'Nolo mortem peccatoris'

BL Harley 1892, f. 1v

Hec sunt verba Saluatoris:
'Nolo mortem peccatoris.'

Haue mynde for the how I was borne,
How with scourges my flesshe was torne,
And how I was crowned with thorne;
Nolo mortem peccatoris.

Haue myende also how lowe I light
Into a mayde so pure and bright,
Taking mercy, leving my myght;
Nolo mortem peccatoris.

Thinke how mekely I toke the felde,
Vpon my bak bering my shelde;
For payne ne dethe I wolde not yelde;
Nolo mortem peccatoris.

Lyft vp thy hert now, man, and see
What I haue done and doo for the;
Yf thou be lost, blame thou not me;
Nolo mortem peccatoris.

This text, like 'O man, whiche art the erthe take froo', comes from the fifteenth-century manuscript of poems collected by the Canterbury Franciscan James Ryman. In Ryman's collection, this poem is followed by another which has an English version of the same refrain: 'I do not desire the death of a sinner'.

Thus seith Jhesus of Nazareth:
'Of a synner I wille noo deth.'

Yf thou thy lyfe in synne haue ledde,
Amende the now; be not adredde,
For God his grace for the hath spredde;
Of a synner he wille no deth.

Yf thou haue done as mekill ylle
As hert may thinke and dede fulfille,
Yf thou axe grace, thou shalt not spille;
Of a synner he wille no deth.

Mary Magdalene did grete offence,
And yet with hir Crist did dispence
And gave her grace and indulgence;
Of a synner he wille no deth.

She asked grace with hert contrite
And foryeuenes of hir delicte,
And he forgave here anone right;
Of a synner he wille no deth.

Man, yf thou wilte thy synne forsake
And vnto Crist amendes make,
Thy soule to blis then wil he take;
Of a synner he wille no deth.

The refrain 'Nolo mortem peccatoris' may be familiar from a motet attributed to Thomas Morley, the text of which is also an English poem with a Latin refrain spoken in the voice of Christ; information on that text and its relationship to these poems can be found here. It was a popular refrain, appearing also in this poem by John Audelay and this in St John's College, Cambridge, MS S.54.



Perhaps easier to read:

Hec sunt verba Saluatoris:
'Nolo mortem peccatoris.'

Have mind for thee how I was born,
How with scourges my flesh was torn,
And how I was crowned with thorn;
Nolo mortem peccatoris.

Have mind also how low I light [alighted]
Into a maid so pure and bright,
Taking mercy, leaving my might;
Nolo mortem peccatoris.

Think how meekly I took the field,
Upon my back bearing my shield;
For pain nor death I would not yield;
Nolo mortem peccatoris.

Lift up thy heart now, man, and see
What I have done and do for thee;
If thou be lost, blame thou not me;
Nolo mortem peccatoris.

The wording of this last verse is a little unfortunate to a modern ear, but the sense isn't so much 'if you're damned, don't blame me' as 'if you're damned, don't say it's by my desire'! And the other:

Thus saith Jesus of Nazareth:
'Of a sinner I desire no death.'

If thou thy life in sin have led,
Amend thee now, be not adread, [afraid]
For God his grace for thee hath spread;
Of a sinner he desires no death.

If thou have done as much of ill
As heart may think and deed fulfill,
If thou ask grace, thou shalt not spill; [be destroyed]
Of a sinner he desires no death.

Mary Magdalene did great offence,
And yet Christ did her dispence [pardon]
And gave her grace and indulgence;
Of a sinner he desires no death.

She asked grace with heart contrite
And forgiveness of her delicte, [sin]
And he forgave her anon right;
Of a sinner he desires no death.

Man, if thou wilt thy sin forsake
And unto Christ amends make,
Thy soul to bliss then will he take;
Of a sinner he desires no death.

Compare:

'Lo, lemman sweet'

'Come home again, mine own sweetheart'

'O man unkyende, pryente in thi myende'

'Unkynde man, gif kepe til me'

BL Harley 1892, f. 115

Some Music for Candlemas

A few things to listen to on the evening of this feast-day.

Introit for Candlemas, BL Egerton 3759, f.72

'Suscepimus Deus, misericordiam tuam in medio templi tui: secundum nomen tuum Deus, ita et laus tua in fines terrae: justitia plena est dextera tua.'



In other words:



'Senex puerum portabat: puer autem senem regebat...'





Kate Rusby sings Robert Herrick's poem 'Candlemas Eve':



'Thus times do shift; each thing his turn does hold;
New things succeed, as former things grow old.'

A few favourite settings of the Nunc Dimittis:









I promise this is my very last post about Candlemas. I am, as you may have gathered from my last few posts, particularly fond of this feast, for reasons which are personal and a little sentimental: they include, for instance, a love for Cnut's Candlemas song at Ely, the subject of a section of my doctoral thesis I was particularly proud of; a real fondness for the medieval texts I've posted and linked to over the past few days; and a sense that on this day one can get especially close to the world of Anglo-Saxon Christianity, of Ælfric and Æthelwold and Dunstan and the rest. But more than anything I associate this day with the Nunc Dimittis, a text which as a student in a college choir I sang many times, in many different forms, week after week, with people who are very dear to me - so it's dear to me too, for that reason.

I also have a special liking for the Nunc Dimittis because I vividly remember the first time I encountered it. It was in my early teens, when I was taken for some reason to Evensong in a little church in the town where I grew up. Although a beautiful (and, I know now, an ancient) church, it's in a deprived area, rundown, with a small and aging congregation. When I went to Evensong there were perhaps four or five people in the congregation, with a few more in the dedicated but raggedy choir. The service, from the Book of Common Prayer, was mostly said or chanted by the congregation in unison. So there I was at thirteen, encountering Evensong for the first time: a near-empty church, the very plainest music, and an elderly church community of the kind which is always supposed to put young people off. But I loved it, odd child that I was - all because of the strangeness and beauty of the language. Although I had had quite an extensive religious education, and had been to a Catholic primary school, I don't think that until that point in my life I had ever heard a beautiful prayer; I'd certainly never encountered religious language that was challenging or difficult. At Evensong I was fascinated by the knotty language of the psalms and the collects, but it was one phrase in the Nunc Dimittis which struck me most of all: a light to lighten the Gentiles. It's such a simple, obvious rhetorical device, and I didn't know then that there's a name for it (polyptoton, in case you're wondering); I didn't know where the phrase came from, or what it meant, or even what Gentiles were (extensive religious education, remember!). I didn't know then what would matter to me now, that it's a poetic device which would work just as well in Old English as in the Tudor English of the Prayer Book - a phrase which an Anglo-Saxon writer could recognise, appreciate, even play with. None of that would have meant anything to me then. I just knew that it was beautiful. Up to that point, religion and beauty of language had seemed to me like quite distinct concepts; beauty was what I found and hungered for in poetry, but it had nothing to do with the simple, mostly banal language in which all religious ideas had been taught to me. I didn't know you could pray beautiful prayers, and I didn't know you could pray for abstract things like 'light'. It was a revelation to me that religious language could be interesting or beautiful, or that there was a place for beauty or complexity in religion at all. It was the first time I learned that prayer could be poetry, and poetry could be prayer.

'Jesus autem hodie'

Baptism of Christ, BL Arundel 157, f. 5v (England, 13th century)

As you will know if you've been reading this blog for any length of time, there is a medieval carol for every occasion - and this one is about the Baptism of Christ.

Jesus autem hodie
Regressus est a Jordane.
Jesus autem hodie
Regressus est a Jordane.

When Jesus Christ baptised was,
The Holy Ghost descended with grace;
The Father's voice was heard in that place:
‘Hic est Filius meus; ipsum audite.’

There were three Persons and one Lord,
The Son baptised with one accord;
The Father said these blessed words:
‘Hic est Filius meus; ipsum audite.’

Consider now, all Christianity,
How the Father said because of thee
The great mystery of the Trinity:
‘Hic est Filius meus; ipsum audite.’

Now, Jesu, as thou art both God and man,
And were baptised in River Jordan,
At our last end, we pray thee, say then:
‘Hic est Filius meus; ipsum audite.’

This carol survives in two manuscripts, one of them the Ritson MS (British Library Additional 5665), a manuscript of English and Latin carols, songs and motets which was compiled between c.1475-1510 at a religious house somewhere in Devon. In the manuscript the carol is set to music for two and three voices, and bears the names of its composers, John Trouluffe and Richard Smert.  It's interesting that the first verse bears a resemblance to the baptism verse in the carol 'Tomorrow shall be my dancing day', where it is told in the first-person voice of Christ:

Then afterwards baptized I was;
The Holy Ghost on me did glance,
My Father’s voice heard from above,
To call my true love to my dance.

