HYMN TEXT: “Lights” by Kate Bluett: Kate Bluett [previously] is a Catholic poet and lyricist from North Texas who frequently participates in cross-denominational music collaborations. Her work has been published by Oregon Catholic Press and GIA Publications and recorded by the Porter’s Gate and Paul Zach, among others. I enjoy following her at https://katebluett.home.blog/, where she regularly shares new metrical verses she has written, tied to the liturgical calendar. Last Eastertide she published a text called “Lights,” which muses on candle flames, stars, and other light sources as reflections of the light of the risen Christ.
+++
AUDIO DRAMA: Anastasis: The Harrowing of Hades by Creative Orthodox:Creative Orthodox is the moniker of Michael Elgamal, a Coptic Orthodox artist and storyteller born in Egypt and living in Canada. Last May he released an audio drama, adapted from a graphic novel, about Christ’s epic descent into the underworld to reclaim the Old Testament righteous. This theatrical medium, which relies on voice acting, sound effects, and music to tell a story, was a very popular form of entertainment in the 1920s–40s before the advent of television but is much rarer today—which is a shame, because I find it really engaging! See the YouTube description for a full list of credits (script, score, actors, etc.).
Dionysius (Russian, ca. 1440–ca. 1508), Christ’s Descent into Hades, from Ferapontov Monastery, ca. 1495–1504. Tempera on wood, 31.2 × 10.5 cm. State Russian Museum, Saint Petersburg.
+++
SONGS:
>> “Christ Is Risen” (لمسيح قام) by Ribale Wehbé:Ribale Wehbé is a Lebanese singer specializing in Byzantine chant. Here she sings a traditional Easter chant in Arabic, arranged by Joseph Yazbeck.
>> “Hallelujah, Hosanna” (हाल्लेलुयाह होशन्ना) by One Tribe: Originally written in Tamil by pastors Dudley Thangaiah and Paul Thangaiah, “Hallelujah, Hosanna” is sung here in Hindi by the Indian Christian worship collective One Tribe. Turn on “CC” for closed captioning, and view the full credits in the YouTube video description. [HT: Global Christian Worship]
>> “He Did Rise” by Monroe Crossing: A bluegrass song about the women’s discovery of the empty tomb on Easter morning, written by Mark Anderson and performed here by his band, Monroe Crossing, at a music festival in Lexington, Kentucky, in 2009. Anderson is on the double bass. [HT: Global Christian Worship]
+++
SPOTIFY PLAYLIST: May 2025 (Art & Theology): An assortment of psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs, old and new. For my Easter-specific playlist from 2022 (with a smattering of new additions since, including a large batch from Cardiphonia at the bottom), see here.
The medieval manuscript known as the Eton Roundels is a brief typological picture sequence produced in the English Midlands (possibly Worcester) in the mid-thirteenth century. Typology is a mode of Christian biblical interpretation in which certain Old Testament figures, events, or objects are seen as foreshadowing New Testament figures or events, especially Christ. Art historian Avril Henry says the Eton Roundels came into being at about the same time as the Biblia pauperum, a tradition of picture Bibles forming the largest and best-known compendium of typological imagery and verses.
The Eton manuscript consists of twelve pages of pictures, each with a large roundel at the center picturing a New Testament event (the “antitype”) and four surrounding smaller roundels depicting the Old Testament (and occasionally classical) “types” and prophets. Each page also includes a half-roundel on the left and right inhabited by anonymous figures who probably simply represent onlookers. A crowned female Virtue is seated at the bottom of each page, under whom is written a biblical commandment whose relevance to the pictures is sometimes difficult to discern. These pages are bound together with an Apocalypse, but it’s unknown whether the two works were conceived together from the start; it’s only certain that they were combined by the late seventeenth century.
The maker, scriptorium or city of origin, original recipient (and whether religious or lay), and purpose of the Eton Roundels are also unknown. Presumably the manuscript’s function was meditational.
The artist didn’t invent any of the typological correspondences illustrated in the roundels; they were all already common currency.
