# Absalon, fili mi



## Golfus

Hello, to all!

Please, be so kind to help me with this sentence, extracted of a sacred music score from The Renaissance: 

"Absalon, fili mi, quis det ut moriar pro te. Non vivam ultra, sed descendam in infernum plorans" 

I understand the meanning in the general sense, but I should be very gratefull if you could be precise.

Thanks in advance. 
Have a nice day!


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## Trisia

Well, I just might try the first part: _Absalom, my son, would I had died for _(instead of, I suppose)_ you.
_
I even found you the Bible verse that inspired all this - 2 Samuel 18:33 The second I understand (general sense, like you said) as _I shall live no more, but descend to hell weeping/lamenting_. Or something like that.


I'm looking forward to what our Latin-knowing forum members have to say.


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## NotNow

Absalom, my son, would that I might die for you.
Let me live no more, but descend into hell weeping.


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## Golfus

Perfect!
Thank you both very much


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## Starfrown

I'd just like to add that "quis det ut moriar pro te" means literally:

"Who would grant that I might die for you?"


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## Flaminius

Hello,

Is the construction "_quis det ut_ [subjunctive clause]" authentic in Classic Latin?  Is it possible that it was developed in order to translate a Hebrew construction for a wish contrary to fact (mi yiten [who will give])?


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## Cagey

The Vulgate version: 
_ Fili mi Absalom, Absalom fili mi: quis mihi tribuat ut ego moriar pro te, Absalom fili mi, fili mi Absalom?_​ The present subjunctive makes it the apodosis of what I know as the _Future Less Vivid_ (or "_should/would_") _Condition_, as Starfrown's translation indicates.  (The missing protasis might be understood as something like "if I should ask.")

This is a conventional construction in Classical Latin.


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## Starfrown

Flaminius said:


> Is the construction "_quis det ut_ [subjunctive clause]" authentic in Classic Latin? Is it possible that it was developed in order to translate a Hebrew construction for a wish contrary to fact (mi yiten [who will give])?


 
Hello, Flamini.  I'm happy to answer one of your questions for a change.

Cagey has presented a very good and interesting method for rationalizing this particular subjunctive use.  I would consider "det" in the sentence under consideration to be a _dubitative subjunctive_, which was used in classical times primarily to indicate doubt (in some cases indignation).  Clearly, here the speaker _highly_ doubts that anyone would grant him his wish.


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## Flaminius

Starfrown said:


> I would consider "det" in the sentence under consideration to be a _dubitative subjunctive_, which was used in classical times primarily to indicate doubt (in some cases indignation).


Salve,

I agree with you and *Cagey* that subjunctive present is the most appropriate tense for the verb, be it _det_ or _tribuat_.  My question is about the construction for the verb.  I admit that my reading hasn't been very far-reaching but this is the first time I see _det_ followed by _ut-_subjunctive clause.  Even _Lewis & Short_ does not list this construction for _do_ in sense of granding, allowing.  It is very tempting to consider it as a Hebraism.


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## wonderment

Flaminius said:


> Hello,
> 
> Is the construction "_quis det ut_ [subjunctive clause]" authentic in Classic Latin?  Is it possible that it was developed in order to translate a Hebrew construction for a wish contrary to fact (mi yiten [who will give])?


Hello!  It’s quite possible. The expression _do ut des_ means “I give so that you might give (in return)” and not “I allow you to give.” I did a quick search in the Vulgate for ‘_tribuat ut_’; the phrase appears only in the Old Testament, used always in the context of a wish. In Latin the optative subjunctive is used to express a wish and the construction is usually (though not always) introduced by ‘_utinam_’. The present subjunctive expresses a wish to be attained in the future; the imperfect subjunctive, for a wish unattained in the present. So one would expect:

(_utinam_) _moriar pro te _= would that I might die instead of you
(_utinam_) _morerer pro te_ = would that I had died instead of you ​rather than: _quis mihi det/tribuat ut moriar pro te. _

One could translate this literally as “May someone grant to me that I might die instead of you” (_quis_ here functions as an indefinite rather than interrogative pronoun; _det/tribuat_, optative subjunctive). Perhaps a bit clumsy, and not entirely natural (for Latin), but I’ve noticed that with Biblical translations, they like to keep things as literal as possible, right down to the word order (easier to do between Greek and Latin than between Hebrew and Latin).