The rhyme-scheme and the final-line refrain are different, of course, but there may be a distant relationship between the two songs - since the first and third lines don't rhyme as they do in the other verses of 'Tomorrow shall be my dancing day', I wonder whether that carol has substituted 'heard from above' for 'heard in that place'...

'Jesus autem hodie' has been set by two modern composers; this is by Peter Maxwell Davies:



And this by Peter Hallock:



The Middle English text, from Richard Greene, The Early English Carols (Oxford, 1977), pp.79-80:

Jhesus autem hodie
Regressus est a Jordane.
Jhesus autem hodie
Regressus est a Jordane.

When Jhesus Criste baptyzed was,
The Holy Gost descended with grace;
The Fadyr voys was herde in the place:
‘Hic est Filius meus; ipsum audite.’

There were thre persons and o Lorde,
The Sone baptized with on acorde,
The Fader sayde this blessed worde:
‘Hic est Filius meus; [ipsum audite.’]

Considere now, all Cristiante,
How the Fader sayde bycause of the
The grete mistery of the Trinite:
‘Hic est Filius meus; [ipsum audite.’]

Now, Jhesu, as thou art bothe God and man,
And were baptized in flom Jordayn,
Atte oure last ende, we pray the, say than:
‘Hic est Filius meus; [ipsum audite.’]

'O God, the king of glory'

Before the end of Ascensiontide, there's just time to enjoy this, one of my favourite anthems - Henry Purcell's 'O God, the king of glory' (at 1:10 into the video):



O God, the King of Glory, who hast exalted thine only Son, Jesus Christ, with great triumph into heaven: we beseech thee, leave us not comfortless, but send to us thine Holy Ghost to comfort us, and exalt us into the same place where our Saviour Christ is gone before us.

Reaping in Joy

I'm afraid blogging here has been a little slow lately, but I'm hoping that will change over the next few weeks: Passiontide calls to mind an endless stream of wonderful poetry, and I've also been visiting some beautiful places I intend to post about. But in the meantime, since I don't have anything in particular to say, let me share a few pieces of music which I've encountered today.  This morning, in the snow, I went to Christ Church Cathedral. The music was Vaughan Williams' Mass in G Minor (and this is the choir of Christ Church singing it):



And the simple, yet extraordinarily beautiful 'O taste and see', also by Vaughan Williams:



And unexpectedly, and best of all, Henry Purcell's 'Hear my prayer':



I have a very great fondness for this piece because it features at the end of my favourite film of all time, Powell and Pressburger's 1944 film A Canterbury Tale, which is set in the lanes and villages around Canterbury and which begins like this. How could you not love a film which begins with Chaucerian pilgrims?  But the pilgrims in this film are from the twentieth century, brought to Kent by the war: a British soldier, about to be sent overseas, a land-girl mourning the loss of her fiance, and a homesick American GI.  They all unexpectedly find themselves to be pilgrims in search of blessings, and at Canterbury they each find (spoiler alert!) the different miracles they've been searching for.  My favourite character is the British soldier, a cynical young man who trained as a church organist but has given it up to play in a cinema, and with it given up his idealism and faith in anything greater than himself. The most bitter and sardonic of the three, he doesn't believe himself in need of a blessing; but he walks into Canterbury Cathedral at the end of the film, amid the weird, unearthly sounds of choirboys singing 'Hear my prayer', and meets the cathedral organist... and from that moment all his cynicism begins to fall away.

I could talk about A Canterbury Tale all day, but this excellent article really says it better than I could.  Do watch the speech in this clip, though; it encapsulates everything most lovable about this film, and its use of Chaucer, Canterbury and pilgrimage.

As I said, this morning it was snowing heavily - it took everyone by surprise, even the Met Office.  This was Christ Church in the snow, with a flock of black-clad choristers hurrying back to the warmth:

But by this evening, after a day of rain, the sun came out and all the snow was gone as suddenly and unexpectedly as it had arrived.  When it melted, it left puddles and streams everywhere, which seemed particularly appropriate, because the last piece of the musical puzzle from this morning was Psalm 126:

1 When the Lord turned again the captivity of Sion : then were we like unto them that dream.
2 Then was our mouth filled with laughter : and our tongue with joy.
3 Then said they among the heathen : The Lord hath done great things for them.
4 Yea, the Lord hath done great things for us already : whereof we rejoice.
5 Turn our captivity, O Lord : as the rivers in the south.
6 They that sow in tears : shall reap in joy.
7 He that now goeth on his way weeping, and beareth forth good seed : shall doubtless come again with joy, and bring his sheaves with him.

And when I hear this psalm I always think of Richard Rolle's interpretation of verse 5:

'That is, as the south wind blowing causes the frozen rivers to be released and to run, so by the Holy Ghost blowing in us we are released from sin, and we run towards heaven; and all our captivity, wherein we were kept captive under the devil, he turns into joy.'

An Evening Hymn on St Lucy's Day

Hail, gladdening Light, of His pure glory poured
Who is the immortal Father, heavenly, blest,
Holiest of Holies, Jesus Christ our Lord.

Now we are come to the sun's hour of rest;
The lights of evening round us shine;
We hymn the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit divine.

Worthiest art thou at all times to be sung
With undefiled tongue,
Son of our God, giver of life, alone:
Therefore in all the world thy glories, Lord, they own.



Music by Charles Wood, words by John Keble, translating the ancient hymn Phos Hilaron.  I am also very fond of John Stainer's setting of the same words:

Veni redemptor gentium

The other day I promised a post on English translations of the Advent hymn 'Veni redemptor gentium', and since this is a hymn of St Ambrose, his feast-day seems a good time to post it. The hymn is fairly securely attributed to him, at least according to the evidence adduced on this site. Here's the Latin:

1. Veni, redemptor gentium,
ostende partum Virginis;
miretur omne saeculum:
talis decet partus Deum.

2. Non ex virili semine,
sed mystico spiramine
Verbum Dei factum est caro
fructusque ventris floruit.

3. Alvus tumescit Virginis,
claustrum pudoris permanet,
vexilla virtutum micant,
versatur in templo Deus.

4. Procedat e thalamo suo,
pudoris aula regia,
geminae gigas substantiae
alacris ut currat viam.

5. Aequalis aeterno Patri,
carnis tropaeo cingere,
infirma nostri corporis
virtute firmans perpeti.

6. Praesepe iam fulget tuum
lumenque nox spirat novum,
quod nulla nox interpolet
fideque iugi luceat.

7. Sit, Christe, rex piissime,
tibi Patrique gloria
cum Spiritu Paraclito,
in sempiterna saecula. Amen.




This is my favourite form of this hymn:



The music has such a wonderful, elegant movement to it! But we're considering the words, which in this case are by J. M. Neale. As usual, he does a splendid job:

1. Come, Thou Redeemer of the earth,
And manifest Thy virgin birth:
Let every age adoring fall;
Such birth befits the God of all.

2. Begotten of no human will,
But of the Spirit, Thou art still
The Word of God in flesh arrayed,
The promised Fruit to man displayed.

3. The virgin womb that burden gained
With virgin honour all unstained;
The banners there of virtue glow;
God in His temple dwells below.

4. Forth from His chamber goeth He,
That royal home of purity,
A giant in twofold substance one,
Rejoicing now His course to run.

5. From God the Father He proceeds,
To God the Father back He speeds;
His course He runs to death and hell,
Returning on God’s throne to dwell.

6. O equal to the Father, Thou!
Gird on Thy fleshly mantle now;
The weakness of our mortal state
With deathless might invigorate.

7. Thy cradle here shall glitter bright,
And darkness breathe a newer light,
Where endless faith shall shine serene,
And twilight never intervene.

8. All laud to God the Father be,
All praise, eternal Son, to Thee;
All glory, as is ever meet,
To God the Holy Paraclete.


Rendering Ambrose's concise Latin into equally concise English is so difficult, and Neale does it so well. Isn't verse 7 beautiful? We may wonder whether a cradle really 'glitters', but even so, you can't fault it.

This American translation, by William M. Reynolds, is also excellent:

1. Savior of the nations, come;
Virgin’s Son, here make Thy home!
Marvel now, O heaven and earth,
That the Lord chose such a birth.

2. Not by human flesh and blood;
By the Spirit of our God
Was the Word of God made flesh,
Woman’s offspring, pure and fresh.

3. Wondrous birth! O wondrous Child
Of the virgin undefiled!
Though by all the world disowned,
Still to be in heaven enthroned.

4. From the Father forth He came
And returneth to the same,
Captive leading death and hell
High the song of triumph swell!

