--- In [email protected], "Rory Goff" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
wrote:
>
> > > --- In [email protected], off_world_beings
> > > <no_reply@> wrote:
> > >
> > > > SECULAR: c.1290, "living in the world, not belonging to a
> > > religious
> > > > order," also "belonging to the state," from O.Fr. seculer,
from
> > > L.L.
> > > > sæcularis "worldly, secular,"...Used in ecclesiastical
writing
> > > like
> > > > Gk. aion "of this world"
> > > > http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?search=secular.
> > > >
> > > > THAT MEANS:
> > > > "sæcularis" means "worldy", "secular".
>
> > --- In [email protected], cardemaister <no_reply@>
> > wrote:
> > >
> > > From my Latin dictionary (Adolf V. Streng, Latinalais-
> > > suomalainen sana-kirja [keer-yah] = Latin-Finnish word-book):
> > >
> > > saecularis, [...] sata*[-]vuotinen [hundred-year-long]
> > >
> > > *) cf. Sanskrit "shata-" (hundred); eg. shata-patha-braahmaNa
>
> --- In [email protected], "Rory Goff" <rorygoff@>
> wrote:
> >
> > That's interesting; I'd not seen any evidence that *saecularis*
> > retained the original meaning of *saeculum*; both of my
> etymological
> > dictionaries (Eric Partridge's Short Etymological Dictionary of
> > Modern English and W. W. Skeat's Etymological Dictionary of the
> > English Language) show it as (Late Latin), meaning "worldly,
> secular"
> > *deriving from* (but clearly different from) the (earlier Latin)
> > *saeculum*, meaning "generation, century, age" or (according to
> > Partridge, in Late Latin)"world." Does your dictionary show it
is
> an
> > adjective and give the "secular" definition at all?
> >
> > (Either way, I've seen no evidence to imply that the noun
> *saeculum*
> > ever meant the adjective "secular". Novus Ordo Seclorum still is
> > evidently best translated as "New Order of the Generations,"
> or "New
> > Order of the Centuries," or "New Order of the Ages." I suppose
it's
> > remotely possible one could translate it as "New Order of the
> > Worlds," but given that that's Late Latin and that the phrase
comes
> > from the Classical Latin poet Virgil (as any 18th-century Latin
> > scholar would well know), such a translation would be pretty
> > unlikely.
> >
> > Either way, translating it as "New Secular Order" is about as
> logical
> > as translating the cognate French phrase "fin de siecle" as "end
of
> > the secular," instead of "end of the century," <snip>
>
> And as an interesting aside, the Freemason Founders were probably
> *not* interested in a secular (in the sense of worldly,
nonspiritual,
> or irreligious) world-view; one of the requirements to becoming a
> Mason is belief in a Supreme Being: atheists and polytheists not
> being admitted. If certain scholars are correct in positing the
roots
> of Freemasonry in the Templars (likely IMO), and further correct
in
> positing that the original Templars stem from French descendants
of
> the Septimanian Jewish Exilarchs (possible, IMO), then this would
> make perfect sense -- Judaism being after all the ultimate and
> original Monotheism...
>
> :-)
>
