Japanese grammar questions!

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Reply #1 - 2013 July 20, 9:29 am
aendolin New member
From: Tampa Florida Registered: 2010-05-03 Posts: 3

Hello!  I have a few questions about a sentence I saw in reading issue 1 of 鋼の錬金術師.
Any help you can give would be very appreciated!

The sentence(s):

この地上に生ける神の子らよ

祈り信じよされば救われん。

This is a religious radio broadcast.

My first question is the 救われん.  It looks like the passive negative slang of 救う.  But if it's negative, the sentence appears to read:

"If you pray and believe you will not be saved."

Am I translating this incorrectly?

The second question is the chaining of　祈る and 信じる.  Why isn't the te-form used? Like: 祈って信じ.  I've seen verb chaining using the masu-stem before, but have yet to see it in an actual grammar guide.  Can someone just clarify to me what is going on?

Final question: this seems to be awfully slangy for a religious broadcast.  Does anyone have any insight on that?

Thanks so much for your help!

Reply #2 - 2013 July 20, 9:37 am
Ash_S Member
From: UK Registered: 2011-02-24 Posts: 156

For your first question its not the negative. It's 救われむ - "you shall be saved."
Check out: http://dictionary.goo.ne.jp/leaf/jn2/21 … %E3%82%80/

Reply #3 - 2013 July 20, 9:45 am
aendolin New member
From: Tampa Florida Registered: 2010-05-03 Posts: 3

Wow, thank you, I've never come across that before...it was a bit confusing to me how similar that was to the negative slang.

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Reply #4 - 2013 July 20, 10:00 am
Ash_S Member
From: UK Registered: 2011-02-24 Posts: 156

I suppose in modern grammar it would be 救われよう or 救われるだろう

p.s. the ん in some expressions like あらん限り is also む. I always used to wonder why they were using the negative lol x)

Last edited by Ash_S (2013 July 20, 10:01 am)

Reply #5 - 2013 July 20, 1:30 pm
yudantaiteki Member
Registered: 2009-10-03 Posts: 3619

There's no slang; the む/ん ending is archaic, and the よ is not the modern spoken emphasis particle.  The first よ is an archaic particle of address; it goes after someone's name or title (or just a noun) that you are speaking to.  The second よ is part of the conjugation 信じよ; this is an archaic conjugation that shows a request/command.  されば is also archaic; the modern form would be something like そうすれば or そうしたら.

Reply #6 - 2013 July 20, 11:09 pm
aendolin New member
From: Tampa Florida Registered: 2010-05-03 Posts: 3

Thank you; that helped me a lot!  I guess I'm just so used to reading manga and newspapers

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