5. Thou, the Father’s only Son,
Hast over sin the victory won.
Boundless shall Thy kingdom be;
When shall we its glories see?

6. Brightly doth Thy manger shine,
Glorious is its light divine.
Let not sin o’ercloud this light;
Ever be our faith thus bright.

7. Praise to God the Father sing,
Praise to God the Son, our King,
Praise to God the Spirit be
Ever and eternally.




Catherine Winkworth Englished a German translation of the hymn, rather well:

1. Redeemer of the nations, come!
Ransom of earth, here make Thy home!
Bright Sun, oh dart Thy flame to earth,
For so shall God in Christ have birth!

2. Thou comest from Thy kingly throne,
O Son of God, the Virgin's Son!
Thou Hero of a twofold race,
Dost walk in might earth's darkest place.

3. Thou stoopest once to suffer here,
And risest o'er the starry sphere;
Hell's gates at Thy descent were riven,
Thy ascent is to highest Heaven.

4. One with the Father! Prince of might!
O'er nature's realm assert Thy right,
Our sickly bodies pine to know
Thy heavenly strength, Thy living glow.

5. How bright Thy lowly manger beams!
Down earth's dark vale its glory streams,
The splendour of Thy natal night
Shines through all Time in deathless light.


I love 'hero of a twofold race'!

And another from David Thomas Morgan (1809-1886), whose longer lines give him a bit more space to work with:

1. O come, Redeemer of mankind, appear,
Thee with full hearts the virgin born we greet;
Let every age with rapt amazement hear
That wondrous birth which for our God is meet.

2. Not by the will of man, or mortal seed,
But by the Spirit's breathed mysterious grace
The Word of God became our flesh indeed,
And grew a tender plant of human race.

3. Lo! Mary's virgin womb its burden bears;
Nor less abides her virgin purity;
In the King's glory see our nature shares;
Here in His temple God vouchsafes to be.

4. From His bright chamber, virtue's holy shrine
The royal Bridegroom cometh to the day;
Of twofold substance, human and divine,
As giant swift, rejoicing on His way.

5. Forth from His Father to the world He goes,
Back to the Father's face His way regains,
Far down to souls beneath His glory shows,
Again at God's right hand victorious reigns.

6. With the eternal Father equal, Thou,
Girt with our flesh dost triumph evermore,
Strengthening our feeble bodies here below
With endless grace from Thine own living store.

7. How doth Thy lowly manger radiant shine!
On the sweet breath of night new splendor grows;
So may our spirits glow with faith divine,
Where no dark cloud of sin shall interpose.

8. All praise and glory to the Father be,
All praise and glory to His only Son,
All praise and glory, Holy Ghost, to Thee,
Both now, and while eternal ages run.


And finally a fifteenth-century translation from the hymnal I mentioned the other day, British Library, MS. Additional 34193. This was the first hymn I encountered from that collection and it was the translation of the 'cradle' verse which most attracted me - 'no cloudes black, no darkness noctiall!' It's rather Dunbar-esque. There are some nice bits of alliteration, too: 'from the chosen chamber of chaste cleanness' and 'banners of bliss' and best of all, 'This is the feast of our felicity'.


Come now, gud lord, now come, owr savyowr,
Come, shew thy byrth of mary, modyr & mayde;
Discende, gude lord, ryght frome thy heyvenly towre;
Now lat all worldys merueyll & be dysmayde,
How in owr kynd lyst to be Areyde,
And os þe son bemes peryth in þe glace,
Thy modyr mayd permaynyng os sche was.

Partles of mannes knolege or mixture,
Thys holy byrth, thys blessyd natiuite,
Whan god to mane is ioynyd in nature,
The holy gost by grace did hyt so be;
Thys is the fest of owr felicite,
Yn wyche þe wombe of þe uirgyne
The frute of lyff tyll vs did sontyfie.

The sacred wombe and cloystyr virginale,
Evyr vnwemmed and inviolate,
Thowgh it be fore ful sklendyr and small
[line missing in the manuscript]
The baners of blys bene splaied & preparate,
Ther can no thynge thys reherce,
loo, god and mane in temple is convers!

ffrom þe chosyne chambyr of chast clennes
Procedyng, and pure paleys of plesance,
Thurgh hys grace owr myscheff to reydres,
A myghty Gyant off dowbyll substance,
ffor to reypresse þe feendis fowle pywssance,
ffrome heyvyne tyl Erth hys cowrs hath swetyly tak
To cause owr joye and owr fynaunce to make.

Of þe fadyr eternall, generate
By generacyone enarrable,
In owr nature be comene incarnate,
So passyng owte be manes mercyable,
In to thys world and eftsone reyturnable,
Whane he hath putte the feendes to silence,
Vnto þe fadyr by merveilows ascence.

O goddes sone, evyn and peregalle
Vnto the fadyr in hys deytee,
In mannes wed by trophe trivmphall,
We the beschen, arreaye þi maieste,
Support well wyth þat owr infirmite,
Ne cause us not to fallene in Rvyne;
Conseruf us, lord, by thy uertu dyvyne.

The bestys crybbe, the humble assys Stall,
As pure gold Burned most fayr And bryght
Noo clowdys Blak, noo darknes noctyall,
May defare þe beemes of þis light;
Most orient and most persaunt of myght
Owr feyth, owr hope, & all owr hole creaunce
Ys in thys dey and all owr Esperance.

Too owr lord god, fadyr omnipotent,
Be yeuone lawd with joy ond all honowr,
And to þe sone that in þis fest is sent,
To help vs and ben owr savyowr,
And to þe holy gost, owr cownfortowr,
As well in erth os in the heyvyns hye,
Now and euer, Amen incessauntly.


That is:

Come now, good Lord, now come, our Saviour,
Come, show thy birth of Mary, mother and maid;
Descend, good Lord, down from thy heavenly tower.
Now let all worlds marvel and be dismayed,
How in our kind he wills to be arrayed;
And as the sunbeam appeareth in the glass,
Thy mother a maid remained, as she was,

Without man's knowledge or mixture;
This holy birth, this blest nativity,
When God to man is joinèd in nature -
The Holy Ghost by grace caused it so to be.
This is the feast of our felicity,
In which the womb of the virgin
The fruit of life to us did sanctify.

The sacred womb and cloister virginal,
Ever unstainèd and inviolate,
Though it before slender was and small
[...]
The banners of bliss are displayed and prepared;
There can no thing this truth explain or tell,
Lo, God and man within this temple dwell!

From the chosen chamber of chaste cleanness
Proceeding, and pure palace of pleasance, [joy]
Through his grace our sorrows to redress,
A mighty giant of double substance,
For to repress the fiend's foul puissance,
From heaven to earth his course did sweetly take
To cause our joy, and our redemption make.

Of the Father eternal, generate
By generation inerrable,
In our nature become incarnate,
So passing forth by means merciful,
Into this world and soon again returning,
When he hath made the fiends silent,
Unto the Father by marvellous ascent.

O God's Son, equal and peregalle [fully equal]
Unto the Father in his deity,
In mankind's weeds, by victory triumphal,
We thee beseech, show forth thy majesty,
Support us well in our infirmity,
And cause us not to fall in ruin;
Preserve us, Lord, by thy virtue divine.

The beasts' crib, the humble asses' stall,
As pure gold burned most fair and bright;
No clouds black, no darkness noctial,
May impede the beams of this light;
Most orient and most piercing of might,
Our faith, our hope, and all our whole creance [belief]
Is in this day, and all our esperance. [hope]

To our Lord God, Father omnipotent,
Be given laud with joy and all honour,
And to the Son who in this feast is sent,
To help us and to be our Saviour,
And to the Holy Ghost, our comforter,
As well in earth as in the heavens high,
Now and ever, Amen incessantly.

Music for All Saints' Day

One of the lovely things about All Saints' Day is that its imagery and music are so deeply familiar; it's a little like Christmas, in that as the feast approaches you already know what you're going to encounter, and can look forward to it.  But unlike Christmas, with its never-ending wealth of poetry and hymns, All Saints' Day has a fairly small range of material - almost all of it wonderful, but all very familiar.  And so this introduction is by way of apology (but not really) for posting such famous hymns today; they're just so good, and I like them so much that I could sing them every day without getting tired.  And we only get to sing them in one season of the year, so I have to make the most of it!

And thus:



Who are these like stars appearing,
These, before God’s throne who stand?
Each a golden crown is wearing;
Who are all this glorious band?
Alleluia! Hark, they sing,
Praising loud their heavenly King.

Who are these of dazzling brightness,
These in God’s own truth arrayed,
Clad in robes of purest whiteness,
Robes whose lustre ne’er shall fade,
Ne’er be touched by time’s rude hand?
Whence come all this glorious band?

