"Wilder than wild, who will tame me?"

The untamable Tiny enjoys a wilder-than-wild moment early morning after plucking a superbowl from her collection and pursuing it about the dining room.

"Wilder than wild, who will tame me?" goes the Dutch folk song that was transformed -- in the wake of the Battle of Turnhout of 1597, in which Prince Maurice of Orange defeated the Spanish occupiers of a town in what is now the Netherlands -- into "We gather together," the familiar Thanksgiving hymn about overcoming religious oppression. So wrote Melanie Kirkpatrick in OpinionJournal last year. We missed her fascinating mini-history at the time, but thanks to the internet search function, it was right near the top when we typed in the first few words of the hymn:

It's tantalizing to think that the English Pilgrims -- in exile in Holland, the only place in Europe where they could worship freely--might have been familiar with "Wilt heden nu treden." There's no record that they were, but the circumstantial evidence is strong. Some of them spoke Dutch, attended Dutch churches and even became Dutch citizens. "It's possible, I'd even go so far as to say it's probable, that the Pilgrims knew the tune," says John Kemp of Plimouth Plantation, the living-history museum of 17th-century America.

But to the Pilgrim mindset, "We Gather Together" would have been a secular song. It wasn't the direct word of the Bible, which meant they would not have sung it at church. The Pilgrims, like the Dutch Calvinists, sang only Psalms in worship and then without musical accompaniment or even harmony, which they considered "man glorifying in man's art," says Mr. Kemp. They saw any song except a Psalm as a violation of the commandment against idolatry.

Pausing between parries and thrusts, Tiny keeps her eye on the ball.

We gather together to ask the Lord's blessing;
he chastens and hastens his will to make known;
the wicked oppressing now cease from distressing:
sing praise to his Name, he forgets not his own.

Beside us to guide us, our God with us joining,
ordaining, maintaining his kingdom divine;
so from the beginning the fight we were winning:
thou, Lord, wast at our side: all glory be thine!

We all do extol thee, thou leader triumphant,
and pray that thou still our defender wilt be.
Let thy congregation escape tribulation:
thy Name be ever praised! O Lord, make us free!

What would the Pilgrims think of the rampant glorification in man's art that pervades the hearts and minds of the people who occupy the land of their "shining city upon a hill" in our day? Would they still see a  glimmer of light in our commitment to human freedom?

Comments

[goomp]

Extreme spiritual beliefs can be oppressive as well as uplifting just as can lack of understanding of the underlying need for a moral standard of behavior. Fortunately in the 18th and 19th and most 20th centuries the moral code was present but less domineering than in the days of the pilgrims and the "shining city upon a hill" came to exist .

[hnav]

such a wonderful post,
amazing photos of Tiny...

great questions as well.

do we truly have a commitment to human freedom?

all i see from most of the Democrat Partisans - Leadership of today, is their own self interest.

the 'say anything to gain power' crowd, looks as if they have no interest in the freedom of others.