Hail to the Lord's anointed

Psalm 72 we owe to Solomon (or at least his circle); the phrase ‘the Lord’s Anointed’ we owe to William Tyndale (via the 1611 AV); the hymn we owe to James Montgomery. He was probably the first to coin the title ‘great David’s greater Son’ which others have been glad to adopt or adapt, as in 407, line 2. The hymn was written in 1821 as ‘an imitation of Psalm 72’, and sung at a Christmas service that year, probably at Fulneck, Yorks. The author read it at Liverpool in the following April, at a missionary meeting chaired by Adam Clarke who included part of it in his large new Bible commentary at Psalm 72. The Evangelical Magazine, to which Montgomery often contributed, also printed part in May 1822, and the author’s Songs of Zion [Syon], being Imitations of the Psalms published the full 8 stzs at the end of that year. He revised it for his Original Hymns in 1853, heading it ‘The Reign of Christ on Earth’. Julian calls it ‘rich and splendid’; Routley, ‘romantic’ (in the best sense); W Milgate, ‘noble’; J R Watson, ‘radiant’. Many others also regard it as Montgomery’s finest hymn. The last line has been much wrestled with, from ‘His Name—what is it? Love’ (1821—‘a typical Montgomery flourish, a final snap to close the hymn’—Watson); to ‘That Name to us is Love’ (1853), and ‘His changeless name of Love’ (Keble, as here). Further variations in the present book are ‘help most speedy’ for ‘succour …’ and ‘help’ for ‘bid’ in stz 2; ‘incense’ for ‘silver’ in stz 4 (in common with other books, by attraction from Matthew 2:11 since the Psalm simply has ‘gold’); and ‘In all the world’ for ‘O’er every foe’ in stz 5. The 2nd half of stz 4 was originally the 1st half of stz 6. Some of the more ‘romantic’ but Psalm-prompted lines are omitted, such as ‘Arabia’s desert ranger/ to him shall bow the knee,/ the Ethiopian stranger/ his glory come to see …’ (Psalm 72:9–10, cf Acts 9:27ff); and ‘for he shall have dominion/ o’er river, sea and shore,/ far as the eagle’s pinion/ or dove’s light wing can soar’; and ‘The mountain dews shall nourish/ a seed in weakness sown,/ whose fruit shall spread and flourish/ and shake like Lebanon’. The commonly selected stzs, as here, have the effect of enlarging the gap between the Psalm and the hymn; for an earlier approach see 491 and for a later one, 72. Those who keep the church’s traditional seasons find this hymn and the other paraphrases ideal for Advent or Epiphany. The first tune known to be set to these words is CULMSTOCK in 1822. This has long given way to CRÜGER as both expected and ideal. The melody dates from 1640, where an early form is found in Johann Crüger’s Neues vollkömliches Gesangbuch. By 1657 it had moved closer to the modern version; in 1786, still further. It fell to Wm H Monk to rearrange this material for the first A&M in 1861.

b Irvine, Ayrshire, Scotland 1771, d Sheffield 1854. His father John was converted through the ministry of John Cennick qv. James, the eldest son, was educated first at the Moravian centre at Fulneck nr Leeds, which expelled him in 1787 for wasting time writing poetry. By this time his parents had left England for mission work in the West Indies. In later life he regularly revisited the school; but having run away from a Mirfield bakery apprenticeship, failed to find a publisher in London, and lost both parents, he served in a chandler’s shop at Doncaster before moving to Sheffield, where from 1792 onwards he worked in journalism. Initially a contributor to the Sheffield Register and clerk to its radical editor, he soon became Asst Editor and (in 1796) Editor, changing its name to the Sheffield Iris. Imprisoned twice in York for his political articles, he was condemned by one jury as ‘a wicked, malicious and seditious person who has attempted to stir up discontent among his Majesty’s subjects’. In his 40s he found a renewed Christian commitment through restored links with the Moravians; championed the Bible Society, Sunday schools, overseas missions, the anti-slavery campaign and help for boy chimney-sweeps, refusing to advertise state lotteries which he called ‘a national nuisance’. He later moved from the Wesleyans to St George’s church and supported Thos Cotterill’s campaign to legalise hymns in the CofE. He wrote some 400, in familiar metres, published in Cotterill’s 1819 Selection and his own Songs of Zion, 1822; Christian Psalmist, or Hymns Selected and Original, in 1825—355 texts plus 5 doxologies, with a seminal ‘Introductory Essay’ on hymnology—and Original Hymns for Public, Private and Social Devotion, 1853. 1833 saw the publication of his Royal Institution lectures on Poetry and General Literature.

In the 1825 Essay he comments on many authors, notably commending ‘the piety of Watts, the ardour of Wesley, and the tenderness of Doddridge’. Like many contemporary editors he was not averse to making textual changes in the hymns of others. He produced several books of verse, from juvenilia (aged 10–13) to Prison Amusements from York and The World before the Flood. Asked which poems would last, he said, ‘None, sir, nothing— except perhaps a few of my hymns’. He wrote that he ‘would rather be the anonymous author of a few hymns, which should thus become an imperishable inheritance to the people of God, than bequeath another epic poem to the world’ on a par with Homer, Virgil or Milton. John Ellerton called him ‘our first hymnologist’; many see him as the 19th century’s finest hymn-writer, while Julian regards his earlier work very highly, the later hymns less so. 20 of his texts including Psalm versions are in the 1916 Congregational Hymnary, and 22 in its 1951 successor Congregational Praise; there are 17 in the 1965 Anglican Hymn Book and 26 in CH. In 2004, Alan Gaunt found 64 of them in current books, and drew attention to one not in use: the vivid account of Christ’s suffering and death in The morning dawns upon the place where Jesus spent the night in prayer. See also Peter Masters in Men of Purpose (1980); Bernard Braley in Hymnwriters 3 (1991) and Alan Gaunt in HSB242 (Jan 2005). Nos.152, 197, 198, 350*, 418, 484, 507, 534, 544, 610, 612, 641, 657*, 897, 959.