Welsh Journals

heddiw yw anghofio nad oedd angen nifer helaeth o ieithoedd er mwyn deall trafodaethau meddylwyr cyfandirol gan fod gan Ewrop gyfan un iaith trwy yr hon y mynegai ysgolheigion eu syniadau, sef Lladin. Mynnai Piwritan fel James Owen, sefydlydd Academi'au yng Nghroesoswallt ac yn ddiweddarach yn yr Amwythig, gynnal ei holl wersi drwy gyfrwng Lladin. Yn y modd yma gallai ddarllen weithiau meddylwyr dylanwadol Protestannaidd y cyfandir. Ymgydnabyddodd Thomas Charles yntau a meddylwyr cyfandirol. "Lladin oedd y briffordd i feddwl Ewrop", meddai'r Athro Tudur Jones (tud 243). Yn ddiweddarach roedd enwau fel Rowland Williams, John Connop Thirlwall, John Harris Jones yn gyfryngau i feddyliau Rhyddfrydiaeth ddiwinyddol, tra bod David Adams yn lladmerydd safbwynt Hegel yng Nghymru. Roedd yn amlwg fod yna "farchnad rydd" mewn syniadau yn agored ar draws Ewrop gyfan. A chafodd Cymru hithau gyfryngau medrus i'r dylanwadau hynny ar hyd y canrifoedd. Nid yw gofod yn caniatáu trafodaeth lawnach ar y gyfrol werthfawr hon. Y mae ei chyhoeddi'n ein hatgoffa gymaint y golled a gafodd astudiaethau hanes yr eglwys ym marwolaeth yr Athro Tudur Jones. R. WATCYN JAMES Tycroes David H. Williams, Warsaw Words [Denbigh, Gee and Son, 1999]. Pbk. 68 pp. ISBN 0 7074 0322 7. £ 6.50 This small book is not about Warsaw itself-there are few references to life in the city-but 'a memento' of the author's time there (1995 to 1997), when he was the first full-time Anglican Chaplain since the destruction by German bombing (September 1939) of the (Anglican) Emmanuel Church'. The two sections cover thirteen sermons, eleven of which follow the major Feasts of the Christian year, and three talks, a magazine article and a letter. This broadly reflects Dr Williams' dual vocation as priest and historian. Most of the sermons were delivered in the Kaplica Res Sacra Miser, the Roman Catholic church in the very heart of Warsaw, kindly made available for Anglican worship'. They are in the reflective homiletic style of Anglo-Catholic personal and pastoral piety. To be effective, this concise, catechetical style needs profundity and the punch of skilled homiletic. Here, however, certainly in their written form, the impression tends to be simplistic rather than simple as regards style and content; literalist concerning the scriptures, and containing some strange statements of 'fact'. For example: "Adam" relates to the first men ever to live, and "Eve" denotes the earliest women to evolve (A Sermon for Lent, p. 22). References to St Francis' crib, and Mary as Theotokos (both for Christmas, p. 12), lack detail and depth-was the congregation mainly children? We are not told. Archbishop Rowan Williams has said, a true sermon discloses not simply truth but life quoting Walter Brueggemann to emphasize that it is, "life enclosed, made open (in) imagination