Below are the two Resurrection-themed pages, with a breakdown of the illustrations, including translations of the Latin inscriptions. The translations are by Avril Henry and are from his book The Eton Roundels: Eton College, MS 177 (‘Figurae bibliorum’)—A colour facsimile with transcription, translation and commentary (Scolar Press, 1990). This book is an excellent resource for learning more about the manuscript and is the only place I’m aware of where you can view all twelve pages.
Thank you to Sally Jennings, Collections Administrator at Eton College Library, and Dr. Carlotta Barranu, Library Curator of Rare Books and Manuscripts at the time of my research, who provided me with photographs and translations prior to my gaining access to Henry’s book.
Folio VIII (5v)
“Three Women at the Tomb,” etc., from the Eton Roundels manuscript, English Midlands, 1260–70. Eton College Library, MS 177, fol. VIII. Reproduced by permission of the Provost and Fellows of Eton College.
↑ Center:Three Women at the Tomb (Mark 16:1–8)
“Because God came forth and God lives after burial, the event filled with mystery is the key to the tomb.”
↑ Top left:Jonah Leaves the Fish (Jonah 2:11; cf. Matt. 12:38–41)
“Jonas. Just as he whom the belly of the sea-creature had enclosed is brought forth unharmed, at a glorious command life rose up from the tomb.”
↑ Top right:A Lion Revivifies Its Young
“By [its] breath the lion brings its cub back to life.”
This statement refers to a piece of lore found in the third-century Physiologus and its descendants, the medieval bestiaries, according to which lion cubs are born dead but are brought back to life three days later by their father’s breath. This (fictitious) leonine behavior was seen to reflect the Father raising the Son from the tomb on Easter morning.
↑ Bottom left:Job and Jonah (Job 19:26; Jonah 2:7)
“Job: And in my flesh I shall see God my [savior]. Jonah: Thou shalt lift up my life from corruption, O Lord my God.”
↑ Bottom right:Samson’s Escape from Gaza (Judg. 16:1–3)
“The imprisoned Samson escaped from Gaza and his enemies. Christ the stone, whom the stone covered, rose from the tomb.”
This roundel portrays Philistine soldiers of Gaza encircling the city gate to kill Samson the Israelite. But Samson escapes their watch unharmed, in a dramatic episode depicted on the following page (see below). The scene here is rarely depicted, whereas what follows in the narrative—Samson carrying the gates of Gaza—was a popular type of the Resurrection. Notice how the soldiers parallel the sleeping ones in the central scene, both groups bested by God’s power.
Folio IX (6r)
“Christ Opens Limbo,” etc., from the Eton Roundels manuscript, English Midlands, 1260–70. Eton College Library, MS 177, fol. IX. Reproduced by permission of the Provost and Fellows of Eton College.
“The gates having been broken and the prince of death bound, the body of the elect is carried to the stars in the heavens.”
Christ’s Descent into Limbo, or the Harrowing of Hell, is an episode inferred from a few enigmatic biblical verses and elaborated in the apocryphal Gospel of Nicodemus. In the Eastern Orthodox Church, it is the primary icon of the Resurrection: Christ breaking down the gates of hell to rescue his predeceased beloveds from death and Satan. Medieval artists in the West were also fond of picturing the Harrowing, often portraying the entrance to hell as a monstrous maw (called a “hellmouth”).
↑ Top left:David Saves the Lamb from the Bear (1 Sam. 17:34–37)
“David. The bear is carrying off a sheep. David assists [the sheep], and takes it back. In the same way, man is saved by Christ and death is slain.”
David, who was a shepherd before he was anointed king of Israel, figures Christ in how he fiercely protected the lambs in his care, intervening to save them whenever they were snatched away by a lion or bear; he’d pry open the beast’s jaws, free the lamb, and then strike the beast dead, he relays to Saul. In a similar manner, Christ pried open the jaws of hell to save his precious sheep.
