Our Confidence and Joy Shall Be

Break forth, O beauteous heav'nly light,
And usher in the morning;
Ye shepherds, shrink not with affright,
but hear the angels' warning.
This child, now weak in infancy,
Our confidence and joy shall be,
The pow'rs of evil breaking,
Our peace eternal making.

Johann Rist, 1681;
tr. John Troutbeck, c.1887, alt.
Tune: ERMUNTRE DICH (8.7.8.7.8.8.7.7.)
Johann Schop, 1641;
harm. Johann Sebastian Bach (?), 1734




Ten Years Ago: Once in royal David's city

Nine Years Ago: Where is this stupendous stranger?

Six Years Ago: Hark! the herald angels sing

Four Years Ago: What child is this?

Three Years Ago: Angels we have heard on high

Two Years Ago: Good Christian friends, rejoice!

Strengthen With Thy Grace

On this day in 2017 we have a convergence of traditions. It's the Second Sunday in Lent on
the Christian calendar, and it's also the Feast of Purim on the Jewish calendar. Neither of
these days is tied to a specific date, so they rarely coincide.  And yet, we can bring them
together through one particular hymn.

Purim celebrates the story from the book of Esther, a woman born an Israelite but later

married to King Ahasuerus of Persia, who kept her origins a secret. At this time the Israelites 

were in exile in Persia. When Haman, an advisor to the king, devised a plot to kill all the

people of Israel, Esther defied convention by appearing before the king to plead for her

people (it was a capital offense to approach the king without permission). The eventual

deliverance of the Jews from the genocidal threat against them is marked by the joyful

celebration of Purim. Though Purim is a movable feast, it generally falls during the

Christian season of Lent.

Today's hymn dates from the sixth century, a text attributed to Pope Gregory the Great

(540-604), which begins:

Clarum decus jejunii

Monstratur orbi coelitus,

Quod Christus Auctor omnium

Cibis dicavit abstinens.

This was translated by Maurice Frederick Bell for the English Hymnal (1906). As was typical,

the text's illustrative exemplars from the Bible were all men, a conceit to which we need no

longer subscribe. In the revision below, the original third stanza (which you can see in the

full text here), referencing Daniel and John, was replaced by one about Esther, and

included in our original hymnal project for the Metropolitan Community Church.  

The glory of these forty days
We celebrate with songs of praise;
For Christ, by whom all things were made,
For us has fasted and has prayed.

Alone and fasting Moses saw
The loving God who gave the law;
And to Elijah, fasting, came
The steeds and chariots of flame.

So also Esther, at her hour,
For such a time was filled with pow'r
To go to the king, prepared to give
Her life, to let her people live.

Then grant us, Christ, like them to be
Full oft in fast and prayer with thee;
Our spirits strengthen with thy grace,
And give us joy to see thy face.

Creator, Christ, and Spirit blest,
To thee be every prayer addressed,
Whom grace and pow'r doth freely share,
With all who turn to thee in prayer.

Gregory the Great, Latin, 6th cent.;

tr. Maurice F. Bell, 1906; alt.

st. 3 Steve Carson, 1989

Tune: ERHALT UNS, HERR (L.M.)

Joseph Klug, 1543;

harm. J. S. Bach, 18th cent.
stanza3 Copyright © 1989 Steve Carson

Oddly enough, March 12 was also the original feast day of Gregory the Great (the date
of his death), but in 1969 the Roman Catholic Church moved it to September 3 (the
date of his elevation to Pope). So we actually have a triple convergence today.

Though I have sung this hymn many times (most recently at a 2015 hymn festival
celebrating the women of the Bible), I was not aware of the Lent/Purim relationship
until a few years ago, but I have no doubt that my friend Steve Carson knew when he
chose Esther to be the woman included in this hymn.



Eight Years Ago: Paul Gerhardt

Seven Years Ago: Robert Lowry

Six Years Ago: Paul Gerhardt

Another Female Stanza Substitution: Jesus calls us o'er the tumult

With Fruit From Life's Glad Tree

In Advent we sing of the coming reign of God -- of justice and mercy and healing -- just as often as we sing about the imminent birth of a baby.

