “to taste, savor; … to have a taste or flavor of a thing”. Logically it is extended to “to know, understand a thing”.  It is often paired in literature with the adverb recte, “rightly”, when wisdom is indicated.  Think of the English word “insipid” (the sap- shifts to sip-) for something without flavor and also a person without taste or wisdom. I suppose a homo sapiens is someone of “good taste”, who knows the savor of life, as it were.  Sapiens is thus connected with Greek sophos, or “wise”, or “sage” (also a savory herb!).  Sapientia, “Wisdom”, is a figure for the Holy Spirit as well as one of His Gifts.  The Holy Spirit, Parácletus, is our Counselor, leading us rightly, and Comforter, bringing us consolation.

LITERAL TRANSLATION:

O God, who taught the hearts of the faithful by the light of the Holy Spirit, grant to us, in the same Spirit, to know the things that are right, and to rejoice always in His consolation.

What leaps to my mind, steeped in the literature of late antiquity, is the connection of wisdom, inherent in the phrase recta sapere, with consolation.

There was a genre of consolation literature in classical times and late antiquity into the medieval period.  This was part of the province of philosophy (“love of wisdom”).  This literature was used as a moral medication for the soul.

In the famous work of the imprisoned Boethius (+525) before his execution, the Consolation of Philosophy, Lady Wisdom, Philosophy, comes to the author in his cell and diagnoses the true nature of his sickness of sadness.  She does this in a dialogue, so that Boethius can understand things rightly (like our recta sapere), and therefore be consoled. Lady Wisdom descended so as to raise Boethius up to God.  This is our pattern too, both in creation and in our renewal when we have sinned.

In explorations of various orations, I’ve told you how they contain influences of the ancient philosophical concept of that all creation proceeds from God (exitus) in and then turns (conversion) to thus take determinate form and return again to God (reditus). These prayers of late antiquity are echoes of these ancient philosophical concepts.

We can’t read/savor/grasp them without knowing these things.

Think now of our prayer and also the Veni Sancte Spiritus with which it is connected:

“Come, Holy Spirit, fill the hearts (corda) of Thy faithful and kindle in them the fire of Thy love.

V. Send forth Thy Spirit and they shall be created

R. And Thou shalt renew the face of the earth.”

In the Holy Spirit, who breathed life into the Body of Holy Church on Pentecost, may we all be renewed.  May He help us to return to God when we have strayed – GO TO CONFESSION! – and to return to each other, reconciled in the embrace of our Holy Catholic Church.

Pray for those who are tearing the Church and her unity to pieces and committing grave scandal.  May grace illuminate their minds and hearts before more damage is done.