↑ Top right:Samson Kills the Lion (Judg. 14:5–8)
“Samson. The strength of Samson conquered the lion and tore [it] to pieces, and Christ conquers defeated hell together with the dragon.”
When Samson went down to the vineyards of Timnah to seek a wife, he encountered a fearsome lion, and “the spirit of the LORD rushed on him, and he tore the lion apart barehanded” (Judg. 14:6). This was Samson’s first display of divine empowerment.
↑ Bottom left:Hosea and the Erythraean Sibyl (Hosea 13:14; Augustine, PL XLI 579)
“Hosea: O death, I will be your death; O hell, I will be your torment. Sibyl: The seeker will break the gates of the hideous underworld.”
The Sybilline Oracles is a collection of ancient Greek prophecies ascribed to the pagan sibyls (but many of which were actually written by Jews and Christians). Several of the church fathers cited them in defense of Christianity. The Erythraean Sibyl, for example, is said to have foretold the coming of Christ through an acrostic whose initial letters spell out “Ιησόύς Χριστός Θεου Ύίος Σωτηρ Σταύρος” (Jesus Christ, God’s Son, Savior, Cross). (See Eusebius’s Oration of Constantine, chap. 18.) She appears in the floor mosaic at Siena Cathedral, the stained glass at Beauvais Cathedral, Michelangelo’s Sistine Chapel, the Van Eycks’ Ghent Altarpiece, and a number of other medieval and Renaissance Christian artworks.
↑ Bottom right:Samson and the Gates of Gaza (Judg. 16:1–3)
“By carrying off the gates, Samson robbed Gaza. Robbing hell, Christ entered heaven.”
To break free of the Gazites, Samson tore the doors of the city gates off their hinges and carried them away, a demonstration of triumph. This feat prefigured Christ’s breaking out of his tomb. It can also be read, as on this Eton folio, as a prefigurement of Christ’s storming the gates of hell to release those held captive by the devil.
VIDEO: “The Lord is Risen! Proclaimed by people from 29 countries”: This video was put out in 2020 by ICF Rotterdam, an intercultural church in the Netherlands whose congregation consists of members from over forty nations! They asked a handful of them to recite the Paschal greeting in their native tongue, so represented here are Indonesian, Chinese, Zulu, Igbo, Urdu, Nepali, Kurdish, Romanian, and more. [HT: Global Christian Worship]
Wycliffe Bibliafordítók (Wycliffe Bible Translators) in Hungary produced a similar video last year:
+++
SERMON: “Let Beauty Awake” by N. T. Wright: One of the things I love about the Anglican cleric N. T. Wright’s preaching and teaching is the importance he places on beauty. (I actually met Wright once—and it was at an arts conference.) In this sermon, which he preached at Durham Cathedral on Easter Sunday 2009, he takes as his text what I’ve heard him say is his favorite chapter in the Bible, John 20, and discusses how in Jesus’s rising, the glory of God was let loose in all the world.
“Easter carries with it a strange and powerful beauty,” he says. “I hope that, by exploring the biblical roots of why this is so, I may have surprised some of you at least into asking, afresh, What can we do to celebrate, more consciously and deliberately, the reawakening of beauty which comes with the light of Easter Day? How can we take this forward, as an explicit project, so that a world so full of ugliness and functionality, and in consequence so full of unbelief or false belief, can once again be wooed into belief and love?”
He opens the sermon by quoting a stanza from a poem by Robert Louis Stevenson, and near the close, he reprises it in his own words, which were developed into a song by Steve Bell:
Let Beauty awake in the morn from the cool of the grave, Beauty awake from death; Let Beauty awake, For Jesus’ sake, In the hour when the angels their silence break And the garden is bright with His Breath.
+++
RECIPE: “Tsoureki: The Symbolic Greek Easter Bread”: On her blog The Liturgical Home (and on Instagram), Ashley Tumlin Wallace shares a recipe for tsoureki, a brioche-like sweet bread made by many Greek Christians on Easter. It is soft and fluffy, flavored with citrus, and decorated with red-dyed eggs!
