I am studying Portuguese on my own.
The title is another part which I couldn't understand.
This segment is from Pai Nosso (a catholic song from Priest Marcelo Rossi)
It should mean something like, I forgive people, and so please forgive me.
But it just grammatically doesn't make sense.
Any advice would be really appreciated.
In addition, by "me esqueci", it of course is not supposed to mean that I am suffering amnesia, isn't it? I interpret it as "I feel lost".
Correto?
I'd say that the sentence De um modo maior com que perdoamos is intended to mean De um modo maior do que o modo com que perdoamos. Maybe it is some kind of elliptical construction (but I'm not sure):
An elliptical construction is the omission from a clause of one or more words that are nevertheless understood in the context of the remaining elements (Wikipedia)
In this case, the omitted clause is "do que o modo".
With respect to the word "maior", what are in comparison in the said sentence are the way we forgive people and the way God forgive us. The prayer is not asking for God forgive us as we forgive others. It is asking for God forgive us in a higher/greater way (which is possible because God is higher/greater than us).
The meaning of Eu quase me esqueci is I almost forgot, as in "I almost forgot your birthday". The meaning of the complete segment Eu quase me esqueci, me esqueci / Que o seu amor vela por mim, vela por mim is (as I understand it) I almost forgot that your love is protecting me (provided that you translate "vela" by "protect"). There is only one "forgotten thing". There is no space for anything different from the "love's protection".
Remark. I tried to understand and explain the meaning of the sentence "De um modo maior com que perdoamos". However, you should be aware that, as far as I known, this is not a comum construction neither in the spoken language nor in the written language; neither in the colloquial language nor in the formal language; neither in the archaic lnguage nor in the modern language.
the excerpt you say "I forgive people, and so please forgive me" is incomplete. There are two forms of this sentence in Portuguese: "Perdoai nossas ofenças, assim como nós perdoamos a quem nos tem ofendido" and "Perdoai nossas dívidas, assim como nós perdoamos aos nossos devedores". The first form could be translated this way:"Forgive our offenses, like we forgive who offends us" and the second: "Forgive our debt, like we forgive our debtors us. "In my opinion, the second form is the most correct, because in Latin it says "debit" not "offenses".
