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Source: (consider it)
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Thread: Heaven: Hymns that make you go 'Huh?'
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venbede
Shipmate
# 16669
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Posted
Back to Thomas Carlyle's translation of Ein festes burg (and his wife, Jane, was fairly formidably by all accounts. Mind you, so was he.)
The problem with the goods, honour, wife line is not in implying wives are goods.
It is in implying all Christians are straight married men (or possibly married lesbians in some enlightened countries now.)
Mind you as a gay man I've never felt excluded by it. Have I internalised my oppression?
(Mind you, as a catholicy Anglican I hardly ever sing the hymn.)
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Man was made for joy and woe;
And when this we rightly know,
Thro' the world we safely go.
Posts: 3201 | From: An historic market town nestling in the folds of Surrey's rolling North Downs, | Registered: Sep 2011
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Kaplan Corday
Shipmate
# 16119
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Gamaliel:
he seems a bit of a cold fish
He had very warm and intimate relationships with young men, but it would be anachronistic to read anything homo-erotic back into them.
There is a Brethren connection with Newman, because his brother Francis (who later renounced the faith for many years) accompanied the early Brethren missionary Anthony Norris Groves on what John Henry's biographer Ian Ker snootily refers to as "a somewhat bizarre Evangelical mission" to Persia.
John Henry's epitaph - "ex umbris et imaginibus in veritatem" - is quite wonderful.
I sincerely hope that it was true for him, and I think I will direct my family to pinch it to mark the final resting place of my remains when medical students have finished with them.
Incidentally, what is this "mess of pottage" which I allegedly received from the Brethren?
All I've ever been offered is a bikky and a cup of tea.
Mmmmmmmmmm....pottage!
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Eliab
Shipmate
# 9153
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Mudfrog:
It's actually
Brightest and best of the sons of the morning,
Dawn on our darkness and lend us thine aid;
Star of the east, the horizon adorning,
Guide where our Infant Redeemer is laid.
The request for guidance is made to the star of Bethlehem, which of all the morning stars is the brightest.
My only gripe about it is that, being sung from the POV of the wise men travelling from the East, it ought to be the star of the West.
quote:
Originally posted by Kaplan Corday:
In Newman's Praise To The Holiest In The Height, I think I can just about unravel:
O generous love, that he who smote
In Man for man the foe,
The double agony in Man
For man should undergo.
but it is syntacticaly infelicitous, and surely it detracts from a hymn if one's mind has to race dementedly while singing to straighten out convolutions.
What's awkward about it? You'd only need to shift positions of "the foe" and "should undergo" a little in their respective clauses and you'd get exactly the word order you'd use in prose. That's not especially convoluted for poetry.
This, on the other hand:
quote:
Be Thou my vision, O Lord of my heart;
Naught be all else to me, save that Thou art.
is just plain misanthropic for a hymn we teach to children. I think I've always known what is was supposed to mean (everything else can be as nothing to me as long as I have God) but I think I worked that out from the context more than the actual words.
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"Perhaps there is poetic beauty in the abstract ideas of justice or fairness, but I doubt if many lawyers are moved by it"
Richard Dawkins
Posts: 4619 | From: Hampton, Middlesex, UK | Registered: Mar 2005
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poileplume
Shipmate
# 16438
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Posted
For years I have wanted to ask this question. In “Lo! He comes with clouds descending”, what have the clouds got to do with it? If clouds descend it is raining.
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Please note I am quite severely dyslexic
Posts: 319 | From: Quebec | Registered: May 2011
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manfromcaerdeon
Apprentice
# 16672
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Posted
As an altar boy, I was troubled constantly around Christmas time by Christina Rossetti's reference to "a breast full of milk" from In the bleak mid-winter. Apart from anything else, I am sure it is biologically incorrect.
She then trips up the congregation in the last but one line, "Yet what I can I give him", where inevitably people will read and sing, "Yet what can I give him". Every year, the congregation, and some choirs, mess it up!
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Gamaliel
Shipmate
# 812
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Posted
Yes, I've heard about that mission to Persia and it did sound a bit odd ... 'bizarre' might be rather strong.
My impression of the Brethren back in the 19th century is that they were all a little odd. But then, I'm sure Anglicans, Catholics and anyone else from those days would appear odd to us today.
