I have a couple questions about a passage in the Confessions of Saint Augustine.
“Da mihi, Domine, scire et intellegere, utrum sit prius invocare te an laudare te et scire te prius sit an invocare te.”
Is it subjunctive because it is a subordinate clause within indirect discourse?
I’m having problem’s getting the exact meaning of the bold. I get the jist of it. Augustine is saying whether we call upon God and then know him or whether the inverse is true. Would someone mind explaining how to read the passage or provide an English translation.
(3) Why is it 3rd person?
Some questions about another passage: “Aliud enim pro alio potest invocare nesciens.”
(1) Is this saying, “For the ignorant is able to invoke one for another?”
One more: “Quaeram te, Domine, invocans te et invocem te credens in te; praedicatus enim es nobis.”
utrum sit prius invocare te an laudare te et scire te prius sit an invocare te. – subjunctive because indirect question.
“. . . whether calling on you is prior to praising you and whether knowing you is prior to calling on you.” 3rd person because the subjects are infinitives, “calling on you”, “knowing you”, etc.
It does mean ‘or’, but only insofar as it follows up the ‘utrum’. So if ‘utrum’ implies a question that allows for two answers, the ‘an’ will divide present the alternative.
Now, to complement that, you should know that
a) Utrum can also be used, as all interrogative adverbs, in indirect questions. (Which is the case here);
b) ‘An’ can also have the ‘Utrum’ implied. So instead of having a phrase like
‘Utrum eat an maneat, nescio.’ —
You could have
‘An maneat, nescio.’, since the alternative is so obvious.
A more comprehensive survey of the uses can be found in the LS.
Some questions about another passage: “Aliud enim pro alio potest invocare nesciens.”
(1) Is this saying, “For the ignorant is able to invoke one for another?”
Yes.
One more: “Quaeram te, Domine, invocans te et invocem te credens in te; praedicatus enim es nobis.”
(1) Why is the bolded in the subjunctive?
It’s not in the subjunctive, it’s in the future.
So “I will search for you by calling you, and I will call you by believing in you.”
(the “by —ing” translating the present participles)
Thanks for all the help. So would a literal translation of the large, bolded passage be: “Whether invoking you or praising you is prior and whether knowing you or invoking you is prior?” Obviously, the comparative would then be implied in each.
Quaeram te, Domine, invocans te et invocem te credens in te; praedicatus enim es nobis.
The emboldened words are indeed in conjunctive. Quaeram could formally be future (no distinction in the 1st person sg. between act. pres. conj. and act. futurum simplex in 3rd and 4th conjugations), but 1st and 2nd conjugations do distinguish them: