>> From the Library of Congress in Washington DC.
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>> Betsy Peterson: Hello, everyone. If I could ask you all to take a seat at this time, that would be great. My name is Betsy Peterson. I'm the director of the American Folk Life Center here at the Library of Congress. And on behalf of the staff, indeed everyone in the library, I want to welcome you today to the latest presentation in our Benjamin A. Botkin lecture series. The series allows us at the center to highlight the work of scholars in a range of areas in the disciplines of folklore, ethnomusicology, oral history and cultural heritage, while also enhancing the collections here at the America Folk Life Center. Every lecture is videotaped and becomes part of the permanent archive. And also each lecture is later posted as a webcast so that people throughout the world and for generations to come can hear the lecture that you are going to be hearing today. So with all of that said now, if you do have any electronic devices, cell phones, et cetera, on, please turn them off at this point. We are very proud to be the American Folk Life Center, but sometimes I know the name gives people the wrong impression or that our interests and our archival holdings are only limited to American materials. And that is not the case at all. Of course, we're an outstanding collection, I would dare say the outstanding repository for American music, dance and traditional culture. But among the more than 3,000 collections in our archive, our materials from hundreds of other cultures, countries throughout the world and in fact virtually all of the reading rooms here at the library contain collections in multiple languages from cultures and countries throughout the world. In the Asian reading room, for instance, you can access the library's South Asian collection which relates directly to our lecture today. And I would just like to acknowledge our colleagues from the Asian reading room today. Welcome and thanks for coming. The South Asian collection in the Asian reading room contains materials from Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, the Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka. The collection currently has 332,000 monograph volumes, more than 1,000 active journals and over 68,000 titles on microfesh and provides broad general research coverage in most fields and disciplines, but especially vernacular languages in literature, religion and philosophy, politics, history and sociology. And so today we will hear about an ancient cultural tradition that is practiced both in India and the United States. This afternoon, I have the pleasure of introducing the distinguished ethnomusicologist and performer Joseph J. Palackal. Dr. Palackal who is originally from the Indian state of Karela grew up in the musical traditions of the Siro Malabar Church and is an Indic musicology singer and composer, as well as one of the foremost experts on the musical traditions of the Indian Christians. The founder and president of the Christian Musicological Society of India, Dr. Palackal received his PhD in ethnomusicology from the Graduate Center of the City University of New York in 2005 for his research on the Syriac or Aramaic chant traditions in south India. His dissertation compared the contemporary melodic practices of the East Syriac, Chaldean rite of the Siro Malabar Church and the West Syriac rite of the Oriental Orthodox churches of south India. In addition to his work as a scholar, Dr. Palackal is a noted performer, writer, composer and CD producer. He made his New York debut in 1990 with a guest appearance singing a Christian devotional song in Hindi in the off-Broadway show Nonsense. And he has also performed at Lincoln Center and Princeton University. We are delighted that he is able to come to the library today, and I ask you to join me in welcoming Dr. Palackal for this presentation on Syriac chants and Aramaic Christianity in India. Dr. Palackal.
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[ Applause ]
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>> Joseph J. Palackal: Thank you for that wonderful introduction. Let me begin by chanting the Lord's prayer using almost the exact words that Jesus taught his disciples.
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[ Chanting ]
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With your permission, I would like to dedicate this event to the saintly Palackal Toman Apan, my collateral and sister who died in 1841. He was a great teacher of the Aramaic language, and founder of the seminary in his native town and the first seminary of the Sindar Christians. And who founded the first Lis congregation for men in India to which I belong, the Caramelites of Mary Immaculate. It is a great honor to be here to talk about the language that he was so passionate and he taught his disciples.
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Almost for 1,000 years the biggest export item from India was religion. And that religion was not Hinduism. It was Buddhism. Ever since Emperor Ahsoka accepted Buddhism, he became the biggest promotor, just like Constantine did to Christianity. And he sent missionaries to the different parts of the world, including Palestine and the Middle East. Emperor Ahsoka not only accepted Buddhism but he also laid out foundations for respectful dialogue and respectful other religious traditions. So by the time Christianity came on the scene, India had already prepared that mindset to welcome anything and everything without contradicting but respecting. So it is in this context we talk about the movement of the eastern religion which became Christianity to other parts of Asia, to south India in Karela. It is amazing that Christianity we believe, that Christianity moved to south India. Before the preaching of Jesus, the charisma of Jesus became a religion. Jesus did not promote a religion; he lived a Jew, died a Jew. He changed the perception of his own mother faith but eventually it became a religion. Before Christianity became a doctrine religion, the faith reached Karela. We believe it came through St. Thomas the Apostle, one of the 12 apostles. Because of the trade relationship, spice trade, the region was known to the Middle East, so probably he came in one of those ships. In any case, they will receive the simple faith, and interestingly, this is the man who made the biggest profession of faith in just two words in Aramaic language. [Aramaic phrase], my Lord and my God. This was an exuberant outburst when Jesus appeared especially for him and asked him to touch his hands and touch his side.
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He came out with this profession of faith [Aramaic phrase], simple words, my Lord and my God. While the disciples were doubtful, he said, "You are man and God." And it took 325 years and the rise of a Roman emperor to arrive at a simple consensus on the exegesis of these two words which we have in the Nicaean Creed. If you look at that creed, how verbose, how difficult, how much they have been struggling to pin down what St. Thomas the Apostle said in two words. So this faith in its simplest form came to India. And it survived there and in due course they created poetry, meaning they have connection with the Middle East in the Syriac Aramaic language. The poetry that they were singing celebrated the faith, the simple faith. I'm going to sing two lines which expresses deep Christological theology.
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So this is part of a canonical prayer literally the hours. This is a couplet from a long chant sung during Advent and Christmas seasons. But this particular couplet when it comes to that couplet, the liturgical book says sing twice three times because of the significance of the text which I will explain soon. And the Siro Malabar Christians began to take it as a separate chant and sing it in three ascending pitch registers and proclaim the faith.
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[ Foreign language ]
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We worship you, Lord. [Foreign name] is God, [foreign name] is divinity. [Foreign name], you are divinity. [Foreign language] and you are human. [Foreign word] is man. [Foreign word] humanity. [Foreign phrase] you're humanity. The next phrase is the crucial. [Foreign phrase] is doubt or division. Very clever play on the word. [Foreign phrase] without division, or without doubt. While Christianity was struggling, in several ecumenical councils to define how did humanity and divinity in Christ come together, they were breaking their heads, they were expounding on the stories. So you can imagine so many things were happening. St. Thomas Christians in India were singing this couplet which proclaimed everything was resolved. There was no problem. Let me sing first and then we will talk a little more.
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[ Singing ]
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There is another song that again dissolves the cloud of historianism that is hanging over the St. Thomas Christians ever since the Portuguese encountered them. And that song is another Grecian melody [foreign name]. Son of Mary, Son of Mary. Mary gave birth to the son of God. So there was no problem. There is no problem. There is no need to fight and kill each other. It was already certain. So they sang, "Son of Mary, son of Mary." Mary forgave for the son of God. There was no confusion.
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[ Singing ]
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And they will sing those two stanzas and this will be the refrain. The other stanzas go, "Son of Mary did this. Son of Mary promised a pardon. Son of Mary sanctified the waters of Jordan." So everything is son of Mary, son of Mary. But that son of Mary is the son of God. So there was no confusion. This was how they celebrated faith, through chants. There was no doctrinal imposition. It was part of their faith. And at this moment I'd like to bring in one Malayalam word, how the word [foreign word] which we translate to English as faith. The Karela people translated it into Malayalam or maybe into Tamur before Malayalam became a language. [Foreign word]. [Foreign word] is breath, breath. [Foreign word], that means it is beautiful breath. This is how they translated faith in Malayalam. It is part of the breath of the people. It is not just something that you believe in. It is not something that you discuss. It is not that something that you arrive at the conclusion, but it is your breath, your own breath. That idea of breath comes from another word in Aramaic, the meaning of which is breath, which is [foreign word]. Which we translate awkwardly in English as Holy Spirit. [Foreign word] the very breath of God. The personification is the third person of the trinity. So let us leave that aside. So this faith in India, among the Christians in India, St. Thomas Christians celebrate it through their songs and dances, and then it continues. And then every love story has a villain, like the Hindi movies you have seen. That villain came from Portugal. So the missionaries came, they encountered St. Thomas Christians and they saw that they were worshiping in Syriac. What kind of -- their idea of Catholicism was different from what they saw in the land. So that came into conflict. They said, "We have to change this. We have to change it to Latin." But the St. Thomas Christians said, "No. This is the way of Thomas. You follow the way of Peter. And this is the language of Jesus, so we want to retain this language." So what happened? They introduced Latin elements, but they translated them into Syriac. So in the video we will see examples of that. Well, the villain went away but then you know, it is amazing. They went away, but a little bit of that villain resurfaced in the 1960s. The people, St. Thomas Christians, the Siro Malabar Christians we are talking about, they thought that the language has lost its credibility, nobody knows Syriac. So they changed, as it happened, the Latin rite, they changed everything into Malayalam in the 1960s, 1962. So this was before the Vatican too. It had nothing to do with the Vatican too. So the generation that was born after that transition did not know the language. Slowly the language is on death bed right now. So it is in this context that I come on the scene. So when I came to New York to do my PhD, I wanted a new topic. And I grew up in the tradition. I was an officer reading Syriac in Malayalam script. So when it came to the choice of doctoral dissertation, I chose Syriac chants in south India at City University of New York. I had a great eminent director, Dr. Steven Blount. And then after doing that, I also worked on a CD of Syriac chants, and interest came in and it continued. So after PhD I continued research on. Because if someone didn't do anything, this could die out. So I started the Aramaic project. The result of that project is what we are going to see now. And the video has four sections. It's a 22-and-a-half-minute video. It has four sections. One is, why should we take the Aramaic tradition in India seriously? So I talked to eminent people, people who know better than I do. And we listen to their answers. The second part is how east meets west, how St. Thomas Christians met the Portuguese missionaries. And during the interaction, finally the Portuguese missionaries succeeded in convincing the St. Thomas Christians to accept their rituals and practices and translate the chants into Syriac. So that gave birth to a new brand of Syriac music. That is exclusively the patrimony of these Siro Malabar Christians in Karela and nowhere else. After watching the video, I would like to have your comments if you now something similar elsewhere. The third section of the video is the transmission of this tradition from the older generation to the younger generation, what we are doing with the Aramaic project. And the fourth is our attempt to reintroduce Syriac into the vernacular liturgy. Interestingly, I am so happy to stand here and talk about that, because the first time we did that in America was not far from here at the Catholic University campus at the Natural Shrine. We had a celebration India event and we celebrated mass in the Siro Malabar tradition. The cardinal came from India and we introduced two Syriac chants in that liturgy. You will see examples from that towards the end of the video. You will see the chant from there. But it caught on. Young people are catching on, and I am so happy that we have representatives from Forest Church, Virginia who just last Saturday for their first communion, they sang three Syriac chants including the one I sang in the beginning, [foreign name]. I thought, "Wow." For the first communion kids, what else can you say? Three years of catechism, they compress into two lines.
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[ Foreign language ]
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We without doubt, we believe in your divinity and humanity. It's not just a piece of bread. You are both man and God. What a beautiful -- what else do they need to say? Looking at that piece of bread, "You are man and God, and we believe without doubt." So in other words, this is becoming part of America. And that's how I'd like to conclude this presentation, by talking about some good news. Complimenting about two countries: one my adopted country, America, second my native country, India. Once I finished my doctoral dissertation, then I embarked on this Aramaic project. The first support came from my own parishioners and the local bank Mass Preferred Savings Bank. Even though they did not fully understand what exactly what I was embarking on, they came forward and helped me to launch the project. And then to my surprise, it caught on. First example, is Father Justin here? Oh, thank you. That is his parish, and I thank you for encouraging your children to sing that. We couldn't include that in the video, because it just happened recently. And at the priestly ordination that took place a week ago in New Jersey, they sang Syriac chants. Next week on June 3rd they are going to sing Syriac chants during a priestly ordination. So it is catching. This is becoming the patrimony of this country. It is becoming American. That's a story of America. It came from everywhere. It found its own life here. So that story is continuing. That Aramaic language and music is getting an American face lift. So some day it will become part of the Christian experience of the children here. And finally, my native country, India. India from the beginning welcomed ideas, ideologies and even contradictory ideas into its shore. When we think of India, it's a slightly different imagination of a country from the contemporary forces that want to reduce India into a Hindu country, a NATO perspective. But India in my view is not a country. It is a concept, a concept of coexistence. India is like the river in Herman Hess's Siddhartha. Everything that flows into it comes into the shore and becomes Indian. It is fascinating. Open to everybody, welcoming everybody, but converting it to Indian. That nation, its philosophy, let noble thoughts come from anywhere, served as a basis for the preservation of this Aramaic tradition. And it survived all this while, and we are now making a historical intervention to make it happen, to keep it going for the next generation and the generation after. So it is this great nation with its open-mindedness, gave the impetus. Therefore I would like to conclude this presentation by saying [foreign phrase], thank you.
