Odp: Polish goddesses and priestesses

----- Original Message -----
From: Mark Odegard
To: cybalist@egroups.com
Sent: Monday, January 10, 2000 11:55 PM
Subject: [cybalist] Polish goddesses and priestesses


Piotr writes:

It's the genitive of bóg, a masculine noun. Like English God, Polish
Bóg also serves as the Supreme Being's name. Of course a feminine noun
can be formed from bóg; it's bogini 'goddess' -- a common noun, not a
name.

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A related question is how Polish handles the concept of 'female
Christian priest' (as you have in the Church of England). 'Priestess',
I think, is unthinkable.

Mark.

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Never underestimate the lexical resources of any language. The general
word for a priest (of whatever cult or denomination) is kapłan, with
its feminine counterpart kapłanka. A more specific word for a Christian
priest (esp. a Catholic one, but also in the Church of England) is
ksiądz, BTW ultimately < *kuningaz. (The usual word for a Protestant
priest is pastor). There is a potential feminine counterpart, ksieni,
formerly used in the sense 'mother superior' (in a convent). It would be
a natural term for a female Catholic priest if such a creature existed.

Piotr


Gerry here: The term "Pastor" is also used in the Catholic church to
demote a higher rank than "father". The mother superior who was
relegated to a convent certainly sounds like something out of Abelard
and Heloise. Is there a liklihood that a "ksieni" might come into
existance in the next century? Only curious.
Gerry
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Gerald Reinhart
Independent Scholar
(650) 321-7378
waluk@...
http://www.alekseevmanuscript.com