Not for tongues of heaven’s angels

with
BRIDGEGROOM
COMFORT

I. Origins

This hymn by British writer Timothy Dudley-Smith, a metrical paraphrase of 1 Corinthians 13, was made at the request of a Catholic hymnal compiler. The author provided his own account of the request:

In 1984 Bob Batastini of GIA talked with me following a hymn festival during the Hymn Society of America Conference at Elmhurst, Illinois. The collection Worship III was in preparation, and he was looking for a new text to Peter Cutts’ tune BRIDEGROOM, usually set to Emma Bevan’s “As the bridegroom to his chosen” (a paraphrase of a fourteenth-century original), for which it was originally written. I do not now recall if he or I proposed the theme of 1 Corinthians 13, but the final shape of the text was the result of correspondence with GIA, Hope Publishing, Derek Kidner, and Peter Cutts himself. This suggested the plural of the final line (originally “May love be mine . . .”) and the recasting of the final verse to a form closer to the meaning of 1 Corinthians 13:13.[1]

Dudley-Smith wrote the text, as was often his custom, while at his summer home in Ruan Minor, Cornwall, in August 1984. In the intervening period between the composition of the hymn text and its publication in Worship, 3rd Ed. (1986), the BBC held a hymn festival, for which they put out a general call for new hymns, and their choices were compiled into a small collection, New Songs of Praise 1 (1985), edited by Noël Tredinnick. In the introduction to that collection, Stephen Whittle explained the process:

We thought it would be an interesting idea to mount a Songs of Praise Festival in 1985, which would celebrate the best of hymnody both ancient and modern. The first part would be based on the ten most popular hymns as chosen by our viewers; the second on new material specially written for the programme and judged by a distinguished panel of church musicians, representing a wide range of musical traditions and reflecting the best of modern material. . . . There were three categories: new words for existing tunes, new words and music, and new children’s hymns and songs. We suggested four themes: the Spirit, Peace, the Beatitudes, and Love. There were over 500 entries and in general the standard was very high.

This hymn was one of fifteen chosen by that process, thus fulfilling the needs of both the BBC and the new Catholic hymnal. It was first printed in New Songs of Praise 1 (1985 | Fig. 1) with its intended tune, BRIDEGROOM, by Peter Cutts.

The tune by Cutts was first printed in 100 Hymns for Today (1969), a supplement for Hymns Ancient & Modern, originally paired with “As the bridegroom to his chosen,” by Emma Frances Bevan (1827–1909)—thus the tune name. Bevan’s text is a paraphrase of an unspecified hymn by Johannes Tauler (1300–1361), as printed in Three Friends of God: Records from the Lives of John Tauler, Nicholas of Basle, Henry Suso (1887).

As intended, Dudley-Smith’s hymn was thereafter included in Worship, 3rd Ed. (1986), with the tune by Cutts.

A couple of years later, when GIA included the hymn in a new hymnal, Gather (1988), which was intended for a more contemporary audience, they used a new tune, COMFORT, by Michael Joncas.

In printings of the song by Catholic publisher OCP, the text is usually paired with a tune by Daniel Schutte, from United As One (1993) and Drawn by a Dream (1993). Other hymnals and songbooks use a tune by Roy Hopp, a Reformed composer-musician in Grand Rapids, Michigan, from Songs of Rejoicing (1989). The editors of Sing! A New Creation: Leader’s Edition (2002), offered a bit of background on the latter:

Hopp composed this tune in 1988, choosing the tune name REINLYN to honor his parents, Reinhold and Evelyn, by “wedding” their names into one word.[2]

In Timothy Dudley-Smith’s own published collections, the hymn text was included in Songs of Deliverance (1988) and A House of Praise (2003), both with commentary.

II. Analysis

In terms of the hymn’s correspondence to its model text, 1 Corinthians 13, the first stanza is a succinct summary of verses 1–3; the second and third stanzas, much like the original, proceed as a list, attempting to cover verses 4–7, at first using positive language, then restrictive. The final stanza, with much territory to cover, condenses verses 8–10 into a simple statement, “this world is fading,” skips 11, then places the context of 12 into the eschatological framework of what it means to be face to face and to understand fully, that is, on the other side of eternity. In a way, the author’s refrain, “May love be ours, O Lord,” takes the final statement of the chapter and turns it into a prayer. In the process of trying to distill the Bible text into metrical poetry, the author was aided somewhat by the decision to structure the rhyme scheme as abcbd, meaning only two of the five lines had to rhyme.

American church musician and editor John F. Wilson summarized both the hymn and its antecedent:

In this paraphrase of that great “love chapter,” a human yearning is expressed for the love that is greater than supernatural gifts of speech or great intellectual brilliance. Although these are marvelous God-given gifts, they soon shall fade and pass away.[3]

Although the hymn and its related Scripture passage are often used at weddings, Lutheran professor Carl Fickenscher cautioned worshipers to observe the original meaning and context:

The hymn’s placement in the “Sanctification” section of [The Lutheran Service Book, 2006] rather than in the “Marriage” section announces that Dudley-Smith has explicated Paul’s text more faithfully, for the “love chapter” is, of course, not about romantic love. Falling as it does in the middle of Paul’s discussion of spiritual gifts (1 Corinthians 12–14), its clear purpose is to ensure that all gifts to the Church be used for the good of the whole Church—in love toward other believers, not selfishly in a manner that exalts the individual. . . .

Dudley-Smith is actually taking permissible liberties with Paul’s language, inasmuch as the apostle is not speaking of love when he directs the Corinthians “earnestly [to] desire the higher gifts” (12:31a). Paul is instead referring to spiritual gifts, such as prophecy being higher than tongues (14:1–3): love is a way to use spiritual gifts that is more excellent than the Corinthians’ self-serving exaltation of tongues. . . .

It is in the final stanza that Dudley-Smith adds his boldest extrapolation. He aptly summarizes verses 8 through 12 by writing that every day of our age is “the day this world is fading”; what is already dim as in a mirror will disappear entirely. . . . When faith and hope have indeed become unnecessary, love, as the greatest of these, will remain. It will be the characteristic that defines eternity.[4]

by CHRIS FENNER
for Hymnology Archive
7 January 2022

Footnotes:

1. Timothy Dudley-Smith, “Not for tongues of heaven’s angels,” A House of Praise (2003), p. 404.

2. Sing! A New Creation: Leader’s Edition (Grand Rapids: CRC, 2002), no. 275.

3. John F. Wilson, “Not for tongues of heaven’s angels,” The Worshiping Church: Worship Leaders Ed. (Carol Stream, IL: Hope, 1990), no. 597.

4. Carl Fickenscher, “Not for tongues of heaven’s angels,” Lutheran Service Book Companion to the Hymns (2019), pp. 937–938.

Related Resources:

Timothy Dudley-Smith, “Not for tongues of heaven’s angels,” Songs of Deliverance (Carol Stream, IL: Hope, 1988), pp. 25, 48–49.

LindaJo H. McKim, “Not for tongues of heaven’s angels,” The Presbyterian Hymnal Companion (Louisville: Westminster/John Knox, 1993), p. 359.

Timothy Dudley-Smith, “Not for tongues of heaven’s angels,” A House of Praise (Carol Stream, IL: Hope, 2003), pp. 403–404.

Carl Fickenscher, “Not for tongues of heaven’s angels,” Lutheran Service Book Companion to the Hymns (St. Louis: Concordia, 2019), pp. 937–939.