By the way, does Hebrew make the distinction between an attainable wish and an unattainable (or contrafactual) one? Jerome (who made the vulgate Old Testament translation from the Hebrew Bible) seems to have elided this distinction altogether. He uses the present subjunctive for both, so one could only tell from context which one is meant. (This can be seen by comparing the various passages from Job in the link above.) In the context under question, it seems a contrafactual wish is meant (i.e. "Would that I had died instead of you...") At the time he utters these words, his son is already dead.


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## ahshav

The Latin here is well beyond my understanding, but with regards to the Hebrew - a distinction can be made between attainable and unattainable wishes - but I'm not sure how prevalent the relevant vocabulary is in Biblical Hebrew. Biblical Hebrew does have a subjunctive, yet it is not used here. A more literal translation might be: "My son Absalom, my son-my son Absalom, who would give my death, mine, under you (in your stead)."


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## Starfrown

wonderment said:


> One could translate this literally as “May someone grant to me that I might die instead of you” (_quis_ here functions as an indefinite rather than interrogative pronoun; _det/tribuat_, optative subjunctive)...


 
I'm not convinced that _quis_ here is indefinite. That use is typically seen after _si_, _nisi_, _ne_, _num_, and in relative clauses (though I will admit that there are notable exceptions to this usage in certain authors, e.g. Horace). Since _quis_ is in the main clause, and the dubitative subjunctive makes sense, I cannot see any problem with my interpretation. Indeed, upon doing a little searching, I found that many others use the same translation, or a slight variation (at least one example was from a scholarly article).

Check out the CPDV translation here, for instance.


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## wonderment

Starfrown said:


> I'm not convinced that _quis_ here is indefinite. That use is typically seen after _si_, _nisi_, _ne_, _num_, and in relative clauses (though I will admit that there are notable exceptions to this usage in certain authors, e.g. Horace). Since _quis_ is in the main clause, and the dubitative subjunctive makes sense, I cannot see any problem with my interpretation.


Starfrown, if I had seen this verse in isolation and hadn't known that the original Hebrew expresses a contrafactual wish, I’d translate it as you have. But after Flaminius mentioned the Hebrew construction, I was open to the possibility that '_tribuat_' could translate an expression of a wish (but as I’ve also explained in post#10, this way of expressing a wish is not the most natural construction for Latin). It’s also very likely that Saint Jerome was being strictly literal. In which case, "_quis det ut_" must be taken as a dubitative subjunctive, and the construction in Latin does not express a wish (contrafactual or otherwise) as it does in Hebrew.

In any case, in the absence of more evidence, I tend to agree with Flaminius’s observation that the “_quis det/tribuat ut_” construction, used in the sense of granting or allowing, is unusual for classical Latin. The only places where I’ve been able to find this construction is in the Vulgate Old Testament (the Hebrew Bible). 



ahshav said:


> The Latin here is well beyond my understanding, but with regards to the Hebrew - a distinction can be made between attainable and unattainable wishes - but I'm not sure how prevalent the relevant vocabulary is in Biblical Hebrew. Biblical Hebrew does have a subjunctive, yet it is not used here. A more literal translation might be: "My son Absalom, my son-my son Absalom, who would give my death, mine, under you (in your stead)."


Thank you  In the original Biblical Hebrew, is this an attainable or unattainable wish? In context, I was expecting a contrafactual wish ("Would that I had died instead of you, my son.") because his son is already dead at this point. If "_mi yiten _[who will give]" expresses an unattainable wish, what is the construction for an attainable one?


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## biscortina

I agree with you, Starfrown, I don´t think "quis" is used  as an indefinite pronoun in this context and that one can interpretate "det" as a dubitative subjunctive, e.g. Quid faciam? 
In addition to that, 
*I.*
"quis det ut.....*?*" it seems to me a little bit strange if it would express a wish:
 -----> (Utinam) quis det ut moriar pro te? (wish + question?!)
In this case the sentence should be:* Utinam* aliquid det ut moriar pro te*!

II.
*Since "quis" is in the main clause, one can´t interpretate this as an indefinite pronoun; if it should be used as an indefinite pronoun, the sentence would be like the following:
-----> Quis/Quisquis/Is qui/ amat, fit dignus amari. 
-----> Quis/Quisquis/Is qui/ det, etiam detur/debitur.