These are they who have contended
For their Saviour’s honour long,
Wrestling on till life was ended,
Following not the sinful throng;
These who well the fight sustained,
Triumph through the Lamb have gained.

These are they whose hearts were riven,
Sore with woe and anguish tried,
Who in prayer full oft have striven
With the God they glorified;
Now, their painful conflict o’er,
God has bid them weep no more.

These, like priests, have watched and waited,
Offering up to Christ their will;
Soul and body consecrated,
Day and night to serve Him still:
Now in God’s most holy place
Blest they stand before His face.


This is Frances Cox's translation of a German hymn, 'Wer sind die vor Gott­es Throne'; if this is indeed the German text, her version is quite a free one. Frances Cox was born in 1812 and lived all her life in Oxford; I just had some fun looking up her different addresses in the city, and found that she lived at one point in a house which is now part of St Hilda's College, and at another time in the Iffley Road; in 1861 she was living here, and is mentioned in that link as one of the 'three spinster daughters' of George Valentine Cox.  Surely Frances deserves to be named, for this hymn if nothing else...

And then there's this:





Give us the wings of faith to rise
within the veil, and see
the saints above, how great their joys,
how bright their glories be.

We asked them whence their victory came:
they, with one united breath,
ascribe their conquest to the Lamb,
their triumph to his death.

They marked the footsteps that he trod,
his zeal inspired their breast;
and, following their incarnate God,
they reached the promised rest.


This is Ernest Bullock's setting of words by Isaac Watts.  When sung as a hymn, I usually hear 'Give us the wings of faith to rise' to the beautiful tune 'Song 67'.  Bullock's version omits verses 2 and 5:

Once they were mourning here below,
and wet their couch with tears:
they wrestled hard, as we do now,
with sins, and doubts, and fears.

Our glorious Leader claims our praise
for his own pattern given;
while the long cloud of witnesses
show the same path to heaven.


It's a shame to lose verse 2; that idea is an important component of All Saints' Day, or at least it is to me, though I may be wrong in this.  I heard a sermon on Sunday which talked about how saints are too perfect for us to identify with - I've heard lots of sermons about that, and I always find it odd.  Maybe the medieval saints I love the most are unusual, but I've never thought them too perfect for me to identify with - from St Anselm playfully remembering his youthful arrogance to St Guthlac quaking with fear at the thought of his death, from the little vanities of St Edith and St Etheldreda to the many flaws of poor Edward the Confessor, I find their struggles deeply comforting.  These are people we remember, who strove and wrestled and wept through their lives, but survived it all somehow, and lived to be great and holy.

In which spirit, here's Vaughan Williams...



These words are taken from Ecclesiasticus 44:

Let us now praise famous men, and our fathers that begat us;
Such as did bear rule in their kingdoms, men renowned for their power;
Leaders of the people by their counsels, and by their knowledge;
Such as found out musical tunes, and recited verses in writing;
All these were honoured in their generations, and were the glory of their times.
And some there be, which have no memorial; who are perished, as though they had never been. Their bodies are buried in peace; but their name liveth evermore.


And RVW brings us to:



I'm sure you know the words, but nonetheless:


1. For all the saints, who from their labours rest,
Who thee by faith before the world confessed,
Thy name, O Jesus, be forever blest.
Alleluia, Alleluia!

2. Thou wast their rock, their fortress and their might;
Thou, Lord, their captain in the well-fought fight;
Thou, in the darkness drear, their one true light.
Alleluia, Alleluia!

3. O may thy soldiers, faithful, true and bold,
Fight as the saints who nobly fought of old,
And win with them the victor’s crown of gold.
Alleluia, Alleluia!

4. O blest communion, fellowship divine!
We feebly struggle, they in glory shine;
Yet all are one in thee, for all are thine.
Alleluia, Alleluia!

5. And when the strife is fierce, the warfare long,
Steals on the ear the distant triumph song,
And hearts are brave again and arms are strong.
Alleluia, Alleluia!

6. The golden evening brightens in the west;
Soon, soon to faithful warriors cometh rest;
Sweet is the calm of Paradise the blest.
Alleluia, Alleluia!

7. But lo, there breaks a yet more glorious day;
The saints triumphant rise in bright array;
The King of Glory passes on his way.
Alleluia, Alleluia!

11. From earth’s wide bounds, from ocean’s farthest coast,
Through gates of pearl streams in the countless host,
Singing to Father, Son and Holy Ghost:
Alleluia, Alleluia!


The words are by William Walsham How, a Wadham man, who also wrote the slightly sentimental but nonetheless lovely 'Summer suns are glowing'.  I have a soft spot for singing 'For all the saints' to Stanford's Engelberg, which you don't hear so often because the Vaughan Williams version is so dearly loved; but I do like Stanford's 'Alleluias'.

Thoughts at Evensong

Yesterday I decided to go to Christ Church Cathedral for Evensong; on St Frideswide's day it seemed the place to be.  It was dark, the grey end of a drizzling kind of day, and I couldn't help thinking of John Donne: 'Churches are best for prayer that have least light'.  Before the service, I went to pay a visit to St Frideswide:

Someone had decorated the lower part of the shrine with lilies, carnations, and a bed of aromatic rosemary stalks, all green and white.  I was just about able to take photographs of the lower part of the Burne-Jones window before it got too dark, including the ones I posted yesterday and also this, which was too frivolous for the other post:

These ducks appear in the scene of Frideswide fleeing to Binsey.  Above them, Frideswide is desperately clinging to a tree (or something; it was a bit too dark to tell), but the ducks pursue their merry way down the Thames.

I had gone hoping to hear a hymn called 'Frideswide, our patron', which is sung to the tune 'Thine be the glory', and which the internet had told me was quite something to experience; however, for some reason we did not sing that.  Instead we sang this hymn, to this stirring tune:

In our day of thanksgiving one psalm let us offer
For the saints who before us have found their reward;
When the shadow of death fell upon them, we sorrowed,
But now we rejoice that they rest in the Lord.

In the morning of life, and at noon, and at even,
He called them away from our worship below;
But not till His love, at the font and the altar,
Had girt them with grace for the way they should go.

These stones that have echoed their praises are holy,
And dear is the ground where their feet have once trod;
Yet here they confessed they were strangers and pilgrims,
And still they were seeking the city of God.

Sing praise, then, for all who here sought and here found Him,
Whose journey is ended, whose perils are past;
They believed in the Light; and its glory is round them,
Where the clouds of earth’s sorrows are lifted at last.


The words are by William Henry Draper (1855-1933), who also wrote this Lenten hymn.  I wasn't entirely sure about it when I first saw the words, but they grew on me as I sang; verse 3 is particularly nice, and could not have been more appropriate within those walls.  Of course the stones of today's Christ Church, though they have echoed Frideswide's praises for centuries, were never beheld by the eyes of the saint herself; but the ground she walked on can't be far away from the cathedral.  I liked the last two lines of verse 2, as well; 'girt with grace' is a felicitious phrase, which had me pondering the verb to gird - the suggestion is of the ceremony by which a knight receives his sword before the altar, but also something more nebulous (literally) because to be girded is to be 'surrounded' by grace as if by a cloud of witnesses.  And I thought about a garth, etymologically related to the verb, a word which came from Old Norse into northern English: enclosed ground, 'a garden walled around', and the green space within a cloister which in Oxford we now call a quad, of which Christ Church has such a splendid example.  A girded garth can be a little garden or all the space of the known world, the Miðgarð in which we all live; that's the 'dear ground' St Frideswide trod.

Then the choir sang this anthem by Orlando Gibbons:



Almighty and everlasting God,
mercifully look upon our infirmities,
and in all our dangers and necessities
stretch forth thy right hand to help and defend us,
through Christ our Lord. Amen.


I've heard this anthem many times, and sung it not a few, but it moved me last night in a way it never has before. The choirboys were tremulous on their high notes, and sounded more than usually childish as they came in with 'and in all our dangers and necessities'; somehow this makes it all the more plaintive, as on our behalf they put forth a prayer they are too young to understand.  The words (a collect from the Book of Common Prayer) are very simple; they ask for everything and nothing, for all one could wish a merciful God would do for people he loved, and all one ought not perhaps really to hope for.

I can't decide how to finish this post or remember what the point of starting it was, but I hope you enjoyed the music, anyway.

