The Dagley Dagley Daily

By Janet Dagley Dagley
Covering the world from the waterfront in Hoboken, New Jersey, USA

ISSN 1544-9114

Add this blog to your My Yahoo! page:

Or click here to read our Atom feed:

Support The Dagley Dagley Daily:
Click to contribute

Your choice

Check out our Dagley Dagley Daily souvenir merchandise!

Visit our ONLINE STORE!

The Dagley Dagley Daily
is brought to you by:

Bohemian Hillbillies

Buy our CD
Once Removed
at CDBaby

The Dagley Dagley Daily
ARCHIVES
01/26/2003 - 02/02/2003 02/16/2003 - 02/23/2003 02/23/2003 - 03/02/2003 03/02/2003 - 03/09/2003 03/09/2003 - 03/16/2003 03/16/2003 - 03/23/2003 03/23/2003 - 03/30/2003 03/30/2003 - 04/06/2003 04/06/2003 - 04/13/2003 04/13/2003 - 04/20/2003 04/20/2003 - 04/27/2003 04/27/2003 - 05/04/2003 05/04/2003 - 05/11/2003 05/11/2003 - 05/18/2003 05/18/2003 - 05/25/2003 05/25/2003 - 06/01/2003 06/01/2003 - 06/08/2003 06/08/2003 - 06/15/2003 06/15/2003 - 06/22/2003 06/22/2003 - 06/29/2003 06/29/2003 - 07/06/2003 07/06/2003 - 07/13/2003 07/13/2003 - 07/20/2003 07/20/2003 - 07/27/2003 07/27/2003 - 08/03/2003 08/03/2003 - 08/10/2003 08/17/2003 - 08/24/2003 08/24/2003 - 08/31/2003 08/31/2003 - 09/07/2003 09/07/2003 - 09/14/2003 09/14/2003 - 09/21/2003 09/21/2003 - 09/28/2003 09/28/2003 - 10/05/2003 10/05/2003 - 10/12/2003 10/12/2003 - 10/19/2003 10/19/2003 - 10/26/2003 10/26/2003 - 11/02/2003 11/02/2003 - 11/09/2003 11/09/2003 - 11/16/2003 11/16/2003 - 11/23/2003 11/23/2003 - 11/30/2003 11/30/2003 - 12/07/2003 12/07/2003 - 12/14/2003 12/14/2003 - 12/21/2003 12/21/2003 - 12/28/2003 12/28/2003 - 01/04/2004 01/04/2004 - 01/11/2004 01/11/2004 - 01/18/2004 01/18/2004 - 01/25/2004 01/25/2004 - 02/01/2004 02/01/2004 - 02/08/2004 02/08/2004 - 02/15/2004 02/15/2004 - 02/22/2004 02/22/2004 - 02/29/2004 02/29/2004 - 03/07/2004 03/07/2004 - 03/14/2004 03/14/2004 - 03/21/2004 03/21/2004 - 03/28/2004 03/28/2004 - 04/04/2004 04/04/2004 - 04/11/2004 04/11/2004 - 04/18/2004 04/18/2004 - 04/25/2004 04/25/2004 - 05/02/2004 05/02/2004 - 05/09/2004 05/09/2004 - 05/16/2004 05/16/2004 - 05/23/2004 05/23/2004 - 05/30/2004 05/30/2004 - 06/06/2004 06/06/2004 - 06/13/2004 06/13/2004 - 06/20/2004 06/20/2004 - 06/27/2004 07/04/2004 - 07/11/2004 07/11/2004 - 07/18/2004 07/18/2004 - 07/25/2004 07/25/2004 - 08/01/2004 08/01/2004 - 08/08/2004 08/08/2004 - 08/15/2004 08/15/2004 - 08/22/2004 08/22/2004 - 08/29/2004 08/29/2004 - 09/05/2004 09/05/2004 - 09/12/2004 09/12/2004 - 09/19/2004 09/19/2004 - 09/26/2004 09/26/2004 - 10/03/2004 10/03/2004 - 10/10/2004 10/10/2004 - 10/17/2004 10/17/2004 - 10/24/2004 10/24/2004 - 10/31/2004 10/31/2004 - 11/07/2004 11/07/2004 - 11/14/2004 11/14/2004 - 11/21/2004 11/21/2004 - 11/28/2004 11/28/2004 - 12/05/2004 12/05/2004 - 12/12/2004 12/12/2004 - 12/19/2004 12/19/2004 - 12/26/2004 12/26/2004 - 01/02/2005 01/02/2005 - 01/09/2005 01/09/2005 - 01/16/2005 01/16/2005 - 01/23/2005 01/23/2005 - 01/30/2005 01/30/2005 - 02/06/2005 02/06/2005 - 02/13/2005 02/13/2005 - 02/20/2005 02/20/2005 - 02/27/2005 03/20/2005 - 03/27/2005 07/02/2006 - 07/09/2006

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons License.

