Three of the reasons I would not be sanguine about a new Episcopal hymnal can be illustrated by our closing hymn at the 11:00 Eucharist this morning: number 481 in the Hymnal 1982, Rejoice, the Lord is King with the tune Gopsal. It is a terrific hymn -- and it would be unlikely to appear in a new Episcopal hymnal. For one reason, the title: many clergy and others in authority are hesitant to refer to the Deity as either “Lord” or “King.” There is overwhelming Biblical support for using these names, such as Psalm 97:1, which may have been in Wesley's mind when he wrote this hymn -- “The LORD is King; let the earth rejoice; let the multitude of the isles be glad.” But these terms imply a hierarchy with which many would disagree – the Deity, especially in its incarnation as Jesus of Nazareth, is our Friend, our Companion, our Lover – but not our Lord. Further, both “Lord” and “King” are masculine terms, which are unacceptable in many circles. For reasons such as this, most of the corpus of traditional hymnody is dissonant with the more liberal expressions of contemporary theology, and many argue that it is time to lay aside the old texts, with the ideas they embody.
A second (and related) reason is that this hymn is the work of two Dead White Males: Charles Wesley (1707-88) and George Frideric Handel (1685-1759). Many modern clergy (and not a few laypersons) are not interested in hearing from such persons, for they are part of the oppressor class and did their work before 1960, meaning that they have nothing to say to our generation.
A third reason is that the tune Gopsal is musically challenging, especially to the organist or pianist. With all my certificates, diplomas, and experience, I have to devote a good bit of work to this tune in order to play it convincingly. What is the volunteer musician in a small parish to do? Or worse yet, what is the guitarist to do? This piece will not work without a keyboard accompaniment.
The Hymnal 1982 is more musically challenging than most denominational hymnals. One senses that the committee which assembled it took pride in the Episcopal Church's tradition of being a place where the best possible music was sung and played. That remains true in places, but not as widely as in 1982, and a new hymnal would probably strive to be more “accessible” at the expense of tunes like Gopsal.
To be fair to the Episcopal hymnal supplements, it is their duty to include new songs and hymns, and there is a lot of excellent new material available. Part of what needs to be added to the wider congregational song are voices that have indeed been overlooked, and the supplements have been at their best when they have attempted to do that.
There is difference of opinion as to whether a new hymnal will ever be needed, or for that matter a new prayerbook. I gather that the Standing Commission's feasibility study discovered that many churches either print all of the day's music in the service leaflet or project it onto screens. The denomination's current trend is to encourage the use of “RiteSong,” which is a subscription-based download service for the hymns and songs in all of the Episcopal hymnals and supplements. This makes it easier to produce service leaflets and PowerPoint presentations. Why have a printed book in the pews if it is not going to be used?
For many reasons, I am convinced that we should continue to have printed Prayerbooks and Hymnals and that we should use them: perhaps I can write of this another time. Should a committee someday be charged with the preparation of a full-scale hymnal to replace the Hymnal 1982, it could easily turn into a battleground, with every constituency pushing its own agenda. But with God's grace it could instead be a feast of many cultures, the best of old and new. One recent book that I think presents a good example is the 2005 hymnal of the (Presbyterian) Church of Scotland, Church Hymnnary 4, where one finds eighteenth century Scottish Paraphrases and items from the old Scottish Psalter alongside Iona songs, Graham Kendrick and others from the “praise and worship” genre, contemporary authors such as Shirley Erena Murray and Carl P. Daw, songs from Africa and Asia, Watts and Wesley, Fanny Crosby, and much more.
There are only two verses in the New Testament that explicitly instruct about music in the church: I Corinthians 14:15 and Colossians 3:16. Both verses occur in the context of forbearance for one another: the first in relation to the exercise of spiritual gifts in worship, most of all in the context of the “more excellent way” outlined in chapter thirteen; the second likewise in the context of “charity, which is the bond of perfectness” (Col. 3:14), and submission to one another (v. 18-24) that there may be “neither Greek nor Jew, circumcision nor uncircumcision, Barbarian, Scythian, bond nor free: but Christ... in all” (v. 11):
Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom; teaching and admonishing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord. And whatsoever ye do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God and the Father by him. (v. 16-17).It is perhaps the challenge and the privilege of our generation, more than any that have come before, to sing one another's songs – across the centuries as well as the continents and islands. The hymnal can be a model of how this may be done.
---
As a footnote, here is a YouTube rendition of "Rejoice, the Lord is King." The first version is to Gopsal, as discussed here; the second is to Darwall's 148th, which is the tune more commonly given with this text -- a thoroughly worthwhile pairing, but not quite as challenging as Gopsal. [the first clip begins with something of an advertisement, and continues after "Rejoice, the Lord is King" with another hymn: "God is love, let heaven adore him" with the Welsh tune Blaenwern with which it is most often sung in Great Britain. The whole thing is taken from the BBC series "Songs of Praise."]
Do take the time to watch this clip. Seeing the people in these two churches brings to mind a sermon by Martin Franzmann, "Theology must sing." In it, he refers to the Albrecht Dürer woodcut, "Hymns of the Chosen before the Lamb." Franzmann said:
[Some persons] begin by criticizing the good hymns as 'hard to sing.' One might ask in return, Why must a hymn be easy? Who ever said that it should be easy? Look at that woodcut... in which those that came through the great tribulation, who have washed their robes in the blood of the Lamb, sing their heavenly song. Look at those faces, their intensity of concentration... if you would know what singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord really means. ["Come to the Feast," edited Robin A. Leaver, MorningStar Music Publishers, page 139]
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment