There’s nothing like driving across Europe to witness the miracle of our continent. Just last week, we did that: from Belgium to Luxembourg to Switzerland to Italy to Sicily to Malta.
You can see first hand the topography changing every step of the way. But it’s not just the landscape that changes; it’s also the graffiti sprayed on walls, the upkeep of the roads, the architecture and the cleanliness of the streets. Lucerne in Switzerland and Naples in Italy, for example, are diametrical opposites: one feels like the princess of Europe, the other is its scugnizzo, the street urchin.
But as you drive down you also become aware of the language question. We moved from dank u to merci to vanschklift to danke to grazie to o uè to grazii to nizzik ħajr.
Sometimes I believe Earth played a trick on us when it decided we were all to speak different languages; which explains the constant attempts for a lingua franca.
I suppose the closest to a universal language was Latin: under the Roman rule it was the language of communication for over a thousand years. I love the ring of Latin: each Latin utterance carries an aura and a gravitas that completely booms around. Think of the expression barba non facit philosophum – a beard doesn’t make one a philosopher; or carpe diem – seize the day; or fortes fortuna adiuvat – fortune favour the bold; habemus papam; mea culpa; pater familias; tabula rasa.
It’s a language that really catered for veni vidi vici; no wonder Julius Caesar was able to conquer every land he set foot in - when bareberi gathered to listen to the new chap, they would have thought “Who’s this new nose on the block?”, but then the minute he opened his mouth and started spouting Latin, they were enthralled.
This brings me neatly to the title of today’s column, an expression I only learnt recently, during a Mass, in a sermon which caused a stir for a number of reasons, but perhaps this one coined word went un-noticed: sapientia cordis.
“I am convinced that a citizen educated, formed and trained in truth and goodness will through time develop that saptientia cordis that promotes and safeguards beauty in the arts, in architecture, in the environment,” said Archbishop Charles Scicluna.
The ability to make good choices and judgements is what we need to negotiate life’s sharp bends
Halt. At first glance, I thought cordis came from the Italian corda, rope. But no, it refers to the Latin cor, heart. Sapientia cordis, therefore means, very simply and very beautifully, wisdom of the heart.
We talk of intellect, knowledge, cleverness, we even talk of emotions and wisdom, and yet I had never seen these two latter words joined together in a text. I therefore did what one must do, and the minute I stepped out on the church parvis, I googled it.
It’s a concept rooted in Ancient Greece. Plato wrote of “the ability of the soul to soar up to heaven to behold beauty, wisdom, goodness and the like”. He said that man must use the beauties of the earth as steps along which to mount upwards for the sake of that other beauty… until he arrives at the idea of absolute beauty.
When you read something so powerful it’s very easy to understand ancient Greek art and architecture. They nurtured their human intellect with the creation of beautiful objects, with the upholding of ethics and knowledge and truth. An environment of unadulterated beauty fills the heart, and inspires the wisdom, which in turn brings inner contentment.
I suppose it was easy for them to talk about beauty – they woke up to plans of an Agora or a Stoa, not of an abhorrent regeneration of that place called Paceville.
I think in this day and age, we have completely lost the notion of wisdom of the heart. In fact, here’s a thought: let’s say you come across an Aladdin’s lamp in your cellar today and a genie comes out and grants you a wish – just one wish. What would you ask for?
I did a quick straw poll among friends and these are the answers I got: health, happiness, a private jet with crew, a round-the-world ticket, health, happiness, a sailing boat, a house in the middle of a forest, health, happiness, playing for Juve, cranes abolished from the island, health, happiness. Unlike the good old King Solomon, it is not our knee-jerk reaction to ask for wisdom.
If you think about it, wisdom of the heart – the ability to make good choices and judgements in life without hurting anyone – is what we need to negotiate life’s sharp bends. The more deft we are at this, the more the possibility of health and happiness. In days of yore, communities used to have The Sage, the wise man to whom people could refer to, to guide them as they pottered about life.
They’ve become rarer and rarer these days. Maybe it’s because we don’t have the time and enough silence to listen to sapientia cordis.
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Twitter: @KrisChetcuti