Hymns and Hymnwriting     •     Echoes of Creation

Text

This text obviously started from Psalm 24. The metrical psalm version in Psalms in Our Time did not include the closing exhortation; the fine chorale by XXX ranged too far from the psalm text to fit into that context, so I was considering how those exultant verses might fit into Christian worship. Although the first stanza alone offers far more of biblical logic and language than many popular "praise choruses", it seemed too slight to stand alone. So I borrowed "walls and doors" imagery from throughout the Old and New Testaments.

I had also been considering the possibility of invitation texts that spoke of salvation in some other tone than a matter of personal pride in personal position: "I'm saved, and you should want to be like me!⁰" I was looking for some vestige of personal humility, some expression of personal repentance, rather than hectoring someone else for being putatively less favorably positioned. Very likely that element here is too brief, too vague, too metaphorical, to be effective without some serious teaching on the subject. Perhaps it could serve as an occasion for that teaching.

The first verse uses mythic language from Psalm 18 in a very traditional way,¹ with an allusion to the "harrowing of hell" myth. But I've turned the image inside out with a very practical intention: this form emphasizes that there is no question of the gates and bars blocking the King's free action. God has done what we needed done, and now gives us the choice of acting (for our own ultimate benefit.)

The reference to Psalm 2 is not so obvious. But that Psalm gave me the clue to the Christianization of Psalm 18. There the Messiah will shatter "with" a rod of iron. I've raised the mythic level (as is fitting, moving from shadow to substance) here the iron bar isn't "lifting" or "shattering" -- even it is itself shattered. It's my way of saying: in our post-Galgotha historical context, we should not be demythologizing, we should emphasize the fact that we should see mythic significance^1a in these passages beyond what could have been expected by the ancient readers.

The second verse borrows parabolic language from the New Testament, ritual language from the Old, and physical imagery common in both. Again there's an allusion to the saving work of Christ -- and its practical significance.

The third verse juxtaposes four walled-architectural figures that we don't often put together: but should have.² All four are Old Testament figures based on a little hilltop village in the Judean hills -- all should teach us something about the relationship God offers, both now and in the future. Joined together here, they offer an invitation to contemplate the continuity of God's saving acts throughout time and eternity.

I was especially pleased with the architectonics here: the unifying imagery of the first three verses came together in a summary that virtually wrote itself, using more familiar theological or New Testament language -- in a context where hopefully it might carry actual meaning and make actual sense. And the last two lines closed the circle by returning to the language and imagery of Psalm 24.

The allusion to Psalm 1 in the (reversed) sequence of first-person verbs in the first three stanzas is probably to subtle to be noticed. But it's not accidental.

I'm not sure exactly how this text might be used. Its natural niche seems to be an invitation song after the Lord's Supper. (We don't get much call for those, hereabouts.)

Music

This text started out as an experiment in traditional iambic meters (the first two lines being the germ which gave the text its form). Throughout the editing process, I retained editorial variants of the fifth and sixth lines in both "8,8" and "8,6" form. So I had an unusually large selection of potential tunes, but the dramatic trajectory of the stanzas didn't fit any of them. I eventually added two more lines (partly because I needed the breathing room in the last stanza), and went looking for a tune with a dramatic center in the fifth and sixth lines that fit the confessional mood of the text. This tune was the best fit I found. It is the oldest tune in the collection, going back to John Calvin's hymnal (psalter) collection in Geneva, as adapted for the Presbyterian psalters in Scotland (and incidentally adding the ninth and tenth cultures to be represented in this eclectic collection of tunes.)

I think common-meter songs are too often, well, boring. I've done two things to try to avoid the usual sources for that. Unlike most of the traditional common-meter tunes in our books, this is a double-length (eight-line) tune, and the text truly consists of eight-line stanzas. And the form of the stanzas is not really 2 + 2 + 2 + 2 lines, or even 4 + 4 lines, but 4 + 2 + 2 lines; as emphasized by the rhyme scheme ababccdd. I was very happy with how much this did not seem to me to fall into the usual common-meter pattern.

Notes

⁰This may sound harsh, but I ask first: read the song text, and ask what reason is given in the song for the peremptory command: "Get in the (glory-land) way!" Secondly, I ask what searing of conscience could have made that kind of prideful proclamation acceptable in our services? And finally, what can we do about it before it's too late?

¹Very traditional indeed, just not our nineteenth-century-literalistic tradition. After writing this, I happened to read a medieval text that dramatized the "harrowing", using this psalm text as a frame.

^1aI use the word "mythic" in the literary sense, of course: "Myth" is our way of expressing the cosmic significance of something that happens -- it is not ever anyone's way of describing something that did not happen! What really happened in those three days, we will never in this world comprehend: but the mythic image of the Messiah, Samson-like bearing the gates of His intended prison -- and for that matter, pulling down its walls -- is probably as close to profound understanding as we are likely to get.

^1aIn this, I'm consciously following the example of Charles Wesley, analyzed by Manning in Hymns of Watts and Wesley: based on Isaiah 35, where the Revised Version substitutes jackals for the mythical "dragons", Wesley boldly proclaims the mythic sense instead: "Where the ancient Dragon lay, Open for Thyself a way!" And here surely, Wesley's poetic sense is right.

²We usually seal these figures into separate hermetic compartments. The "temple" is a historical Judaistic ritual artifact and no more. The "house" of God is no more than an alternate technical name for the present-day "Church" and no more. The "city of Gold" is an alternate technical name for a future "heaven" and no more. And the "stronghold" is nothing at all. This kind of "wresting the scriptures" leaves us unable to appreciate the language of the Psalms or the Prophets -- and hopelessly at sea in the Revelation. Consider this text as yet another effort at restoring a sense of the Biblical usage of what we usually consider "heaven-language".

This text, © Stephen Hutcheson, 2003, and offered freely for use under a Creative Commons License. These studies are created by members of the West Allen Church of Christ in Allen, Texas