Who Links Here

My blogroll:

My Technorati Profile

Comments: Post a Comment

'Truth stands and is forever mighty and abides'

And that's what we're celebrating on this holiday, Jan Hus Day.

On July 6, 1415, Bohemian priest and professor Jan Hus was burned at the stake by the people who were then in control of the Catholic Church. Not that anybody was all that much in control of the Church at that time: three different men claimed to have been elected Pope, and each issued edicts excommunicating the other two. One if not all of the alleged Popes were busy selling indulgences (i.e., demanding money from parishioners by using a combination of threats and promises involving both this world and the next) to finance wars against the other two alleged Popes. Fortunately there was no Fox News at the time or the situation would have been even worse. Though they were awfully busy fighting amongst themselves, the Church leadership, if you could call them that, managed to take time to deal with Jan Hus and the trouble he was causing them. And while they succeeded in punishing the alleged heretic with a painful, ghastly death, they could not extinguish the message he delivered: people do not need intermediaries to communicate with God. Nor do they need to pay those intermediaries, or worship them, or obey them. Religion could, and should, be a do-it-yourself venture.

Looking back with the better-than-20-20 hindsight of nearly six centuries, it's easy to see that alleged religious leaders who couldn't even agree among themselves as to who was Pope were neither infallible nor divine. They were just men who had managed to grab themselves a bit of power and who wanted to hold onto that power and add to it, and who were willing to abandon or pervert any and all principles to accomplish that goal. Hus was not only in their way, he was threatening their very lucrative livelihood: he had to go.

Jan Hus, like my daughter Sallie did centuries later, received a bachelor's degree from one of the world's great schools, Charles University in Prague. Unlike Sallie, he did not go on to Columbia University for his master's (Columbia wasn't founded until 1754); he stayed on for graduate school at Charles University. At the time, Charles University, founded by Bohemian King, Holy Roman Emperor, and all-around genius and great leader Charles IV, had a bit of an educational exchange thing going on with Oxford University in England, which dates back to the year 1096 or earlier. Oxford University was the home of a rabble-rousing preacher named John Wycliffe (also spelled Wyclif, Wiclif, or other variations: nobody knows for sure anymore), that is until he got kicked out. Though Wycliffe (1324-1384) was dead by the time Hus was studying at Charles, his students and his teachings were still very much alive. While the authorities who threw Wycliffe out of Oxford must have thought that was a successful move on their part, in the end they furthered his cause, not theirs. Freed of his day-to-day teaching obligations, Wycliffe was able to spend the last two years of his life finishing the most important project of his career: translating the Bible from Latin into English.

Wycliffe translated the Bible because he felt people ought to read it for themselves, and he knew that most wouldn't go to the trouble of learning Latin for that purpose. He would not have been popular in the Muslim faith, either, since it is frequently pointed out that "any translation of the Qur'an immediately ceases to be the literal word of Allah, and hence cannot be equated with the Qur'an in its original Arabic form." Be that as it may, the Bible wasn't written in Latin in the first place, though its Greek and Hebrew components were brought together in a Latin version in the year 405.

Like Wycliffe, and Sts. Cyril and Methodius centuries before, Hus believed that teaching, preaching, and just communicating in general was more effective when conducted in the native language of the recipient, or at least a language that person could understand. So when he preached, and when he taught, he did so in Czech. He took such an interest in Czech, his own mother tongue, that he even helped solidify its written form by inventing the hacek (ha-chek), or hook, that little v-shaped thingy that appears over certain Czech letters, signifying different sounds than the letters without haceks. Without the hacek over the "c", for example, the word hacek would be pronounced hatsek. But Hus's interest in improving the language was just a sideline; his primary interest was preaching and teaching, both of which he did with great fervor.

In 1411, Hus was excommunicated for speaking out against papal envoys who had come to sell indulgences for a war against the King of Naples. One of the alleged Popes ordered that his home and Bethlehem Chapel, where he preached, be destroyed, but those orders were not obeyed. Hus moved out of Prague, but kept preaching, making the occasional guest appearance in the Bohemian capital. After awhile he was summoned to the Council of Constance and promised safe passage by King Sigismund, son of Charles IV. By the time Hus realized that Sigismund's promise was no good, it was too late. Hus was imprisoned along with one of the alleged Popes, then tried before the council. He refused to recant either his teachings or those of Wycliffe. They burned his writings right before his eyes, but he stood firm. They burned him at the stake, and the headline above is one translation of the words he is said to have spoken as the fire was lit.

Wycliffe was already dead by then, but the council ordered him exhumed so that what was left of him could be burnt publicly and his ashes thrown into the river.

On December 17, 1999, Pope John Paul II apologized on behalf of the Catholic Church for the execution of Jan Hus. So far there has been little talk of going beyond that and making him a saint, but then it's only been 588 years since Hus was executed.

They call it "Jan Hus Day," but my guess is, he wouldn't have wanted this holiday to have that name. I think he would have preferred "Truth Day."

posted by Janet Dagley Dagley @11:56 AM

6.7.03