SPOKEN WORD + SONG: “Because He Lives” by Sharon Irving: Singer-songwriter, worship leader, and spoken word artist Sharon Irving [previously] recorded this video for City First Church Spring Creek’s virtual worship service for Easter 2020. It begins with an original spoken word piece, and then is followed by her singing the Gaither classic “Because He Lives.”
+++
SONG: “Sbab Dia Hidup” (Because He Lives) by Prison Akustik: The song “Because He Lives,” written in 1971 by Bill and Gloria Gaither, has made its way all around the world and has been translated into many languages. Here is the group Prison Akustik [previously] singing it in Indonesian.
+++
SUBSTACK POST: “Myrrhbearers & Magi” by Beth Felker Jones: In her Church Blogmatics post from last week, theologian Beth Felker Jones [previously] shares three new digital collages she made: one of the three myrrh-bearing women who discovered Jesus’s empty tomb, one of the three magi who brought gifts to the newborn Christ, and one that combines both groups of devoted witnesses. She provides descriptions of each and two original prayers, including the one below.
Digital collage (with AI-generated elements) by Beth Felker Jones, 2025
Holy Father, who accompanied your daughters on their way to the tomb, and in the power of your Spirit, turned their sorrow into joy, bring us too into the joy of those who found the tomb empty, and incorporate us, with them, into your resurrection life. With our sisters at the tomb that day, help us to say, “I have seen the Lord!” Amen.
Now the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain to which Jesus had directed them. When they saw him, they worshiped him, but they doubted. And Jesus came and said to them, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit and teaching them to obey everything that I have commanded you. And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”
—Matthew 28:16–20
Jesus said to [his disciples] again, “Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, so I send you.” When he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit.”
—John 20:21–22
LOOK: The Great Commission by He Qi
He Qi (Chinese, 1950–), The Great Commission, 2017. Oil on canvas. [purchase giclée print]
In this painting by the Chinese artist He Qi (pronounced huh chee), Jesus holds a staff in his right hand (he is the Good Shepherd) and with the other points to the world outside Jerusalem’s gates, to which he calls his disciples to carry his all-renewing gospel. A modern cityscape rises up behind the figures, indicating that this call extends to the present era.
In the foreground, a minister baptizes a kneeling woman in red, their forms intercut with a fishing boat. The boat is a reference to Peter and Andrew’s original vocation as fishers and to Jesus’s promise, should they choose to follow him, to make them “fishers of people” (Matt. 4:19)—that is, gatherers of folks into the wide net of (proto-)Christian community, proclaiming and living out the kingdom of God in the power of God’s Spirit.
The Holy Spirit is represented as a dove sweeping down from the heavens, caressing the edge of Jesus’s halo. He’s the wind in the sails of the woman at the right, who goes forth into the darkness bearing the light of God’s word—her cheeks aglow with it, her feet eager to publish it abroad.
Her predecessors in the task of preaching the good news of Christ’s resurrection are portrayed in the background—the three women who first discovered the empty tomb and who then proceeded to “go quickly and tell” (Matt. 28:7).
LISTEN: “As the Father Sent Me” by Alana Levandoski, on Behold, I Make All Things New (2018)
Easter Sunday marks the beginning of a week in the liturgical calendar known as the Easter Octave, followed by a seven-week festival called Eastertide, also referred to as the Great Fifty Days.
Beginning with the Feast of the Resurrection and including the Feast of the Ascension, Eastertide lasts fifty days, paralleling the forty days Christ spent on earth after His resurrection, plus the ten days the disciples spent waiting for the promised Spirit of Jesus. Exclamatory worship and celebratory feasting characterize the prayers and practices of Eastertide, which include invitations for baptism, thanksgiving, savoring beauty, feasting, play, and caring for creation. It is a time of celebration for the new creation that Jesus inaugurates for all of us.
So keep celebrating! I will continue posting Easter content throughout the season, just at a lesser frequency.
