A Russian Proverb

[Daniel Rancour-Laferriere]

Oops - a word order problem.  That is Жив Бог ("Zhiv Bog"), not Бог жив 
("Bog zhiv").   (Otherwise we would be getting into "Lenin zhiv..." 
territory).

DRL

Daniel Rancour-Laferriere wrote:

> 6 September 05
>
> Dear colleagues,
> I thank you all for your suggestions on how to translate Dahl's 
> proverb Бог жив, жива душа моя ("Bog zhiv, zhiva dusha moia").
>
> Now, the reason I asked the question was that I needed to decide 
> whether the proverb would make an appropriate epigraph for a chapter 
> of my book in progress titled _Tolstoy's Quest for God_.  In Tolstoy's 
> _Confession_ (1879-1882), you may recall, Lev Nikolaevich cannot make 
> up his mind about whether God exists or not.  It seems that, when he 
> is feeling very good, God does exist; but when he is feeling depressed 
> and suicidal, God does not exist.  In other words, the question of the 
> existence of God is framed in terms of Lev Nikolaevich's alternation 
> of (hypo)manic and depressive states (in DSM IV this is termed  
> Bipolar II Disorder).
>
> Since there is some disagreement on how to translate the proverb, and 
> since this disagreement is connected with the unresolved question of 
> whether God's existence (and the soul's existence) is finite or not, 
> then I conclude that the proverb will make a perfect epigraph for a 
> chapter on the unresolved question of God's infinite existence in 
> _Confession_.
>
> By the way, the question was eventually resolved in favor of God's 
> infinite existence as Tolstoy grew older and came to believe in a 
> pantheistic God.
>
> And I welcome any comments on these conclusions.
>
> Best regards to the list,
>
>
> Daniel Rancour-Laferriere
> Emeritus Professor of Russian
> University of California, Davis
>
>
> Sarah E Dunn (dunn at Princeton.EDU) wrote:
>
>> Isn't that the point?  It's a proverb, not a simple declarative 
>> sentence.  There may be irony: "As long as God lives" (and we all 
>> know he lives forever), "so lives my soul" (which also must live 
>> forever, if it depends on the eternal existence of God). Besides, 
>> grammatically speaking, a short-form adjective implies  that the 
>> state of the subject which it describes is temporary.
>>
>> sd
>>
>> ----- Original Message -----
>> From: pjs <pscotto at MTHOLYOKE.EDU>
>> Date: Friday, September 2, 2005 12:36 pm
>> Subject: Re: [SEELANGS] A Russian Proverb
>>
>>  
>>
>>>> As long as God lives, so lives my soul.
>>>>     
>>>
>>> The problem with this is that it implies that both God's existence 
>>> and, by the extension, the existence of one's mortal soul could be 
>>> finite.
>>>
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