John Johns (1801-1847) was either a Presbyterian (as he was minister to that church in Crediton for sixteen years) or a Unitarian; sources differ.  In 1836 he was appointed Minister to the Poor in Liverpool. While tending to the needs of his people he contracted a fever and died, afterward being long remembered for his life of service. Today's hymn, written during his Liverpool years, clearly rose from his experience there. It first appeared in the Unitarian book A Collection of Hymns for Public and Private Worship (1837) by Dr. John R. Beard, along with thirty-four other texts by Johns.

Come, commonwealth of God!
Sweet reign of light and love!
Shed peace and hope and joy abroad,
And wisdom, from above.

Over our spirits first
Extend thy healing reign;
Then come and quench our urgent thirst
That ne'er shall pain again.

Soon may we all be blest
With fruit from life’s glad tree;
And in its shade like kindred rest,
All of one family.

John Johns, 1837; alt.
Tune: POTSDAM (S.M.)
Johann Sebastian Bach, 1742;
adapt. John Goss (?), 1854

The tune POTSDAM, which in the twentieth century seems to have appeared primarily in Lutheran hymnals, is attributed to J. S. Bach because the melody is derived from the second E Major fugue (BWV 878) from his The Well-Tempered Clavier (though it may be difficult to excavate).  It first appeared as a four-part hymn tune in The Church Psalter and Hymn Book (1854) along with other tunes taken from Bach. The book's preface claims that it was musical editor John Goss who "rigidly revised and, whenever necessary, corrected and rearranged" the older melodies, though I have not seen Goss credited anywhere else for this tune.

More Hymns for the Second Sunday of Advent:

Eight (Liturgical) Years Ago: Hark! the glad sound

Seven (Liturgical) Years Ago: Hail to you, God's Anointed

Six (Liturgical) Years Ago: Watcher, tell us of the night

Four (Liturgical) Years Ago: O come, O come, Emmanuel

Martin Luther

From the great reformer Martin Luther (November 10, 1483 - February 18, 1546), a hymn asking for the intervention of the Holy Spirit to bring us clarity and strength that we may persevere in the right:

Come, Holy Spirit, God and Lord!
Let all your graces be outpoured
On each believer’s mind and heart;
Your fervent love to us impart;

And by the brightness of your light,
In holy faith all folk unite
Of every land and every tongue;
This to your praise, O God, be sung.

From every error keep us free;
Let none but Christ our Teacher be,
That we in living faith abide,
In Christ with all our might confide.

O holy Fire, our Comfort true,
Grant us the will your work to do
And in your service to abide,
Let trials turn us not aside.

And by your power prepare each heart,
Unto our weakness strength impart,
That bravely here we may contend,
Through life and death to you ascend.

Martin Luther, 1524;
tr. Catherine Winkworth, 1855, and others
Tune: DAS NEUGEBORNE KINDELEIN (L.M.)
Melchior Vulpius, 1609;
harm. Johann Sebastian Bach, 1724




Eight Years Ago: Martin Luther

Seven Years Ago: Martin Luther

Saint Michael and All Angels

A happy and blessed Michaelmas to all!  A few churches may have celebrated this feast on Sunday, but technically it falls today. There are many, many hymns about angels so we have not nearly run out.

Praise to God who reigns above,
Binding earth and heav’n in love;
All the armies of the sky
Worship God's great sovereignty.
Seraphim God's praises sing,
Cherubim on fourfold wing,
Thrones, dominions, princes, powers,
Marshaled might that never cowers.

Speeds th’archangel on his race,
Bearing messages of grace;
Angel hosts God's words fulfill,
Ruling nature by One will.
Yet on earth they joy to wait,
All that bright celestial state,
For in us their Ruler see,
Christ, th’incarnate deity.

Oh, the depths of joy divine,
Thrilling through those orders nine,
When the lost are found again,
When the banished come to reign!
Then, in faith, in hope, in love,
We will join the choirs above,
Praising, with the heav’nly host,
God and Christ and Holy Ghost.

Richard M. Benson, 1861; alt.
Tune: SALZBURG (7.7.7.7.D.)
Jakob Hintze, 1678; harm. J. S. Bach (18th cent.)