On this eighth day of Easter and ever forward, may you be filled with the transforming knowledge, excitement, and power of Christ’s resurrection, and go out and share it with the world.
The Antioch “Chalice,” Byzantine (Syria), 500–550. Silver, silver-gilt, overall 7 11/16 × 7 1/16 × 6 in. (19.6 × 18 × 15.2 cm). Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. Photo: Fr. Lawrence Lew, OP.
This Byzantine liturgical object was discovered in 1908 in Antioch on the Orontes (in modern-day Turkey, near the Syrian border) and is thought to be from the first half of the sixth century. Originally it was identified as a chalice, used in the celebration of the Eucharist, but more recent scholarship suggests that it was probably a standing oil lamp that was used in church.
The elaborate silver shell that encloses the plain silver bowl is covered in emblems of the renewal of life—vines, fruit, doves, a butterfly, a rabbit. There are also snails and a grasshopper! If indeed the object is a lamp, its flame would have reinforced Jesus’s self-identification as the light of the world.
Twelve seated human figures circle the bowl, two of which likely represent Christ, as each is surrounded by five figures in attitudes of directed reverence. One Christ figure (see the first photo below) is shown with a scroll draped over his left arm, representing his teaching. The other Christ, on the opposite side, is depicted as the resurrected Lord and giver of life; a lamb stands under his right arm, and beneath him, an eagle with outspread wings perches on a fruit basket.
View 1, what I’ll call the frontView 2, what I’ll call the back. Photo edited by me to focus on the (second) Christ figure and the lamb. Click on image for original.
The subordinate figures, all holding scrolls, may be apostles, or they may be philosophers of the classical age who, like the Hebrew prophets, had foretold the coming of Christ.
LISTEN: Christ lag in Todesbanden (Christ Lay in the Bonds of Death) (BWV 4) by J. S. Bach, 1707 | Words by Martin Luther, 1524 | Performed by Ensemble Orlando Fribourg at the Church of St. Michael’s College, Fribourg, Switzerland, 2016
Bach wrote this Easter cantata—one of his earliest works—at age twenty-two as part of his application for the post of organist at Divi Blasii church in Mühlhausen, Germany. (He got the job!) Its text and melody are taken from the hymn of the same name by Martin Luther, which was itself derived from the eleventh-century plainsong “Victimae paschali laudes.”
The twenty-two-minute cantata is divided into an opening instrumental movement, called a sinfonia, and seven vocal movements corresponding to the stanzas of Luther’s hymn. These are arranged symmetrically—chorus–duet–solo–chorus–solo–duet–chorus—with the focus on the high drama of the central fourth movement, which describes the battle between Life and Death.
Sinfonia
1. Choral Christ lag in Todesbanden, für unsre Sünd gegeben, der ist wieder erstanden und hat uns bracht das Leben. Des wir sollen fröhlich sein, Gott loben und dankbar sein und singen Halleluja. Halleluja.
2. Duett (SA) Den Tod niemand zwingen kunnt bei allen Menschenkindern; das macht alles unsre Sünd, kein Unschuld war zu finden. Davon kam der Tod so bald und nahm über uns Gewalt, hielt uns in seim Reich gefangen. Halleluja.
3. Aria (T) Jesus Christus, Gottes Sohn, an unser Statt ist kommen und hat die Sünde abgetan, damit dem Tod genommen all sein Recht und sein Gewalt; da bleibt nichts denn Tods Gestalt, den Stachel hat er verloren. Halleluja.
4. Choral Es war ein wunderlich Krieg, da Tod und Leben ’rungen; das Leben, behielt den Sieg, es hat den Tod verschlungen. Die Schrift hat verkündet das, wie ein Tod den andern fraß, ein Spott aus dem Tod ist worden. Halleluja.
5. Duett(ST) Hier ist das rechte Osterlamm, davon wir sollen leben, das ist an des Kreuzes Stamm in heißer Lieb gegeben. Des Blut zeichnet unsere Tür, das hält der Glaub dem Tode für, der Würger kann uns nicht rühren. Halleluja.