I s'pose my impression of 19th century Brethren stuff is heavily coloured by Edmund Gosse's 'Father and Son.' But I'd imagine that growing up in a Manse or in a devoutly Anglican or Presbyterian family in those days wouldn't have been too dissimilar - apart from some of the quirkier forms of 'enthusiasm' that Gosse notes - sometimes affectionately.
I was teasing you about the Brethren 'pottage', of course. I didn't hang around very long, but I was quite impressed by the Brethren folk I met back in the early '80s but the whole things seemed hopelessly shot-through with dispensationalism back then ... but we've had this discussion before ...
Incidentally, has there been any distinctive Brethren contributions to hymnody?
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Let us with a gladsome mind
Praise the Lord for He is kind.
http://philthebard.blogspot.com
Posts: 15997 | From: Cheshire, UK | Registered: Jul 2001
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Gamaliel
Shipmate
# 812
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Posted
Well, you learn something new every day, Manfromcaerdeon ...
I hadn't realised it was 'What I can I give him ...'
Just shows.
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Let us with a gladsome mind
Praise the Lord for He is kind.
http://philthebard.blogspot.com
Posts: 15997 | From: Cheshire, UK | Registered: Jul 2001
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Chamois
Shipmate
# 16204
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Poileplume:
For years I have wanted to ask this question. In “Lo! He comes with clouds descending”, what have the clouds got to do with it? If clouds descend it is raining.
It's a reference to Matthew 24 v30: "then all the tribes of the earth will mourn, and they will see the Son of man coming on the clouds of heaven with power and glory". Which is itself a reference to Old Testament visualisations of the appearance of God, for example Psalm 18 v.12.
quote:
Originally posted by manfromcaerdeon:
As an altar boy, I was troubled constantly around Christmas time by Christina Rossetti's reference to "a breast full of milk" from In the bleak mid-winter. Apart from anything else, I am sure it is biologically incorrect.
No, it's not biologically incorrect. When your breasts are full of milk by golly they feel FULL! Ask any woman who's nursed a child, or go and watch a herd of cows just before milking time. It's kind of the same sort of feeling as having an over-full bladder and having to hang on in there - not exactly painful but definitely very uncomfortable.
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The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases
Posts: 978 | From: Hill of roses | Registered: Feb 2011
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Old Hundredth
Shipmate
# 112
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Posted
As a child I had some difficulty with the last line of 'The day thou gavest, Lord, is ended', and I can see that it would mystify an unchurched person. Words can change their meanings between a hymn being written and the present day, and 'Till all thy creatures own thy sway' is meaningless in an age when we interpret 'creatures' to mean only fauna rather than all created beings, 'own' means 'possess' rather than 'acknowledge', and 'sway' means moving from side to side rather than authority.
Having said that, I am a resolute advocate of traditional hymnody (can't you tell from my name?) and while current thinking is that we should axe the incomprehensible old hymns, my take is that we should instead educate the punters.
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If I'm not in the Chapel, I'll be in the bar (Reno Sweeney, 'Anything Goes')
Posts: 976 | From: The land of the barm cake | Registered: May 2001
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Gill H
Shipmate
# 68
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Posted
'In the bleak' is a nightmare to scan anyway - probably because it was a poem first.
As a child I was confused by 'Dear Lord and Father of mankind'. I read 'in purer lives thy service find' as 'Don't bother with me, God, find someone else who has a purer life than me to praise you'.
Likewise 'Blest are the pure in heart, for they shall see our God'. That one made me really grumpy. Well, lucky old them! What about distinctly un-pure me?
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*sigh* We can’t all be Alan Cresswell.
- Lyda Rose
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Angloid
Shipmate
# 159
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by poileplume:
For years I have wanted to ask this question. In “Lo! He comes with clouds descending”, what have the clouds got to do with it? If clouds descend it is raining.
No, not 'it' but 'he' (or He if you prefer).
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Brian: You're all individuals!
Crowd: We're all individuals!
Lone voice: I'm not!
Posts: 12927 | From: The Pool of Life | Registered: May 2001
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Mudfrog
Shipmate
# 8116
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Gamaliel:
Well, you learn something new every day, Manfromcaerdeon ...
I hadn't realised it was 'What I can I give him ...'
Just shows.
Not in our book it's not.
We sing, 'Yet, what can I give him? Give my heart.'
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"The point of having an open mind, like having an open mouth, is to close it on something solid."
