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I find that the Vulgate shows "benedicat tibi Dominus" and I read online that there are posts saying "Benedicat te" as well. I have not found that "benedico" has to go with dative in my dictionary. Is there any difference between these two phrases? Are they both the correct sayings to say "Bless you"?

Valentine Vincent
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1 Answers1

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In this case, both te (accusative) and tibi (dative) are right, though the latter seems to be less common, ("sometimes", according to Lewis and Short.)

Which seems to mean except in the Vulgate, since, as you say, dative is the preferred choice there. Nevertheless, there are some instances of the verb benedico with accusative in the Vulgate too.

Now bless you is idiomatic in English, but in other languages you need to take care of a few more things.

First, benedicat implies expressing a wish that a third person (a he/she/it/He) blesses te/tibi, and nothing else. For example, if you wanted to mean I bless you it should be benedico te.

Second, benedicat begs for a subject, unless it is clear from context. The English expression, if I'm not mistaken, comes from God bless you, which in Latin could be either Deus benedicat te or, somewhat more common in church Latin,

benedicat te Deus.

Now, a good complementary question, for which I have no answer at the moment, is 'what would a native (either ecclesiastical or classical) Latin speaker have said to someone that has just sneezed?' Salve (see meaning II.B), perhaps? Prosit? Or maybe it's just too modern a custom for it to have needed a Latin expression.

Update: as Sebastian notes in the comments, Erasmus (1466—1536) did write about someone sneezing, and suggested a couple of formulas as well. In my opinion, they are somewhat baroque, though. Specifically,

Sternuanti [to the one sneezing]:

  • sit faustum ac felix [be it favorable and happy]
  • servet te Deus [may God keep you]
  • sit salutiferum [may it bring health]
  • bene vertat Deus [may God turn it well] enter image description here
    source: Colloquia familiaria
Rafael
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    Erasmus commendat: Sit faustum ac felix. Servet te Deus. Sit saluti ferum. [???] Bene vertat Deus. – Sebastian Koppehel Jan 09 '24 at 16:44
  • Whoa! Nice finding, @SebastianKoppehel! – Rafael Jan 09 '24 at 20:39
  • The accusative/dative aspect of the question probably comes from simultaneously thinking of the verb as adverb+verb bene dicere, taking an indirect object, and an unanalysable single transitive verb benedicere, which logically takes a direct object. If you ask a native speaker which of the two is correct, he will probably answer “Yes”. – Martin Kochanski Jan 13 '24 at 10:28