Argy-bargy at the arboretum

On Tuesday I found myself walking in this federal capital city's wonderful National Arboretum, haltingly reciting the new prayer to some ravens.

"Our father in the skies," I declaimed, the ravens cocking their heads and listening intently, their beady white eyes bulging with concentration, "let your name be spoken in holiness."

"Let your kingdom arrive. Let what you want happen on earth, as in the sky. Give us today tomorrow's loaf of bread. And free us from our debts, As we too have set our debtors free ... "

But there my memory temporarily failed me, for I am 75 and have been reciting another, different version of the prayer all my life. The brisk wind whistled and chattered in the leaves and twigs of Forest 68 (the tree of that forest is Eucalyptus lacrimans the Weeping Snow Gum) as, to refresh my memory, I consulted the new prayer on my smartphone.

But just having got that far into the prayer I could tell that the ravens, traditionalists in these things, were quietly startled by what the new translation's "give us today tomorrow's loaf of bread." But acclaimed Quaker philologist and translator Sarah Ruden's choice of words is explained and semi-defended by Casey Cep writing in the New Yorker and reviewing Ruden's latest book The Gospels - A New Translation.

In her book's version of Matthew's gospel, there is Dr Ruden's new translation of the Lord's Prayer. Coincidentally, and we will come to it in a moment, one passage of her prayer has an echo of the much-reported Pentecostal talk our impassioned prime minister recently gave to members of his flock.

Meanwhile, just as background I should report that to walk (lonely as a cloud, and seldom meeting another soul in that bosky vastness) in the National Arboretum is one of the ace privileges of privileged Canberra life. And at my age long, long walks are just what the doctor ordered. One is reminded as one saunters of G.M. Trevelyan's smart remark "I have two doctors - my left leg and my right."

Then, talking to ravens (and the Arboretum is raven-enriched) is a habit of a lifetime for ravens are famously intelligent. Here in the ACT we are especially blessed with the Australian Raven, Corvus coronoides) and one can be sure they understand every word one says to them. Perhaps it is unkind of me but I think I see far more intellectual curiosity and sceptical inquiry on the faces of ravens than I used to see on the faces of university undergraduates I attempted to teach.

The memory refreshed I resumed reciting the new Lord's Prayer to them, finishing with the scholar's replacement of the familiar "and deliver us from evil" with her "and rescue us from the malicious one".

You could tell that the ravens couldn't quite believe their ears.

"Did he really say 'rescue us from the malicious one'?" you could see them inquiring of one another.

While the ravens are coming to terms with this methinks the prime minister will approve (as this columnist does) of this new Lord's Prayer's personalising of evil. In his aforementioned talk his most-reported remark was his characterisation of Satan as "the evil one". Personalising evil like this enables us to think of a Beelzebubian, Satanic "one" (perhaps with horns and a long, maliciously pronged tail) personally hatching and choreographing all of the evil there is. This is more satisfying, more operatic, more fun than (it make Beelzebub a villain in a pantomime) the notion of "evil" as a vague entity one can't get to grips with, can't hiss at, can't throw rotten eggs at.

Reviewing Ruden's new book reviewer Casey Cep (herself a biblical scholar) says that "Ruden's new translation of the four canonical accounts of Christ's life is somehow both clever and wry, serious and sincere. In her introduction, Ruden notes that her preference is "to deal with the Gospels more straightforwardly than is customary," and, in a sense, she does, producing a version that is, by turns, fascinating and maddening."

You could tell that the ravens were in turns fascinated and maddened by this Lord's Prayer. How one ached to be able to discuss it with them, since of all animals they do seem the one's most on the verge of talking to us.

Alas, new scientific findings suggest that even with the help of AI we, humans, will never be able to talk to the animals, for even if we seem to come close to it there is such a gap between animal minds and our own. We will not know what a lion, an armadillo, a bat or a platypus is trying to say to us and they will be similarly bamboozled by what's on human minds.

Meanwhile up close ravens' "conversation" is a range of animated, rasping, curmudgeonly, grumbling noises suggestive of the sounds letters to the editor of The Canberra Times would make if only they could speak.

The sound of raven "talk" is reminiscent too of the complaining, crotchety noises leaders of oppositions make when the press gives them an opportunity to criticise governments.

Leaving the ravens to their Albo impersonations I strode off across the Arboretum arm-in-arm with the two aforementioned sturdy physicians who accompany me on all my walks.