CHRISTIAN LATIN. – It is the special language (group language) of Christians, which developed within the framework of Late Latin in the early Christian communities. With the expansion of Christianity, it gradually became the common language of the Latin peoples, and from it the Romance languages arose.
I. DEVELOPMENT
The Christian message, having crossed the borders of Palestine, was initially formulated in the Greek *koinē*, which, for a time, was the ecumenical language of Christianity.Ancient Christian Greek texts from Rome and the earliest communities in Gaul attest that the primitive communities of the West were Greek-speaking. On the other hand, the oldest Christian documents from North Africa were originally composed in Latin; yet since the Latin texts from Africa are saturated with Greek elements, one must suppose not only Greek preaching but also an initial Greek phase in the African Church as well. It was long believed that the Latinization of Christian communities first took place in the Church of North Africa and that this then contributed greatly to the Latinization of the Church of Rome. Now, however, it is increasingly evident that the process of Latinization in the Roman community was already underway by the mid-2nd century, meaning that one is confronted with a contemporary evolution in Africa and Rome. Indeed, by the mid-2nd century, Rome began translating the Bible and other Christian texts originally written in Greek into Latin, for example, the First Epistle of St. Clement. As for the liturgical language, it seems that the Roman Church did not decide to fully Latinize the liturgy—especially the Eucharistic liturgy—until much later (mid-4th century).
The process of differentiation in Christian idiom unfolded over several generations, gradually altering the face of Latin within Christian circles. In this process of differentiation, which was also marked by a return to the vernacular, the earliest versions of the Bible played a very important role. After the creative period of the first two centuries, during which Christian Latin was formed and stabilized, one can observe a kind of slowdown in its evolution, which was at the same time a consolidation. Then, during the second half of the 2nd century, after the Peace of Constantine, a new creative activity emerged, though in this case it involved more the doctrinal creation of technical theological terms, which were added to the popular formations of the first Christian centuries. By the 5th century, a kind of linguistic conservatism prevailed, which, while preserving the legacy of the early Christian centuries, oriented itself toward more traditional norms.
This evolution was the consequence of the social and cultural emancipation of Christian communities, which brought with it a certain linguistic normativism taught in schools. In this way, a kind of Christian humanism emerged—a fortunate combination of linguistic and stylistic elements drawn from the literary tradition of Rome and specifically Christian elements—which formed the basis of Christian literature at its height.
II. CHARACTERISTIC FEATURES
Christianity gathered its earliest adherents especially from among the urban proletariat. It follows that, at the decisive moment of the first formation of its idiom, the tendencies of the common people prevailed—not only because of the social status of the first Christians but also for a psychological reason: Christians resolutely rejected the exclusivism and normativism of cultivated Latin, which were the result of an exaggerated emphasis on refined literary form. A certain utilitarianism took the place of the reverential conservatism that governed the language of educated pagan circles.The first evolution of Christian Latin was thus characterized by a democratic tendency, which manifested itself above all in the ancient versions of the Bible. These versions, in turn, exerted a strong and lasting influence on the language used in Christian circles. During the 2nd and 3rd centuries, a whole technical vocabulary of Christians was developed, which would remain in use until the end of the Latin period, pass into the Romance languages, persist in Medieval Latin, and serve as a model for the languages of all peoples who adopted Christianity as preached by the Latin Church. Now, to understand this well, one must realize that originally Christianity was preached in Greek and that Christian ideas and institutions entered the West with Greek names. Behind every technical term of these two centuries lies—or reveals—an original Greek word.
In Latinizing the oldest technical vocabulary, three processes were applied: either a Greek word was borrowed, or a new word was created, or an existing Latin word was given a new meaning. In general, it can be said that more or less concrete things or institutions retained their foreign names of origin, making an entire technical vocabulary borrowed from Greek commonplace in Christian circles: for example, the nouns: *apostolus*, *ecclesia*, *baptisma*, *catechumenus*, *diaconus*, *episcopus*, etc.; the verbs: *baptizare*, *blasphemare*, *propheteare*, etc. There are, however, certain categories of ideas that from the outset were interpreted with purely Latin words, whether through lexical neologisms or semasiological neologisms: thus, notions closely related to Christian doctrine almost always found a Latin interpretation. For example, the entire vocabulary of Christian charity (*caritas*, *dilectio*, etc.) is Latin. The same applies to the vocabulary of salvation and redemption (*salus*, *salutare*, *salvare*, *salvator*, etc.), as well as to that concerning the opposition between flesh and spirit (*spiritualis*, *carnalis*, etc.). Later, theological and dogmatic terminology would be almost exclusively Latin. Very often, moreover, new words were not created; instead, common language provided a starting point, and a shift in meaning was sufficient to express a Christian idea. Words like *pax*, *confiteri*, *salus*, *gratia*, *caro* adopted new meanings.