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[ Applause ]
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[ Music ]
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>> We are in the [inaudible] church of the Syrian tradition. And this tradition is [inaudible]. And also in our traditional piety. There are celebrations in which even now the liturgy of [inaudible] is used. And in some places the use of the Syriac language is become more and more prevalent. So I believe that this tradition is to be kept up.
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[ Inaudible ]
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>> It's about the transformation that has happened in the pronunciation of the incantation of words.
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[ Inaudible ]
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[ Inaudible ]
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[ Music ]
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[ Inaudible ]
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[ Singing ]
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[ Singing ]
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[ Music ]
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[ Singing ]
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[ Singing ]
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[ Singing ]
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>> Can you say the Lord's Prayer in Aramaic?
>> Yeah.
>> Do it.
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[ Foreign language ]
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>> Can you say this prayer in Aramaic?
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[ Inaudible ]
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[ Chanting ]
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[ Music ]
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[ Singing ]
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[ Chanting ]
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[ Inaudible ]
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[ Chanting ]
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[ Music ]
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[ Chanting ]
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>> That was beautiful. Very rarely do we listen to this chant in a female voice. Traditionally this is always sung by the priest and singers who used to be all men. So it's wonderful to listen to this chant in a female voice. And what do you think? What do you feel about this chant when you sing it?
>> It's a very meditative and mournful song?
>> Do you like it?
>> I do like it.
>> Why?
>> It reminds me of the Gregorian chants which are some of my favorite western music.
>> How do you compare it to the Gregorian chant. What is your reason for that?
>> There's this kind of unstructured tempo to it. Very natural flow of time.
>> Interesting. Now given that opportunity, will you learn more songs in Syriac?
>> Yeah, it will be interesting.
>> And when the time comes, will you teach your children these types of songs?
>> It's very hard to say, but I would like to think that I would.
>> Excellent.
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[ Chanting ]
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>> We will sing in Syriac, brothers and sisters, raise your voice to glorify the living God.
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[ Chanting ]
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[ Music ]
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[ Chanting ]
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[ Applause ]
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>> Joseph J. Palackal: We have a few minutes for questions and answers and comments. Yes? Yes, please.
>> When the music is written down, is it written in a trunk type thing? Like chanting?
>> Joseph J. Palackal: This is an oral tradition. This is an oral tradition.
>> Strictly oral?
>> Joseph J. Palackal: Strictly. There were two attempts to make notations, but that never picked up. People learn by listening and --
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[ Chanting ]
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Yeah, they just learn. And it's amazing, now that you mention it. When I was in the service, before that I have to mention, acknowledge a very special person, my director. When I was in the minor seminary, my father John Biyani, for some reason, he is here, some miracle. And I mentioned him because in the seminary work we did, during prayers, canonical prayers, you learn the melody, you sing with those who know and then gradually pick up the memory. In fact, our community sings a 17-verse melody, a stroph which is 17 versus. And it's a tremendous musical composition, but we learn it by practice and it becomes natural.
>> So there's no symbol that suggests the up and down?
>> Joseph J. Palackal: No. It just happens. Yes?
>> This came from Syria of course. What's the story of this language there now? Does anybody have any [inaudible] in the Syriac language?
>> Joseph J. Palackal: I'm glad you asked that question, but the answer is a sad one. The history of the language is sad. Because in the seventh century, because of the Arabic invasion, it was not like Karela. There Arabic was imposed. So the Syriac that you hear from the Middle East now sounds very different. Even the [chanting], it must have a different flavor there. And the memory of the language is dying out there. Whereas in India, there was no persecution either for the Jews or for Christians, so it survived. So probably the history of the language is redefined in India. Some of the melodies may be more intact in India than in the Middle East. Now not all the melodies came from Syria or Middle East. There are some melodies there, especially the Portuguese melodies were composed in Karela. There are very few samples of that. So Karela has its own contribution to the music history of India. Yeah.
>> One question.
>> Joseph J. Palackal: Yes.
