Jesus, the joy of loving hearts

Ray Palmer’s hymn, written in N America in 1858, is one of the finest but freest of many paraphrases of the Joyful Rhythm [Jubilee celebration] of St Bernard on the Name/Love of Jesus (Jubilus rhythmicus de nomine/amore Jesu) from the 12th c or thereabouts. It began Jesu dulcis memoria, with this extract representing Jesus dulcedo cordium (stz 4 onwards); the rhyme scheme is normally aaaa, which is more musical and less monotonous in Lat polysyllables than it would be in English. Other approaches include 337 and 741. Its 42 stzs, skilful but repetitive in theme, appear in one ms in the Bodleian Library, Oxford, and centos are found in several later Breviaries (liturgical books) and other monastic collections. This English version was requested by the compilers of the Sabbath Hymn Book in 1858 where it was first published, and has that date in his 1876 Poetical Works where it is headed ‘Jesus the Beloved’. The original ‘Jesu, thou joy …’ was often rendered ‘O Jesu, joy …’ from the 1860s onwards; the present line 1 is now found in several hymnals. Like other translators, Palmer opts for an abab rhyme scheme which he uses skilfully with his parallel patterns of verbs, nouns and adjectives. Other original lines were 1.2, ‘thou fount of life …’; 4.2, ‘where’er our changeful lot is cast’; and 5.4, ‘shed o’er the world …’ Dearmer calls this the strongest and most attractive version of the Lat, which ‘deserves the popular preference which has been given it’; it is certainly more congregational than the 1st-person singular versions. Some books place it in their ‘Communion’ section on account of stz 3, but this of course is not its only value. David and Jill Wright point to its special message for 20th-c pleasure-seekers (1.3), restlessness (4.1) and consequent need for calm (5.2).

Henry P Smith composed MARYTON for Keble’s Sun of my soul, thou Saviour dear, with which it appeared in the 1874 Church Hymns with Tunes. It has been set to several other sets of words, appearing at least twice in several hymnals, and to this hymn in Hymns of Faith, GH and many other books.

b Little Compton, Rhode Is, USA 1808, d Newark, NJ, USA 1887. After a short period in business, at work in a Boston dry goods store, he studied at Phillips Academy, Andover and Yale Univ while also teaching at a NY girls’ school. Already a member of Park St Congregational Ch, he was ordained as a Congregational minister, serving churches at Bath, Maine (where his hymnwriting began), and Albany, New York State. In 1865 he moved to NY City to become the corresponding secretary of the American Congregational Union, a job he stayed with until he retired. to Newark in New Jersey. He published Hymns and Sacred Pieces (1865), Hymns of My Holy Hours and Other Pieces (1868) and his own Poetical Works (1876). In addition to his original verse he was one of the most gifted N American translators from Lat hymnody, and included items of both kinds in his Sabbath Hymn Book (1858). He would allow no alteration of his texts and would accept no payment for them; apart from Fanny Crosby (F van Alstyne, qv) he is said to have been the USA’s most prolific hymnwriter as well as one of the best- known and best-loved of his day. In Julian, Prof F M Bird endorses this view. No.731.