Happy Easter, again! Today, May 5th, was Easter Sunday for those Christians following the Eastern Orthodox calendar (a not inconsiderable number).

Reaching around in the muck of my memory for a song to reference in celebration of this fact, I thought about the big concepts of Easter, and thought of various songs about “rising again” and the like, but it was only when I thought of the rolling away of the stone that I thought of a song that piqued my own interest, because it is a song that is relatively-little-known but looms large in my own recollection, for one reason or another. Actually for a really simple reason: the song, “Something’s Burning, Baby,” was released on the album Empire Burlesque, in 1985. It was the first album that Bob Dylan released after I had become a fan of Bob Dylan, which I did in the 1983/84 time period, at the age of sixteen. So when Empire Burlesque was released in 1985, I think it felt for me kind of like what Highway 61 Revisited must have felt like for people who were Dylan fans back then. I recall an intense feeling of anticipation in advance of the release date, and a sense of wondering: “How is Bob going to blow my mind anew with this one?” To many, this will seem comical, since mid-80s Dylan is commonly mocked—as it was then—but that didn’t (and doesn’t) matter. To me, it was 1965, and every new song from Bob could not but be a dramatic revelation, a brand-spanking-new tablet carried down from the mountain.

People tend to remember fondly the pop-music they listened to during their teen years, their coming-of-age years. It’s a distorted magnifier, associating the music with their biological intensity of feeling during that time. There are those people—very many, in my perception—who essentially stop listening to popular music in any engaged fashion after that period, and it then becomes only a matter of nostalgia. Oblivious to anything else, if they happen hear a track from their youth (by Depeche Mode, the Cure, Journey, take your pick) they suddenly become enormously animated, singing along and gesturing wildly, as if everyone present ought to appreciate how wonderful that song is. [Read more →]

From section: Commentary, Dylanosophy, Faith by Sean Curnyn

Today was what is known as “Good Shepherd Sunday” in many Christian churches, the appointed psalm being Psalm 23, and the gospel from John, chapter 10. And the second reading one may have heard, from Revelation, chapter 7, has this:

For the Lamb in the midst of the throne will be their shepherd, and he will guide them to springs of living water; and God will wipe away every tear from their eyes.

It’s natural to focus on the promise of every tear being wiped away, which is that which we all long for, but the image of the Lamb being the shepherd is such a beautiful and mysterious and imponderable thing, and all the more worth pondering for that. [Read more →]

From section: Commentary, Faith, Music by Sean Curnyn

Today is Good Friday—at least for those observing the liturgical calendar followed by most Christians in the western hemisphere. It is a Christian holy day, but not a U.S. federal holiday, nor a New York State holiday, and yet, curiously, Wall Street—the New York Stock Exchange—is closed today. It’s been closed on Good Friday as a rule since its inception. Hard-nosed capitalists or no, it seems that no one has had the gumption to break that particular precedent. Well, deference to much of anything being in such short supply, I think one can only applaud it when one sees it.

My purpose today, however, is just to reflect a little on a song. I think it might be described as a Good Friday kind of song, and it’s a song I’ve grown to love, although a few months ago I had not even heard of it.

Accounts tell us that in 1872, an American Methodist minister named Lewis Hartsough wrote the lyric and the tune, during the course of a revival meeting in Iowa. The song become known by its first line: “I hear thy welcome voice.”

Yet, I’ve never heard the song sung in English, and I would guess not all that many people have.

The song was noticed not long after its first publishing by a Welsh Methodist minister named John Roberts (also known by his poetic name of Ieuan Gwyllt). He translated the song into Welsh, and I guess you could say that from there it went viral. (This being the age before antibiotics, perhaps back then they would’ve said that it went bacterial.) It quickly became a deeply beloved hymn of the Welsh, such that many presume that it has been Welsh all along. [Read more →]

From section: Commentary, Faith, Music by Sean Curnyn

Tomorrow evening marks the beginning of Passover, and today was Palm Sunday and the kick-off of Holy Week for many Christians like myself (although for those observing the Eastern Orthodox calendar, Palm Sunday will arrive very much later on April 28th). So I take this opportunity to wish happy holidays and observances to all, and may God have mercy on every one of us.