G.K. Chesterton
Posts: 8237 | From: North Yorkshire, UK | Registered: Jul 2004
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Kaplan Corday
Shipmate
# 16119
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Gamaliel:
I couldn't agree more, Old Hundredth.
Same here, OH.
I seem to remember once asking a congregation of predominantly young people how many of them knew the meaning of potentate and ineffably in "Praise Him the Lord of years / The potentate of time / Creator of the rolling spheres / Ineffably sublime".
That was when we still sang hymns of that stature; nowadays it's mainly Hillsong -style crap on Powerpoint.
I also seem to remember reading that there was criticism of The Day Thou Gavest (of which I am very fond) when it was first written, on the grounds that its sentiments were inappropriately familiar and popular.
I preached at a Chinese church this morning (in English, I hasten to add!) where we sang the ancient Irish hymn Be Thou my Vision, O Rord of My Heart in Elizabethan English.
Christian Multicultural Eclecticism Rules, OK.
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Kaplan Corday
Shipmate
# 16119
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Gamaliel:
I was teasing you about the Brethren 'pottage', of course. I didn't hang around very long, but I was quite impressed by the Brethren folk I met back in the early '80s but the whole things seemed hopelessly shot-through with dispensationalism back then ... but we've had this discussion before ...
Incidentally, has there been any distinctive Brethren contributions to hymnody?
Are those rumours true about the Orthodoxen controlling the global pottage market?
"Mess of pottage", incidentally, comes from Bunyan, not the Bible.
I can't think of any distinctive Brethren contribution to hymnody.
The Open Brethren used to use the Believers (sic) Hymn Book, with its claim that it contained no "dispensational incongruities", but it is found in only a few assemblies these days.
The Exclusives had Little Flock.
We use Mission Praise in the small traditional Breaking of Bread, and Powerpoint slides in the main family service.
[ 12. August 2012, 03:55: Message edited by: Kaplan Corday ]
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Lothlorien
Ship's Grandma
# 4927
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Posted
We used to use an early edition of Little Flock, before some hymns were edited to suit Londoners (generic name for that branch) and their somewhat dodgy theology in certain areas.
[tangent] quote:
while current thinking is that we should axe the incomprehensible old hymns, my take is that we should instead educate the punters.
I'm in 60s. When I was at school we had Arbor Day in August. The school used to plant trees and we had an extended lunch hour for a picnic.
The practice dropped right out but seem to have been revived. It's now called Tree Day. Very plain and ordinary and nothing special to look forward to as we did for weeks beforehand. How hard would it be to tell pupils what arbor meant? [/tangent]
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Buy a bale. Help our Aussie rural communities and farmers. Another great cause needing support The High Country Patrol.
Posts: 9745 | From: girt by sea | Registered: Aug 2003
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Firenze
Ordinary decent pagan
# 619
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Kaplan Corday:
where we sang the ancient Irish hymn Be Thou my Vision, O Rord of My Heart in Elizabethan English.
Odd that, since it was translated from the Irish in 1905 (versified 1912). I'd say Standard Poetic Diction meself.
Posts: 17302 | From: Edinburgh | Registered: Jun 2001
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Kaplan Corday
Shipmate
# 16119
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Firenze:
quote:
Originally posted by Kaplan Corday:
where we sang the ancient Irish hymn Be Thou my Vision, O Rord of My Heart in Elizabethan English.
Odd that, since it was translated from the Irish in 1905 (versified 1912). I'd say Standard Poetic Diction meself.
Not odd at all.
In the early twentieth century it would not have seemed at all strange to translate anything religious, even from the sixth century, into KJV English, replete with thous, thys and arts.
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Firenze
Ordinary decent pagan
# 619
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Posted
What I was trying to say was that poetic diction - common in both secular and religious verse - is an artificial and archaism-ridden form of speech, but it would still be a fair distance from any actual 16th C demotic. It's better to think of it as a literary style which would still have been considered proper (despite Wordsworth's best efforts) even in the 20th C.
Posts: 17302 | From: Edinburgh | Registered: Jun 2001
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Kaplan Corday
Shipmate
# 16119
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Firenze:
What I was trying to say was that poetic diction - common in both secular and religious verse - is an artificial and archaism-ridden form of speech, but it would still be a fair distance from any actual 16th C demotic. It's better to think of it as a literary style which would still have been considered proper (despite Wordsworth's best efforts) even in the 20th C.
OK, fair enough.
