Meridian Magazine :: Topical Hymns

Topical Hymns
By Orson Scott Card

You’d think that with a few hundred hymns in the hymnbook, every aspect of the gospel would have at least one hymn about it.

But if you thought that, you’d be wrong.

There’s plenty of variety in the book, mind you. It’s just that some gospel subjects are hard to write a convincing hymn about.

(To those who learned their grammar rules from misinformed teachers: It’s perfectly acceptable in the English language to end a sentence with a preposition that functions as part of the verb. Please don’t write to me about it.)

(And to those of you who still want to write to me about it: Please do some actual research, find out that I’m right, and stop correcting people who aren’t wrong.)

For instance, it’s a core doctrine of the Church that we came to earth to get a physical body and to be tested. But how, exactly, do you write that into a hymn? One practical problem is that few useful hymn-words rhyme with body. Shoddy? Bawdy? Toddy? Or do you give up and try words with t, like naughty, haughty, or spotty? How could you make these rhymes have anything to do with the gospel? No, you have to give up on ending any line with body. But that’s begging the question. What exactly do you say about most LDS doctrines that is remotely singable?

Imagine that you’re bringing your dearest non-member friends to sacrament meeting for the first time, and when the opening hymn begins, the words are: “Genealogy! We are doing it!”

There’s a reason why that song is sung only by children: Children don’t have free agency about the choice of Primary songs, and most of the time they have no idea what they’re singing about anyway. (Ironically, in most cases the children who sing “Genealogy! We are doing it!” are being forced to fib, since as a group they are highly unlikely to be doing any original research, genealogical or otherwise.)

Gossip

There are topics that cry out for hymn-singing that are almost completely ignored. Where is the song condemning gossip?

We who would obey the Lord
And love our neighbor (as he taught)
Know well that it is deeply wrong
To pass a hurtful tale along,
When a single whisper’s done
The tale is heard by everyone.
Like poison spreading through a ward
It sickens all. O gossip not!

There is so much wrong with this “hymn” that it’s almost not worth listing the errors, but part of the problem is the use of unhymnlike words. Gossip and ward, though they are polite words whose meaning, within the Church, at least, is clear, are too specific to feel right in a hymn.

But even if the diction in my example had been right, we just don’t sing hymns that condemn specific sins.

For instance, the one hymn that is explicitly about gossip — “Nay, Speak No Ill” — is almost never sung. (I would have said never, but then thirty people would have written to me that in their ward it was sung just last week.)

Do you even recognize these lines? “Full oft a better seed is sown / By choosing thus the kinder plan, / For, if but little good is known, / Still let us speak the best we can.”

We don’t sing this hymn very often precisely because it’s too direct, too “on the nose.” Besides which, it goes too far. It’s one thing to condemn gossip; quite another to urge people never to be the first to point out someone’s fault.

(Besides which, it’s hard to enjoy singing archaic words like “fain” and “efface,” not to mention “nay”; the tone is too arch to inspire us.)

Other anti-gossip hymns are less direct, and if they’re too preachy to be effective, they are also relentlessly positive. “Let Us Oft Speak Kind Words” encourages kind speech rather than condemning harshness or criticism.

“Truth Reflects Upon Our Senses,” which repeats the Savior’s parable of the mote and the beam, comes as close as any hymn to condemning criticism. But how awkwardly it does it: It’s so convoluted that by the end, half the congregation has no idea what they just sang.

It may be that an effective hymn about gossip simply can’t be written. Still, there are some commandments so important that they ought to have hymns.

Tithing

Right, that’s what we need — a hymn that tells us:

Now, before thy money’s spent,
Set aside that ten percent.
On gross increase be it set;
Base it not upon the net.

The secret to writing a good hymn about tithing is to avoid a flat-out statement of the specific commandment, but instead focus on the intent or the result of the law. With tithing, what are the intent and the result?

As a writing teacher, I long ago learned that if I use a rigorous screening process, admitting only the most talented applicants to my class, I usually end up with a miserable bunch of students. Why? Because they aren’t joining the class to learn, they’re joining the class because it’s the prize they get for “winning” the competition to get in. All they want is validation.

