Litvintseva Kristina

Features of functioning of expressions with word 'of God' is in the religious and secular texts

Abstract

The paper gives a comparative analysis of semantics and of the linguistic status of polysemantic expressions мир Божий ‘Divine peace’, свет Божий ‘Divine light’ and страх Божий ‘awe of God’, as they occur in religious and secular texts. In the modern Russian language, when it is used in the religious sphere, there is an urgent need to update the internal form of some frequently used expressions. For example, analyzing such expression as свет Божий , it becomes clear that for the author of a religious-oriented text ‘light’ is an attribute of God, as comes from Him; the word Божий is therefore essential. By contrast, for the authors of texts with another thematic focus, the meaning of свет Божий is assigned to the token ‘the Earth’. Moreover, the idea of ‘God’ is almost absent in this case; this token can therefore be taken out of this expression easily and without any semantic changes. The language of sermons demonstrates semantically motivated use of expressions as opposed to semantically unmotivated use of the same expressions in texts of other kinds. Consequently, the use of a special type of multiple meaning, semantic syncretism, seems to be typical of sermons almost to the same extent as of poetry.

Keywords

modern Russian language, phraseology, corpus linguistics, religious discourse, the genre of the sermon, set expression, idiom, collocation.

References

1. Arutjunova N. D. 1990 “Diskurs” (Discourse), in Lingvisticheskij jenciklopedicheskij slovar', Moscow, 1990.
2. Baranov A. N., Dobrovol'skij D. O. Aspekty teorii frazeologii (Aspects of Phraseology Theory), Moscow, 2008.
3. Baranov A. N., Voznesenskaja M. M., Dobrovol'skij D. O., Kiseleva K. L., Kozerenko A. D. Frazeologicheskij ob’jasnitel'nyj slovar' russkogo jazyka (Phraseological Explanatory Dictionary of Russian Language), Moscow, 2009.
4. Vinogradov V. V. Russkij jazyk (Russian Language), Moscow, 1972.
5. Dobrushina E. R. 2014 “Ozhivlenie vnutrennej formy pristavochnyh leksem v religioznyh tekstah” (Revival of Inner Form of Prefix Lexemes in Religious Texts), in Korpusnye issledovanija po morfemnoj, grammaticheskoj i leksicheskoj semantike russkogo jazyka, Moscow, 2014, pp. 91–95.
6. Dobrushina E. R. 2012 “Slovar' hristianskoj leksiki: sostav slovnika” (Dictionary of Christian Vocabulary), in Vestnik PSTGU. Serija III: Filologija, 2012, vol. 3/29, pp. 105–113.
7. Dobrushina E. R., Poljakov A. E. 2013 “Korpus cerkovnoslavjanskogo jazyka: vozmozhnosti, metody sozdanija, perspektivy” (Corpus of Church-Slavonic Language: Possibility, Methods of Creating, Perspectives), in Vestnik PSTGU. Serija III: Filologija, 2013, vol. 1/31, pp. 32–44.
8. Dobrushina E. R., svjashh. Pol'skov K. O., Litvinceva K. V., Hangireev I. A. 2011 “Ot «abbata» do «analoja»: fragment Lingvo-jenciklopedicheskogo slovarja russkoj hristianskoj leksiki” (From “Abbot” to “Analogion”: Fragment of Linvo-Encyclopaedic Dictionary of Russian Christian Vocabulary), in Vestnik PSTGU. Serija III: Filologija, 2011, vol. 3/25, pp. 119–146.
9. Efremova T. F. Novyj slovar' russkogo jazyka. Tolkovo-slovoobrazovatel'nyj (New Dictionary of Russian Language. Explanatory-Word-Forming), Moscow, 2000.
10. Zhukov V. P. et al. Slovar' frazeologicheskih sinonimov russkogo jazyka: Okolo 730 sinonim. rjadov (Dictionary of Phraseological Synonyms of Russian Language: Nearly 730 Synonymic Lines), Moscow, 1987.
11. Krysin L. P. 1996 “Religiozno-propovednicheskij stil' i ego mesto v funkcional'no-stilisticheskoj paradigme sovremennogo russkogo literaturnogo jazyka” (Religious-Preacher Style and Its Place in Functional-Stylistic Paradigm of Modern Russian Literary Language), in Pojetika. Stilistika. Jazyk i kul'tura, Moscow, 1996, pp. 135–138.
12. Kusmaul' S. M. 2014 “Knizhnaja sprava 40-h godov XVII veka” (Book Correction of 40-s Years of XVII Centuries), in Slověne = Slovene, 2014, vol. 3/1, pp. 72–101.
13. Kustova G. I. Slovar' russkoj idiomatiki. Sochetanija slov so znacheniem vysokoj stepeni (Dictionary of Russian Idiomatic. Word-Combinations with Meaning of High Degree), in http://dict.ruslang.ru/magn.php.
14. Litvinceva K. V. 2012 “Leksicheskaja vyrazitel'nost' v tekstah propovedej” (Lexical Significance in Sermon Texts), in Problemy jazyka: Sbornik nauchnyh statej po materialam Pervoj konferencii-shkoly «Problemy jazyka: vzgljad molodyh uchjonyh», Moscow, 2012, pp. 140–147.
15. Loginova Ju. A. 2012 “Ad’ektivnye i imennye varianty prilagatel'nogo bozhij v sovremennom russkom jazyke” (Adjective and Name Variants of Adjective bozhij in Modern Russian Language), in Vestnik PSTGU. Serija III: Filologija, 2012, vol. 4/30, pp. 26–40.
16. Arutjunova N. D. (ed.) Logicheskij analiz jazyka. Adresacija diskursa (Logical Analysis of Language. Addressing of Discourse), Moscow, 2012.
17. Ljudogovskij F., svjashh. Tema sveta v cerkovnoslavjanskih akafistah (Light Theme in Church-Slavonic Akathistos), in http://www.bogoslov.ru/text/486196.html (Date: 15.10.2009)
18. Mokienko V. M., Nikitina T. G. Bol'shoj slovar' russkih pogovorok (Big Dictionary of Russian Sayings), Moscow, 2007.
19. Percov N. V. 2000 “Neodnoznachnost' v pojeticheskom jazyke” (Ambiguity in Poetic Language), in Voprosy jazykoznanija, 2000, vol. 3, pp. 55–82.
20. Evgen'eva A. P. (ed.) Slovar' russkogo jazyka (Dictionary of Russian Language), Moscow, 1999, vol. 2.
21. Telija V. N. Russkaja frazeologija. Semanticheskij, pragmaticheskij i lingvokul'turologicheskij aspekty. M., 1996.
22. Telija V. N. Bol'shoj frazeologicheskij slovar' russkogo jazyka (Big Phraseological Dictionary of Russian Language), Moscow, 2006.
23. Fjodorov A. I. Frazeologicheskij slovar' russkogo literaturnogo jazyka (Phraseological Dictionary of Russian Literary Language), Moscow, 2008.
24. Molotkov A. I. (ed.) Frazeologicheskij slovar' russkogo jazyka (Phraseological Dictionary of Russian Language), Moscow, 1968.
25. Fedosov I. V., Lapickij A. N. Frazeologicheskij slovar' russkogo jazyka (Phraseological Dictionary of Russian Language), Moscow, 2003.
26. Vvedenie v lingvistiku (Introduction to Linguistic), Moscow, 2005.

Information about the author

Litvintseva Kristina