--- In
cybalist@yahoogroups.com, george knysh wrote:
>>> GK: If so, they would have had the "ecclesia"
>>> word in the other sense mentioned above.
> [congregatio fidelium GK)
Useful mention. But yet we don't know for sure the word was
popular in late Balkan Latin as previously hinted.
>> (MI) They might have had it if that Latin adopted Greek
>> word would have had a clear reason to be preserved.
>
> *****GK: That word (or some other word reflecting the same
> concept) is quite essential to any kind of genuine Christianity,
> even (perhaps especially) one independent of the controlling
> presence of a priesthood.
In Romanian there are alternate ways to design the Christianity
as a whole, starting up with "creStinãtate" (< christia:nitatem)
and "bisericã" (it has also this meaning). One may say also
"dreptcredincioSi" (`the ones having adopted the right faith`,
where the right faith is by default Christian).
> I am wrestling with two hypotheses concerning the PR :(a) they
> were a population which contacted with Christianized elements
> and borrowed a number of terms from them which were retained
> in the vocabulary, but were not themselves Christians;
Hard to believe that since most basical Christian words are of
Latin origin. Some Romance people getting Latin Christian terms,
not being themselves Christians and having no other Romance
neighbor than themselves... that doesn't make much sense.
> (b) they were a population which experienced an early form
> of Christianization (Latin version) [...]
That sounds pretty logical.
> but subsequently, through a variety of historical pressures,
> became "deChristianized" except for the survival of some
> words from the earlier vocabulary.
I don't understand well your "deChristianized". Why should those
people abandon their faith to be late "reChristianized"? Latin
Christian inherited terms include also words specifical to some
Christian practices: if the population would have lost the faith,
they would have also forget the practices and the subsequent words:
quadragesima > pãresimi (`Lent`)
Pascha(e) > PaSti (`Easter`)
rogationem > rugãciune (`prayer`)
communicare > cuminecare (`communion`)
etc.
If conservation of "creStin", "cruce" (< crucem `cross`) or
"Dumnezeu" (< "Domine Deus") can be understood also out of the
Christian faith, not the same could be said about a word like
"pãgân" < "paganus" which supposes some opposition between
Christians and other people, where Romance speakers situated
themselves on the Christian side.
Another point is that many Christian terms of Latin origin
are not in agreement with "official" terms in Western Romance:
Creatio (Mundi) <=> "Facere(a)" (< Lat. facere `to make`)
Creator (Mundi) <=> "Fâcâtorul"
Regnum Dei <=> "împãrãTia Domnului" (der. imperator + dominus)
Virgo <=> "Fecioara" (der. "fecior" < "fetiolus") and so on,
fact which suggests also that Christian faith was something
quite popular since people _constructed_ the terms they needed
from the words of their own language (see also Mircea Pacuraru,
1980, "Istoria BOR")
> In both cases the genuine (permanent cgs) Christianization of
> the PR /R would have occurred more or less simultaneously with
> that of their Slavic neighbours, in the context of the Bulgarian
> Empire.
I still don't know why you suppose that Proto-Romanians had to
reconvert to Christian faith once they already got it at a basical
level. What is due to Slavic contact is the organization of an
Institutional Church, with clear consequences on corresponding
Christian vocabulary part, and all our historians agree on this
important contribution.
> Did the Romanian ecclesiastical vocabulary adopt the Slavic
> "tserkov" "tserkva" (or variants).
No. As said, Romanian had already Latin words for that.
> This is the Slavic equivalent of "ecclesia"
Yup, I knew that.
> Anyway, does Romanian have "tserkov" et sim.?*******
It has only the funny derivative "Târcovnic" (< "crkovUnikU"),
might be some very regionalisms in Southern part; otherwise, no.
Regards,
Marius Iacomi