For many years I’ve been dwelling on the meaning of penance in the Abrahamic religions. In Hebrew the verb K-P-R, which is at the root of Yom Kippur (Day of Atonement) has a sense of lowering one’s eyes before God. In Arabic, the same Semitic root K-F-R (but with an F replacing the P) has the sense of turning one’s face away from God. It’s the origin of the word Kafir, which translates as “thankless”, “heretic” or “non-believer”, but which I suspect originally meant something more akin to “an *Unrepentant* One”. In Islam the word for repentance is “tawba” (from a completely unrelated root). But it appears in the Gospels as “metanoia” in Greek, which means “change your mind”, but the various Latin renderings all go back to the Latin root “paeniteo”, which translates as “feel sorry” or regretful. I feel like there’s something lacking in that, like there should be a breaking down of the individual morphemes. I want to know the original metaphorical sense that was being used. I feel like you can almost see the word “itere” (to go) within it. Was the element “paen-“ part of some word that has been lost to us. Like a sense of regret so bad that you “go back into yourself”?
Wow, this is fascinating, Daniel. The tawba you mentioned may be more phonically related to the Hebrew teshuvah. The meaning is certainly closer, as it is to metanoia. The idea of return seems to connect them - turning away, turning back, so true of the struggles of life. I take your point about the Latin deviation. I can almost hear poenio in it which would accord with a later more self punishing and degraded expression. Enriched!
For many years I’ve been dwelling on the meaning of penance in the Abrahamic religions. In Hebrew the verb K-P-R, which is at the root of Yom Kippur (Day of Atonement) has a sense of lowering one’s eyes before God. In Arabic, the same Semitic root K-F-R (but with an F replacing the P) has the sense of turning one’s face away from God. It’s the origin of the word Kafir, which translates as “thankless”, “heretic” or “non-believer”, but which I suspect originally meant something more akin to “an *Unrepentant* One”. In Islam the word for repentance is “tawba” (from a completely unrelated root). But it appears in the Gospels as “metanoia” in Greek, which means “change your mind”, but the various Latin renderings all go back to the Latin root “paeniteo”, which translates as “feel sorry” or regretful. I feel like there’s something lacking in that, like there should be a breaking down of the individual morphemes. I want to know the original metaphorical sense that was being used. I feel like you can almost see the word “itere” (to go) within it. Was the element “paen-“ part of some word that has been lost to us. Like a sense of regret so bad that you “go back into yourself”?
Wow, this is fascinating, Daniel. The tawba you mentioned may be more phonically related to the Hebrew teshuvah. The meaning is certainly closer, as it is to metanoia. The idea of return seems to connect them - turning away, turning back, so true of the struggles of life. I take your point about the Latin deviation. I can almost hear poenio in it which would accord with a later more self punishing and degraded expression. Enriched!