Two hymns for Michaelmas

Michaelmas is one of my favourite days in the church's year, almost entirely because of the season in which it falls: it's an autumn feast, the last glow of fiery summer, and the golden leaves of angels' wings (as in this window at Winchester Cathedral, above) seem to flutter in harmony with the unleaving of the trees.  I couldn't resist posting today two of my absolute favourite hymns, which both speak of angels and angel-song.  Neither mentions St Michael directly but both do something almost better: they begin with the angels' singing and work downwards through creation to our singing, and then upwards again to God.  Both acknowledge how weak human praise can be; one asks for the angels to assist us in our singing, and then takes delight in the contribution that a heart properly 'tuned' can make to the general song; the other takes comfort in the idea that human endeavours of music and art come from God and return to him, pleasing to him because he made them for that purpose.  My favourite kind of hymn is 'hymns about hymns' - songs about singing, carols about the joy of carolling, such as these two Victorian examples, or this medieval one.  For me, this kind of hymn adds immeasurably to the experience of worship, and allows us to participate in such a gloriously joyful picture of heaven; sometimes I think such hymn-singing is the only experience on earth that's anything like heaven at all.

These two hymns share that feature, but they also have something else in common which makes them especially dear to me - their creators (in one case of the tune, in the other of the words) belonged to my Oxford college, and so we sing them very often in our chapel.  As Edmund says in Mansfield Park, "I have not yet left Oxford long enough to forget what chapel prayers are" - and what the singing of these two hymns in that chapel is!  I could find no recording on youtube sung quite so lustily or with so much love, but I enjoyed myself looking; there are many versions of both, and having just listened to about twenty of each, I could still listen to twenty more. But here's one:




Ye holy angels bright,
Who wait at God's right hand,
Or through the realms of light
Fly at your Lord's command,
Assist our song,
For else the theme
Too high doth seem
For mortal tongue.

Ye blessed souls at rest,
Who ran this earthly race
And now, from sin released,
Behold the Saviour's face,
His praises sound,
As in his sight
With sweet delight
Ye do abound.

Ye saints, who toil below,
Adore your heavenly King,
And onward as ye go
Some joyful anthem sing;
Take what he gives
And praise him still,
Through good or ill,
Who ever lives.

My soul, bear thou thy part,
Triumph in God above:
And with a well-tuned heart
Sing thou the songs of love!
Let all thy days
Till life shall end,
Whate'er he send,
Be filled with praise.

'Ye holy angels bright' is an adaptation by J. H. Gurney of a text written in 1681 by Richard Baxter, and the tune is by John Darwall.  I always think this hymn has something of George Herbert about it, especially that last verse - 'a well-tuned heart' is Herbert through and through.  Isn't it just the most wonderful phrase?

The second hymn is 'Angel-voices ever singing', by Francis Pott, with a tune by Edwin George Monk.  This is the choir of Norwich Cathedral, singing a very precise but not very hearty version; I chose this one because you can clearly hear the irresistable harmony lines, but it is a little lacking in body. You should hear the way the students in chapel roar out "Yea, we can!"...



Angel-voices ever singing
Round thy throne of light,
Angel-harps, for ever ringing,
Rest not day or night;
Thousands only live to bless thee,
And confess thee
Lord of might.

Thou who art beyond the farthest
Mortal eye can scan,
Can it be that thou regardest
Songs of sinful man?
Can we know that thou art near us
And wilt hear us?
Yea, we can.

Yea, we know that thou rejoicest
O'er each work of thine;
Thou didst ears and hands and voices
For thy praise design;
Craftsman's art and music's measure
For thy pleasure
All combine.

In thy house, great God, we offer
Of thine own to thee;
And for thine acceptance proffer,
All unworthily,
Hearts and minds and hands and voices,
In our choicest
Psalmody.

Honor, glory, might and merit,
Thine shall ever be,
Father, Son, and Holy Spirit,
Blessed Trinity!
Of the best that thou hast given
Earth and heaven
Render thee.


The rhymes in these verses - especially between 'rejoicest' and 'voices' and then between 'voices' and 'choicest' - are just about my favourite thing in hymnody (or psalmody, perhaps I should say.  Are there any other hymns which contain the word 'psalmody'?!).


I found this on youtube while I was searching for the hymns: if you have a spare five minutes, travel back to 1974 with John Betjeman and a village choir in Norfolk rehearsing 'Ye holy angels bright' (skip to 1:35):



It might as well be a different universe!  And only twelve years before I was born.  What on earth happened to this world?

Te lucis ante terminum: Various Translations

Way back in Lent I posted some translations of the Compline hymn 'Christe, qui lux es et dies', and so here are some versions of another, 'Te lucis ante terminum'. 'Te lucis' dates probably from the seventh century, and in Latin goes like this:

Te lucis ante terminum,
rerum Creator, poscimus,
ut solita clementia,
sis praesul et custodiam.

Procul recedant somnia,
et noctium phantasmata:
hostemque nostrum comprime,
ne polluantur corpora.

Praesta, Pater omnipotens,
per Iesum Christum Dominum,
qui tecum in perpetuum
regnat cum Sancto Spiritu.


Very literally:
To thee, before the end of the light, Creator of all things, we pray, that thy accustomed mercy may be our protector and guard.
Let dreams depart from us, and the phantoms of night, and restrain our enemy, that our bodies may not be polluted.
Grant this, all-powerful Father, through Jesus Christ our Lord, who with thee in eternity reigns with the Holy Spirit.





Here's Thomas Tallis' setting:




And perhaps you know the one by Henry Balfour Gardiner (1877-1950), staple of many an Evensong:




But back to translations. The English version best known to me, because we sing it at Compline in my college, is J. M. Neale's:

Before the ending of the day,
Creator of the world, we pray
That with Thy wonted favour Thou
Wouldst be our guard and keeper now.

From all ill dreams defend our eyes,
From nightly fears and fantasies;
Tread under foot our ghostly foe
That no pollution we may know.

O Father, that we ask be done
Through Jesus Christ, thine only Son,
Who with the Holy Ghost and Thee
Dost live and reign eternally.


This is Neale in appropriately archaic mode: my favourite line is 'tread under foot our ghostly foe', which nicely plays with all the senses of the word 'ghostly' - it means 'spiritual', of course, but it's particularly appropriate in the context of a verse about dreams, illusions and fantasies. It's interesting to compare it to this sixteenth-century version, which is from a Prymer (that is, a vernacular Book of Hours intended for the use of the laity) dated to 1545. The words (from this book, p.68) are:


O Lorde, the maker of al thyng,
We pray the nowe in this euenyng
Us to defende, through thy mercy,
From all disceite of oure enemy.

Let vs neither deluded be,
Good lorde with dreame or phantasy:
Oure hearte wakyng in the thou kepe,
That we in sinne, fal not on slepe.

O father, throughe thy blessed sonne,
Graunt vs this, oure peticion:
To whom with the holy gost alwaies
In heauen and yearth, be laude and praise.


This text is sometimes attributed, like a number of other sixteenth-century verses, to the authorship of Henry VIII; well, you never know, but it looks spurious. The interesting vocabulary is all in the second verse; we'll get to dreams and phantasies in a moment, but it's useful to note deluded, a relatively new word in English at this date. In this sense to delude means "To befool the mind or judgement of, so as to cause what is false to be accepted as true; to bring by deceit into a false opinion or belief; to cheat, deceive, beguile; to impose upon with false impressions or notions." (OED 3a). This is stronger and scarier, perhaps, than its modern overtones.





Here's an Old English interlinear gloss of the hymn which, while not strictly a translation, provides some insight into how the vocabulary might have been translated in the eleventh century:

þe leohtes ær geendunge
gescæfta scyppend, we biddaþ
þæt gewunelicre mildheortnyssa
þu sy wealdend to heordrædene.

Feor aweg-gewitan swefna
7 nihta gedwymeru
7 feond urne ofþrece 7 ofsete
þæt ne beon besmitene lichoman.

Gitiða fæder, o eala þu ælmihtiga,
þurh hælend crist drihten
þe mid þe on ecnyssa
rixað mid halgan gaste.

(From here, with punctuation added by me)


You'll notice that the word dream doesn't appear in the Old English; instead there's swefna, an OE word which literally means 'sleep', but is also the usual word for 'dream' in the modern sense. That's because dream in Old English means 'joy, revelry, gladness' and also 'music, melody', but not (to the confusion of many poor undergraduates learning Old English) 'dream' in the sense of 'vision'.

(For the double meaning of 'joy' and 'music' you might want to compare the semantic range of glee, which I discussed here a little while back. I think it tells us something pretty great about Anglo-Saxon culture that there's so much overlap between words meaning 'joy, revelry' and 'music, melody'...)

Anyway, dream in the sense of 'joy' fell out of use early in the Middle English period (though the sense 'music' survived a little longer in poetry). This was partly through the influence of Old Norse, where draumr always meant essentially what dream means in Modern English - sleeping or waking visions. This is why the word was available to the 1545 translator but not, apparently, to the person who made the Old English gloss.

