a constant sense

I have a feeling this is going to turn into another series of posts… It’s also another topic I didn’t really think I’d broach in this forum. But the love and dating essay didn’t bring me any flames, so I figure I’ll take another shot at something potentially controversial.

Let’s talk about faith and religion. Except not much in depth right now; I’ll get to that later. What I really want to talk about—or rather, share with you directly—are some of my favorite hymns. These are hymns that keep coming to mind as I plan a larger essay. Once I had three or four in the queue, I realized they merited their own entry.

One observation is that faith has two meanings in this context, which I think sometimes gets forgotten. (And I’ll definitely be oversimplifying for now. I’ll oversimplify less later.) A person can have faith in God, which is some kind of belief in the existence and trustworthiness of God. She or he can also be faithful to God, meaning they abide by that belief through the various hardships and joys of life. And this sort of faithfulness is carried out by God, too; God is faithful to us, in ways we can’t fathom.

Great is Thy faithfulness, O God my Father;
There is no shadow of turning with Thee;
Thou changest not, Thy compassions, they fail not;
As Thou hast been, Thou forever will be.

Great is Thy faithfulness!
Great is Thy faithfulness!
Morning by morning new mercies I see.
All I have needed Thy hand hath provided;
Great is Thy faithfulness, Lord, unto me!

Summer and winter and springtime and harvest,
Sun, moon and stars in their courses above
Join with all nature in manifold witness
To Thy great faithfulness, mercy and love.

Pardon for sin and a peace that endureth
Thine own dear presence to cheer and to guide;
Strength for today and bright hope for tomorrow,
Blessings all mine, with ten thousand beside!

The text above is by Thomas Chisholm. It reminds me a great deal of Psalm 90. That psalm was written by Moses, which is really rather amazing. I’m particularly struck by his testimony to God’s faithfulness “in all generations”, when Israel had just come out of four hundred years of slavery. Isaac Watts wrote a deliberate versification of Psalm 90 (in fact, of most of the psalms), which is another perennial favorite:

Our 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.

Thy Word commands our flesh to dust,
“Return, ye sons of men:”
All nations rose from earth at first,
And turn to earth again.

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

The busy tribes of flesh and blood,
With all their lives and cares,
Are carried downwards by the flood,
And lost in following years.

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

Like flowery fields the nations stand
Pleased with the morning light;
The flowers beneath the mower’s hand
Lie withering ere ‘tis night.

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

Another hymn by Chisholm, but less well known, starts towards what I’d like to discuss about religion—namely, that it’s about relating to God, not about beating people over the head with one holy book or another. This one is much less well-known. In fact, I don’t think I’ve ever seen it outside of a Church of Christ hymnal. (The composer of the tune was L.O. Sanderson, whose son Leon was the song-leader for the church in which I grew up in Memphis.)

Be with me, Lord, I cannot live without Thee;
I dare not try to take one step alone.
I cannot bear the loads of life unaided;
I need Thy strength to lean myself upon.

Be with me, Lord, and then if dangers threaten,
If storms of trials burst above my head,
If lashing seas leap ev’rywhere about me,
They cannot harm or make my heart afraid.

Be with me, Lord, no other gift or blessing
Thou couldst bestow could with this one compare:
A constant sense of Thy abiding presence,
Where’er I am, to feel that Thou are near.

Be with me, Lord, when loneliness o’ertakes me,
When I must weep amid the fires of pain.
And when shall come the hour of “my departure”
For “worlds unknown,” O Lord, be with me then.

To close, we come to my absolute favorite hymn, another by Watts. Whatever religion one subscribes to, I think there has to be some heartfelt recognition of the goodness of the God one worships. That’s a pretty general statement; more precisely, I find in this hymn an expression of one’s utter disbelief and gratitude at the work God has done for our sake.

When I survey the wondrous cross
On which the Prince of glory died,
My richest gain I count but loss,
And pour contempt on all my pride.

Forbid it, Lord, that I should boast,
Save in the death of Christ my God!
All the vain things that charm me most,
I sacrifice them to His blood.

See from His head, His hands, His feet,
Sorrow and love flow mingled down!
Did e’er such love and sorrow meet,
Or thorns compose so rich a crown?