Lexical differentiation was not limited to technical terms indicating specifically Christian things. In Christian circles, in fact, a considerable number of new words were formed that did not denote specifically Christian things, ideas, or concepts, but rather general ideas. This surprising fact can only be explained by reference to the very conception of the special language, which inherently implies a differentiation across the entire domain of language, without the need for an external necessity in each individual case. Examples of this kind include: *appetitare*, *arrepitire*, *beatificare*, *beneplacitum*, *cohabitare*, *concrembere*, *cooperatio*, *cooperato*, *corruptibilis*, *fornicari*, *immarcescibilis*, *damnator*, etc.
Even in the syntactic sphere, distinctions can be noted that cannot be justified by any concrete need for technical expression. In such cases, these are very often general tendencies of the language that, within the Christian linguistic community, led to a special evolution. One might mention, for example, the special use of possessive adjectives in place of the genitive in fixed expressions such as *divina gratia*, *passio dominica*, *apostolica praecepta*, *divina misericordia*, etc.; a certain predilection for free and expressive constructions, such as the collective singular, the isolated nominative, etc.; the use of certain verbal constructions, such as *ad* with *verba dicendi*, *benedicere* with the accusative, and the technical use of the phrase *credere in*. Very often, as in the last of the cases cited, the Latin usage was stimulated by the example of Hebrew or Greek constructions, e.g., the periphrastic future with verbs like *coepi*, *incipio*; the indirect question introduced by *si*, and in most cases with the indicative; the use of the final infinitive; the use of the genitive in expressions like *homo peccati*, etc.
III. THE LATIN OF THE CHURCH
This is a particular branch of Christian Latin. The earliest form of Church Latin is found in the Latin of the ancient versions of the Bible, which were composed in a very popular language. The translators, simple people without literary training, drew extensively from the idiom of the people and at the same time practiced extreme literalism, lacking as they were in literary concerns, translating word for word and often preserving the syntactic construction of the original Greek, which had already undergone, in many respects, the influence of Hebrew. Because of the numerous exotic linguistic and stylistic elements, the language of the ancient versions, although extremely popular, had a special character that clearly distinguished it from the current language of Christian communities.These ancient versions generally offended the taste of literary men because of their popular and at the same time exotic character. Lactantius observes that the vulgar character of the ancient versions scandalized the literary men and that this constituted an insurmountable obstacle for many of them, steeped as they were in the literary culture of the time. Nevertheless, within Christian circles, this rude and unliterary form was eventually accepted as the biblical style. In his *Locutiones in Heptateuchum*, St. Augustine endeavors to point out and explain the peculiarities of language and style in the ancient versions, characterizing them as biblical elements, and acknowledges the existence of a biblical language and style, distinct not only from the common language of educated people but also from the current language of Christians; he accepted them in his books *De doctrina christiana* and recommends the Bible as an example of Christian eloquence. After Lactantius, there was a shift in the inner sense of the language, which explains how Jerome, a literary man and a good connoisseur of classical Latin, in revising the ancient versions of the Bible, was able to preserve many words and expressions that were quite bold and even vulgar. For Jerome’s contemporaries, these elements had been ennobled as traditional features of biblical language.
A more mature form of Church Latin manifests itself in liturgical Latin. Because Western liturgy, and in particular that of Rome, was Latinized at a very late date, the earliest form of Roman liturgical Latin shows a highly evolved phase of Christian Latin. For this reason, liturgical Latin clearly differs from biblical Latin, which still bears traces of the oldest versions of the Bible.
Roman liturgical Latin was able to draw, from its origins, on all the riches of a mature idiom; its style is an autonomous Roman creation, clearly distinct from the style of Eastern prayer, and is manifested first of all in the most ancient liturgical texts, such as the Roman Canon of the Mass. It has undergone various influences in different epochs: Byzantine, Gallican, and others, but all these influences, which in most cases tend to diminish the very severe and hieratic character of the Roman style in favor of a more mysterious, more poetic, or more emotional style, never succeeded in completely eliminating the character of solemn sobriety, manly unction, and austerity of the ancient Roman style. The very solemn and hieratic style of the Roman Canon of the Mass is a style of ancient Roman prayer; it is related to the style of ancient Roman national prayer, from which it took the search for grandeur, verbosity, and juridical precision. Thanks to the fact that the West long remained faithful to the primitive spirit, which allowed certain liturgical prayers to be improvised, whether spontaneous or premeditated, by the celebrant, it became possible for traditional liturgical forms to arise; and a traditional formulary and style developed for certain types of prayers; for them, the *orationes* have one style and the *prefaces* another.
In curial style, the Latin of the Church found its most official expression, consciously distancing itself from the popular character of the language commonly used by Christian communities, and was influenced by the language of Roman law and especially by the style of official imperial documents; it thus remained faithful to the very strict norms established by classical Latin.