Non serviam
Non serviam is Latin for "I will not serve". The phrase is generally attributed to Lucifer, who is said to have spoken these words to express rejection to serve his God in the heavenly kingdom.
Today "Non serviam" is also used or referred to as motto by a number of political, cultural, and religious groups to express their wish not to conform; it may be used to express a radical view against established common beliefs and organisational structures accepted by the majority.
Use
In the Latin Vulgate, Jeremiah laments that the people of Israel speak "Non serviam" to express their rejection of God. The words became a general expression of the basic manner of rejecting God, such that it would apply to the fall of Lucifer. The words have thus been attributed to Lucifer.
In modern times "Non serviam" developed also into a general phrase used by modernists to express radical, sometimes even revolutionary rejection of conformity, not necessarily limited to religious matters only and as expressed in modern literary adaptations of the motto.[1]
The expression also underlies the Shermanesque statement, that "I will not accept if nominated and will not serve if elected."
Scriptural discussion
The original Hebrew phrase is לֹא אעבוד (Lô´ ´e`ĕvôd). Some English language Bibles may translate "non serviam" as "I will not transgress"; this seems to be an alternate reading of certain manuscripts. This is most likely a scribal error because the difference between "serve" (עבד) and "transgress" (עבר) in late Hebrew characters is so minute that it would be easy to mistake one for the other when hand-copying a manuscript. Most modern literal translations (such as the Revised Standard Version) choose "serve" over "transgress" as the proper reading because the context calls for a statement of disobedience, not of obedience.[citation needed]
References
- ^ c.f. e.g. A. Olson, Exile and Literary Modernism Initiation, in: A. Eysteinsson et al., Modernism Vol. 2, Amsterdam/Philadelphia 2007