(I might as well also note the tangentially-related point that Neale's use of ill in the phrase "ill dreams" - i.e. "evil dreams", a usage now a tiny bit archaic - is another word derived from Old Norse; it came into Middle English from ON illr, which means 'bad, wicked'.)

The other kind of dream in this hymn is the phantasmata of the Latin, rendered by the 16th-century translator and by Neale as fantasy. This word, which is ultimately of Greek origin, first came into English in the fourteenth century, via French (which means that to the author of this poem, to which it is central, the new word probably had a slightly technical, learned sound; he's almost flaunting his knowledge of it). The Old English has gedwymeru, a form of gedwimer, which means 'an illusion produced by sorcery'. It has a wonderful (I almost said a fantastic) sound.




This seems like a good place to post a description of the purpose of Compline in Old English, which I came across a little while ago. It’s from a manuscript made in c.1065 at the Benedictine monastery at Worcester. The manuscript gives a brief outline of the form of each of the monastic hours, with a few sentences to describe the role of each. This is the description of Compline:

On foran-niht we sculon God herian ær we to bedde gan and gemunan þæt Crist on byrgene neah foran-nihte bebyrged wearð and ðær his lichaman on gereste swa lange swa his willa wæs. Þonne age we þæs micle þearfe þæt we þæt geþencan and us sylfe on ðone timan Gode betæcan ær we to bedde gan and hine biddan þæt he us gedefre reste geunne and wið deofles costnunga gescylde swa his wylla sy.

The Benedictine Office: An Old English Text, ed. James M. Ure (Edinburgh, 1957), pp.99-100.

"In the first part of the night we ought to praise God before we go to bed, and remember that in the first part of the night Christ was buried in the tomb, and there his body rested as long as it was his will. At this time we have great need to think on that, and at that hour to entrust ourselves to God before we go to bed; and to ask him to grant us a quiet rest and shield us against the temptations of the devil, as it may be his will."

Psalm Translations: I was glad

Some medieval translations of Psalm 122 (123), which we've been hearing rather a lot in this Jubilee year, because of its use in the coronation service. I like this psalm very much in its Book of Common Prayer formulation, so I was curious to see how earlier translators had rendered it.

To start with the most familiar version, this is the BCP:

1. I was glad when they said unto me : We will go into the house of the Lord.
2. Our feet shall stand in thy gates : O Jerusalem.
3. Jerusalem is built as a city : that is at unity in itself.
4. For thither the tribes go up, even the tribes of the Lord : to testify unto Israel, to give thanks unto the Name of the Lord.
5. For there is the seat of judgement : even the seat of the house of David.
6. O pray for the peace of Jerusalem : they shall prosper that love thee.
7. Peace be within thy walls : and plenteousness within thy palaces.
8. For my brethren and companions' sakes : I will wish thee prosperity.
9. Yea, because of the house of the Lord our God : I will seek to do thee good.


I was disappointed not to be able to find a version of this set to Anglican chant on youtube; there's at least one particularly lovely setting, and the words really lend themselves to that aesthetic, especially the first declaration "I was glad" and the gorgeous rich alliteration of 6-8: pray, peace, prosper, plenteousness, palaces, prosperity... So much fun to sing!

However, I suppose we ought to have a link here to Parry instead:




And now for some medieval translations. Here's the Latin from which most of the medieval translators were working:

1. Laetatus sum in his quae dicta sunt mihi in domum Domini ibimus.
2. Stantes erant pedes nostri in atriis tuis Hierusalem.
3. Hierusalem quae aedificatur ut civitas cuius par ticipatio eius in id ipsum.
4. Illic enim ascenderunt tribus tribus Domini testimonium Israel ad confitendum nomini Domini.
5. Quia illic sederunt sedes in iudicium sedes super domum David.
6. Rogate quae ad pacem sunt Hierusalem et abundantia diligentibus te.
7. Fiat pax in virtute tua et abundantia in turribus tuis.
8. Propter fratres meos et proximos meos loquebar pacem de te.
9. Propter domum Domini Dei nostri quaesivi bona tibi.


Here's an Old English translation from the Paris Psalter (online here) - this is from the tenth century. I've inserted verse numbers which match up with the Latin, so you can compare.

(1) Ic on ðyssum eom eallum bliðe,
þæt me cuðlice to acweden syndon,
and on godes hus gange syððan.

(2) Wæron fæststealle fotas mine
on þinum cafertunum, þær ure cyðð wæs,
on Hierusalem geara ærest.

(3) Hierusalem, geara ðu wære
swa swa cymlic ceaster getimbred,
þær syndon dælas on sylfre hire.

(4) þær cneorisse cende wæron
cynn æfter cynne; cuðan þa drihten
and on þære gewitnesse wæran Israelas,
þe his naman neode sceoldon
him andetnes æghwær habban.

(5) Oft hi þær on seldon sæton æt domum;
þu eart ðonne dema, Dauides hus,
þæt on heofenum siteþ heah gestaðelod.

(6) Biddað eow bealde beorhtere sibbe,
ða ðe on Hierusalem gode syndan;
and geniht agun, þa þe neode þe
on heora lufun lustum healdað.

(7) Si þe on þinum mægene sib mæst and fyrmest,
and on þinum torrum wese tidum genihtsum.

(8) For mine broðru ic bidde nu,
and mine þa neahstan nemne swylce,
þæt we sibbe on ðe symble habbon.

(9) And ic for mines godes huse georne þingie,
and to minum drihtne deorum sece,
þæt ic god æt him begitan mote.


This is a poetic translation, not a literal one, and I'll discuss the vocabulary in a moment; first, let's have two later translations (both from the fourteenth century). This is a Wycliffite translation:

1. I am glad in these thingis, that ben seid to me; We schulen go in to the hous of the Lord.
2. Oure feet weren stondynge; in thi hallis, thou Jerusalem.
3. Jerusalem, which is bildid as a citee; whos part taking therof is in to the same thing.
4. For the lynagis, the lynagis of the Lord stieden thidir, the witnessing of Israel; to knouleche to the name of the Lord.
5. For thei saten there on seetis in doom; seetis on the hous of Dauid.
6. Preie ye tho thingis, that ben to the pees of Jerusalem; and abundaunce be to hem that louen thee.
7. Pees be maad in thi vertu; and abundaunce in thi touris.
8. For my britheren and my neiyboris; Y spak pees of thee.
9. For the hous of oure Lord God; Y souyte goodis to thee.


And this is from the Surtees Psalter:

1. I am faine in þa þate saide are to me:
“In hous ofe lauerd ga sal we”.

2. Standande ware our fete als beme
In þi porches ofe Iherusaleme.

3. Ierusalem, þat bigged als cite isse,
Ofe wham in him-selfe del-taking hisse.

4. Þider sothlike vpstegh on heght
Kinde, kinde ofe lauerd reght,
Witnes ofe Irael þe same,
For to schriue to lauerdes name.

5. For þare sat þai setels in dome with,
Setel ouer þe hous ofe Dauid.

6. Biddes whilke at pais ere Ierusalem land,
And mightsomnes to þe louand.

7. Pais be in þi might esse,
And in þi toures mightsomnes.

8. For mi brethre and mi neghburghs be,
Spake I mikel pais of þe.

9. For hous ofe lauerd, our god es he,
Soght I godes vnto þe.



The first words of this psalm gives us an opportunity to explore medieval terms for happiness - "Laetatus sum!" Last time I did one of these psalm translation posts, I ended up talking about various kinds of curses, and the time before that it was words for sorrow and sadness, but this is a nicer subject! These three translations have, respectively, blithe, glad, and fain, all lovely words. The Old English begins Ic eom bliðe, which means 'I am glad, I rejoice'. Modern English blithe can have slightly negative overtones ('oblivious, careless'), but it was entirely positive in Old English: in this case it means 'glad, merry, joyful', but it could also mean 'kind, mild, gentle, merciful' (cf., I suppose, the last of these terms of endearment). Blithe and glad are both Old English words and together they became a very common phrase in Middle English poetry - "ever he was glad and blithe", says the author of Havelok about the most good-humoured hero in English literature. Fain often appears in these doublet phrases too - glad and fain, fain and merry, blithe and fain, all largely interchangeable. (Mentioning fain means I also have to give a link here to this post about one particularly lovely phrase - 'as fain as a bird when the day dawns'.)

