View source for Our God, Our Help in Ages Past

{{short description|Christian hymn by Isaac Watts}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=June 2021}}
{{Infobox musical composition
| name                = Oh God, Our Help in Ages Past
| type                =
| image               = Isaac Watts from NPG.jpg
| alt                 =
| caption             = [[Isaac Watts]] in 1705
| translation         = <!-- to English, if hymn name is a different language -->
| native_name         = <!-- if hymn name is the translation -->
| native_name_lang    = <!-- two-letter code -->
| composer            =
| genre               = [[Hymn]]
| occasion            =
| text                = [[Isaac Watts]]
| language            =
| written             = 1708
| based_on            = {{Sourcetext|source=Bible|version=King James|book=Psalm|chapter=90}}
| meter               = 8.6.8.6 ([[Common metre|C.M.]])
| melody              = "St. Anne" by [[William Croft]]
| composed            = <!-- {{Timeline-event|date={{Start date|YYYY|MM|DD|df=y}}|end_date={{End date|YYYY|MM|DD|df=y}}|location=}} -->
| published           =
| misc                =
}}
"'''Our God, Our Help in Ages Past'''" (or "'''O God, Our Help in Ages Past'''") is a hymn by [[Isaac Watts]] in 1708 that [[paraphrase]]s [[Psalm 90|the 90th Psalm]] of the [[Book of Psalms]]. It originally consisted of nine stanzas; however, in present usage the fourth, sixth, and eighth stanzas are commonly omitted to leave a total of six (Methodist [[hymn book]]s also include the original sixth stanza to leave a total of seven)
==History==
The hymn was originally part of ''The Psalms of David Imitated in the Language of the New Testament'', published by Watts in 1719. In this book he paraphrased in Christian [[verse (poetry)|verse]] the entire [[psalter]] with the exception of twelve Psalms which he felt were unsuited for Christian usage. In 1738, [[John Wesley]] in his hymnal, ''A Collection of Psalms and Hymns'', changed the first line of the text from "Our God" to "O God". Both Watts' original text and Wesley's rewording remain in current use.
The hymn is often sung as part of the [[Remembrance Day]] service in Canada and on similar occasions in the United Kingdom, including at the annual Remembrance Sunday service at [[the Cenotaph]] in London.
The [[hymn tune]] "St. Anne" ([[common metre]] 86.86) to which the text is most often sung was composed by [[William Croft]] in 1708 whilst he was the organist of [[St Anne's Church, Soho]]: hence the name of the tune. It first appeared anonymously in the ''Supplement to the New Version of the Psalms, 6th edition'' in 1708. It was originally intended to be used with a version of [[Psalm 62]]. It was not until sometime later when set to Watts' text that the tune gained recognition.
[[File:William Croft from NPG.jpg|thumb|[[William Croft]] as a choirboy, circa 1690. [[National Portrait Gallery, London]].]]
Later composers subsequently incorporated the tune in their own works. For example, [[George Handel]] used the tune in an anthem entitled, "O Praise the Lord". [[J. S. Bach]]'s Fugue in E-flat major [[BWV]] 552 is often called the "St. Anne" in the English-speaking world, because of the similarity of its subject to the first line of the hymn tune, though there is some debate as to whether Bach used the actual tune after hearing it, or coincidentally created himself the very similar tune used as the fugal theme. Young Bach's inspirator and mentor [[Dieterich Buxtehude]], church administrator and organist of St Mary's in [[Lübeck]] in north Germany, used the same first line of the hymn tune as theme for the (first) fugue of his Praeludium-pedaliter in E major for organ.
{{listen|filename=Prelude and Fugue in E-flat major BWV 552 (fugue).ogg|title=J.S. Bach, Prelude and Fugue in E-flat major – Fugue|description=|format=[[ogg]]}}
[[Arthur Sullivan]] uses the tune in the first and last sections of his ''[[Festival Te Deum]]'', first in a relatively standard setting, but eventually pairing it with a military march accompaniment. The American composer [[Carl Ruggles]] (1876–1971) used the text in his last composition, "Exaltation" (for Brass, Chorus, and Organ) in 1958, in memory of his wife Charlotte who had died the previous year. The hymn and words are also featured in [[Vaughan Williams]]'s anthem "Lord, thou hast been our refuge", using both the ''[[Book of Common Prayer]]''{{'s}} words and those of Watts. [[Colin Smith (religious and hymnodist)|Brother Colin Smith]] also arranged a setting of this hymn.<ref name="apmn.org.au">{{cite web|url=http://www.apmn.org.au/donrita-reefman.html|title=apmn - Donrita Reefman|website=Apmn.org.au|access-date=28 July 2018}}</ref>
==Lyrics==
In modern hymnals, some stanzas are omitted, for example as in ''[[The New English Hymnal]]'':<ref>{{cite web |title=O God, Our Help in Ages Past › Representative Texts |url=https://hymnary.org/text/our_god_our_help_in_ages_past_watts/fulltexts |website=hymnary.org |access-date=29 April 2020 |language=en}}</ref>
<poem>
1 O God, our help in ages past,
Our hope for years to come,
Our shelter from the stormy blast,
And our eternal home;
2 Under the shadow of thy throne
Thy saints have dwelt secure;
Sufficient is thine arm alone,
And our defence is sure.
3 Before the hills in order stood,
Or earth received her frame,
From everlasting thou art God,
To endless years the same.
4 A thousand ages in thy sight
Are like an evening gone,
Short as the watch that ends the night
Before the rising sun.
