The timeless message of God's timely actions is well expressed in contemporary language.
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Fill your hearts with joy and gladness,
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This "Hallel" (or "praise") psalm speaks of a multitude of reasons to praise God: his actions that established the natural order (the cosmos; the seasons) and ordered society in justice: necessary preconditions for the blessings the psalmist enjoyed.
This metrical version represents almost every thought from the psalm, more or less in the same order, but compressed and carefully arranged into four verses. There is no "refrain" as such, but recurring phrases tie the sections of the psalm together (which may be an intentional reflection of Hebrew poetic technique, or may simply be an idiom picked up through close familiarity with the Hebrew psalms.) Like the psalm, it begins and ends with "Praise the Lord!", and each verse contains that acclamation.
The first stanza focuses on God's glory as seen in the cosmos; the second on His justice in relieving human suffering and attacking its source; the third, on His goodness as seen in the blessings provided through the natural order; the fourth, on His activity in society: moved by these blessings, all people are called to live in right relationship with Him.
Some books have omitted the second stanza, making a nature hymn but shortchanging the message of the psalm. The God of Nature is the God of Justice, and is the personal God of believers; that is a message we do not do well to neglect.
This widely-used version by Timothy Dudley-Smith1, probably the most widely-published twentieth-century hymnwriter, exhibits his concern for plain, contemporary language: an ideal that we can trace back to Luther and Watts, if not to King David himself. It also shows a skilled command of poetic techniques: note the use of parallel phrases (both of line and half-line length), often reinforced by alliteration2.
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This is another traditional American frontier hymn tune3 in a pentatonic major key. In normal use, its first two lines are repeated, to fit a "double-length" (eight-line) stanza; this version omits the repeat to fit the six-line stanza. Like most such tunes still in use (or restored to use), it has been re-harmonized. This harmonization, done for a Southern Baptist hymnal, is still under copyright.
This is not one of my favorite tunes, and this new (copyrighted) harmonization seems to me unnecessarily dissonant and unnecessarily difficult. In its favor, it has a strong and distinctive shape, and a lively but inobtrusive rhythm: it is certainly singable, and suitable for singing with words. Today, it appears to be one of the most widely used American tunes4 not associated with a single text.
Other books have published this text to "Regent Square" or "Ode to Joy" (Joyful, joyful, we adore Thee), sometimes repeating the last two lines of each verse to fill out an eight-line tune.
This is another psalm of pure praise for manifold blessings, for which one would have to search hard to find an unsuitable occasion. Thanksgiving for the seasons of the year is a theme underrepresented in our hymnals.
If the music proves too difficult or too uncongenial, either of the alternative tunes are acceptable and are simple to sing. "Ode to Joy" is already associated with a joyful hymn of praise emphasizing nature motifs; "Regent Square" is underutilized in our books.
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Copyright © 2002,2003,2004, Stephen Hutcheson
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| These studies are created by members of the West Allen Church of Christ in Allen, Texas |