As Christians we should find ways to celebrate love every day… But it has been customary to take a pause on Valentine’s Day – a date that some in Orthodoxy have been trying to establish for yesterday, February 13 (celebration of Saints Aquila and Priscilla)… Regardless of dates and their always excessive commercialization, it is always enjoyable to stop and think what “Love” means to all of us…
Let’s start with the famous passage of Corinthian’s 1:13 in English and Greek… The Greek original has been recognized as a poem for the Ages – and a true reason why knowledge of Greek enriches someone’s intellectual state of existence…
HYMN TO LOVE – CORINTHIANS 1:13
If I speak all tongues of men and of angels, but speak without love, I am no more than a noisy gong or clanging cymbal. If I can prophesy and fathom all mysteries and knowledge and if I have so much faith that I can move mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. If I give all my possessions to the poor, or even give my body to be burnt, but have not love, I gain nothing.
Love is patient; love is kind and envies no one. Love is never boastful, nor conceited, nor rude. It does not insist on its own way. It does not take offense, nor does it keep a record of wrongs. Love does not enjoy evildoing but enjoys the truth. There is nothing love cannot face; there is no limit to its faith, its hope, and its endurance.
Love never ends. Prophecy will cease. Tongues will be stilled. Knowledge will fail. For we know in part and we prophesy in part, but when the Fulfillment comes, the partial will be done away with. When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I saw as a child, I thought and reasoned as a child. When I became a man, I put away the things of a child. Now all we can see of God is like a cloudy picture in a mirror, but then we shall see him face to face. I do not know everything now, but then I will, just as God completely understands me.
In a word, there are three things that last forever: faith, hope, and love: but the greatest of them all is love.
ORIGINAL BIBLICAL TEXT ΠΡΟΣ ΚΟΡΙΝΘΙΟΥΣ 1: 13
Εάν ταις γλώσσαις των ανθρώπων λαλώ και των αγγέλων, αγάπην δε μη έχω, γέγονα χαλκός ηχών ή κύμβαλον αλαλάζον. Και εάν έχω προφητείαν και ειδώ τα μυστήρια πάντα και πάσαν την γνώσιν, και εάν έχω πάσαν την πίστιν, ώστε όρη μεθιστάνειν, αγάπην δε μη έχω, ουδέν ειμί.
Και εάν ψωμίσω πάντα τα υπάρχοντα μου, και εάν παραδώ το σώμα μου ίνα καυθήσομαι, αγάπην δε μη έχω, ουδέν ωφελούμαι.
Η αγάπη μακροθυμεί, χρηστεύεται, η αγάπη ου ζηλοί, η αγάπη ου περπερεύεται, ου φυσιούται, ουκ ασχημονεί, ου ζητεί τα εαυτής, ου παροξύνεται, ου λογίζεται το κακόν, ου χαίρει επί τη αδικία, συγχαίρει δε τη αληθεία, πάντα στέγει, πάντα πιστεύει, πάντα ελπίζει, πάντα υπομένει. Η αγάπη ουδέποτε εκπίπτει.
Είτε δε προφητείαι, καταργηθήσονται, είτε γλώσσαι παύσονται, είτε γνώσις καταργηθήσεται. Εκ μέρους δε γινώσκομεν και εκ μέρους προφητεύομεν όταν δε έλθη το τέλειον, τότε το εκ μέρους καταργηθήσεται. Ότε ήμην νήπιος, ως νήπιος έλάλουν, ως νήπιος εφρόνουν, ως νήπιος ελογιζόμην ότε δε γέγονα ανήρ, κατήργηκα τα του νηπίου. Βλέπομεν γαρ άρτι δι’ εσόπτρου εν αινίγματι, τότε δε πρόσωπον προς πρόσωπον άρτι γινώσκω εκ μέρους, τότε δε επιγνώσομαι καθώς και επεγνώσθην. Νυνί δε μένει πίστις, έλπίς, αγάπη, τα τρία ταύτα μείζων δε τούτων η αγάπη.
ELYTIS’S MONOGRAM PART 3
One of the best Love poems ever written in Greek by our Nobel prize winning poet Odysseus Elytis…
Τhis is how I speak of you and me
Because I love you and in love I know
To enter like a Full Moon
From everywhere, for your small foot in the vastsheets
To pluck jasmine petals – and I have the power
As you are asleep, to blow to take you
Through glimmering passages and hidden archways of the sea
Hypnotized trees with spiders that shine silver.
Waves know you from hear-say
How you caress, how you kiss
How you say ‘what’ and ‘eh’ under your breath
All around the neck, the bay
It’s always us the light and the shade.
Always you the little star and always I the dark vessel
Always you the harbour and I the lantern on the right side
The moistened wharf and the shine on the oars
High at the house with the vine arbour
The tied roses, the water that cools
Always you the stone statue and always I the shade that grows
The ajar shutter you, the wind that opens it I.
Because I love you and I love you.
Always you the coin and always I the worship that cashes it:
So the night, so the bluster in the wind
So the drop in the air, so the silence
Around (is) the sea the despotic
Arch of the sky with stars
So your faintest breath
That I no more have anything else
Between the four walls, the ceiling, the floor
To call of you and be beaten by my own voice
To smell of you and cause people’s anger
Because whatever is untried and brought from elsewhere
People cannot bear and it is soon, can you hear me?
It is still soon in this world, my love,
To speak of you and me.
Και λίγοι στίχοι για την γιορτή της αγάπης – από τον μεγάλο μας Ελύτη… Από το Μονόγραμμα μέρος ΙΙΙ…
Έτσι μιλώ γιά σένα καί γιά μένα
Επειδή σ’αγαπώ καί στήν αγάπη ξέρω
And a few of the best love songs of all time…
Righteous Brothers – Unchained Melody
Maria Callas – O Mio Babbino Caro (Puccini)
Βίκυ Μοσχολιού “Δεν ξέρω πόσο σ’αγαπώ” Στίχοι: Χρήστος Αργυρόπουλος. Μουσική: Απόστολος Καλδάρας. (Amazing poetry as always – even in the English translation at the bottom)…
I don’t know how much Ι love you