An interesting feature of all three words is that they share a similar three-fold range of meaning, according to the OED: 1) the primary sense, 'glad, joyful', 2) 'kind, mild, gentle', and 3) 'beautiful', literally and metaphorically, and in the case of both glad and blithe, 'shining, bright'. I think it's delightful that these three qualities meet in these words; it's both more vague and more precise than our sense of gladness. It's a bit like how Old English uses 'bright' to describe anything lovely - on the one hand it seems thoughtless and just a meaningless stock phrase (as sometimes it is), but it also expresses something of a sense of what constitutes beauty. Similarly, glad, blithe and fain (and also merry) tell us about what constitutes happiness in medieval literature. Happiness is not exactly a feeling, or not just a feeling - these words all suggest a particular kind of cheerfulness which is also a moral quality, an indwelling sense of joy which is the rejoicing of the angels but also expresses itself in everyday courtesy, simple kindness and generosity. I think that to understand this helps make various things about medieval literature more comprehensible - saints' lives, for instance. A saint like Edward the Confessor is often credited with a mild cheerfulness which doesn't entirely fit with our idea of how a royal saint should behave (in these stories, for instance), and saintly jests are a mini-genre of their own (think of Wulfstan's 'Cat of God' joke). It seems almost undignified to us, but I think it's supposed to express a sense of abiding light-heartedness, a constant rejoicing in God which makes for gentleness and a peaceful spirit.

This question reminds me a little of what Chesterton says about pre-modern joy as embodied in the works of Dickens, and C. S. Lewis talks about this somewhere when he describes medieval ideas of what it is to be 'jovial'. We tend to denigrate medieval merriment as the stereotyped jolliness of Errol Flynn's Robin Hood - contrived tricks and schemes, and sudden bursts of slightly forced laughter. Medieval gladness is somehow 'lighter' than that - if the Green Knight is jovial, Gawain is constantly glad (and not just because it alliterates with his name!). In the romances such gladness belongs to courteous heroes, good-humoured and humble, generous and open-handed. In an utterly characteristic passage, Langland describes Charity as follows, while riffing on 1 Corinthians 13:4-8:

He is glad with alle glade and good til alle wikkede,

And leneth and loveth alle that Oure Lord made.

Corseth he no creature, ne he kan bere no wrathe,

Ne no likynge hath to lye ne laughe men to scorne.
Al that men seyn, he leet it sooth, and in solace taketh,

And alle manere meschiefs in myldenesse he suffreth.
Coveiteth he noon erthely good but heveneriche blisse...
For Charite is Goddes champion, and as a good child hende,

And the murieste of mouth at mete where he sitteth.

The love that lith in his herte maketh hym light of speche,

And is compaignable and confortatif, as Crist bit hymselve:

Nolite fieri sicut ypocrite tristes &c.

For I have seyen hym in silk and som tyme in russet,

Bothe in grey, and in grys, and in gilt harneis -

And as gladliche he it gaf to gomes that it neded.

[He is glad with all who are glad [i.e. 'rejoices with those who rejoice'] and good to all the wicked, and gives freely and loves all whom Our Lord made. He curses no creature, and bears no grudges, and never takes delight in lying or laughing men to scorn. All that people say he trusts to be the truth, and takes it as comfort, and he bears every kind of injury with mildness. He covets no earthly good, only the bliss of heaven... For Charity is God's champion, as gracious as a well-behaved child, and the merriest in conversation at dinner wherever he goes. The love that lies in his heart makes him light of speech, and he is sociable and cheerful, as Christ himself taught: 'Do not be sad like the hypocrites [Matt. 6:16]'. For I have seen Charity in silk and in woolen cloth, both in rich furs and in gilt armour - and he gave it away gladly to anyone who needed it.]

That says it all - no sour-faced saints here! St Paul doesn't actually mention cheerfulness and good dinner-table conversation as expressions of Love, but in my experience they really can be. "The love that lith in his herte maketh hym light of speche" - how beautiful.


Oh right, the psalm. I'll just point one or two more things:
- Note that in the Old English Jerusalem is a ceaster, which is the OE word for a fortified city like a Roman castrum, and therefore the source of many English place names of towns which had been Roman settlements: Chester, Worcester, Gloucester, Colchester, etc.
- I like how the Surtees Psalter has the psalmist standing "in the porches of Jerusalem"! Seems like a perfectly reasonable translation of atrium to me...
- a funny piece of linguistic history is illustrated in verse 7. The word to be translated is abundantia, 'abundance' (the BCP's splendid plenteousness). The Wycliffite translation logically renders it abundaunce. The Old English equivalent is tidum genihtsum, 'plentiful seasons'; this latter word means 'plentiful', and the Surtees Psalter's mightsomnes is sort of derived from the Old English word, but in an odd way. In Early Middle English the word genyhtsumnes became inihtsumnesse, which was rare and seems to have been misunderstood by the medieval scribes who copied it; if you imagine inihtsumnesse written in a manuscript, with all those joined-up minim strokes, you can see how a scribe unfamiliar with Old English might think the word was mihtsomnesse. Such a word had never existed in English, but in this way it was born - though it only appears in this one Psalter, a number of times. You have to sympathise with those poor scribes...

Blessed be the God and Father

This is Samuel Sebastian Wesley's 'Blessed be the God and Father', written (according to wikipedia) in 1833 or 1834:




This piece is full of happy memories for me. I realise now that I didn't quote it when I wrote about 'flowers that glide' earlier in the year, though it would have been appropriate. The words are a selection of extracts from 1 Peter (which is this week's reading at Evening Prayer):

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ,
which according to his abundant mercy
hath begotten us again unto a lively hope
by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead,
To an inheritance incorruptible, and undefiled,
that fadeth not away, reserved in heaven for you,
Who are kept by the power of God
through faith unto salvation
ready to be revealed at the last time.

But as he which hath called you is holy,
so be ye holy in all manner of conversation.
Pass the time of your sojourning here in fear.
Love one another with a pure heart fervently.
See that ye love one another.
Love one another with a pure heart fervently:

Being born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, by the word of God.
For all flesh is as grass, and all the glory of man as the flower of grass.
The grass withereth, and the flower thereof falleth away; but the word of the Lord endureth for ever.

Now glad of heart be everyone

It's still Eastertide, and so here's an under-appreciated Easter hymn. The words, by Arthur Henry Fox-Strangeways, are a loose translation of the German hymn 'Wir wollen alle fröhlich sein', which (according to the Oxford Book of Carols, the place where I first encountered it) "was 'an old song' already in Spangenberg's Christlichs Gesangbüchlein, 1568."

There are no recordings of this in English on youtube, but lots of the German original; this makes me think it's more popular in Germany than in the English-speaking world, which is a shame, because it's lovely. The tune in the Oxford Book of Carols is slightly altered (and lacking the 'Alleluias') but the English words would fit to this too:





Now glad of heart be everyone!
The fight is fought, the day is won,
The Christ is set upon his throne.

Who on the rood was crucified,
Who rose again, as at this tide,
In glory to his Father's side.

Who baffled death and harrowed hell
And led the souls that loved Him well
All in the light of lights to dwell.

To him we lift our heart and voice
And in his Paradise rejoice
With harp and pipe and happy noise.

Then rise, all Christian folk, with me
And carol forth the One in Three
Who was and is and is to be.

By faith, the shield of heart and mind,
Through love, which suffers and is kind,
In hope, that rides upon the wind.

Psalm Translations: By the waters of Babylon

I was thinking about something today - I don't know why - and as so often happens, a psalm at Evensong tonight resonated with my thought, and worked to crystallise it somehow. So if this post goes off on a tangent at the end, you'll have to forgive me.

It was Psalm 136/7:




1. By the waters of Babylon we sat down and wept : when we remembered thee, O Sion.
2 As for our harps, we hanged them up : upon the trees that are therein.
3 For they that led us away captive required of us then a song, and melody, in our heaviness : Sing us one of the songs of Sion.
4 How shall we sing the Lord's song : in a strange land?
5 If I forget thee, O Jerusalem, : let my right hand forget her cunning.
6 If I do not remember thee, let my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth : yea, if I prefer not Jerusalem in my mirth.
7 Remember the children of Edom, O Lord, in the day of Jerusalem : how they said, Down with it, down with it, even to the ground.
8 O daughter of Babylon, wasted with misery : yea, happy shall he be that rewardeth thee, as thou hast served us.
9 Blessed shall he be that taketh thy children : and throweth them against the stones.


I love that setting, which is by George Garrett; it's so beautiful it breaks your heart.

