On Sunday, January 13, 2013, (the First Sunday after Epiphany) Peter spoke in his sermon about the powerful impression one gets from viewing the photographs taken by the Hubbell Telescope. To see what he was talking about go to http://hubblesite.org/.
The photographs are breathtaking in their beauty and give new meaning to the overworked adjective “awesome.” Peter’s point was that rather than weakening our faith in God, these extraordinary pictures give us an opportunity to observe God’s creative majesty and power. Of course, we don’t need the Hubbell Telescope to renew our faith, but it’s a wonderful opportunity to do so. In times past, long before the availability of high-tech color photography of outer space, we can see that the heavens inspired the Bible’s authors and countless later writers. And the season of Epiphany is rich with references to the stars. This month’s column calls attention to the star references in much of the music we sing during our services in this season when the night sky is so often radiant with stars and the long-lasting sunsets dazzlingly golden.
It wouldn’t be Epiphany without the guiding star that led the Three Wise Men to the stable in Bethlehem. Scientists have calculated the probability of a very bright “star” (probably a planet) that shone at the time of Christ’s birth. Others have theorized that there may have been a meteor shower as well. Whatever the astronomical cause, this event has inspired innumerable hymns and songs about a “guiding star.” William Dawson’s immortal Negro spiritual, “Behold the star up yonder” is one example. It’s not in the hymnal but often sung in Christmas concerts. No one needs a hymnal to sing the refrain from “We three kings of orient are” #128:
O star of wonder, star of night,
Star with royal beauty bright;
Westward leading, still proceeding,
Guide us to thy perfect light!
Another famous star hymn is #497 “How bright appears the Morning Star,” an English translation of the German chorale “Wie schön leuchtet der Morgenstern.” The history of this hymn is worth noting. Both the tune and the original text appeared in Philip Nicolai’s Freuden-Spiegel in 1599, but the text was probably written two years earlier. The first letters of the German stanzas form an acrostic on the name of a distinguished pupil of the author, Wilhelm Ernst, Graf und Herr zu Waldeck. The hymn was parodied in a popular love song during the course of the 17th century, but also became a favorite wedding hymn in its own right. The first English translation appeared in Lyra Davidica in 1708, followed by another in J.C. Jacobi’s Psalmodia Germanica in 1722. The tune, bearing the original German text as its name, became the central theme of J.S. Bach’s Cantata No. 1 for the Feast of the Annunciation. Bach also set it as an organ prelude along with countless other composers. The hymn we sing in Epiphany is based on Bach’s harmonization of the tune which forms the final chorus of the cantata, composed in 1740.
We can easily find star references in the psalms too. Psalm 8: 4-5, for example, is a perfect accompaniment to the photographs on the Hubbell Telescope web site:
When I consider your heavens, the work of your fingers,
The moon and the stars you have set in their courses,
What is man that you should be mindful of him?
The son of man that you should seek him out?
On the Second Sunday after Epiphany we chanted Psalm 36: 5 – 10. The opening verse again focuses us skyward:
Your love, O Lord, reaches to the heavens,
And your faithfulness to the clouds.
When I lived in Palo Alto, California, I had the honor of serving in two churches as a musician. At both St. Mark’s in Palo Alto and St. Bede’s in Menlo Park there were singers in the choir or members of the congregation who worked at the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center (SLAC) or the Stanford Radio Telescope (“the Dish”) as researchers. These were astrophysicists, astronomers, physicists, chemists and other scientists who used Stanford University’s two-mile-long atom smasher or high-powered telescope on a daily basis in their work. In fact, these facilities were directly across the street from St. Bede’s and in plain sight as one exited the church. I was amazed that these scientists, who might be stereotyped as atheists in their research, were, on the contrary, inspiringly positive on how their work strengthened and enhanced their belief in God the Creator of the cosmos.
Stars and outer space dominate the Third Sunday after Epiphany. We sing Canticle 12, “A Song of Creation.” Part I is subtitled “The Cosmic Order” and paired with it we get the best psalm of all about the heavens: Psalm 19. Here are verses 1, 2 and 5 of that psalm:
The heavens declare the glory of God, / And the firmament shows his handiwork.
One day tells its tale to another, / And one night imparts knowledge to another…
In the deep has he set a pavilion for the sun; / It comes forth like a bridegroom out of his chamber;
It rejoices like a champion to run its course.
This psalm has inspired several remarkable poems that have been turned into hymns both old and new. We open with #409 “The spacious firmament on high”. This hymn is an arrangement of one of the most famous movements in Haydn’s Creation. Its majestic words are by Joseph Addison (1672-1719). Here is part of Addison’s poem:
The spacious firmament on high,
With all the blue ethereal sky,
And spangled heavens, a shining frame,
Their great Original proclaim.
The unwearied sun from day to day
Does his Creator’s power display;
And publishes to every land
The work of an almighty hand.
A relatively new star hymn appeared for the first time in The Hymnal 1982. It’s #431 “The stars declare his glory,” a paraphrase of Psalm 19 by Timothy Dudley- Smith (b. 1926) to a lovely tune by Chicago composer Richard Proulx.
Here’s Timothy Dudley-Smith’s rendering of Psalm 19:
The stars declare his glory; the vault of heaven springs
Mute witness of the Master’s hand in all created things,
And through the silences of space their wordless music rings.
The dawn returns in splendor, the heavens burn and blaze,
The rising sun renews the race that measures all our days,
And writes in fire across the skies God’s majesty and praise.
The ultimate astronomy hymn is #459, “And have the bright immensities.” We sing it for the offertory on the Third Sunday after Epiphany. The text is by the Rev. Howard Chandler Robbins and was first printed in The Living Church on April 4, 1931, and then published in Robbins’s Way of Light in 1933. It was later included in H. Augustine Smith’s New Church Hymnal in 1937. The English composer Erik Routley reviewed the text at the time of its publication, calling it “a remarkable poem connecting the Ascension with the mysteries of interstellar space in language suggestive of the Book of Job.” The tune we use for this remarkable poem, named Halifax, is by G.F. Handel. It was taken from the aria “Ask if you damask rose be sweet,” in his oratorio, Susanna, composed in 1748. The first harmonization was composed by Winfred Douglas for the Hymnal 1940. The current Hymnal 1982 has a new, simplified harmonization by David Hurd with an unwieldy “introduction” and “interlude.” The Winfred Douglas harmonization is far better suited to the beauty and grandeur of Fr. Robbins’ poem.
Robbins certainly knew his astronomy and would have loved what we now can see revealed by the Hubbell Telescope. Here’s the poem:
And have the bright immensities received our risen Lord,
Where light years frame the Pleiades and point Orion’s sword?
Do flaming suns his footsteps trace through corridors sublime,
The Lord of interstellar space and conqueror of time?
The heaven that hides him from our sight knows neither near nor far:
An altar candle sheds its light as surely as a star;
And where his loving people meet to share the gift divine,
There stands he with unhurrying feet: there heavenly splendors shine.
May the stunning beauty of the night sky in February fill you with faith the Lord of interstellar space!
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