Today I was struck by an antiphon in the office of Lauds and Vespers for the 5th and final psalm of the hour, Ps 148.
Ant. Fulcíte me flóribus, * stipáte me malis, quia amóre lángueo.
Which is rendered in the DRV used at Divinum Officium as:
Ant. Revive me with flowers, * stay me up with apples for I am swooning with love.
Looking up the verse in the RSV I found:
Sustain me with raisins, refresh me with apples; for I am sick with love.
That’s weird, quoth I. I wondered “What does the prayer really say?”
Given that the Psalm is in Hebrew, I figured I bet check the Hebrew. I got:
Sustain/revive me with flagons, comfort (make a bed = refresh) with apples for I am sick of love.
That “flagon”, which is usually a container as for wine, in biblical contest can mean a cake of pressed raisins as is in the RSV.
Fathers commenting on that bit “I am sick/wounded with love” remark that it is a wound “without a sore” and it is, for Ambrose, inflicted by God in Scripture, so it is wound without a sore. Augustine says that, “It’s a wound as long as we desire and don’t yet have”, referring the happiness of Heaven. Gregory the Great extends the image: in the preaching of sermons words are like arrows. When they are drawn by the voive of those leading holy lives, they transfix the hearts of the hearers. “With these arrows holy Church has been struck, saying, ‘I am wounded with love’.” (Moralia 34.21)
I’d like to get into it more, but I lack access to Patristic commentaries on the Song of Songs, which are quite rich.
On another note the Vespers hymn by the 18th c. Servite, Callisto Palombella, Iam toto súbitus vesper eat polo is odd and wonderful.
What’s the meter? We have 3 asclepiads and 1 glyconic, hence, 2nd Asclepiadian like an Ode of Horace. — u u — — u u — u — — A choriamb (— u u —) followed by another choriamb (— u u —) then an iambic close (u —), and a final long syllable.
| Iam toto súbitus vesper eat polo, Et sol attónitum præcípitet diem, Dum sævæ récolo ludíbrium necis, Divinámque catástrophen. |
Now let sudden evening go across the whole sky, And let the astonished sun cast down the day, While I recall the savage mockery of death, And the divine catastrophe. |
| Spectátrix áderas supplício, Parens, Malis uda, gerens cor adamántinum; Natus funérea péndulus in cruce Altos dum gémitus dabat. |
You were present as a spectator at the punishment, O Mother, Wet from evils, bearing an adamantine heart, While your Son, hanging on the funereal Cross, Uttered deep groans. |
| Pendens ante óculos Natus, atrócibus Sectus verbéribus, Natus hiántibus Fossus vulnéribus, quot penetrántibus Te confíxit acúleis! |
Your Son, hanging before your eyes, with savage, Scourgings torn, your Son, with gaping Wounds pierced, with how many stabbing Thorns He transfixed you also! |
| Eheu! Sputa, álapæ, vérbera, vúlnera, Clavi, fel, áloë, spóngia, láncea, Sitis, spina, cruor, quam vária pium Cor pressére tyránnide! |
Alas! The spittle, the blows, the scourges, the wounds, The nails, the gall, the aloe, the sponge, the spear, The thirst, the thorn, the blood, how manifoldly the pious Heart they oppressed with tyranny! |
| Cunctis intérea stas generósior, Virgo, Martýribus: prodígio novo, In tantis móriens non móreris, Parens, Diris fixa dolóribus. |
Meanwhile you stand more noble than all, O Virgin, than the Martyrs: by a new wonder, In so great sufferings, dying, you do not die, O Mother, Fixed in dread sorrows. |
| Sit summæ Tríadi glória, laus, honor, A qua supplíciter, sollícita prece, Posco virgínei róboris ?mulas Vires rebus in ásperis. Amen. |
Glory, praise, honor be to the most high Trinity, From whom, with humble and urgent prayer, I ask for powers that may rival virginal strength For things that are hard. Amen. |
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Fr Z,
Please help. I believe my home is under a violent spiritual attack. Everyone is up each other‘s throat and anger is in everything. I’m walled up in my bedroom and have cleansed my space to isolate. I believe it is the enemy trying to attack a good family and destroy them even more. Would you please say prayers of healing or delivery or what is appropriate in this particular situation. We are Roman Catholic. We frequent the sacraments and believe. Yet no one can tell what is right or wrong right now. I beg your prayers to break what might be a spiritual attack in this beautiful home. I feel this is urgent. What harm could a defense be even if it might not be needed? Please consider. I’m on retreat in my bedroom in prayer. Thank you for your consideration of this.
Addendum: I’ve been to Confession today but have no recourse but to wait until tomorrow to receive the Eucharist. I want to give you as much information as possible to discern, Thank you.
My first recommendation was to go to Confession. The Sacrament of Penance is mightier than any sacramental.
Also, say your Rosary and don’t rush.
Also, ask your Guardian angel for help.
Also, ask St. Joseph to guard, for he is the Terror of Demons.
Also, ask the Lord to bathe you and yours in His infinitely powerful Precious Blood.
Jennifer,
Having just seen this, I am praying for you all. I can’t imagine I’m the first, and trust I have been or will be joined by many who do not comment.
Father,
Many thanks for this!
I thought it worthwhile variously reminding or telling your readers of Dr. Parker’s 4 July 2010 Clerk of Oxford blogpost, “In a valley of restless mind: Quia amore langueo”, on a mediaeval English poem about the Crucifixion with this as its refrain (with her translation).
The late Douglas Gray (the first J.R.R. Tolkien Professor of English Literature and Language at Oxford) has editions of it – and another poem with the same refrain – with an interesting note on it being “a favourite phrase in devotional literature”, with an example from Richard Rolle of Hampole – in A Selection of Religious Lyrics (1975).
A Trappist in Massachusetts has a website
https://www.lectio-divina.org/index.php/patristics/patristics-studies
where he appears to have posted English translations of some commentaries and/or some of his own notations on the commentaries: Origen, Gregory the Great, Gregory of Nyssa, and Bernard of Clairvaux. The recent publication of Gregory the Great’s Song of Song Commentaries by Liturgical Press in Collegeville is dedicated to the abbey where this Trappist lives.
In addition, Internet Archive has Origen’s in English:
https://archive.org/details/songofsongscomme0026orig/mode/2up
CatholicLibrary has some of the commentaries in translation or in original languages:
https://catholiclibrary.org/library/browse/century/00
Although St. Bernard is post-Patristic, Internet Archive has two translations of his commentary (sermons):
https://archive.org/details/LifeWorksOfSBernardClairvauxV4/mode/2up
https://archive.org/details/CommentaryOnTheSongOfSongs/mode/2up
I hope this is of some use.
“I’d like to get into it more, but I lack access to Patristic commentaries on the Song of Songs, which are quite rich.”
I like to use a phone app called “Catena,” which gives chapter and verse patristic, medieval, and modern (Lapide, Haydock) commentaries for scripture. I recommend it.
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