March
4, 2007
Psalm
100
“Worship the Lord with
gladness; come into his presence with singing.
Know that the Lord is God. It is
he that made us, and we are his; we are his people; and the sheep of his pasture.”
Dear Lord and Father of Mankind…
I think it is appropriate to begin this Lenten series with a
Psalm – especially this Psalm – because our guide throughout the season will be,
like the Psalms themselves, a hymn.
Psalms, in fact, will ground several of these reflections and
proclamations along the way. And so it
is that we will literally “Come into God’s presence with singing” – singing,
perhaps, for the next several weeks, “Dear Lord and Father of mankind.”
So where
did this hymn come from?
The lyrics flowed from the pen of John Greenleaf Whittier
who was born near the close of 1807 in Massachusetts, and died some 85 years
later in New Hampshire. Often called
“the Quaker poet,” Whittier was raised in rural poverty, put himself through
school, and became an ardent abolitionist in whose cause he edited several
antislavery newspapers and journals.
Along the way he began to write poetry, and though he never felt very
highly of his efforts, his readers disagreed.
He certainly never considered himself a hymnwriter, “for the good reason,”
he once observed, “that I know nothing of music.” Perhaps it was humility at the thought of his
own verses being put to such use.
“Raised in the silence of Quaker meetings, he acknowledges: ‘A good hymn is the best use to which poetry
can be devoted, but I do not claim that I have succeeded in composing
one.” (Mennonite Hymnal Companion, p.
704).
The
hymn-text at the center of our consideration these next several weeks is lifted
from a much larger, seventeen-stanza, poem concerning the practice of true
worship. Titled The Brewing of the Soma, the poem begins by describing a rite of
Hindu priests during which soma, an intoxicating beverage brewed from honey and
milk was consumed to induce a state of religious frenzy associated with deep
spiritual communion with the gods.
Using this
practice as a metaphor for frenzied spiritual manipulation, Whittier reflects
on the content of more authentic worship as drawn from his Quaker experience…
Dear Lord and Father of mankind,
Forgive our foolish ways;
Reclothe us in our rightful mind;
In purer lives thy service find;
In deeper reverence, praise.
Let’s get
one thing out of the way here at the outset.
The gender-exclusive language doesn’t fit very well with our broader
understanding of inclusion and the subtle power that vocabulary has for shaping
it. “Father,” while still perhaps the
most normative way that the faithful tend to refer to God, has begun to grate
on some. And though National Public
Radio still seems to insist on using “mankind” as the inclusive generic
referring to all people, it seems like an unnecessary selection given the
perfectly functional and sonorous alternatives.
What, then, to do?
One obvious
possibility is to simply ignore those hymns whose language doesn’t lend itself
to modern sensibilities, relegating such familiar standards to the archives of
an antiquated age. We could choose the
opposite path, singing full voice ahead without regard to offense, calculating
the silencing of those who can’t countenance the exclusion to be a small and
reasonable expense.
Or, we could simply change the
words. The sudden and violent flinching
by the poets and composers among us should provide adequate warning that there
are some important concerns in that option.
First, there is propriety. Someone
likely owns the words to hymns, and it isn’t any more acceptable to go tweaking
with their property than it would be to go, with paintbrush in hand, and change
the color of a neighbor’s house just because we preferred it over the older
shade. Owners – those who rightly
possess the privilege to decide – may not view our tampering to be the
“improvement” we assess it to be. So,
permission is one thing.
Aesthetic is another. It’s possible to “fix” something in one
sense, and “ruin” it in another. Whatever
else it is, poetry is an aesthetic, and we futz with it at great risk.
But finally there is meaning. Translation – even the translation from one
age of English to another – is finally about moving meanings and ideas from one
voice to another. The words necessarily
change, but the intent should remain the same.
Altering the lyrics of a hymn, in other words, is tricky and careful
business. But I would argue that it’s
worth a try. So do the editors of many
contemporary hymnals. The Mennonite
Hymnal offers as an alternative, “Dear Lord, thou life of humankind.” The hymnal for the United Church of Canada
suggests, “Dear God, Who Loves all Humankind,” while the Presbyterian Hymnal
offers “Dear Lord, Creator Good and Kind.”
Our own hymnal editors, along with
those of the United Church of Christ, have tried their revisionist hands, as
well. You noticed, perhaps, that
underneath the familiar title of this very old hymn is a parenthetical
alternative: “Dear God, embracing
humankind.” Aesthetically, I would give
the alternate version a passing grade.
It certainly maintains the metrical structure; it flows well in the
line, and manages to salvage the same ending rhyme. And I assume they secured permission for the
change.
But what about its content? Does it mean the same as the original it is
trying to translate? My sense of the
matter is “no.” It replaces the first
phrase with a perfectly good one that eliminates the problematic words, while
still asserting a desirable affirmation.
The problem is, I just don’t think it is the same affirmation or
claim. To embrace something is not the
same thing as fathering it. A hug is not
the same thing as origination. All of
which is to say that I’m not really crazy about the hymnal’s attempt to smooth
the rough patch.
So what are
we to hear in Whittier’s poetic salutation?
For starters, let us recognize a prayer when we see it. The sentiments expressed in the stanzas are
not conversation starters over drinks, nor are they intellectual musings
offered to the atmosphere. What we are
singing, here, is a prayer – intercessions; hopes and pleas for God’s keeping
of God’s people in the life that surrounds them.
Let me begin at the end of the
phrase – with “mankind”, that umbrella word intended to encompass all people. Something is being said about every woman,
child and man that is worth all of us overhearing. And what is being asserted is our common
parentage: that God is the origin of us
all. Dear
Lord and Father of Mankind. Or, as I
might venture to phrase it, Creator of
all humankind…
Whatever
else is to be said, then; whatever else is to be considered, argued or
commended throughout these verses – and for us, throughout this season – the
hymn begins by placing us squarely in the audience of the one who brought us
into being – our creator; the one whose fingers gathered and formed the dust
from which we began and to which we will return.
That’s not
a bad place from which to begin a process of spiritual reflection and renewal: the conscious comprehension of the fact that
whatever we might accomplish with our lives, whatever we might say or do or
initiate or imagine; whatever we might sing or dance or write or solve, our
actions are secondary at best. The first
action was God’s, who first thought and then spoke us into being. Anything and everything after that is
derivative. That isn’t to demean our
efforts. Indeed, one could say that it
elevates them into the category of divine imitation – like children trying on
momma’s dress or clomping around in daddy’s shoes. To take God’s lead is honoring imitation – as
long as we don’t forget and forsake where we came from.
That, I
believe, is the hymn’s first valuable gift to us and our particular spiritual
vitalization: remembering where we came
from, and to whom we owe whatever words, energies and creative insights that
issue from our turn and time on this earth.
For those who know and remember who they are, every song they sing,
every breath they take, every horizon toward which they reach is finally
thankful praise.
And so with
the Psalmist we exclaim:
“Worship the Lord with gladness;
come into God’s presence with singing.
Know that the Lord is God.
It is God that made us,
and it is to God that we belong;
we are God’s people;
and the sheep of God’s pasture.”
God, Creator of all humankind.
* entire hymn text and tunes may be found at: http://www.oremus.org/hymnal/d/d030a.html