The English language in its high flexibility has the ability to form relative clauses, an asset not shared by other languages as diverse as Welsh and Hebrew. This confers upon English both convenience and accuracy of expression as well as rhetorical power in the construction of long sentences. It can be well studied in The Book of Common Prayer (1549 & 1662 & USA 1928) where it is embodied in the English (Anglican) language of prayer for it occurs in numerous Collects and Prayers. We owe this presence to the hand of Archbishop Thomas Cranmer, who perfected in English translation what he found [Deus qui] in some of the Latin originals with which he worked.
Of the 45 Collects that use the relative clause in the B.C.P. (1549) there was already such a clause in the original Latin of 36 of them. Further, Cranmer made use of the relative clause in no less than seven of the Collects for Saint's Days. And of the total of 82 Collects in the BCP there is no relative clause in 36 of them (including a blank run from Trinity XIV to Trinity XXII), leaving 46 of them with it.
The Prayer of Consecration and Relative Clauses
This said, the most attractive and interesting (perhaps unique) use and exploitation of the relative clause on a big scale is in the Prayer of Consecration in the Order for the Administration of the Lord's Supper. Here the opening address to & invocation of God ("Almighty God, our heavenly Father") is followed not by one relative clause but by two, with one inside the other: "which of thy tender mercy didst give." and "who by his one oblation of himself." And on the wings of these two relative clauses the single, vast and profound sentence soars to its first exclamatory climax, "Hear us, O merciful Father." And, importantly, it is in another relative clause ("who in the same night that he was betrayed.") that the actual words of consecration are framed and thus the Words of Institution remain part of the Consecration Prayer.
If Cranmer's Prayer is compared with the Latin prayer in the Sarum Missal we find that the formula of consecration there is in a subordinate clause, "who, the day before he suffered, took bread"; but if we may dare say so, the whole exordium is less attractively constructed in Latin than in Cranmer's English.
In modern Eucharistic Liturgies in English the architectural structure of the Prayer of Consecration has been demolished, usually with the removal of the first two relative pronouns & clauses. Instead of the people of God being reminded of what their God is to them and has done for them by use of carefully constructed relative clauses, the Deity himself is told by his creatures of what he has done in words such as these: "You gave your only Son.." [which invites the response from Heaven, "Oh! Did I do so?"]
Reverence before God assisted by appropriate words
Indeed, one of the many differences between the classic language of prayer in The Book of Common Prayer and the "contemporary language" in post 1970s Anglican liturgies is in the contrast of attitude in prayer as created by the form of words used. In the former idiom, language is stretched and poetically formed in order to produce reverence and awe before Almighty God who is the merciful One, while in the latter it tends to be used in a commonplace and pedestrian manner in order to make worshippers feel welcomed by and near unto God, present amongst them. Perhaps this is to overstate it, but such may be argued rather convincingly.
Taken over from the Latin idiom of prayer and developed by Cranmer, the use of the relative clause became one of the means used by the Anglican language of prayer to be reverent and humble before God while, at the same time, recognizing that in Christ Jesus and by divine revelation we have been brought near unto the Father and have by his design a duty to ask petitions of him that he will grant. Thus there is both a logical and a linguistic use of the relative clause. Its use is a means by which the worshippers point out to God in a suitably humble and reverent way that he has both the means and the propensity to grant the petition.
In the Communion Service the relative clause may be seen in the Collect for Purity:
"Almighty God, unto whom all hearts be open, all desires known and from whom no secrets are hid: Cleanse." [Modern liturgies proceed to inform God by saying "Almighty God to you all hearts are open and desires known.."]
It is also there in the Absolution: "Almighty God, our heavenly Father, who of his great mercy hath promised forgiveness of sins to all them that with hearty repentance and true faith turn unto him; pardon and deliver you from all your sins.."
Finally, as we have seen, it is there in glorious proportions in the one sublime prayer that is the Prayer of Consecration.
And of course it is there in the Communion Service in many of the Collects used on Sundays and Saint's Days. Here are two examples from the many:
"Almighty and everlasting God, who art always more ready to hear than we to pray, and art wont to give more than either we desire or deserve: Pour down upon us the abundance of thy mercy." [Trinity XII]
Almighty and merciful God, of whose only gift it cometh that thy faithful people do grant unto thee true and laudable service: Grant, we beseech thee.." [Trinity XIII]
Contemporary Language of Prayer
The usual way that these and others have been rendered into "contemporary English" is not by using the "You" form for the "Thou" but by abandoning the relative clause altogether. Thus we get, "Almighty God, you are always more ready to hear than we to pray." etc.
And sometimes when the use of the relative clause has been maintained in the contemporary English, the form of the verb has been wrong! This is seen in "The Book of Common Prayer for use in the Church in Wales" where not a few Collects have bad grammar. For example, "Almighty God, who has [have!] created the heavens and the earth." and "Almighty God, who shows [show!] to those who are in error the light of the truth." [In the address to God "Thou hast" becomes "You have" and "Thou showest" becomes "You show".]
In this case, and all cases where this approach is used (and it is often in modern prayer books), the pronoun-and-verb forces upon the Almighty information about himself. It can do no other for the English language does not provide for the juxtaposition of the prayed vocative and an independent clause of statement. The manner in which the information is imparted in this new prayer language presumes a God who listens, but the minister moves out of prayer for a few seconds whilst he enters into what looks like [at best] a vote of thanks for services rendered and [at worst] congratulates himself/herself on his/her powers of understanding in relation to Deity.
If the aim of the liturgist is to cater for the lowest common denominator and to make what he writes to be immediately intelligible and accessible to everyone on first hearing it, then the use of the relative clause in prayer language is probably out. The way forward is to say, "You are God and we praise you," and the like.
However, it is now in 2002 that the Vatican, which in the late 1960s pioneered the move into the most accessible forms of the vernacular for the translation of the Latin Mass, is calling for the restoration of the DEUS QUI, the relative clause, to prayers and collects in English where it is there already in the Latin originals! Amazing turn around.
(For more sophisticated discussion of this and related matters see the brilliant essay, "The Question of Style", by Ian Robinson in the book, "The Real Common Worship," edited by Peter Mullen from Edgeways Books, The Brynmill Press, Norfolk, IP20 0AS - ISBN 0 907839 67 3 ---
sales@edgewaysbooks.com )
The Revd Dr Peter Toon Trinity XII in 2002
The Rev'd Dr. Peter Toon
Minister of Christ Church, Biddulph Moor,
England & Vice-President and Emissary-at-Large
of The Prayer Book Society of America
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