Today's Word: Supernal

William Safire, in his column On Language in the New York Times, commented on this word as used in the most famous newspaper editorial ever written, titled "Is There a Santa Claus?".

"...the words, with one exception, are understandable to most 8-year-olds. The "hard" word is in this passage: "Only faith, fancy, poetry, love, romance can . . . picture the supernal beauty and glory beyond."

Supernal? That adjective is not synonymous with "supernatural" or the slangy emphasizer "super-duper." Five centuries ago, Shakespeare had a character look upward to "that supernal Judge that stirs good thoughts," wth a capital J as one would capitalize G in God. Then why didn't The Sun's editorial writer use the familiar synonym "heavenly"? Because, I like to think, Frances Pharcellus Church in 1897 was also writing to adults far off in the future who might be "affected by the skepticism of a skeptical age."