In the spirit of thinking of songs that in a certain sense span the Judeo/Christian story, I happened to think of “Wade in the Water” today. It is of-course a famous Negro spiritual, and has been performed too many times by too many people in too many variations to even begin a litany. I love the song for its mysteriousness. I guess the one fundamental observation that can be made about it is that it blends the story of the Israelites crossing the Red Sea with the Christian belief in baptism by water. The chorus (which is the one thing that is consistent amongst the many versions) goes: [Read more →]

From section: Commentary, Faith, Music by Sean Curnyn

It’s funny: I was talking about this song a few days ago to a few friends, merely spewing my enthusiasm for something I’d only really discovered relatively recently, and I turned on the CD player and played for them the version that I’m embedding at the bottom of this post; then, this morning, it turned out to be the closing (or recessional) hymn at church here in New York City. This caught me quite by surprise, and made me chuckle, and also made me think that I must be supposed to write something about it today. I had planned to write something about it anyway, but at some undetermined later juncture. Well, why put off till tomorrow, etc.? Why, indeed.

The thing is, I have very little to say about it. If ever there was a song that spoke for itself, it is this one. But there are details, and context—those things that can sharpen the appreciation for even a song that stands so squarely and strongly on its own.

It is a song from Wales. The lyric is by a great 18th century Welsh writer named William Williams, also known as Williams Pantycelyn (there being so many “Williamses” in Wales that it is necessary to give them nicknames in order to be sure that everyone receives the appropriate royalties). The song became what it is today, however, sometime around 1904/05, when the English version of the lyric was wedded to a recently-composed tune by yet another great Welshman named John Hughes; i.e. the tune titled “Cwm Rhondda,” after the Welsh valley of the same name. This was during what is known as a Great Awakening or religious revival in Wales, and one that spread (not unlike the tune) to many other quarters.

This marriage of words and music was one made in heaven, apparently, as the song became very quickly and deeply beloved of the Welsh. It has ultimately come to be known as the unofficial national anthem of Wales, and can be heard sung ceremonially at important sporting events (i.e. rugby matches).

In Wales itself, it is generally known either as “Bread of Heaven” (a line from the first verse) or as “Cwm Rhondda,” the name of the melody. Globally, it is usually referred to by the first line of the lyric, which is alternately presented as “Guide Me O Thou Great Jehovah,” or “Guide Me O Thou Great Redeemer,” or “Guide Me Ever, Great Redeemer.” [Read more →]

From section: Commentary, Faith, Music by Sean Curnyn

The final blessing of Moses on the people of Israel is presented in chapter 33 of Deuteronomy. The first part of verse 27 goes like this (ESV):

The eternal God is your dwelling place,
and underneath are the everlasting arms.

The famous American hymn “Leaning on the Everlasting Arms” was published in 1887, and was composed by two Presbyterian men, namely Anthony J. Showalter and Elisha Hoffman. It was Showalter who received the initial inspiration, writing the refrain and the melody, reportedly after reaching for the above scriptural verse to console two former students of his who had both recently lost their wives. He then asked Hoffman—a prodigious hymn-writer credited with over 2000 religious songs—if he could come up with lyrics for the verses. Naturally he could.

In looking into the history of this song, I found the text of an old book online, written by one J.H. Hall, filled with short biographies of various composers of gospel songs. It includes this passage on Elisha Hoffman:

Mr. Hoffman’s first impressions of music came from hearing the voice of sacred song in the home. His parents both had sweet voices and sang well. It was their custom, in the hour of family worship, both morning and evening, to sing one or two hymns. The children early became familiar with these hymns and learned to love them and to feel their hallowing and refining power. Their lives were marvellously influenced by this little service of song in the home. A taste for sacred music was created and developed, and song became as natural a function of the soul as breathing was a function of the body.

As natural a function of the soul as breathing is of the body: What an inspired way of thinking about the singing of these kinds of songs. It immediately reminded me of the quote highlighted in this space last week from Abraham Joshua Heschel, where he says of losing oneself to prayerful music that: “it is not an escape but a return to one’s origins.” [Read more →]

From section: Commentary, Faith, Music by Sean Curnyn

Gosh, is it time for another Heschel-related post already? It seems no one can stop me, so the answer is yes. I’ve been reading yet another of his great books, this one titled Man’s Quest For God. It is in major part a reflection on the way in which human beings reach out for God through prayer. I suppose that it easily qualifies as the most moving book on prayer I’ve read. It includes reflections on, among other things, the power and nature of words themselves, and the special nature of scriptural and liturgical words.