6. Aria (B) So feiern wir das hoh Fest mit Herzensfreud und Wonne, das uns der Herre scheinen lässt. Er ist selber die Sonne, der durch seiner Gnaden Glanz erleucht unsre Herzen ganz; der Sünden Nacht ist vergangen. Halleluja.
7. Choral Wir essen und leben wohl, zum süßen Brot geladen; der alte Sau’rteig nicht soll sein bei dem Wort der Gnaden. Christus will die Kost uns sein und speisen die Seel allein; der Glaub will keins andern leben. Halleluja.
Sinfonia
1. Chorale Christ Jesus lay in death’s strong bands for our offenses given; but now at God’s right hand he stands and brings us life from heaven. Therefore let us joyful be and sing to God right thankfully loud songs of alleluia! Alleluia!
2. Duet(SA) No son of man could conquer death, such ruin sin had wrought us. No innocence was found on earth, and therefore death had brought us into bondage from of old and ever grew more strong and bold and held us as its captive. Alleluia!
3. Aria (T) Christ Jesus, God’s own Son, came down, his people to deliver; destroying sin, he took the crown from death’s pale brow forever. Stripped of pow’r, no more it reigns; an empty form alone remains; its sting is lost forever. Alleluia!
4. Chorale It was a strange and dreadful strife when life and death contended. The victory remained with life, the reign of death was ended. Holy Scripture plainly saith that death is swallowed up by death; disgraced, it lies defeated. Alleluia!
5. Duet (ST) Here the true Paschal Lamb we see, whom God so freely gave us; he died on the accursed tree— so strong his love—to save us. See, his blood now marks our door; faith points to it; death passes o’er, and Satan cannot harm us. Alleluia!
6. Aria (B) So let us keep the festival to which the Lord invites us; Christ is himself the joy of all, the sun that warms and lights us. Now his grace to us imparts eternal sunshine to our hearts; the night of sin is ended. Alleluia!
7. Chorale Then let us feast this Easter day on Christ, the bread of heaven; the Word of grace has purged away the old and evil leaven. Christ alone our souls will feed; he is our meat and drink indeed; faith lives upon no other! Alleluia!
Moveable Garden, a community art project organized by Sojourn Arts, 2021. Mixed media on panel.
Sojourn Arts is a ministry of Sojourn Midtown in Louisville, Kentucky. As one way for their community to engage the springtime theme of Easter, on Easter Sunday 2021, Tim Robertson led a riso printing project in the church’s art gallery between services, open to all. Participants selected and arranged live flowers on the glass copier of a risograph (a type of digital printing machine that uses a process similar to screen printing to create vibrant, textured prints), printed their designs onto colorful paper, cut them out, and collaboratively collaged them into a floral arrangement on a wood panel—a “moveable garden”! View more photos here.
LISTEN: “Christ Is Your Spring”|Words by Edward A. Washburn, 1863 | Music by Andy Bast, 2024 | Performed by Bellwether Arts, feat. Emily Hanrahan, 2024
Christ has arisen, And Death is no more! Lo! the white-robed ones Sit by the door. Dawn, golden morning, Scatter the night. Haste, you disciples glad, First with the light!
Break forth in singing, O the world newborn! Sing the great Eastertide, Christ’s holy morn. Sing him, young sunbeams Dancing in mirth; Sing, all you winds of God Coursing the earth!
Sing him, you laughing flow’rs Fresh from the sod; Sing him, wild, leaping streams, Praising your God! Break from your winter, Sad heart, and sing! Bud with your blossoms fair; Christ is your spring.
Sing alleluia!
Christ is your spring.
What a beautiful hymn text! Andy Bast found it in Jane Eliza (Coolidge) Chapman’sEaster Hymnscompilation, published in Boston in 1876. In the introduction to the hymnal, Chapman’s uncle J. I. T. (James Ivers Trecothick) Coolidge, an Episcopalian minister, delights in how
[Easter’s] sun shines with fuller radiance each year upon the world, whose night of darkness it broke on the Resurrection Morning. The anthems which greet its rising are caught and repeated by increasing millions of grateful hearts of every tongue, kindred, and people, until the wide earth is filled with their sounding praise. How sacred a privilege to have part in this mighty and triumphant symphony, how sad to be out of harmony with its sublime strains!