If I give no talent test at all, but merely charge a ridiculously high price, I invariably end up with a class that is hardworking, willing to learn and change, so it’s worth taking the time to teach them. Why? Because they are making a sacrifice to get into the class, and now they’re going to work hard and learn and change, because if they don’t, they wasted their money and time.

Likewise, if all it took to be a Latter-day Saint was to say you believe and then show outward signs of piety, it would be much easier to be a member — but being a member wouldn’t mean as much, and we would accomplish far less as a people.

Instead, we are required to make a serious financial commitment in order to be a member in good enough standing that we can go to the temple.

So the doctrine of tithing results in sacrifice, about commitment, and is based on the debt we owe the Lord and on the principle of consecration.

“How Generous the Lord”
by Orson Scott Card

How generous the Lord:
The fullness of Earth
Is enough and to spare.
Take heed of his word:
Discover its worth
By returning a share.

The Earth is the Lord’s,
Created for us
To replenish and tend:
Make plows out of swords,
Turn gold into trust,
Turn a foe to a friend.

The treasures and towers
We own while we live
Will be lost in a breath,
For nothing is ours
Except what we give
Out of love, out of faith.

This hymn is definitely about tithes and offerings, as a part of how we repay our great debt to our Father in heaven. But instead of referring to money or wealth, the hymn refers to “treasures and towers / we own while we live,” and even those are mentioned only to affirm that we can’t take them with us when we die.

Tithing, thus, is cast, not as a check we make out to the Church and hand to the bishop, but as a “share” that we return to the Lord, or something we “give / out of love, out of faith.”

The middle stanza, in fact, is not about tithing at all. Instead, it speaks of the righteous use of the gifts we are given by God in our mortality. The Earth belongs to the Lord; we must replenish and tend it. To serve God, we beat swords into ploughshares and try to “turn a foe to a friend.”

The only tithing reference in the second stanza is very oblique, when we sing of turning gold into trust — changing our covetousness toward our own money into a commitment to the Church that is so firm that the Lord — and his servants — can trust us to make the sacrifices that church callings and responsibilities require.

My only misgiving about the meaning of the hymn is that these three stanzas end with a reference to how we lose all our possessions at death — which is true, but not a cheery way to end a hymn that means to be positive. So as I was writing this column, I composed an additional verse:

His gifts are a trust:
The goods we have earned
Are not ours to hold.
These treasures that rust,
When shared, can be turned
Into heavenly gold.

This is a much more upbeat ending. The trouble is that I duplicate a rhyme-word from the second stanza — trust. This is a weakness. So if I were to include this fourth stanza, I would probably need to revise the second one to avoid the repetition of that rhyme word.

However it ends, this is a tithing hymn that never overtly mentions tithing. It’s stronger and more effective precisely because of it.

As a hymn text, it offers a few challenges to the composer. For one thing, the six lines of each stanza are rhymed in threes: ABCABC. This forces the composer to work without the safety net of a structure based on fours.

Another difficulty the composer will face is that the final metrical foot of the first line in each stanza is a single syllable — Lord, Lord’s — until we get to the last verse, when suddenly it has two syllables — towers.

This is fine if the composer has given “Lord” and “Lord’s” two notes each, like the first syllable, “gen” in “Gently raise the sacred strain.” With two notes for “Lord,” there would be two notes available for “towers.” But if there’s only one note, there’s little choice but to say the word as “tow’rs” instead of towers.

As with “heaven”, “tower” is a word that can be sung on one note or two. But we don’t like singing “heav’n.” That’s not the real word and we know it.

That extra fourth stanza’s third line, “Are not ours to hold,” would naturally be accented with the stress on ours: “Are not ours to hold.” But to fit with the pattern of the other stanzas, the musical stress would have to be: “Are not ours to hold.”

This does not change the meaning; the real problem is that if quick notes have been used for the unstressed syllables, the words “ours to” may be too difficult to say, because the retroflex r in ours can function as a third vowel in the diphthong. That’s a lot of sound to pack into a brief note. If this stanza is used, the composer will need to make sure there’s time enough on those notes to make all those sounds.

Welfare

Singing about picking cherries or weeding sweet potatoes on the welfare farm might be fun, but the resulting song is highly unlikely to be appreciated in sacrament meeting.

Instead, the hymn should be about the reasons or results. It is our responsibility to take care of each other’s material needs — to share.

