Basileia

Here’s what it all boils down to: The oft-repeated “Peace on earth, good will toward men” is only one of two variant readings of verse 14 from the second chapter of Luke. Favored by the Byzantine tradition, that version of the verse appears not only in the popular Christmas carol, but also notably in the King James Bible: “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men.” The other version, favored by Alexandrian and Western families of texts, offered a rather different picture, to the effect of offering peace on earth for the men to whom God extended his good will (I’m not happy with the more concise but less precise translation offered by the Catholic pew bible I read it from tonight.) For anyone who doesn’t know, the Byzantine, Alexandrian, and Western texts referred to were all copies made by scribes of the original Greek versions of the texts. The repeated hand-copying among other factors led to such variations in the textual readings.

Had this verse not happened to have been in the Gospel read at midnight mass tonight, I might never have found the answer. But, if you’ll refer back one post, you’ll see that I was wondering about the Latin translation of this verse offered by Wheelock’s as an example of some grammatical point or other (without, of course, any citation of the verse number). I remembered the words from the carol “It Came Upon a Midnight Clear,” which offered the Byzantine reading favored by the (Protestant) King James Bible. But the Catholic pew bible in the apparatus of which I found the derivations of the variant readings favored the Alexandrian reading. Having been raised Catholic, I have not frequently found myself inclined toward the Protestant take on anything other than the King James Bible. Though I am of course aware as a student of the Classics that KJB is not a particularly close translation of the Greek, as a sometimes-English student, I cannot overlook that it is unsurpassed for poetic value in English. And here, again, I side with the King James Bible.

So for Christmas, I choose to retract my earlier offering of “Gloria in altissimis Deo et in terra pax hominibus bonae voluntatis,” to be replaced not with some earlier translation, but with that offered up to seventeenth century England, based on a different reading of the text (which one Luke actually recorded, we will never know):

Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men.

I am very satisfied to support the reading that includes all men, who certainly ought every one to receive the hypothetical good will. My views are only inclusive when the subject is very important, as this. If such a good will should be brought about, it would come to nothing if it were not extended to everyone. Everyone. Not “those in God’s favor” (a phrase easily read to the advantage of whoever seizes the opportunity) but to everyone. It’s a greatly preferable ideal, if only that.

Well, I’m up very late. Santa would be displeased. Oh, but Yuletide textual study makes me cheery! Merry Christmas to all.