Written by Rev. Dr. Edward A. Washburn (and given a new tune by Bast), “Christ Is Your Spring” apostrophizes the whole newborn world, enjoining it to praise God. Sunbeams, winds, flowers, streams, the human heart—all are encompassed in God’s project of renewal and invited to sing each in their own way.
LOOK: Mary Magdalene Stood Crying by Kateryna Kuziv
Kateryna Kuziv (Ukrainian, 1993–), Mary Magdalene Stood Crying, 2021. Egg tempera and gilding on gessoed wood, 40 × 30 cm.
LISTEN: “Weeping Mary” | Traditional American, 19th century | Arranged by Dan Damon and performed by the Dan Damon Quartet, feat. Sheilani Alix, on Beautiful Darkness, 2022
Is there anybody here like Mary a-weeping? Call to my Jesus and he’ll draw nigh. Is there anybody here like Mary a-weeping? Call to my Jesus and he’ll draw nigh.
Refrain: Glory, glory Glory, glory Glory be to my God on high Glory, glory Glory, glory Glory be to my God on high
Is there anybody here like Peter a-sinking? . . .
Is there anybody here like jailers a-trembling? . . .
This early American spiritual was transmitted orally before first being recorded in The Social Harp (Philadelphia, 1855), a shape-note hymnal compiled by John Gordon McCurry (1821–1886). McCurry was a farmer, tailor, and singing teacher who lived most of his life in Hart County in northeastern Georgia. The Social Harp credits the music for “Weeping Mary” to him and gives it the year 1852, but I think that indicates not composition but notation and harmonization; in other words, McCurry is the arranger.
In the description of their 1973 facsimile reprinting of The Social Harp, the University of Georgia Press writes, “In the time between the [American] Revolution and the Civil War, the singing of folk spirituals was as common among rural whites as among blacks. This was the music of the Methodist camp meeting and the Baptist revival, and white spirituals in fact are known chiefly because homebred composers sometimes wrote them down, gave them harmonic settings, and published them in songbooks.”
I regard “Weeping Mary” as an Easter song, since the primary verse refers to Mary Magdalene standing outside the empty tomb weeping because she doesn’t know what happened to the body of her Lord (John 20). Then a man she supposes to be the gardener engages her in conversation—and turns out to be the one she’s been seeking, only he’s alive!
The jailer in the third verse refers to the Philippian jailer from Acts 16, tasked with guarding the prisoners Paul and Silas, who were falsely charged with disturbing the peace. One night an earthquake strikes, releasing the chains from the walls and breaking open the cell doors. The jailer raises his sword to kill himself to avoid the shame of having let his wards escape. But Paul alerts him that they’re still there, after which the jailer “fell down trembling” and asked the two what he must do to be saved. “Believe in the Lord Jesus,” they reply. After which he and his whole household convert to the new faith.
“Call to my Jesus and he’ll draw nigh,” the song promises.
Another “Weeping Mary” verse not in The Social Harp but that I’ve heard added in some renditions is “Is there anybody here like Thomas a-doubting?”
More subdued than the typical Easter fare, “Weeping Mary” testifies to the nearness of God in our sorrows, fears, doubts, and weaknesses. It embraces those who are anxious, grieving, or struggling, offering a gentle word.
I first learned this song from a recording by the American folk musician Sam Amidon, which I also really like:
In Brattleboro, Vermont, where he grew up in the 1980s and ’90s, he told NPR, shape-note singing was a social tradition, something that happened once a month, with singers moving to different people’s houses, including his own. His parents are the well-known folk musicians Peter and Mary Alice Amidon.
In his rendition he uses the grammatically incorrect but historically faithful verb that appears in original songbook, “Are there anybody . . .”