This is perhaps the most famous setting of the Latin version:



1 Super flumina Babylonis ibi sedimus et flevimus, cum recordaremur Sion.
2 Super salices in medio eius suspendimus citharas nostras.
3 Quoniam ibi interrogaverunt nos qui captivos duxerunt nos verba carminis et qui adfligebant nos laeti: canite nobis de canticis Sion.
4 Quomodo cantabimus canticum Domini in terra aliena?
5 Si oblitus fuero tui, Hierusalem, in oblivione sit dextera mea.
6 Adhereat lingua mea gutturi meo, si non recordatus fuero tui si non praeposuero Hierusalem in principio laetitiae meae.
7 Memento, Domine, filiorum Edom in diem Hierusalem dicentium evacuate evacuate usque ad fundamentum eius.
8 Filia Babylon vastata, beatus qui retribuet tibi vicissitudinem tuam quam retribuisti nobis.
9 Beatus qui tenebit et adlidet parvulos tuos ad petram.


Now for some medieval translations. I don't have an Old English translation to offer you, but I can direct you to this illustration from a Psalter produced at Canterbury in c.1000. The organ and harp hanging on the sinewy trees are wonderful!

The earliest English translation I could find is by Richard Rolle (I didn't look very hard, so there may be earlier ones).

1. Aboven the flodes of Babilon, thar we sat and gret whils we umthou3t of Syon.
2. In the wylghis in the myddis of hit we hang up our orgoyns.
3. For thar thei askyd us, tho that caitifes led us, wordes of songes, and tho that away led us ȝmpne synges til us of the sanges of syon.
4. How shal we syng the song of Lord in aliens land?
5. If I forgete thee Jerusalem, til forgetyng be gifen my riȝthand.
6. My tong draw til my chekis, if i had thouȝt not of thee, if i sett nouȝt of thee, Jerusalem, in begynnyng of my joy.
7. Be menand, Lord, of the sunnys of Edom in day of Jerusalem, the whilk seys "temys, temys, til the ground in hit."
8. Dowȝghtur of Babilon, wrech, blisful he that shal ȝeld til thee the ȝeldyng that thou ȝeldid til us.
9. Blisful he that shal holde and knok his smale til the stone.


Rolle's is a psalter with commentary, and his comment on this last verse is, "These small [things] are evil stirrings in man's thought, of pride, covetise and lechery, but he is blessed that holds them, that they pass not into delight, and knocks them against Christ, that they perish through his might, for if he let them wax, they will not so soon be overcome." I like that!

His comment on the first verse is, "Floods of Babylon are all things that are loved here and pass away, which holy men behold and forsake, sitting above them, and weeping for their own pilgrimage and their sins that are ravished into the floods while they think of Sion - that is, of heaven, where nothing runs away, but all joy is together. Worldly men weep for the loss of their goods or their friends, as they joy in nothing but in their wealth; but each man should weep when thinking of Sion."

We'll come back to that.

Here's a Wycliffite translation from the late 14th century:

1. On the floodis of Babiloyne there we saten, and wepten; while we bithouyten on Syon.
2. In salewis in the myddil therof; we hangiden up oure orguns.
3. For thei that ledden us prisoners, axiden us there the wordis of songis. And thei that ledden awei us seiden "Synge ye to us an ympne of the songis of Syon."
4. Hou schulen we singe a songe of the Lord in an alien lond?
5. If I foryete thee, Jerusalem, my riyt hond be youun to foryeting.
6. Mi tunge cleue to my chekis, if I bithenke not on thee, if I purposide not of thee, Jerusalem, in the bigynnyng of my gladnesse.
7. Lord, haue thou mynde on the sones of Edom, for the dai of Jerusalem. Whiche seien, Anyntische ye, anyntische ye; til to the foundement ther ynne.
8. Thou wretchid douyter of Babiloyne; he is blessid, that schal yelde to thee thi yelding, which thou yeldidist to vs.
9. He is blessid, that schal holde; and hurtle doun hise litle children at a stoon.


It took me a ridiculously long time to realise that the word ympne in "Synge ye to us an ympne of the songis of Syon" is of course hymn. Should have spotted that sooner...

This would be a useful psalm to learn condemnations from. That "Anyntische ye, anyntische ye" in verse 7 means 'bring to nothing, destroy' (related to the French anéantir), while Rolle's "temys, temys" comes from a word of Old Norse origin meaning 'to spill, to pour out'. Choose your method of destruction.

Rolle was a Yorkshireman and our next translation is also from Yorkshire, from the thirteenth-century Surtees Psalter (the numbering of the verses is a bit different here):

1. Stremes ofe Babilon, þare sate we on,
And wepe, whils we mined of Syon.

2. In selihes in mide ofe ite
Our organes henge we yhite.

3. For þider asked vs, þat wrecches swa
Led vs, wordes of sanges ma;

4. And þat outlede vs: "ympne singe yhe
Til vs of sanges ofe Syon be."

5. Hou sal we singe sange with blisse
Ofe lauerd in outen land þat isse?

6. Ife I forgete þe, Jerusalem land,
To forgetelnesse giuen be mi righte hand.

7. Mi tunge to mi chekes cleuand be,
Ife þat I noght mine ofe þe;

8. Ife I forsete þe noght, Jerusalem, ai
In biginninge ofe mi fainenes al dai.

9. Mine, lauerd, ofe Edom sones, þat tem,
In daie ofe Jerusalem,

10. Þat saies: “lesses, lesses yhite,
Vnto þe grondstaþelnes in ite!”

11. Doghtre of Babilon, wrecched alle!
Seli þat foryhelde salle
To þe þi foryheldinge nou
Þat til vs foryhelded þou;

12. Seli þat sal hald on-ane
And giue þi smale vnto þe stane.


Seli is one of my favourite words for 'blessed'; in Middle English it means 'fortunate, favoured', but also 'innocent, blameless', and over time the latter meaning came to be used of things deserving of compassion or pity, like children or animals (especially sheep, for some reason - so you will sometimes find Christmas carols which have the shepherds 'leave their silly sheep'). And this tender epithet came to have overtones of 'weak, foolish', and thus we get today's silly, still used of things or people towards whom one feels more pity than contempt.


Songs and hymns, streams and floods and waters. I didn't even realise until I started writing this post just how close this psalm comes to what I've been thinking about in my own life. It's something about singing in exile. Rolle is quite right: "The floods of Babylon are all things that are loved here and pass away". Recently I've been feeling self-conscious about the things I love - essentially, all the stuff I post about on this blog. It's such an odd and silly assortment, and pretty much no one I know in real life shares my love for any of it. I've spent my whole life being a little embarrassed about my taste in music and literature, and wishing really that I could just be normal and like the things everyone else likes; I don't feel that as much as I did when I was younger, but I still wish I could love my own things a little less. Perhaps it's just an extreme case of the grad student's curse - which is the knowledge that absolutely no one cares about your subject as much as you do - but I suspect really it's a manifestation of Sehnsucht, C. S. Lewis' Joy, the 'inconsolable longing for we know not what', and the sense of utter aloneness which comes with it.

And somewhere in there is Chesterton, and his idea of things 'saved from the wreck':

Crusoe is a man on a small rock with a few comforts just snatched from the sea: the best thing in the book is simply the list of things saved from the wreck. The greatest of poems is an inventory. Every kitchen tool becomes ideal because Crusoe might have dropped it in the sea. It is a good exercise, in empty or ugly hours of the day, to look at anything, the coal-scuttle or the book-case, and think how happy one could be to have brought it out of the sinking ship on to the solitary island. But it is a better exercise still to remember how all things have had this hair-breadth escape: everything has been saved from a wreck...

I really felt (the fancy may seem foolish) as if all the order and number of things were the romantic remnant of Crusoe's ship. That there are two sexes and one sun, was like the fact that there were two guns and one axe. It was poignantly urgent that none should be lost; but somehow, it was rather fun that none could be added. The trees and the planets seemed like things saved from the wreck: and when I saw the Matterhorn I was glad that it had not been overlooked in the confusion. I felt economical about the stars as if they were sapphires (they are called so in Milton's Eden): I hoarded the hills. For the universe is a single jewel, and while it is a natural cant to talk of a jewel as peerless and priceless, of this jewel it is literally true. This cosmos is indeed without peer and without price: for there cannot be another one.

'The greatest of poems is an inventory' - I love that. I've quoted it before in reference to this poem (and it's even more true of this one). Chesterton was being typically ebullient, but hoarding hills and seeing in them a sudden glimpse of the hills of heaven are two sides of the same coin. Sometimes it's cosy, sometimes it's "the old stab, the old bittersweet". Everyone would have their own list of things saved from the wreck; this was C. S. Lewis':

the smell of bonfire, the sound of wild ducks flying overhead, the title of The Well at the World's End, the opening lines of Kubla Khan, the morning cobwebs in late summer, or the noise of falling waves.

That longing, that love, is an endless hunger of hopeless things, and sometimes it's more wonderful than painful, and sometimes the other way around. I suppose everyone feels it to some degree, but some people seem more susceptible than others; and these days I wish I was less susceptible.

And I've forgotten what this has to do with the psalm.