The paragraph I’m pulling out here, however, is in reference to that special quality of music to express that which cannot be said with words alone.

In no other act does man experience so often the disparity between the desire for expression and the means of expression as in prayer. The inadequacy of the means at our disposal appears so tangible, so tragic, that one feels it a grace to be able to give oneself up to music, to a tone, to a song, to a chant. The wave of a song carries the soul to heights which utterable meanings can never reach. Such abandonment is no escape nor an act of being unfaithful to the mind. For the world of unutterable meanings is the nursery of the soul, the cradle of all our ideas. It is not an escape but a return to one’s origins.

Naturally, I love everything about what he says and how he says it there, but consider that last sentence in particular. To give oneself up to prayer in the form of music, Heschel says, “is not an escape but a return to one’s origins.” What a wonderful way to meditate upon our origin: this idea that we have come from that same place from which music comes, and the thought that music is ultimately our true language.

People have always sought and found glimpses of the transcendent in music; this surely dates from the moment in which the first human being sang. (And certainly people have been annoyed by music since the time that the first human stomped on the floor to tell his downstairs’ neighbor to turn it down.) We might look around the world sometimes and wonder if the scientific reductionists have it right, if human beings really have no special purpose in any transcendent order, but are merely freaks of nature—nothing more than chipmunks with swollen brain cavities. But how many chipmunks (other than Alvin, maybe) sing like Ella Fitzgerald, or even like your mother or grandmother used to in the kitchen? We credit birds with song, and whales, and frogs, and the sounds they make are wonders of creation, but we humans seem to be pursuing melody and harmony on a very different level. And even if we don’t make music ourselves, we cannot resist listening to it (I deeply pity the rare soul who just never listens to music).

Yours truly spent some years without any easily definable or shall-we-say-biblical beliefs, but never shook off a belief in a God at the bottom of it all, and there’s no question that a love of music was the major reason for that. And it was purely popular music which I listened to during those years, and indeed that remains the form of music I’m happy to listen to most, hour for hour (albeit that some of it stretches the definition of “popular”). Being able to detect some shred of the transcendent in a song and performance which brought tears to my eyes for reasons that were ultimately inexpressible kept me in mind of the fact that there was, after all, a transcendence out there. Many are happy enough to concede the reality of an impersonal transcendence, but to me at least it’s always felt very personal in those moments, shot through with mercy and with hope. [Read more →]

From section: Commentary, Faith by Sean Curnyn

Below, a photo of our little mutt, Billie, posing cooperatively and carefully amidst some very breakable Christmas ornaments (recycled from a previous Christmas photo session, in case anyone remembers).

There were reports in the media earlier this year regarding a new book from Pope Benedict, the current commander-in-chief at the Vatican, titled “Jesus of Nazareth: The Infancy Narratives.” It was said that he had debunked some traditional notions regarding Christmas. One of those had to do with the specific year in which Jesus was born, to the effect that it was likely not in the year 1 AD, but rather in the year 5 or 6 BC. This fact is really nothing new (although it must have caused no end of confusion for calendar-makers back then: “Well, is he here yet or isn’t he here yet? We can’t cancel another print run!”)

The other reported-debunking was more controversial, however. It was widely broadcast just as in the following story: [Read more →]

From section: Commentary, Faith by Sean Curnyn

Happy Chanukah to Jewish friends and readers, that festival having begun yesterday evening and continuing until next Sunday. Here in New York City one can have a tangible sense of the holiday being celebrated without being Jewish, due to the make up of the population, a sense which I must assume is pretty uncommon elsewhere. It is one of the nice things about this city.

Although (judging by appearances in the stores) it seems that Christmas began sometime in October, it is still weeks away. Yet, many Christians do continue to observe at least some of the traditions of the season known as Advent, a time of anticipation of the arrival of Jesus. It encompasses roughly four weeks in advance of December 25th, today counting as the second Sunday of this year’s Advent season. I’m far from being the religious historian or theologian to attempt to fully explain the tradition, which has many rich and varied aspects, but on a very basic level I would judge its purpose is to help in nurturing and recalling a sense of longing for the Messiah. This is a strange thing, and maybe all the more worthy of cherishing for that reason. People who grow up as Christians, whether in actuality or merely nominally to one degree or another, are naturally prone to taking the birth of Jesus for granted. It’s old-hat, even. Yeah, Jesus was born, whether it was 2012 years ago or a few years earlier. But we’ve moved beyond all that now. We’ve got other problems.

