VERY SMALL LATIN, INDEED

From a sadder but wiser former Gertrudian (Cult Central, U.S.A.)

Not everyone who assisted at Cekada's cult was a Billy-Bob. There were plenty who could see through all his posturing and bluffing. He really didn't like it if someone corrected his blatant errors or challenged him on his groundless claim of being a "learned canonist."

You are right that he never saw the inside of a real college let alone a shabby night law school. And he certainly never studied at CUA or any other canon law institute. Anybody with any sense knew he was just a dabbler. He got a pass because people wanted to hear the true Mass. Period! Of course, he was still able to lord it over the great unwashed of his cult -- and that includes quite a few of the clergy who visited as well as the nervous, sad young men from that hinterland "seminary" in FL, who were pressed into service at Easter or Christmas.

Believe me when I say your reach is far wider than your hit counter indicates. Your articles are forwarded to a worldwide circle of people who are delighted to see Tony exposed. (The French are exceptionally keen on this point.) I know Europeans who love your documentation of his ignorance of Latin. Even if you're busy this quarter, I hope you can keep posting occasionally.

The Reader replies: We are not immune to kind words, so for your friends in Europe, we offer yet another case of Anthony Cekada’s estrangement from Latinity.

(Fair warning to the Checkmeister’s hollow-eyed, drooling, sallow-faced bumpkin votaries in the cyber peanut gallery: the point that follows is a subtle one, but remember that we’re writing for the bright-eyed, clear-browed, well washed select few who, like our Oct. 17 correspondent, appreciate the considerable importance of such seemingly minor details.)

On p. 323, here is how our woodenheaded Maundering Scholar translates Zerwick’s Latin (cited in note 62 as phrasis…menti nostrae [non praemonitae] excludit illam universalitatem operis redemptivi quae pro mente semitica in illa phrasi connotari potuit…):

The phrase…excludes from our thinking (if not sufficiently instructed) that universality of the redemptive work which the phrase could connote for the Semitic mind…

This is a classic example of Anthony’s reckless and really witless approach to translating Latin. He's so eager to reach an unusual (and slanted) rendering that he quite misses many obvious points in the original text. It is much more plausible and natural to regard menti as a dativus iudicantis rather than a dative of separation (i.e., of the remoter object), especially since excludere is a verb of “depriving” that prefers the ablative of separation.

Here is Zerwick’s text properly translated:

The phrase…to our (unforewarned) mind excludes that universality of the work of redemption (lit., redemptive work), which that phrase could connote for the Semitic mind (lit., which for the Semitic mind could be connoted in that phrase).

Note that in addition to over-translating the Latin original, the hapless Anthony missed bringing out the admirable contrastive parallelism of menti/mente. But of course, his poor Latin is always accompanied by a poorer sense of English style.