toki mi tawa jan sewi (My prayer)

[jan_Pusa]

Today, as I write this, is Good Friday. For Christians, it is a time to refelect as we remember the death of Jesus as payment for our sins.

I did my own reflecting (mostly in relation to what I have been through professionally and how I kept thinking about it personally, as reflected in my last two TP poems) and while I have no idea what came over me, I just opened my text editor and started typing my heartfelt prayer. I share my prayer here as an addition to TP literature. There may be a few errors, but I leave the whole thing unedited so as not to ruin the Heart that I put into it

jan sewi o, pilin mi li jo e pilin ike. o weka e pilin ike mi. o pana tawa mi e pona e pilin pona. mi sona e ni: pilin mi li pakala tan ike. o pona e pilin mi tan ni: mi pona tawa jan ali. jan ike li utala e mi kepeken toki ike la o pana e sona e awen tan ni: mi ken utala kepeken pilin pona en toki pona. o pana e pona sina tawa mi. o weka e ike lon pilin mi. jan sewi o, mi pana e ike mi tawa sina. mi wan taso la mi jo ala e ken. mi sona e ni: sina ken pona e ali mi.


jan sewi o,
mi toki tawa sina kepeken nimi pi jan Jesu,
ni li lon.

[janKipo]

For the record only.
3rd sentence 'tawa mi' goes after DOs (as always).
5th sentence (by one count anyhow) 'awen tan ni' probably 'tawa ni', purpose rather than cause.
7th 'weka lon mi' probably 'tan mi'

[jan pali pi jan Jesu]

toki sina li pana e pona tawa mi. mi sona sama e ni: mi wan taso la mi jo ala e ken. kama pona.
I do have one question that i would like to ask. Seeing that your a Christian, you have probably recognized God's beauty in the complexity in creation, have you ever thought of a way of saying that complexity is beautiful without saying 'ike li pona'?

[jan_Pusa]

Um, I'm afraid "ike li pona" is the best way to say it, even if other people end up reading it as "bad is good". In my (current) experience, dealing with a less-than-respectable ex-boss became a learning opportunity for me (turning the bad into a good thing).

kin la mi wile toki e ni: sina jan pi nasin sewi Kolisu?

[janKipo]

This is not my pidgen nor this forum's but I have to object to your assumptions. I would call nature complex on in a subjunctive sort of way "If this had been designed, it would have been done better" (God would have been a terrible watchmaker, since none of gs time measuring devices work right, but, happily, that was nor gs job). Complexity is about ends and means and they don't apply to nature, which is what it is and got to be that way happenstantially. Whether you think it beautiful or not is another issue, but is rarely a matter of complexity -- elegance is a primitive aesthetic category.

[jan pali pi jan Jesu]

kin la mi wile toki e ni: sina jan pi nasin sewi Kolisu?

I'm going to assume Kolisu is Christ

kin mi jan pi nasin sewi Kolisu. mi sona e ni: jan sewi suli li wan tawa jan Jesu. mi sona e ni: tenpo pini la jan Jesu li moli. jan Jesu li moli tan ni: ona li ante e mi. tenpo ni la mi lon suno. telo loje pi jan Jesu li pana pona tawa mi tan ni: ona li kama jo e mi.

o pilin ala e pakala mi mi awen sin pi Toki Pona

[janKipo]

Good assumption (also in most vocabs)
'kin la mi...' "indeed, I am" "wed to" = "united with"? not sure about the right preposition. "He is dead because he changed me" seems odd, maybe 'tawa ni' "in order to" (still bad theology, but not outright heresy)
'pana e pona' 'tan ni' seems more about 'pona' than 'pana'

[jan pali pi jan Jesu]

Good assumption (also in most vocabs)
'kin la mi...' "indeed, I am" "wed to" = "united with"? not sure about the right preposition. "He is dead because he changed me" seems odd, maybe 'tawa ni' "in order to" (still bad theology, but not outright heresy)
'pana e pona' 'tan ni' seems more about 'pona' than 'pana'

I wasn't sure how to say that He died to cleanse me of my sins, maybe "ona li moli tawa ni: ona li weka e pali ike mi"?

So could i say "pana pona e mi" instead of "pana e pona tawa mi"?

[janKipo]

'kama moli' for "die"
'pana pona e mi' "emitted me well" doesn't seem to cover anything in the stuation.
The rest gets too far into the theory of atonement, etc., to take up here