Take Up Thy Cross, The Saviour Said

"Take Up Thy Cross, The Saviour Said" is an American Christian hymn written by Charles W. Everest. It was originally a poem published in 1833 but was later altered to become a hymn.[1] It was then edited by English hymnwriter Sir Henry Baker for inclusion in the Church of England's Hymns Ancient and Modern hymnal.[2]

Take Up Thy Cross, The Saviour Said
by Charles W. Everest
GenreHymn
Written1833
Based onMatthew 16:24
Meter8.8.8.8
Melody"Breslau", "Quebec" by Sir Henry Baker
Jesus carrying the cross

History

"Take Up Thy Cross, The Saviour Said" was written by American clergyman Charles William Everest (1814–1877) and was included in the Episcopal Watchman magazine titled "Visions of Death" in 1833. It was published in the United Kingdom a year later in The Tract magazine.[3] It was first published as a hymn in the Union Sabbath-School Hymns hymnal in 1835.[4] This hymn version of the poem later went back to the United Kingdom where it was published with alterations in the Salisbury Hymn Book in 1857. "Take Up Thy Cross, The Saviour Said" was eventually included in the Church of England's Hymns Ancient and Modern, being one of only two American hymns to make it into the first edition of the hymnal in 1861 (the other was "Thou Art The Way" by George Washington Doane).[2] During editing of "Hymns Ancient and Modern", the editor Henry Baker made a number of alterations and added an extra verse to the hymn before inclusion. As a result, a majority of Baker's alterations continued to be used as the hymn crossed denominations including into the Methodist Church's United Methodist Hymnal.[5]

Analysis

"Take Up Thy Cross, The Saviour Said" was written based upon Mark 8:34 where Jesus said "Whosoe'er will come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me".[2] It has been viewed as a "young man's hymn" because of vagueness in the wording.[2] The hymn has commonly been used on Good Friday.[6]

Music

A widely used tune is Breslau, a 15th-century German folk melody. Felix Mendelssohn wrote a choral arrangement of the tune for his 1836 oratorio, St Paul, and this harmony, or simplified versions of it, are frequently used.[2]

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References
  1. "Charles William Everest". Hymnary.org. Retrieved 2017-03-16.
  2. Watson, J.R. (2002). An Annotated Anthology of Hymns. Oxford University Press. p. 360. ISBN 0-19826973-0.
  3. "The Tract magazine and Christian miscellany for 1834". Tract. 3. Vol. 1. 1834.
  4. "Take up thy cross, the Saviour said". Dictionary of Hymnology. Retrieved 2017-03-16.(subscription required)
  5. Discipleship Ministries. "History of Hymns: "Take Up Thy Cross"". United Methodist Church. Retrieved 2017-03-16.
  6. Bartlett, Canon J.R. (2011-04-22). "Canon J.R. Bartlett, formerly Precentor of Christ Church Cathedral, Good Friday, 11:15". Church of Ireland. Retrieved 2017-03-16.

The original text of Take Up Thy Cross in Vision of Death; and Other Poems, C. W. Everest (1845), Robins and Smith, Hartford (p. 58).

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