A Dream So Fair
Aug. 29th, 2006 01:46 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
browngirlSometimes, I wonder how much of my Christianity was fueled by my love of speculative fiction (and hence how much of my interest in the numinous is currently). Below the cut is a hymn I loved as a child, and a large part of what I loved about it was that it felt like a different universe than the one we currently live in, or, rather, felt like the story of a translation from one universe to another.
The Holy City
Text: Frederick E. Weatherly, 1892
Music: Stephen Adams alias Michael Maybrick, 1892
Last night I lay asleeping,
There came a dream so fair;
I stood in old Jerusalem
Beside the temple there.
I heard the children singing,
And ever as they sang,
Me thought the voice of angels
From heav'n in answer rang;
Me thought the voice of angels
From heav'n in answer rang.
Jerusalem! Jerusalem!
Lift up your gates and sing,
Hosanna in the highest!
Hosanna to your King!
And then methought my dream was chang'd,
The streets no longer rang,
Hush'd were the glad hosannas
The little children sang.
The sun grew dark with mystery,
The morn was cold and chill,
As the shadow of a cross arose
Upon a lonely hill,
As the shadow of a cross arose
Upon a lonely hill.
Jerusalem! Jerusalem!
Hark! how the angels sing,
Hosanna in the highest!
Hosanna to your King!
And once again the scene was chang'd,
New earth there seemed to be;
I saw the Holy City
Beside the tideless sea;
The light of God was on its streets,
The gates were open wide,
And all who would might enter,
And no one was denied.
No need of moon or stars by night,
Or sun to shine by day;
It was the new Jerusalem
That would not pass away,
It was the new Jerusalem
That would not pass away.
Jerusalem! Jerusalem!
Sing for the night is o'er,
Hosanna in the highest!
Hosanna forevermore!
When I was a kid, I'd sing this and other songs that dealt with the Second Coming/End of Days/whatnot; I'd read Revelations and envision "the whole natural universe melting away like a dream and something else-something it never entered your head to conceive-comes crashing in; something so beautiful to some of us and so terrible to others that none of us will have any choice left? For this time it will be God without disguise; something so overwhelming that it will strike either irresistible love or irresistible horror into every creature." [Quotation from C.S. Lewis's Mere Christianity, chosen because it gave me nightmares as a teenager and still gives me chills.] Looking back on my eschatological fascination, I can recognize a lot of the same feelings that I feel now when I read a post-apocalypic novel (or hear such a story, as one of the students told me today), that combination of fascinated horror and transcendence. I'm still not sure what that means about me, but it feels important.
Now that I've reread the lyrics, I find myself remembering my father's performances of this song, when I was a child, the shivers of the second verse, the exultation of the third. If my father and I got along, I might call him and tell him that. Maybe I will anyway.
The Holy City
Text: Frederick E. Weatherly, 1892
Music: Stephen Adams alias Michael Maybrick, 1892
Last night I lay asleeping,
There came a dream so fair;
I stood in old Jerusalem
Beside the temple there.
I heard the children singing,
And ever as they sang,
Me thought the voice of angels
From heav'n in answer rang;
Me thought the voice of angels
From heav'n in answer rang.
Jerusalem! Jerusalem!
Lift up your gates and sing,
Hosanna in the highest!
Hosanna to your King!
And then methought my dream was chang'd,
The streets no longer rang,
Hush'd were the glad hosannas
The little children sang.
The sun grew dark with mystery,
The morn was cold and chill,
As the shadow of a cross arose
Upon a lonely hill,
As the shadow of a cross arose
Upon a lonely hill.
Jerusalem! Jerusalem!
Hark! how the angels sing,
Hosanna in the highest!
Hosanna to your King!
And once again the scene was chang'd,
New earth there seemed to be;
I saw the Holy City
Beside the tideless sea;
The light of God was on its streets,
The gates were open wide,
And all who would might enter,
And no one was denied.
No need of moon or stars by night,
Or sun to shine by day;
It was the new Jerusalem
That would not pass away,
It was the new Jerusalem
That would not pass away.
Jerusalem! Jerusalem!
Sing for the night is o'er,
Hosanna in the highest!
Hosanna forevermore!
When I was a kid, I'd sing this and other songs that dealt with the Second Coming/End of Days/whatnot; I'd read Revelations and envision "the whole natural universe melting away like a dream and something else-something it never entered your head to conceive-comes crashing in; something so beautiful to some of us and so terrible to others that none of us will have any choice left? For this time it will be God without disguise; something so overwhelming that it will strike either irresistible love or irresistible horror into every creature." [Quotation from C.S. Lewis's Mere Christianity, chosen because it gave me nightmares as a teenager and still gives me chills.] Looking back on my eschatological fascination, I can recognize a lot of the same feelings that I feel now when I read a post-apocalypic novel (or hear such a story, as one of the students told me today), that combination of fascinated horror and transcendence. I'm still not sure what that means about me, but it feels important.
Now that I've reread the lyrics, I find myself remembering my father's performances of this song, when I was a child, the shivers of the second verse, the exultation of the third. If my father and I got along, I might call him and tell him that. Maybe I will anyway.
