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The year 2017 marked the 500th anniversary of the Reformation,1 and while it is good to celebrate congregational song since the Reformation, there is also a danger, especially among Protestants, of neglecting the medieval heritage of Christianity. Often, Protestant depictions of ecclesial and liturgical history leap from the early church to the sixteenth century, ignoring or deliberately distancing present-day Protestants from the medieval period. Protestant hymnals, however, can reveal an alternative narrative. They show how the texts and tunes of medieval Christians have been sought out and sung by Protestant congregations from the early years of the Reformation up to the twenty-first century. Identifying and encouraging the singing of these medieval hymns can reclaim a connection with medieval Christians, providing Protestants with an opportunity to rediscover dimensions of Christian faith and practice that have been needlessly lost. It can also enrich ecumenical relationships and bridge divides among Protestants, and between Protestants and Catholics, as a shared history is acknowledged in all its complexity.
This paper analyzes the 59 medieval texts and 18 medieval tunes contained in three significant Protestant hymnals published in the past decade: Evangelical Lutheran Worship (ELW);2 Glory to God (GG), a Presbyterian hymnal;3 and Lift Up Your Hearts (LUYH), of the Reformed tradition.4 We first assess the contents of each hymnal and identify the medieval texts and tunes. We then analyze the corpus of medieval texts and tunes in the three volumes, identifying broad patterns in this material, including the use of medieval sources, dates and places of origin, translation history, textual themes, musical genres, and text-tune pairings. We conclude by engaging key issues related to the translation, identification, and attribution of medieval hymns, in order to explore the stories that are told by and to contemporary Christians in placing these books in pews, projecting these songs on screens, and singing the words and melodies of medieval Christians in the twenty-first century.
Hymnals
Evangelical Lutheran Worship was produced by the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America in collaboration with the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Canada. Published in 2006, it is the result of more than a decade of study and conversation, including significant collaboration with local congregations. There is an explicit effort to balance contemporary and historic material, uniting the church across time...