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## ahshav

wonderment said:


> Thank you  In the original Biblical Hebrew, is this an attainable or unattainable wish? In context, I was expecting a contrafactual wish ("Would that I had died instead of you, my son.") because his son is already dead at this point. If "_mi yiten _[who will give]" expresses an unattainable wish, what is the construction for an attainable one?



You're welcome. The way I understand it, the phrase used here (_mi yiten_) can mean either an unattainable or an attainable wish, depending on context - in which case, the wish is unattainable.

Constructions for unattainable wishes have two forms (to the best of my knowledge) - a positive (_loo_ - like "were this to happen"), and a negative (_loolay _or _eeloolay_ like "had this not happened").

The other construction that comes to mind, regarding attainable wishes is the subjunctive (almost entirely absent from modern Hebrew), which seems to be what _mi yiten_ is, but I don't think the use of this construction is limited to clearly attainable wishes. (Another example would be "[long] live the king" - _yekhi ha-melech_).

Hope this helps - I know this isn't the Hebrew forum, and I didn't mean take the discussion off course.


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## wonderment

biscortina said:


> "quis det ut.....*?*" it seems to me a little bit strange if it would express a wish:
> -----> (Utinam) quis det ut moriar pro te? (wish + question?!)
> In this case the sentence should be:Utinam aliquid  (aliquis or quis) det ut moriar pro te!


The verse could be _either_ a question (dubitative subjunctive) _or_ an expression of a wish (optative subjunctive), but clearly not both. The question mark ('?') is not there in the original Latin; this punctuation mark is a relatively late invention. _Quis_ could be _either_ an interrogative pronoun _or_ an indefinite pronoun. 



> Since "quis" is in the main clause, one can´t interpretate this as an indefinite pronoun; if it should be used as an indefinite pronoun, the sentence would be like the following:
> -----> Quis/Quisquis/Is qui/ amat, fit dignus amari.
> -----> Quis/Quisquis/Is qui/ det, etiam detur/debitur.


Why not? Please see examples from classical authors in the above link to _quis_ as an indefinite pronoun (specifically the ones from Horace and Tacitus).



ahshav said:


> You're welcome. The way I understand it, the phrase used here (mi yiten) can mean either an unattainable or an attainable wish, depending on context - in which case, the wish is unattainable.
> Just as I thought, thanks for confirming. Clearly there's a problem translating from Hebrew into Latin because in Latin, it's not clear that this is a contrafactual/unattainable wish ("Would that I had died for you" which is the standard English translation of this verse in various editions I've checked). Even the literal translation of the Latin "Who would grant that I might die for you?" seems a bit off to me given the context because it suggests that the wish could be attained in the near future. Until I really understand Biblical Hebrew, or someone could channel Saint Jerome for me, I really don't know what he intended with his Latin translation.
> 
> Hope this helps - I know this isn't the Hebrew forum, and I didn't mean take the discussion off course.
> Thanks so much, ahshav--it helps immensely. I must learn Hebrew!


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## biscortina

Sorry, it was my mistake, I certainly had to say "aliquis" instead of "aliquid" !
Oh what a shame!
I know I have to admit that there are some cases esp.by Horace and Tacitus in which "quis" is really used alone as an indefinite pronoun.-even though in most cases not in main clauses, and toghether with si or ne....(si quis,si quid, ne quis, ne quid, ne qui home) ...still I personally  rather like to interpretate "quis" as not as an indefinite pronoun but as an interrogative here in this case.


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## Flaminius

Hi,

I came upon this passage on a bit of research from the Hebrew side (note mine):


> I take it that מי יתן [_mi yiten_] simply expresses the _fact_ of the wish; it implies nothing       as to whether the speaker believes the event will or will not occur ....


If the translation method that Hieronymus employed to Vulgata is a very literal one, the _quis_ in the text under discussion seems best understood as an indefinite pronoun.

One of the reference works that the quoted author relied upon (1) terms the original Hebrew construction (_mi yiten_) as "exclamatory optative."


(1) Joüon et Muraoka. 1994. _ A Grammar of Biblical Hebrew._ §163d (on _mi yiten_).


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## Starfrown

Well, Flaminius and wonderment make a persuasive argument.  I only wish we had an expert on the Vulgate around to comment.


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