Advent offers a means of stepping back and remembering why the arrival of such a Savior was something for which to yearn. Then, the celebration of His arrival can be something more than rote and something more than just a religious holiday that coincides with the zenith of the retail year. It can rather be something that gives genuine relief to souls badly in need of it.

…

Advent has its own songs. Tunes like “Jingle Bells Will Be Ringing Soon” and “Santa Claus Is Beginning to Make Plans to Travel.” But those are just the secular ones. An Advent hymn heard at church today was “On Jordan’s Banks the Baptist’s Cry.”

On Jordan’s bank the Baptist’s cry
announces that the Lord is nigh;
awake and hearken, for he brings
glad tidings of the King of kings.

Then cleansed be every breast from sin;
make straight the way for God within,
prepare we in our hearts a home
where such a mighty Guest may come.

The reference is to John the Baptist, who didn’t actually foretell the birth of Jesus (as he was a contemporary) but foretold His ministry. The Gospel reading in many churches today would have been from Luke, chapter three, and also concerned John the Baptist. It struck me in one particular way this morning. A slightly abridged version:

In the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar … the word of God came to John the son of Zechariah in the wilderness. And he went into all the region around the Jordan, proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. As it is written in the book of the words of Isaiah the prophet,

“The voice of one crying in the wilderness:
‘Prepare the way of the Lord,
make his paths straight.
Every valley shall be filled,
and every mountain and hill shall be made low,
and the crooked shall become straight,
and the rough places shall become level ways,
and all flesh shall see the salvation of God.’”

What happened to strike me this morning was this concrete example of why all Christians at least ought to be extremely dubious of anyone who claims they know how any biblical prophecy will actually be fulfilled. The evangelist Luke is indicating pretty clearly that the passage from Isaiah (chapter 40) is a foretelling of the ministry of John the Baptist. (In the Gospel of John, this same assertion is attributed to John the Baptist himself.) A Jewish exegesis of this passage would inevitably be different. But when one piece of Holy Scripture (of the New Testament) characterizes another piece of Holy Scripture (of the Old Testament) in this way, believing Christians pretty much have to take it as, well, the Gospel truth. What does it mean to accept that this prophecy was fulfilled in this very specific way?

“Every valley shall be filled, and every mountain and hill shall me made low …” Is that what John the Baptist did? It is glorious language from Isaiah, poetic and powerful and rightly stirring. Yet, on the most mundane level, what John the Baptist did was to preach repentance from sin, which was something that prophets had done often before to the people of Israel, and in his way he inspired a kind of spiritual revival amongst those who listened to him. He wasn’t saying anything so dramatically new—I don’t think—but instead was reminding people of the urgency of repentance and of following God’s law. Although very few of his words have been recorded (only those few that are in the Gospels) he was apparently very inspiring to those who heard him. Even King Herod of the time, a decadent and corrupt man by all accounts, was intrigued and compelled by things that John the Baptist preached. However, John didn’t literally fill the valleys and level the mountains. The physical geography remained unchanged. What he did was inspire people and gather followers, and when Jesus began his public ministry he found a ready audience in people who had already been following John. John was a warm-up act, one might say. Perhaps in a certain sense he did the spadework, helping to enable Jesus to work at a higher level in his own preaching. [Read more →]

From section: Commentary, Faith by Sean Curnyn

In concert lately, Leonard Cohen has been following his song “Amen” with his song “Come Healing,” which are both from his most recent album, Old Ideas.

There’s a fan’s YouTube clip embedded below, and a few thoughts from yours truly on the songs below that.

I think that “Amen” is as harrowing a song as he’s ever written. To my ears at any rate it is a deep moan to God, without sentimentality, laying out the worst of this world, begging maybe just to be able to believe it will be put right. Can God really want us, actually love us, after all of it? It’s a prayer for the evidence. [Read more →]

From section: Commentary, Faith, Music by Sean Curnyn