For a more vigorous jazz arrangement, which includes scat singing and a trumpet solo, see June April’s 2007 album What Am I?. She uses just the first verse.
And here’s a traditional performance in four-part a cappella by the Dordt College Concert Choir, directed by Benjamin Kornelis:
Caspar David Friedrich (German, 1774–1840), Easter Morning, ca. 1828–35. Oil on canvas, 43.7 × 34.4 cm. Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid.
I got to see this painting in person when I was in Madrid in 2018, and boy, what a beauty! Caspar David Friedrich was the leading painter of German Romanticism, exploring the spiritual and emotional connections between humanity and nature.
His Easter Morning shows a winding, tree-lined path at early dawn as winter gives way to spring, the leaves just starting to appear on the branches. Three women wrapped in shawls step onto the path, joining others who are making their way to church to worship the risen Lord. Although this is a contemporary scene, the women evoke the three devoted Marys of scripture who got up early one momentous Sunday morning to visit Jesus’s tomb.
Dnes spaseniye miru byst, poyem voskresshemu iz groba i nachalniku zhizni nasheya: razrushiv bo smertiyu smert, pobedu dade nam i veliyu milost.
English translation:
Today salvation has come to the world. Let us sing to him who rose from the dead, the Author of our life. Having destroyed death by death, he has given us the victory and great mercy.
Celebrated as one of the greatest musical achievements of the Russian Orthodox Church, Rachmaninoff’s All-Night Vigil (Всенощное бдение / Vsénoshchnoye bdéniye) is an a cappella choral composition that sets texts from the All-Night Vigil, a liturgical service sung the evening before a major feast, including Pascha, the Feast of the Resurrection of Our Lord. The work premiered in Moscow in March 1915 with the all-male Moscow Synodal Choir and was warmly received but soon after, in 1917, was suppressed, like all church music, by the new Soviet government. For this reason, it didn’t become known in the West until the 1960s.
A troparion inviting meditation on the exalted mystery of the Resurrection, “Today Salvation Has Come” (Днесь спасеніе / Dnes spaseniye) is the thirteenth of the piece’s fifteen movements. It draws on the znamenny style of chant.
Richard Pousette-Dart (American, 1916–1992), Golden Dawn, 1952. Oil and graphite on linen, 93 1/2 × 51 1/2 in. (237.5 × 130.8 cm). North Carolina Museum of Art, Raleigh. Photo: Victoria Emily Jones. [object record]
This abstract expressionist painting by Richard Pousette-Dart shows an explosion of light, and human bones, as I read it, reassembling—death being translated into life. I’m reminded of Ezekiel’s vision in the valley, of scattered skeletal remains coming back together, growing flesh, standing up, and receiving breath—a foretaste (one, of the descent of God’s Spirit at Pentecost, but also) of the coming resurrection of all the dead, the firstfruits of which was Christ.
LISTEN: The Protecting Veil: “Christ Is Risen!” by John Tavener, 1988 | Performed by the Ulster Orchestra, feat. Maria Kliegel, on John Tavener: The Protecting Veil; In Alium, 1999; re-released on The Essential John Tavener, 2014
This is section 6 of 8 from John Tavener’s The Protecting Veil, a work for cello and strings commissioned by the BBC for its 1989 Promenade season. It’s a Marian work, its title referencing the name of an Eastern Orthodox feast that commemorates the Mother of God’s miraculous appearance over Constantinople in the early tenth century to protect the Christians living there from a foreign invasion.
The “Christ Is Risen!” section is shimmering and exultant, evoking Jesus’s bursting out of the tomb. But about halfway through, the tempo slows and the mood softens, perhaps suggesting, after his triumphant victory over death, a quieter, tearful moment of reuniting with his mom.
The Protecting Veil, Tavener said, “is an attempt to make a lyrical ikon in sound, rather than in wood, and using the music of the cellist to paint rather than a brush.”
The painting featured above is no religious icon, but I see the gospel in it.
.jpg)
Art & Theology 