His dying crimson, like a robe,
Spreads o’er His body on the tree;
Then I am dead to all the globe,
And all the globe is dead to me.

Were the whole realm of nature mine,
That were a present far too small;
Love so amazing, so divine,
Demands my soul, my life, my all.

The last verse says, I think, why faith and religion are so important: they draw from us the most profound recognition of meaning and duty in life. In the end, however, when we recognize it, we follow God not from duty, but from love.

O For a Thousand Books... Part 2

I purchased nine more hymnals today, as well as Everybody’s Song Book, which contains many hymns (along with school songs from Cornell, Harvard, Yale, and Rutgers, and other secular songs).

While at the Commons, I visited the Bookery, where I got the first two Catholic hymnals for my collection; one of these is also the first French songbook I have. The gentleman working there suggested I look at another used bookstore: Phoenix Books, which I can now heartily recommend to any bibliophiles in the Ithaca area. He said they usually have a good selection of religious books. (Many used-book stores place hymnals in the religion section.)

Phoenix actually had the hymnals in the music section, next to opera scores, textbooks on Gregorian chant, and histories of Western music. I was unprepared for the great number of hymnals they had. So I had to face an interesting, heretofore unstated, question: am I collecting hymnals or hymns? Many of the books they had were old and not in particularly good condition. A practical question then is, do I want to deal with the upkeep of these worn-out books now, right before I leave the country? If the hymns they contained looked worth it, I probably would have. But on a first lookover (all I had time for, as the bookstore was only open for 40 minutes after I arrived), I didn’t see anything particularly promising which I don’t already have in my collection. (I will go back and look again sometime, when I have more time.) Even one of the books in relatively good condition, a collection of songs and arrangements for men’s voices, didn’t really catch my attention.

Conclusion: for now at least, I’m collecting hymns. More precisely, I am collecting both hymns (the texts) and hymn tunes; the distinction is important for many reasons, but the practical meaning for my collection is that I have two hymnals without any music included, which I purchased because the selection of lyrics looked very good.

I started this collection because I wanted to discover hymns I had not known, and to have available many I have loved since youth but are less common. The actual book itself carrying the hymns is less my concern. I guess this is consistent with the greater emphasis I tend to place on knowledge rather than the medium of conveying that knowledge.

The current state of the collection:

• 34 hymnals, 32 with music included
• 2 collections of a mix of hymns and secular songs (one of these in shaped notes)
  
• 2 survey books of hymnody, with both historical essays and large numbers of hymns

It also appears there is honest confusion about who wrote the tune “Manoah”—Rossini or Haydn? In earlier hymnals it could be attributed to either. (And as I’ve mentioned before, I have at least one hymnal that attributes it to both, at separate times.) I don’t think any of my more modern hymnals attribute it to Haydn. The Cyberhymnal, which generally seems to be well-researched, lists Rossini as the composer, with no further commentary. However, the Christian Classics Ethereal Hymnary (which I’d never seen before tonight) lists both. It would seem that the only way to solve this mystery is actually to find a place where either Haydn or Rossini used this tune. Does anyone out there know of one?

"O for a thousand books to sing..."

I collect hymnals. This is a recently acquired hobby, although it is one I considered taking up for some time. I have determined to make it my habit to seek out used bookstores in each town I visit and find whatever hymnals they have. In the last two weeks, I have more than doubled the number of volumes in my collection. As I was driving into Ithaca today, I stopped by the used bookstores on the Commons to see if I could reach 20. Depending on how you classify some of the volumes, you might claim I made it. Musical treasures abound in these books.

(This may be as far as you want to read in this entry, because from here on out the details get gritty.)

I bought my first hymnal in the spring of 2005 at the Friends of the Library Book Sale. It was the current edition (1989) of the United Methodist Hymnal. For my birthday that year, Becky gave me two Lutheran hymnals and one from the United Church of Christ. In Burlington, Vermont, she pointed me to a collection of American hymns ranging from the 17th century to original commissioned works, and it didn’t take me much deliberation to decide to get it. The real fun started at this spring’s Friends of the Library sale, when I found a book dating from the 1880s and a book of revival-era songs.

