My Favorite Monk Joke

In an ancient monastery in a faraway place, a new monk arrived to join his brothers in copying books and scrolls in the monastery's scriptorium. He was assigned as a rubricator on copies of books that had already been copied by hand.

One day he asked Father David (the Armarius of the Scriptorium), "Does not the copying by hand of other copies allow for chances of error? How do we know we are not copying the mistakes of someone else? Are they ever checked against the original?"

Fr. David is set back a bit by the obvious logical observation of this youthful monk. "A very good point, my son. I will take one of the latest books down to
the vault and compare it against the original."

Fr. David went down to the secured vault and began his verification. After a day had passed, the monks began to worry and went down looking for the old priest. They were sure something must have happened. As they approached the vault, they heard sobbing and crying. When they opened the door, they found Fr. David sobbing over the new copy and the original ancient book, both of which were opened before him on the table. It was obvious to all that the poor man had been crying his old heart out
for a long time.

"What is the problem Reverend Father?" asked one of the monks.

"Oh, my heavens," sobbed the priest, "the word is 'CELEBRATE'!"