How silently, how silently

“After an early dinner, we took our horses and rode to Bethlehem,” wrote Rev Philip Brooks of Philadelphia in December 1865.  “It was only about two hours when we came to the town, situated on an eastern ridge of a range of hills, surrounded by its terraced gardens. It is a good-looking town, better built than any other we have seen in Palestine...Before dark, we rode out of town to the field where they say the shepherds saw the star. It is a fenced piece of ground with a cave in it (all the Holy Places are caves here)...As we passed, the shepherds were still keeping watch over their flocks or leading them home to fold.”

Three years later, he wrote the hymn “O Little Town of Bethlehem” for the Christmas service of Holy Trinity in Boston, where he was now Bishop. After the service, it was reprinted on leaflets and sold in a little book store on Chestnut St. By 1892 it was included in America's Episcopal hymnal.

Among the usual carols sung at Christmas, this one is my favourite. It's romantic, lyrical, magical. It sounds like a song from Midsummer Night's Dream. You can see in it Bethlehem in gorgeous miniature, where mortals sleep under a canopy of spinning stars.

O little town of Bethlehem,
How still we see thee lie;
Above thy deep and dreamless sleep
The silent stars go by.
Yet in thy dark streets shineth
The everlasting Light;
The hopes and fears of all the years
Are met in thee tonight

For Christ is born of Mary,
And gathered all above,
While mortals sleep, the angels keep
Their watch of wondering love.
O morning stars together
Proclaim the holy birth,
And praises sing to God the King,
And Peace to men on earth

How silently, how silently
The wondrous gift is given!
So God imparts to human hearts
The blessings of His heaven.
No ear may hear His coming,
But in this world of sin,
Where meek souls will receive him still,
The dear Christ enters in.

O holy Child of Bethlehem,
Descend to us, we pray;
Cast out our sin and enter in,
Be born to us today.
We hear the Christmas angels
The great glad tidings tell,
O come to us, abide with us
Our Lord Emmanuel.

Light, which made the angels sing

The Sussex Carol was so called because it was recorded in Sussex in the late nineteenth century, but by the time Ralph Vaughan Williams heard it and set it to music, it was already centuries old. The first record of it was in Bishop Wadding's collection A Small Garland of Pious and Godly Songs, published in 1684, but whether he wrote it, or only wrote it down, is unknown.

On Christmas night all Christians sing,
To hear the news the angels bring,
News of great joy, news of great mirth,
News of our merciful King's birth.

Then why should men on earth be so sad,
Since our redeemer made us glad,
When from our sin he set us free,
All for to gain our liberty?

When sin departs before his grace,
Then life and health come in its place;
Angels and men with joy may sing,
All for to see the new-born king.

All out of darkness we have light,
Which made the angels sing this night:
Glory to God and peace to men,
Now and for evermore. Amen.

Corde natus ex parentis

Last year I found not a few nativity poems with which to mark the season. Rather than repeat the exercise I thought this year I would locate and share some carols. I'm intrigued by their folk-song provenance, their consonance with poetry, and above all their endurance. I'll go fossicking for their histories, and try to turn up some treasures. (“Caroling,” by the way, comes from something Greek choruses used to do, roughly equivalent to dancing in a circle. We don't quite do that at our sedate carols nights, but the impulse of communal joyousness is beautifully present.)

This is one of the world's oldest Christmas carols, written in the late fourth century by a Roman Christian, Aurelius Prudentius Clemens, a provincial governor who later served in the court of Emperor Theodosius I. This translation from 1851 renders the refrain “saeculorum saeculis” as “evermore and evermore,” but this Latin phrase from the Vulgate can also be rendered, as the Prayer Book has it, “world without end.”  I've never heard it but apparently it's still sung in some corners.

Of the Father’s love begotten,
Ere the worlds began to be,
He is Alpha and Omega,
He the source, the ending He,
Of the things that are, that have been,
And that future years shall see,
Evermore and evermore!

At His Word the worlds were framed;
He commanded; it was done:
Heaven and earth and depths of ocean
In their threefold order one;
All that grows beneath the shining
Of the moon and burning sun,
Evermore and evermore!

He is found in human fashion,
Death and sorrow here to know,
That the race of Adam’s children
Doomed by law to endless woe,
May not henceforth die and perish
In the dreadful gulf below,
Evermore and evermore!

O that birth forever blessed,
When the virgin, full of grace,
By the Holy Ghost conceiving,
Bare the Saviour of our race;
And the Babe, the world’s Redeemer,
First revealed His sacred face,
Evermore and evermore!

O ye heights of heaven adore Him;
Angel hosts, His praises sing;
Powers, dominions, bow before Him,
and extol our God and King!
Let no tongue on earth be silent,
Every voice in concert sing,
Evermore and evermore!

This is He Whom seers in old time
Chanted of with one accord;
Whom the voices of the prophets
Promised in their faithful word;
Now He shines, the long expected,
Let creation praise its Lord,
Evermore and evermore!

[...]

Christ, to Thee with God the Father,
And, O Holy Ghost, to Thee,
Hymn and chant with high thanksgiving,
And unwearied praises be:
Honour, glory, and dominion,
And eternal victory,
Evermore and evermore!

Iron and velvet

I was going to write a post about this, but you should read the article instead. It notes, as I did, the passing of two world leaders, within a day of each other, who were worlds apart. Kim Jung-il, ruler of the bleakest state on the planet, and Vaclav Havel, leader of a bright new world.

What the article didn't include, which I would have, are these quotes from Havel's speeches. The first three are from his New Year's Address to the Nation in 1990, not long after he led Czechoslovakia to post-communist democracy:

Our country, if that is what we want, can now permanently radiate love, understanding, the power of the spirit and of ideas. It is precisely this glow that we can offer as our specific contribution to international politics.

Let us teach ourselves and others that politics should be an expression of a desire to contribute to the happiness of the community rather than of a need to cheat or rape the community.

You may ask what kind of republic I dream of. Let me reply: I dream of a republic independent, free, and democratic, of a republic economically prosperous and yet socially just; in short, of a humane republic that serves the individual and that therefore holds the hope that the individual will serve it in turn. Of a republic of well-rounded people, because without such people it is impossible to solve any of our problems — human, economic, ecological, social, or political.


And this one from his speech accepting the Open Society Prize at the Central European University in 1999.

The only thing I can recommend at this stage is a sense of humor, an ability to see things in their ridiculous and absurd dimensions, to laugh at others and at ourselves, a sense of irony regarding everything that calls out for parody in this world. In other words, I can only recommend perspective and distance. Awareness of all the most dangerous kinds of vanity, both in others and in ourselves. A good mind. A modest certainty about the meaning of things. Gratitude for the gift of life and the courage to take responsibility for it. Vigilance of spirit.


If Kim Jung-un were to take his inspiration not from his own forebears but from someone like Havel, what a wonderful world that would be.