Richard Meux Benson was a priest in the Church of England who founded the Society of Saint John the Evangelist, the first Anglican community of monks since the time of the Reformation. They were also known as the Cowley Fathers because their first community lived in Cowley in Oxfordshire.  The order spread to Scotland, Canada, the United States, India, South Africa, and Japan before dwindling in the twentieth century.  The UK branch finally closed down in 2012, but maintains a trust fund for the benefit of retired members.

The Society survives still in Cambridge, Massachusetts, in a beautiful building on the banks of the Charles River. It seems unlikely that they would be singing Benson's hymn today but you never know.

Surprisingly, I have apparently only used the familiar tune SALZBURG once before in the last eight years.
  



Seven Years Ago: Around the throne of God a band

Six Years Ago: Stars of the morning, so gloriously bright

Five Years Ago: They are evermore around us

Three Years Ago: O Captain of God's host

One Year Ago: High on a hill of dazzling light

Hope From Desolation

We are still in the Lenten season, but the end is in sight, with Holy Week approaching soon.

Jesus, all my gladness,
My repose in sadness,
Jesus, heaven to me;
Ah, my heart long plaineth,
Ah, my spirit straineth,
Longeth after thee!
Thine I am, O holy Lamb;
Only where thou art is pleasure,
Thee alone I treasure.

Hence with earthly treasure:
Thou art all my pleasure,
Jesus my desire!
Hence, for pomps I care not,
E'en as though they were not
Rank and fortune's hire.
Want and gloom, cross, death, and tomb;
Naught that I may suffer ever
Shall from Jesus sever.

Flee, dark clouds that lower,
For my joy-bestower,
Jesus, enters in!
Joy from tribulation,
Hope from desolation,
They who love God win.
Be it blame or scorn or shame,
Thou art with me in earth's sadness,
Jesus, all my gladness. 

Johann Franck, 1650;

tr. Arthur W. Wotherspoon, 1912; alt.

Tune; JESU, MEINE FREUDE (6.6.5.6.6.5.7.8.6.)

Johann Cruger, 1653; harm. J. S. Bach (18th cent.)




P.S. - The art above is a portion of the painting The Presence (1910) by A. E. Borthwick, which hangs at St. Mary's Cathedral in Edinburgh and depicts Christ coming to a petitioner in the nave of the cathedral.

William Hiley Bathurst

William Hiley Bathurst, born today in 1796, was ordained in the Church of England in 1819 following his graduation from Oxford, and served as the rector of a Yorkshire church for thirty-two years.

He was a fairly prolific hymnwriter, though not many of his texts are known today. In 1831 he published Psalms and Hymns for Public and Private Use, which collected more than three hundred of his hymns and psalm paraphrases (only 18 texts in the book, all psalm paraphrases, are not by Bathurst).
He left the Anglican Church and retired from his parish in 1852 because he had developed doubts about the rites of the church as laid out in the Book of Common Prayer for baptism and burial.

O for that flame of living fire,
Which shone so bright in saints of old!
Which bade their souls to heav’n aspire,
Calm in distress, in danger bold.

Grant us that Spirit, God, which dwelt
In Abram’s breast, and sealed him thine,
Which made Paul’s heart with sorrow melt,
And glow with energy divine.

That Spirit which eternally,
Proclaimed thy love, and taught thy law,
Led to Christ's tomb those women three
And changed their sorrow into awe.

Is not thy grace as mighty now
As when Elijah felt its power;
When glory beamed from Moses’ brow,
Or Job endured the trying hour?

When Miriam, faithful unto death,
Led Israel's children through the wild,
Or Sarah and Elizabeth
Received a long-awaited child?

Remember, God, the ancient days;
Renew thy work; thy grace restore;
As still today our hearts we raise,
On us thy Holy Spirit pour.

William Hiley Bathurst, 1831; adapt. C.W.S. 1993
Tune: HERR JESU CHRIST (L.M.)
Pensum Sacrum, 1648;
harm. J.S. Bach, 18th cent.