“Let No Hands Be Idle Here”
by Orson Scott Card

Let no hands be idle here.
Let no heart be filled with fear.
Let no child uncared-for be.
Where the need is, O let me!

Leave no broken heart alone.
Leave no lonely soul unknown.
Lead all wanderers to Thee.
Where the need is, O let me!

Set the world’s desires aside.
Set all sail against the tide.
Set the weeping captive free.
Where the need is, O let me!

Give the beggar what he asks.
Give the willing worker tasks.
Give to all unstintingly.

Where the need is, O let me!
We are part of Lehi’s dream.
Hold the rod beside the stream.
Taste the fruit upon the tree:
Love of God, so sweet to me!

Note that the work-for-food principle — a cornerstone of the Church’s welfare program — is included by the line “Let no hands be idle here.” The principle of self-reliance is even included in the recurring line, “O let me!” The idea is that, if we can, we provide for each other whatever is needed — a helping hand, a meal, money to a beggar, freedom for a captive — but to the willing worker, we give tasks.

So the broadest principles of welfare are included in this hymn — even in the anomalous final stanza, which not only breaks the “O let me” pattern, but seems to have changed the subject entirely. How did we suddenly get from the generalities of the first four stanzas to a specific mention of a specific prophet and his particular vision?

In this case, the congregation is metaphorically being included in a familiar vision. If they hold to the rod (the word of God) they can in time taste the sweet fruit of the love of God, which, in the vision, really does grow on trees.

Ultimately, the poem is about our individual responsibility to help others in need; it is only obliquely about the welfare program, rather the way Newell Dayley’s words to “Faith in Every Footstep” were only obliquely about the early plains-crossing pioneers.

Five stanzas, though, are too many for the hymnbook. If published there, this hymn would ordinarily have one or even two stanzas dropped entirely or included as words alone, after the music. (Elder McConkie’s eight-stanza “I Believe in Christ” got around this by repeating the melody twice, virtually unchanged, so that each “stanza” is really two stanzas.)

Which of these stanzas should be dropped? I would propose that the third stanza is the least essential. The metaphor of sailing against the tide is undeveloped; the “weeping captive” is not really part of the Church’s welfare program. I believe it belongs in the hymn, ideally; but in practical terms, it’s the one that would be least missed.

The more obvious choice would be to delete that final stanza. But that would be a mistake, because the differences between it and all the other stanzas actually serve to provide a stronger closure for the hymn.

Genealogy

It’s time for me to accept the challenge I set out at the beginning, when I pointed out how inappropriate “Genealogy! We are doing it!” would be in sacrament meeting, sung by adults.

The key, once again, is to focus on the reason for doing genealogy, and the result. Genealogy is not an end in itself; its purpose is to offer saving ordinances to those who have died before us. It is an act of love toward ancestors we may never have met. Pedigree charts and family group sheets have no place in a hymn, but our feelings toward our forebears can be sung about:

“Honor Them”
by Orson Scott Card

Those who taught us as we grew,
Beloved ones no longer here,
Brought us farther than they knew,
So heaven’s light is bright and clear.

Chorus
Honor them: They did their part.
So great their gifts! So few their claims!
Hold them dear in home and heart;
In temples, let us bless their names.

Like the links that form a chain,
Each generation lifts the rest.
Which was first these gifts to gain?
Before and after, all are blessed.

Those who lived before our day
Still shape our lives in all we do.
Here is how we can repay:
We’ll raise our children strong and true.

What makes this hymn work (if it does) is that it takes in a wider set of tasks than merely doing genealogy. It calls for us to honor our forebears not only by finding the “links that form a chain,” but also by speaking about them in our homes and by raising our children to continue in the path of righteousness.

Many people, however, have ancestors — or closer relatives — who were not good people, deserving of honor. How would an abused child feel, singing this hymn?

I kept this in mind while I was writing the text. First, though, let’s remember the principle once articulated by Elder Boyd K. Packer, when he was responding to critics who thought the Brethren should not stress commandments in a way that would hurt the feelings of those who had broken them.

Elder Packer answered that in the Church, we must teach the general rules so that everyone knows that this is what we aspire to; and then, individually, we must be compassionate to those who have not yet found a way to achieve those aspirations.