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[ Inaudible ]
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Oh good. I am glad you asked that question. Aramaic, Christian Aramaic, is known as Syriac. The Aramaic language was a commercial language for a long time. Remember when Emperor Ahsoka published the edicts, Aramaic was one of the languages. Which means there are people who knew only Aramaic in the kingdom. Because if you didn't know the rules of the kingdom, your head could be chopped off. So just the way we do Chinese in Chinatown in New York, there were Aramaic inscriptions. So that was a story there. And then -- so it was already in the history of the language. And when Christianity came, literature in Aramaic came to be known as Syriac. Political situations changed. One major reason is the translation of the Septuagint in Greek. So Syria Aram, Aramaic, became Syriac. And then it stayed on. Now there's a move among St. Thomas Christians in many Syriac churches in Karela to take out the Syrian and make it Syriac, because they don't want association with Syria. Rather, Syriac Christians. Thank you for clarifying that, yes. Yes?
>> How about the Portuguese? When they came to India, did they try to suppress and destroy history? [Inaudible]
>> Joseph J. Palackal: There is an element, because they challenged us. Basically they thought, "This is not real." So they wanted us to change the language in the Latin and chant and all that. But we resisted. So in the process, one group broke away from that tradition and said, "No, we don't have to do anything with this people." So those are the Akarbites, the orthodox and all that. But we, the Siro Malabar Christians, stayed with the Portuguese but translated into Syriac and kept the incantations. So we adopted benediction of the blessed sacrament, we adopted [inaudible] and we have songs for the -- the song that the children sang in [inaudible] is --
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[ Chanting ]
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It's a hymn to the blessed virgin. Probably that was composed when we started [inaudible] and all that. So we cannot say they destroyed everything. I wouldn't use that word destroy. They challenged us. The Siro Malabar Christians accepted the challenge and translated it into Syriac and moved on. So in the history of music, that became a bone because we have a new branch of music in India. And after the Portuguese left, we didn't do much to revive the tradition, and then we left it. We cannot blame anybody for what we are doing now. I'm glad some of our priests are stepping forward to reclaim the Siro Malabar Church. Otherwise the next generation will have zero. So that Siro B stands for Syriac language. So I am glad for priests like Father Justin and his assistant Felix Simon. They are trying to bring it back. And someday we will study the history of the language in America. Amazing. Yes?
>> Question between the history of the Catholic versus the orthodox Jews. Are there differences?
>> Joseph J. Palackal: Oh yes. Yes, yes, yes. The orthodox Christians used west Syriac. The Catholics, the Siro Malabar, we use -- I cannot say Catholic because Siro Malingula also use west Syriac. So the Siro Malabar Church, these two churches -- there are eight churches among Sindon Christians. Two churches use Chaldean Syriac. So what I am singing, what you heard here, the whole story of Chaldean Syriac, east Syriac. West Syriac, the pronunciation is different. The basic difference is like British English and American English.
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[ Inaudible ]
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Yes. Completely different melodic repertoire. They have a very complex system of music. It is much more complex than this. They have us practice this singing, one chant in eight different melodies, octo arcos. [Inaudible] Gregorian chant. Same text for different seasons. They sing in eight different tunes. Whereas in the eastern Syriac tradition, we sing same melody with different text. What a beautiful complementarity. That means we --
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[ Chanting ]
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We apply that to different texts in the same major for different liturgical context. So these are complementary traditions. It enriches the world. But for example, to be specific, eastern Syriac will say [foreign phrase], Holy God. [Foreign word] is God. West Syriac will say [foreign phrase].
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[ Foreign language ]
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Glory be to the father and the son and the Holy Spirit.
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[ Foreign language ]
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Whereas we will say --
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[ Foreign language ]
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Such differences, yes. This world of music, Syriac music is more complex than we think. Thank you for that question.
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Yes, please.
>> This really isn't a musical question, so I'm not sure I should ask it. But I was struck by the fact that in the church there seemed to be many statues, but I didn't see anything resembling the icons that one sees in the eastern orthodox and of course many oriental orthodoxies.
>> Joseph J. Palackal: Good observation. Because these are from the Siro Malabar churches, which was Latinized. So most of the segments are from that tradition. That's why you see that. Good observation. Thank you.
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>> Betsy Peterson: I want to thank Dr. Joseph J. Palackal again for coming.
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[ Applause ]
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>> This has been a presentation of the Library of Congress. Visit us at LOC.gov.
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