I was using the term Elizabethan English in a very loose sense.
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Pine Marten
Shipmate
# 11068
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Mudfrog:
quote:
Originally posted by Gamaliel:
Well, you learn something new every day, Manfromcaerdeon ...
I hadn't realised it was 'What I can I give him ...'
Just shows.
Not in our book it's not.
We sing, 'Yet, what can I give him? Give my heart.'
No, no, no - Miss Rossetti distinctly wrote 'Yet what I can I give him...' - but we still bugger it up when carol singing round the parish.
quote:
Originally posted by Kaplan Corday:
We use Mission Praise in the small traditional Breaking of Bread, and Powerpoint slides in the main family service.
I'm so dreadfully sorry for you, KC ![[Frown]](frown.gif)
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Keep love in your heart. A life without it is like a sunless garden when the flowers are dead. - Oscar Wilde
Posts: 1731 | From: Isle of Albion | Registered: Feb 2006
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venbede
Shipmate
# 16669
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Kaplan Corday:
I preached at a Chinese church this morning (in English, I hasten to add!) where we sang the ancient Irish hymn Be Thou my Vision, O Lord of My Heart in Elizabethan English.
Eh? I've got "Be thou my vision" (which we didn't sing at school so I regard as a modern hymn) is Irish c8th century, Tr Mary Byrne 1880-1931, versified Eleanor Hull 1860-1935. Victorian at the earliest, surely, and more likely early C20 Celtic twilight revival.
What has Elizabeth got to do with it?
Do listeners bother about the words of rock songs?
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Man was made for joy and woe;
And when this we rightly know,
Thro' the world we safely go.
Posts: 3201 | From: An historic market town nestling in the folds of Surrey's rolling North Downs, | Registered: Sep 2011
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venbede
Shipmate
# 16669
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Posted
Just seen Firenze and KP's exchange on "Be thou my vision". I still say Celtic Revival myself. (It's a lovely tune.)
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Man was made for joy and woe;
And when this we rightly know,
Thro' the world we safely go.
Posts: 3201 | From: An historic market town nestling in the folds of Surrey's rolling North Downs, | Registered: Sep 2011
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Firenze
Ordinary decent pagan
# 619
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Posted
It's a pity the didn't get Yeats on the job -
Vision are you, Lord of my heart
In the long gray twilight I sing
That all that is nothing is
And the glory fades westward
To Cahersiveen...
Posts: 17302 | From: Edinburgh | Registered: Jun 2001
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churchgeek
Have candles, will pray
# 5557
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Fr Weber:
quote:
Originally posted by cosmic dance:
quote:
Originally posted by bib:
I always cringe at the lines in Ein Feste Burg
'And though they take our life, goods, honour, child and wife.' I really can't cope with being listed as part of the goods possessed.It seems strange to me that this line persists when other sexist language has been purged.Certainly makes me go Huh!
There are commas between each of the items taken, which suggests to me its simply a list. Its not setting up a category "Goods: honour, child and wife." And something has to rhyme with 'life'. I suggest you are reading back into the verse from a modern perspective something that was not intended.
An alternate translation reads :
"Let goods and kindred go,
This mortal life also"
You'd have to do some serious Moral Outrage Gymnastics to read kindred as a subset of goods there.
Ah! That's the version I know! And I think it's an example of when updating a hymn text is a good thing.
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I reserve the right to change my mind.
My article on the Virgin of Vladimir
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LutheranChik
Shipmate
# 9826
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Posted
"Come, Thou Fount of Every Blessing"'s line, "Here I raise my Ebenezer" -- another line that regularly perplexes even regular contemporary churchgoers as well as casual visitors. I think if you polled the members of my congregation, they'd tell you that the line was referring, somehow, to Ebenezer Scrooge.
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Simul iustus et peccator
http://www.lutheranchiklworddiary.blogspot.com
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The Rogue
Shipmate
# 2275
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Posted
Is it a champagne bottle?
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If everyone starts thinking outside the box does outside the box come back inside?
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Kaplan Corday
Shipmate
# 16119
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by LutheranChik:
"Come, Thou Fount of Every Blessing"'s line, "Here I raise my Ebenezer" -- another line that regularly perplexes even regular contemporary churchgoers as well as casual visitors. I think if you polled the members of my congregation, they'd tell you that the line was referring, somehow, to Ebenezer Scrooge.
Been there.
Churchgeek provided an explanation.
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