As you probably noticed, this text is not exactly as Bathurst wrote it. Like most of the hymns we know which talk about people from the Bible, his text included only men. (There were older hymns written about the women of the Scriptures, as we have seen here and here, among others, but these texts have not survived in modern hymnals.) My revision replaced Isaiah and David in stanza three and added the new stanza five, reminding us that God's Spirit was poured on several women as well.


Two Years Ago: Ira David Sankey

Samuel Sebastian Wesley

Today is the 201st birthday of composer Samuel Sebastian Wesley, the grandson of hymnwriter Charles Wesley. His father, also Samuel, was a composer of some renown in his day but is largely forgotten now. The elder Samuel worked to promote the music of Johann Sebastian Bach in England, and his son (whose middle name came from the German master) would do the same in his day.

Young Samuel Sebastian became a boy chorister at the Chapel Royal at age ten. One story told of his time there claims that his singing caught the attention of King George IV, who gave him a gold watch.

He obtained his first position as an organist at sixteen at St. James Church, Hampstead Road, and over the next five years worked at three additional London churches (sometimes at more than one at a time). In 1832 he became organist at Exeter Cathedral, and would go on to serve at the cathedrals of Winchester and Gloucester. He published the book A Few Words on Cathedral Music (1849) which argued for higher standards (and therefore higher salaries) for cathedral musicians.

Wesley wrote some music for the organ, but most of his output was choral music, both anthems and music for the service, as well as 130 hymn tunes, several of which we have already heard here.

Today's hymn is set to a tune by Wesley which appeared in The European Psalmist (1872), a collection he edited. The text is by an unknown author, but it has been used as a gospel song with a tune by James McGranahan.

O Christ, in thee my soul hath found,
And found in thee alone,
The peace, the joy I sought so long,
The bliss till now unknown.

I sighed for rest and happiness,
I yearned for them, not thee;
But, while I passed my Savior by,
Thy love laid hold on me.

I tried the broken cisterns, Lord,
But, ah, the waters failed;
Even as I stooped to drink they fled,
And mocked me as I wailed.

Now none but Christ can satisfy,
None other Name for me!
There’s love, and life, and lasting joy,
Dear Jesus, found in thee.

Author unknown, 19th cent.; alt.
Tune: WETHERBY (C.M.)
Samuel Sebastian Wesley, 1872

The 'broken cisterns' in stanza three are presumably those in Jeremiah 2:13.


Two Years Ago: Samuel Sebastian Wesley

Charles Gounod

The French composer Charles Gounod (June 17, 1818 - October 18, 1893) was born today in Paris. His mother was his first piano teacher but eventually he enrolled in the Paris Conservatoire and later studied the sacred choral music of Palestrina and others in Italy. It was reportedly Fanny Mendelssohn (sister to Felix and a composer herself) who introduced Gounod to the piano music of J.S. Bach. For two years he considered entering the priesthood but returned to composing, and though he wrote music in many forms, sacred music was always a part of the mix.

Gounod's first major work to gain success was a Messe solenelle (solemn mass) which was first sung on Saint Cecilia's Day in 1855 (and is now known as the St. Cecilia Mass). He was also writing symphonies around this time, and had produced his first opera, Sapho (1851), which was a failure. He eventually wrote twelve operas, the most successful of which was Faust (1859), which was for many years the most-performed opera in the world. It was the first work performed at New York's Metropolitan Opera House in 1883, and most people today think of Gounod as solely an opera composer.

For a time during and after the Franco-Prussian War, Gounod went to live in London, where he concentrated more specifically on sacred music. He formed a choral group (still singing today as the Royal Choral Society) which performed new pieces of his beginning with the cantata Gallia (1871). Even after his return to France in 1876 he continued to write large-scale choral works such as La rédemption (1882) for the major British choral festivals.

Many of his sacred vocal and choral pieces were smaller, such as his Ave Maria, adapted from a keyboard piece of Bach (which I well remember singing at my sister's wedding 20 years ago). His years in England coincided with the huge growth in hymnals published (following the popularity of Hymns Ancient and Modern in 1861), so it is not surprising that he wrote a few hymn tunes as well while he was there, such as this one which still appears in some hymnals today.

Christ, whose glory fills the skies,
Christ, the true, the only Light,
Sun of Righteousness, arise,
Triumph o’er the shades of night;
Dayspring from on high, be near;
Day-star, in my heart appear.