5 Time, like an ever-rolling stream,
Bears all its sons away;
They fly forgotten, as a dream
Dies at the opening day.
6 O God, our help in ages past,
Our hope for years to come,
Be thou our guard while troubles last,
And our eternal home.
</poem>
==Notable uses==
* 14 April 1912 – according to passenger [[Archibald Gracie IV]], it was the last hymn sung at a church service presided over by Captain [[Edward Smith (sea captain)|Edward John Smith]] on the morning before the RMS ''[[Titanic]]'' sank.<ref>{{cite web |title=Our God, Our Help in Ages Past |url=https://www.encyclopedia-titanica.org/godhelp.html |website=Encyclopedia Titanica |access-date=29 April 2020 |language=en |date=12 October 2005}}</ref>
* The hymn is included in "the Traditional Music" of the [[National Service of Remembrance]], whose programme of music was finalised in 1930.<ref name=richards>[https://books.google.com/books?id=zSJ7zXkBc3MC&pg=PA155 Jeffrey Richards, ''Imperialism and Music: Britain 1876–1953'', Manchester University Press 2001], {{ISBN|0-7190-4506-1}} (pp. 155–156)</ref>
* 1941 – on board {{HMS|Prince of Wales|53|6}} at a religious service attended by [[Winston Churchill]] and [[Franklin Delano Roosevelt]] as part of the conference creating the [[Atlantic Charter]].<ref>{{cite web | url = http://www.ohinemuri.org.nz/journal/07/wg_parker.htm | first = WG | last = Parker | title = An Historical link with 1941 – World War II | access-date = 2008-08-17 | url-status = dead | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20110822234503/http://www.ohinemuri.org.nz/journal/07/wg_parker.htm | archive-date = 22 August 2011}}</ref>
* May 1942 – Elizabeth Goudge quotes the line "A thousand ages in Thy sight are as an evening gone" in a vignette of the London Blitz, when a husband and wife, remembering their life together, are killed during an air-raid in her war-time novel ''The Castle on the Hill'' (Chapter X, Part II, p 207)
* [[H. G. Wells]] quotes the seventh stanza of the hymn in the first chapter – "The End Closes in upon Mind" – of the last of the 146 books he published during his lifetime, the bleak ''[[Mind at the End of its Tether]]'' (1945), and adds his own comment: "But hitherto other sons have appeared, and now only does life pass plainly into a phase of complete finality, so that one can apprehend and anticipate its end."
*[[Bing Crosby]] included the hymn in his album ''[[Beloved Hymns]]'' (1951).
* It was sung at the funeral of [[Winston Churchill]].
* It is the University Anthem of the [[University of California, Berkeley]].
* It is the College song for [[St. Stephen's College, Delhi]].
*It is also the School hymn for [[King Edward VI School, Southampton]], which Isaac Watts himself attended, and the peal of the [[Civic Centre, Southampton|Southampton Civic Centre]] clock tower.
*[[Alan Hovhaness]] set the text to new music in his choral & organ work ''O God our help in ages past''.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Alan Hovhaness List of Works by Opus Number |url=https://www.hovhaness.com/hovhaness_works.html |access-date=2022-10-30 |website=www.hovhaness.com}}</ref>
* The hymn tune is employed prominently in [[John Addison]]'s [[Academy Award for Best Original Score#1960s|Academy Award-winning]] score for the 1963 movie ''[[Tom Jones (1963 film)|Tom Jones]]''.
* Its fourth stanza appears at the beginning of [[Gene Wolfe]]'s ''[[The Shadow of the Torturer]]''.
* In [[Evelyn Waugh]]'s ''[[Decline and Fall]]'' the prisoners communicate the death of Prendergast, bypassing a rule of silence by amending the words of the hymn in chapel.<ref>''The picturesque prison: Evelyn Waugh and his writing'', Jeffrey M. Heath</ref>
* The stanza beginning "Time, like an ever rolling stream" is quoted word-for-word in the first lines of "Bath" on [[The Divine Comedy (band)|The Divine Comedy]]'s album [[Promenade (The Divine Comedy album)|Promenade]].
* On 10 November 1986 it was sung at the launch meeting of [[Ulster loyalism|Ulster loyalist]] paramilitary group [[Ulster Resistance]], a gathering of over 2,000 people at [[Ulster Hall]], [[Belfast]], where the hymn was described as "Ulster's battle hymn".<ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2017/jun/27/troubled-past-the-paramilitary-connection-that-still-haunts-the-dup |title=Troubled past: the paramilitary connection that still haunts the DUP |last=Cobain |first=Ian|author-link=Ian Cobain|date=27 June 2017|website=[[theguardian.com]] |access-date=27 June 2017}}</ref>
* This hymn was also the only hymn sung at the 8th president, Martin Van Buren's funeral in Kinderhook, New York.
==References==
{{reflist|colwidth=30em}}
==External links==
{{wikisource}}
* [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2wMrRF_2TTs "O God, Our Help in Ages Past"] (arr. [[Stephen Cleobury|Cleobury]]) performed by [[Choir of King's College, Cambridge|King's College Choir]]
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{{Hymns and songs based on Psalms}}
[[Category:English Christian hymns]]
[[Category:18th-century Christian texts]]
[[Category:Hymns by Isaac Watts]]
[[Category:1719 compositions]]
[[Category:18th-century hymns]]
[[Category:Psalm settings]]
[[Category:Hymns in The New English Hymnal]]