A Hymn for Good Friday

It is an interesting fact of history that American Christian fundamentalism developed in the late 1700s and early 1800s -- almost precisely the same time that men like William Wordsworth and Samuel Coleridge were launching the Romantic movement in English poetry. The Romantics were not particularly Christian -- if anything, they were the forerunners of today's nature lovers. But their somewhat overwrought style of writing and archaic vocabulary seeped into the hymnal, where it remains to this day. (One benefit of that is that kids brought up in the fundamentalist tradition often have an affinity for Romantic art. Another is that years of singing 19th-century hymns are the best possible preparation for the language section of the SAT.)

This piece was written by Love Humphreys Jameson in 1854 -- roughly 240 years after the John Donne poem below. According to Cyberhymnal, Jameson was a member of the Disciples of Christ who spent most of his life in Indianapolis. He was born in 1811 -- right in the heart of the Romantic revolution -- and he was the sort of person who used phrases like "ebon pinion" to mean "black wing." The topic -- Jesus' crucifixion -- is the same as Donne's poem, but thanks to the Romantic revolution, the tone, mood, and language is very different. My head tells me that I should prefer Donne, but this hymn speaks to my heart.


Night, with Ebon Pinion

Night, with ebon pinion, brooded o'er the vale;
All around was silent, save the night wind's wail,
When Christ, the Man of Sorrows,
In tears, and sweat, and blood,
Prostrate in the garden, raised His voice to God.

Smitten for offenses which were not His own,
He, for our transgressions, had to weep alone;
No friend with words to comfort,
Nor hand to help was there,
When the Meek and Lowly humbly bowed in prayer.

"Abba, Father, Father, if indeed it may,
Let this cup of anguish pass from Me, I pray;
Yet, if it must be suffered,
By Me, Thine only Son,
Abba, Father, Father, let Thy will be done."

-- Love Humphreys Jameson