Cold and cheerless is the morn
Unaccompanied by thee;
Joyless is the day’s return
Till thy mercy’s beams I see;
Till they inward light impart,
Glad my eyes, and warm my heart.

Visit then this soul of mine,
Pierce the gloom of sin and grief;
Fill me, Radiancy divine,
Scatter all my unbelief;
More and more thyself display,
Shining to the perfect day.

Charles Wesley, 1740; alt.
Tune: LUX PRIMA (7.7.7.7.7.7.)
Charles Gounod, 1872

I would be in trouble in some quarters if I did not mention the other tune to which this hymn is frequently matched, a German tune later harmonized by William Henry Havergal called RATISBON. I don't really have a preference between the two, but some people do.

Some of Gounod's other hymn tunes are adapted from his choral works, and I would not be surprised if, hidden away in some nineteenth-century hymnals, there are also some tunes taken from melodies in his operas.

Though Gounod is no longer as acclaimed in this century as he once was, he is far from unknown. His descendants, however, are not quite satisfied with his current reputation and have built their own website to spread the word about the glories of Charles Gounod.

Two Years Ago: Helen Maria Williams

The Bread of Angels Sharing

The appointed Gospel lesson for the First Sunday in Lent has remained the same in many traditions since the sixth century, the story of Jesus' sojourn in the wilderness. He spent forty days there, fasting, praying and resisting temptation, which we now mark in the church calendar with the season of Lent.

The final line in the story, from Matthew 4: 11, reads: Then the devil left him, and suddenly angels came and waited on him. This ties in to Psalm 91, also read today, and particularly verse 11: For God will command the angels to guard you in all your ways.

Which brings us to today's hymn, an anonymous Latin text from the seventeenth century which begins:

O esca viatórum,
O panis angelórum,
O manna coélitum,
Esuriéntes ciba,
Dulcédine non priva
Corda quæréntium.

This text has been set to music by several different composers, and translated into English a number of times as well. This version is drawn from a few different translations.

O Food of souls wayfaring,
The bread of angels sharing,
O Manna from on high!
We hunger; Christ, supply us,
Nor thy delights deny us,
Whose hearts to thee draw nigh.

O stream of love past telling,
O purest fountain, welling
From out the Savior's side!
Come now, thy love bestowing
On thirsting souls, and flowing
Till all are satisfied.

O Jesus, by thee bidden,
We here adore thee, hidden
'Neath forms of bread and wine.
Grant when the veil is riven,
We may behold, in heaven,
Thy countenance divine.

Latin, 17th cent.
Translation composite; alt.
Tune: O WELT, ICH MUS DICH LASSEN (7.7.6.7.7.6.)
Heinrich Isaac, 15th cent.
harm J.S. Bach, 1729

In one of the many stories from the life of Saint Dominic, his community of friars was unable to raise the necessary funds to feed themselves, after having given away their own possessions, and were visited by two angels who brought them sustenance. The mural below, picturing this story, is from the Convent of San Marco in Florence, painted by Giovanni Antonio Sogliani.

Bernard of Clairvaux

Both the Episcopal and Roman Catholic calendars mark August 20th as the commemoration of Bernard of Clairvaux (1090 - 1153), a French Benedictine monk who later joined the stricter Cistercian order and helped it to flourish. Bernard was a noted theologian unfortunately associated with the Second Crusade (his treatises were considered directly responsible for recruiting thousands of soldiers to invade the Holy Land), but other writings, such as a series of sermons on the Song of Songs are more admired today.

He is also known for a number of hymns, originally written in Latin, that have been translated into many languages. This one, part of a longer poem, begins:

Salve caput cruentatum,
Totum spinis coronatum,
Conquassatum, vulneratum,
Arundine verboratum
Facie sputis illita.

This was translated into German by Paul Gerhardt, sometimes called "the sweet singer of Lutheranism," in the seventeenth century, beginning thus:

O Haupt voll Blut und Wunden,
Voll Schmerz und voller Hohn,
O Haupt, zum Spott gebunden
Mit einer Dornenkron’,
O Haupt, sonst schön gezieret
Mit höchster Ehr’ und Zier,
Jetzt aber höchst schimpfieret;
Gegrüßet sei’st du mir!