This came home to me recently when some parents complained about a program that taught young children to aspire to a temple marriage. The complaint came from parents in part-member families or parents who had not gone to the temple. “You’re teaching our children to consider our own marriage as less than perfect.”

The uncharitable response to that is, of course, “Duh.” Of course the Church is teaching children to aspire to marry in the temple — especially those who come from a family that did not do so. Instead of complaining that the teaching of temple marriage should be abolished, just to avoid hurting their feelings, those parents should be embracing the program and affirming to their children, “Yes, we did not follow that pattern when we married, and we still have a good and happy family. But raising your children in righteousness will be easier if you have made those temple covenants before you bring them into the world.”

Sometimes, in other words, you just have to swallow hard and accept the fact that the whole Church cannot be expected to give up teaching core commandments just because you did not follow them and it causes you discomfort to be reminded of the fact.

Still, I can imagine that a hymn that relentlessly praised our forebears could be unpleasant for someone whose heritage includes an abusive relative. And, ultimately, it would be perceived by everyone as false — nobody’s genealogy includes only ancestors who lived worthy of celestial glory.

So in writing the hymn, I made sure that the hymn is not all-inclusive — that is, there is room to interpret the hymn as referring to righteous ancestors, the ones who taught us as we grew (instead of harming us); the ones who are beloved in memory, not the ones who were feared and resented in life.

The final verse is deliberately ambiguous: Those who lived before our day still shape our lives, even if they do so negatively. So if you read that stanza as an abused child, you can still sing it: We repay a wicked parent by raising our own children in love and righteousness.

Reading the Scriptures

There are already hymns urging us to read the scriptures, like, for instance, “Thy Holy Word,” hymn 279. This is a good hymn text, with each stanza treating a different reason for or result of reading the scriptures: Hearing the word of God taught to us; reading and pondering it ourselves; preaching it as missionaries; and finally a prayer for the Lord to help us live by his word.

But just because there’s already one hymn about reading scriptures doesn’t mean there isn’t room for another.

“Thy Word”
by Orson Scott Card

When in the dark of night
I lose my way,
Thy word, O Lord, is light
And night is day.

When in the icy storm
My heart is cold,
Thy word, O Lord, is warm,
Thine arms enfold.

When hope is driven out
By worldly lies,
O save me, Lord, from doubt:
Thy word is wise.

When I must hide my face
In guilt and shame,
Thy word, O Lord, is grace,
And peace thy name.

And when to those who seek
My steps are led,
O give me words to speak
And they’ll be fed.

Again, this is a five-stanza hymn; the expendable one is, once again, the middle stanza. Why? Because this is the one with the unredeemably awkward phrase “worldly lies.” While it’s true that the world is full of lies, and the antidote is the word of God, the tone of this verse is somewhat accusatory and negative. It is also a little too “on the nose” — better to stick with the vagueness of metaphors like “the dark of night,” “the icy storm,” and hiding one’s face in shame.

I’ve shown three examples of “topical hymns,” but of course there are many doctrines and commandments that still lack good hymns. The Word of Wisdom, for instance, consisting as it does of highly specific prohibitions, is very hard to hymn about.

And how can you write a hymn encouraging church attendance, especially since the people who most need the message are, by definition, not there to sing it?

Above all, we still have that crying need for hymns that encourage us not to gossip — because that remains one of the cruelest, most damaging forces that disrupt our religious lives in the tiny villages where we, as Latter-day Saints, spend so much of our lives: our wards and branches.

Many helpful hymns remain to be written. Which is actually encouraging to those of us who spend serious amounts of time writing hymns. The hymnal is never a finished book.

Post your comments — but not your own hymn texts, unless you wish to surrender copyright! — here on Meridian. And don’t send hymn texts to me! I’m not a music publisher.

However, if you’re a composer and wish to set one of my hymns to music, don’t ask for my permission first. I hereby grant you permission to use my hymn text free of charge in your own musical setting, as long as you don’t publish or sell the result.

In other words, you can perform your hymn as much as you want. But the moment you want to publish it or record it or charge for it, then we need to talk — I’ll need to hear your hymn and decide if I approve of it before you can publish, record, or charge for the combined work. I can be reached at http://www.nauvoo.com or http://www.hatrack.com.

And if I deny permission, then you can simply write your own words to fit the music you wrote. You won’t lose a thing.