The Story of the Hymns and TunesButterworth, Hezekiah
Religion
The Story of the Hymns and Tunes
Butterworth, Hezekiah
Hymns -- History and criticism; Religious poetry
Apropos of both, it is related that Mason was once presiding at choir
service in a certain church where the minister gave out "When thou my
righteous Judge shalt come" and by mistake directed the singers to "omit
the second stanza." Mason sat at the organ, and while playing the last
strain, "Be found at thy right hand," glanced ahead in the hymnbook and
turned with a start just in time to command, "Sing the _next_ verse!"
The choir did so, and "O Lord, prevent it by Thy grace!" was saved from
being a horrible prayer to be kept out of heaven.
ZINZENDORF.
"Jesus, Thy Blood and Righteousness."
Nicolaus Ludwig, Count Von Zinzendorf, was born at Dresden, May 26,
1700, and educated at Halle and Wittenberg. From his youth he evinced
marked seriousness of mind, and deep religious sensibilities, and this
character appeared in his sympathy with the persecuted Moravians, to
whom he gave domicile and domain on his large estate. For eleven years
he was Councillor to the Elector of Saxony, but subsequently, uniting
with the Brethren's Church, he founded the settlement of Herrnhut, the
first home and refuge of the reorganized sect, and became a Moravian
minister and bishop.
Zinzendorf was a man of high culture, as well as profound and sincere
piety and in his hymns (of which he wrote more than two thousand) he
preached Christ as eloquently as with his voice. The real birth-moment
of his religious life is said to have been simultaneous with his study
of the "Ecce Homo" in the Dusseldorf Gallery, a wonderful painting of
Jesus crowned with thorns. Visiting the gallery one day when a young
man, he gazed on the sacred face and read the legend superscribed, "All
this I have done for thee; What doest thou for me?" Ever afterwards his
motto was "I have but one passion, and that is He, and only He"--a
version of Paul's "For me to live is Christ."
Jesus, Thy blood and righteousness
My beauty are, my glorious dress:
'Midst flaming worlds, in these arrayed,
With joy shall I lift up my head.
Bold shall I stand in Thy great day,
For who aught to my charge shall lay?
Fully absolved through these I am--
From sin and fear, from guilt and shame.
Lord, I believe were sinners more
Than sands upon the ocean shore,
Thou hast for all a ransom paid,
For all a full atonement made.
Nearly all the hymns of the great Moravian are now out of general use,
having accomplished their mission, like the forgotten ones of Gerhardt,
and been superseded by others. More sung in Europe, probably, now than
any of the survivors is, "Jesus, geh voran," ("Jesus, lead on,") which
has been translated into English by Jane Borthwick[8] (1854). Two
others, both translated by John Wesley, are with us, the one above
quoted, and "Glory to God, whose witness train." "Jesus, Thy blood,"
which is the best known, frequently appears with the alteration--
Jesus, Thy _robe_ of righteousness
My beauty _is_, my glorious dress.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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