This work of Bernard and Gerhardt has been translated into English a number of times, producing one of the most universally used Lenten hymns. One of the most well known translations:

O sacred head, sore wounded,
Defiled and put to scorn;
O kingly head surrounded
With mocking crown of thorn:
What sorrow mars thy grandeur?
Can death thy bloom deflower?
O countenance whose splendor
The hosts of heaven adore!

Thy beauty, long-desirèd,
Hath vanished from our sight;
Thy power is all expirèd,
And quenched the light of light.
Ah me! for whom thou diest,
Hide not so far thy grace:
Show me, O Love most highest,
The brightness of thy face.

In thy most bitter passion
My heart to share doth cry,
With thee for my salvation
Upon the cross to die.
Ah, keep my heart thus moved
To stand thy cross beneath,
To mourn thee, well-beloved,
Yet thank thee for thy death.

My days are few, O fail not,
With thine immortal power,
To hold me that I quail not
In death's most fearful hour;
That I may fight befriended,
And see in my last strife
To me thine arms extended
Upon the cross of life.

Bernard of Clairvaux, 1153; tr. Robert Bridges, 1899
Tune: PASSION CHORALE (7.6.7.6.D.)
Hans Leo Hassler, 1601; harm. J.S. Bach, 1729

Earlier translations were done by Henry Williams Baker (first editor of the seminal English Hymns Ancient & Modern), James Waddell Alexander, and Samuel Macaulay Jackson. Alexander's version contains at least two verses that are sometimes combined with other translations.

O sacred head, now wounded,
With grief and shame weighed down,
Now scornfully surrounded
With thorns, thine only crown;
How art thou pale with anguish,
With sore abuse and scorn!
How dost that visage languish
That once was bright as morn!

What language shall I borrow
To thank thee, dearest Friend,
For this thy dying sorrow,
Thy pity without end?
O make me thine forever,
And should I fainting be,
O let me never, never
Outlive my love to thee.

Jackson's translation is said to be closest to Gerhardt's German (though it doesn't fit the Hassler/Bach tune quite as well):

O Head, blood-stained and wounded,
Tortured by pain and scorn;
O Head, in jest surrounded
By a rude crown of thorn!
O Head, once rich-adornèd
With highest laud and lays,
But now so deeply scornèd,
To thee I lift my praise!

Thy face was once the fairest,
In beauty like the light;
Thou with the sun comparest;
Why art thou now so white?
Thy eye, whose rays outstreaming
The world enlightened had,
Why is it now scarce gleaming
Upon thy cross so sad?

PASSION CHORALE, originally by the German Hans Leo Hassler, was apparently a favorite of Bach, who used it in five times in his St. Matthew Passion, twice in the Christmas Oratorio, five more times in his cantatas, and also wrote an organ prelude based on it. He usually re-harmonized the tune each time he used it.

This eighteenth-century harmonization of a seventeenth century tune is now irrevocably associated with this hymn derived from the writings of a twelfth century French monk, and translated into English in the nineteenth century thanks to a seventeenth century German poet. Our heritage of hymns spans a very broad time (and space) frame.

Isaac Watts

Today is the birthday of Isaac Watts, often called the Father of English Hymnody. Anyone out there reading this blog undoubtedly knows a number of hymns by Watts, maybe without realizing it, because many of them are still sung today and I think it's a rare hymnal that contains no Watts hymns. Cyberhymnal.org lists nearly 700, and most accounts say that there were about fifty more that he wrote.

Watts showed a talent for poetry at an early age and was challenged by his father to write hymn texts. I'm still travelling this week without a lot of time to blog, but I encourage you to read the biographical material at the links above, since Watts is still so very important to our modern understanding and love of hymns. Too important to skip his birthday!

It's hard to say which one is the most familiar, but I'm choosing this one for today, which has to be right up there at the top.

O God, our help in ages past,
Our hope for years to come,
Our shelter from the stormy blast,
And our eternal home.

