Hymn of the Week: November 9, 2020

Hymn of the Week:

We Gather Together
Glory to God #336

Text Attributed to Adrianus Valerius c. 1626
Music From the Neder-landtsch Gedenck-Clanck 1626 Harmonized 1877

We Gather Together

1.
We gather together to ask the Lord’s blessing;
He chastens and hastens His will to make known;
The wicked oppressing now cease from distressing;
Sing praises to His Name; He forgets not His own.

2.
Beside us to guide us, our God with us joining,
Ordaining, maintaining His kingdom divine;
So from the beginning the fight we were winning;
Thou, Lord, were at our side, all glory be Thine!

3.
We all do extol Thee, Thou Leader triumphant,
And pray that Thou still our Defender will be;
Let Thy congregation escape tribulation;
Thy Name be ever praised! O Lord, make us free!

In anticipation of my favorite holiday, this week looks at the popular Thanksgiving Hymn, We Gather Together.

At the time the hymn was written, the Dutch were engaged in a war of national liberation against the Catholic King Philip II of Spain. "Wilt heden nu treden," "We gather together" resonated because, under the Spanish King, Dutch Protestants were forbidden to gather for worship. The hymn first appeared in print in a 1626 collection of Dutch folk and patriotic songs, Nederlandtsche Gedenck-Clanck by Adriaen Valerius. In anglophone hymnology, the tune is known as "Kremser", from Eduard Kremser's 1877 score arrangement and lyric translation of Wilt Heden Nu Treden into Latin and German. The modern English text was written by Theodore Baker in 1894. According to the Hymn Society in the United States and Canada, "We Gather Together's" first appearance in an American hymnal was in 1903. It had retained popularity among the Dutch, and when the Dutch Reformed Church in North America decided in 1937 to abandon the policy that they had brought with them to the New World in the 17th century of singing only psalms and add hymns to the

church service, "We Gather Together" was chosen as the first hymn in the first hymnal.

According to Michael Hawn, professor of sacred music at Southern Methodist University's Perkins School of Theology, "by World War I, we started to see ourselves in this hymn," and the popularity increased during World War II, when "the wicked oppressing" was understood to include Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan.[1]

This hymn is often sung at American churches the Sunday before Thanksgiving.