I wasn't sure where to put this so I decided to put it here. Didn't quite seem to fit the Bible Study part, lol.
So I finally found the churches that still did services in Aramaic. Apparently the Orthodox Church of Georgia had an influx of migrants from Syria many centuries ago and their traditions were preserved to the present day.
In some of our services we do sing the Psalms and various other verses of Scripture as well. It's woven into the very fabric of our worship. You will see quite a variety of expressions depending on where you go, but this is the closest you would see to the Ancient Syrian expression of the faith.
So here it is, Psalm 53 in Aramaic, for your edification.
“If the history of the 20th Century proved anything, it proved that however bad things were, human ingenuity could usually find a way to make them worse.” - Theodore Dalrymple
I'll add another one here, this time one of the typical hymms sang in Orthodox Churches during Sunday Service. It is called the Trisagion hymm, usually comes before the first Scripture reading of the day. This rendition is from the same priest and parish that did the previous video I posted.
This is also Aramaic, and specifically I found out the dialect used here was an Assyrian dialect called Old Eastern Aramaic. This particular dialect was a precursor to the modern Syriac languages (not to mention influenced many other Middle Eastern languages too).
Here the hymm is a simple prayer to God, which the English version reads "Holy God, Holy Might, Holy Immortal, have mercy on us."
“If the history of the 20th Century proved anything, it proved that however bad things were, human ingenuity could usually find a way to make them worse.” - Theodore Dalrymple
Now I miss my dad more than ever.
I was his alter boy when he adopted me. Rules of the priesthood say no service may be held unless there is at least one other person. I was his other person much of the time.
Greek Orthodox priest when we met about 35 years ago, buried as a bishop about 9 years ago. He spoke umpteen dozen languages, Aramaic being one of them.
Those were awesome videos, with good memories; Thanks for sharing!
Peace!