Under the shadow of thy throne
Thy saints have dwelt secure;
Sufficient is thine arm alone,
And our defense is sure.

Before the hills in order stood,
Or earth received her frame,
From everlasting thou art God,
To endless years the same.

A thousand ages in thy sight
Are like an evening gone;
Short as the watch that ends the night
Before the rising sun.

Time, like an ever rolling stream,
Bears all of us away;
They fly, forgotten, as a dream
Dies at the opening day.

O God, our help in ages past,
Our hope for years to come,
Be thou our guard while troubles last,
And our eternal home.

Isaac Watts, 1719
Tune: ST. ANNE (C.M.)
William Croft, 1708

This paraphrase of Psalm 90 has had a number of small alterations over the years across the hundreds of hymnals that have published it. Some use Watts' original Our God, our help in ages past, but many have altered it as above. For me, God is bigger than just "ours."

A birthday this important deserves two hymns. The most significant thing about Watts, and why he received the "Father of English Hymnody" title, is that he published and popularized hymns that were not simply transcriptions of the Psalms and other passages from Scripture. Others took up this method of hymnwriting and it eventually overtook the previous one; there are many many more of these kind of hymns than the Scripture paraphrases. Here's one that is not as well known, but I always like hymns that use garden imagery and the people of God as plants tended by a loving gardener.



We are a garden walled around,
Chosen and made peculiar ground;
A little spot enclosed by grace
Out of the world's wide wilderness.

Like trees of myrrh and spice we stand,
Planted by God's almighty hand;
And all the springs in Zion flow,
To make the young plantation grow.

Awake, O, heav'nly wind! and come,
Blow on this garden of perfume;
Spirit divine! descend and breathe
A gracious gale on plants beneath.

Make our best spices flow abroad,
To entertain our Savior God
And faith, and love, and joy appear,
And every grace be active here.

Isaac Watts, c. 1708; alt.
Tune: DAS NEUGEBORNE KINDELEIN (L.M.)
Melchior Vulpius, 1609; harm. J.S. Bach, 1724


So how many of the 700 listed at the above link do you know?

Hymns of Glory, Songs of Praise

We're still in the liturgical season of Easter with yet another Sunday beyond today (Easter V) before Ascension, but I know that many churches have slipped into the "General Hymns" section of their hymnals. It's not as though there aren't enough Easter hymns to sing during the season, but somehow they lose interest. You don't still have to be singing about the stone being rolled away or Mary in the garden; the resurrection theme is a broad one.

At the Lamb’s high feast we sing,
Praise victorious echoing,
Who hath washed us in the tide
Flowing from his piercèd side;
Praise we Christ, whose love divine
Gives us sacred blood for wine,
Gives us manna for the meal,
Christ, whose presence here we feel.

Where the Paschal blood is poured,
Death’s bright angel sheathes the sword;
Israel’s hosts triumphant go
Through the wave that drowns the foe.
Praise we Christ, whose blood was shed,
Paschal Victor, Paschal Bread;
With sincerity and love
Eat we manna from above.

Mighty Victor from the sky,
Hell’s fierce powers beneath thee lie;
Thou hast conquered in the fight,
Thou hast brought us life and light;
Now no more can death appall,
Now no more the grave enthrall;
Thou hast opened paradise,
And in thee thy saints shall rise.

Easter triumph, Easter joy,
Nothing now can this destroy;
From sin’s pow'r do thou set free
Souls reborn, O Christ, in thee.
Hymns of glory, songs of praise,
Maker, unto thee we raise;
Risen One, all praise to thee,
With the Spirit ever be.

Latin, 1632; tr. Robert Campbell, 1849; alt.
Tune: SALZBURG (7.7.7.7.D.)
Jakob Hintze, 1678; harm. J.S. Bach, 18th c.

(Yes, that J.S. Bach)

Back when we were working on the possibility of a denominational hymnal (see blog entry for February 5) I always knew that the title of today's entry up there was what I would like to call the finished volume. Apparently it's not even in the original text/translation of this hymn -- must be someone else's "alt." from generations past, but it was particularly appropriate for our collection which encompassed a (very) wide range of both hymns and songs. And you'll probably note that our "alt." in this hymn is quite extensive.