I am reading the Fullmetal Alchemist manga and came across the following in the first volume:
祈り信じよ
されば救われん
The subtitles of the anime translate this to be:
"Pray and you shall be saved."
The translation work on Viking Anime has this:
"Believe in your prayers, and you can be saved."
The first part is easy (about the prayers), but the part I can't figure out is the "われん" ending. The base verb is 救う, so is 救われん a contraction? If so, of what verb ending?
Answer
救われん is made of 救われる and the archaic suffix ん, which came out of む. む・ん had similar roles to よう・おう today; that is to say, 救われん in modern style would be 救われよう or 救われるだろう. It is not related to the ん that comes out of ぬ, which is a strong or dialectal way of stating a negative.
Additionally, as chocolate says in the comments, 祈り信じよ means 'Pray and believe', rather than 'Believe in your prayers.' Accordingly, the full phrase literally means 'Pray and believe, that you might be saved.' In more modern Japanese, the phrase is 祈って信じなさい。そうであれば、救われよう。
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