Here is the full set as it currently stands, in chronological order:

• Book of Worship with Tunes (1880, Lutheran Publication Society)
• Laudes Domini: A selection of spiritual songs ancient & modern (1887, The Century Co.)
• Junior Praises (1901, Western Methodist Book Concern)
• The Gospel in Song (1926, Review and Herald Publishing Association)
• Glorious Gospel Hymns (1931, Nazarene Publishing House)
• Union Hymnal: Songs and prayers for Jewish worship (1932, The Central Conference of American Rabbis)
• The Concordia Hymnal, bound with a supplementary section as the St. Olaf College Song Book (1934, Augsberg Publishing House)
• The Hymnal of the Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States of America (1940, The Church Pension Fund)
• The Hymnal for Youth (1941, The Westminster Press)
• Tabernacle Hymns Number Four, round note edition (1951, Tabernacle Publishing Company)
• The Methodist Hymnal (1966, The Methodist Publishing House)
  
• Crusader Hymns and Hymn Stories (1967, The Billy Graham Evangelistic Association)
• The Hymnal of the United Church of Christ (1974, United Church Press, 7th printing 1979)
• The Hymn Book, words only (1975, the Anglican Church of Canada and the United Church of Canada)
• Lutheran Book of Worship, organist edition (1978, Lutheran Church in America, 17th printing 2005)
• The United Methodist Hymnal (1989, The United Methodist Publishing House, 11th printing 1994)
• With One Voice: A Lutheran resource for worship (1995, Augsberg Fortress)
• The Celebration Hymnal: Songs and hymns for worship (1997, Word/Integrity)

I also have the following reference works, which include a number of hymns as well:

• American Hymns Old and New, 2 volumes, including notes on the hymns and biographies of the authors and composers (1980, Columbia University Press)
• A Survey of Christian Hymnody (1987, Hope Publishing Company)

and the following references which contain few if any hymns:

• Biography of Gospel Song and Hymn Writers, by J. H. Hall (1914, Fleming H. Revell Company)
• The Chorale Through Four Hundred Years, by Edwin Liemohn (1953, Muhlenberg Press)
  
• Liturgies of the Western Church, by Bard Thompson (1961, Fortress Press)

Each book has its particular value. In Laudes Domini I found a lovely setting of “Worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness”. The St. Olaf College Song Book has many of F. Melius Christiansen’s hymn arrangements, and the supplement holds a ballad about Olav in a setting by Grieg. Junior Praises has a text set to the tune of “Swanee River”. Glorious Gospel Hymns (which has, so far, the worst editing job of my collection) is the only hymnal I have containing a tune I had been singing to myself for some time until I found this book. (To give you an idea of the editing, the tune is attributed twice to Rossini and once to Haydn, but I think the former is correct.)* The United Methodist Hymnal introduced me to Charles Wesley's poem “Come, O Thou Traveler Unknown” and the complete text of “Glory to God, and Praise and Love”, from which “O For a Thousand Tongues to Sing” is taken. Among five hymnals, I have seven different settings of “Come, Ye Sinners, Poor and Needy” (or “poor and wretched,” which I think is the original), three of which have an added refrain. And yes, I did happen upon a Jewish hymnal, with a number of tunes based on traditional (e.g., Sephardic) melodies.

The reactions of my friends upon hearing of this collection have been varied. Becky claims that if I continue this practice, then at the end of my life I’ll have a collection that I’ll have to donate to St. Olaf, and that they’ll love it. Some friends chide me in jest for having an addiction. One remarked that a famous hymnist, Philip Bliss, is from this region (born in Clearfield County, Pennsylvania).

In any case, I’m pleased with what I’ve found so far. Searching through used bookstores means finding a concentration of hymnals from the first half of the 20th century—I suspect this is due in part to dispersing the possessions of people who have passed on, and may have received these books early in their lives. Apart from the United Methodist Hymnal and American Hymns, the more contemporary works I have were gifts.

Now that you’ve read far more than you expected or wanted to about my new hobby, I’ll alert you that this is as much for my own records as it is to enlighten anyone else on it. But perhaps some of you enjoyed the curious diversity of the list. :-)

* Added 9 July: I have now discovered the tune in both of my 1880s hymnals. It is by Rossini, and its name is “Manoah”.