{"id":97851,"date":"2022-12-11T19:29:04","date_gmt":"2022-12-12T02:29:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/?p=97851"},"modified":"2022-12-12T22:48:24","modified_gmt":"2022-12-13T05:48:24","slug":"this-single-truth","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/2022\/12\/this-single-truth.html","title":{"rendered":"“This single truth”"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"The<\/a>
The Star over Bethlehem, from the Christmas 1898 cover of Harper\u2019s Magazine
(Wikimedia Commons public domain image)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

For the past several years, Jeri Covey and her husband, Stephen M. R. Covey, have invited us to the annual Christmas dinner and musical event that they put on at their home.\u00a0 We were there again last night.\u00a0 For this year, along with a wonderful spread of food, they had a BYU faculty\/staff male quartet that performed together and individually, along with superb pianists, a violin soloist, a chamber orchestra of (I think) BYU students, and at least one other really fine male soloist.\u00a0 The music ranged from spirituals to Schubert to John Rutter to fun carols.\u00a0 They finished with a rousing version of \u201cO, Holy Night\u201d; the most stirring portion of the song for me has always been<\/p>\n

Truly He taught us to love one another;<\/span><\/strong>
\nHis law is Love and His gospel is Peace;<\/span><\/strong>
\nChains shall he break, for the slave is our brother,<\/span><\/strong>
\nAnd in his name all oppression shall cease.<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

And then we closed by all rising and joining in Handel\u2019s incomparable \u201cHallelujah Chorus.\u201d\u00a0 I\u2019m so very grateful that we\u2019ve been included in these marvelous evening.<\/p>\n

My own personal traditional Christmas is an amalgam mostly of English and German elements.\u00a0 (The Christmas tree, the music \u2014 including the German-born Handel\u2019s English-born oratorio Messiah \u2014 <\/em>the holly and the ivy, Charles Dickens, and so forth.) \u00a0That\u2019s true for many Americans, of course. \u00a0But mine may be a tad more Germanic than most.\u00a0 When I envision a perfect Christmas setting, I think of small Bavarian, Swiss, or Austrian chapels in snowy meadows under a cold, clear, starry night sky, surrounded by white Alpine peaks.\u00a0 (I once spent precisely such an evening with a Latter-day Saint family in the village of Innertkirchen, in the area of the Berner Oberland called Haslital.)\u00a0 I\u2019m especially fond of German and Austrian carols, and the season of Christmas and New Year will not fully pass before we have a dinner of Swiss fondue, a dinner of what the Germans tend to call Rouladen<\/em> and the Swiss that I\u2019ve known call Fleischv\u00f6gel<\/em>, and a dinner of Swiss raclette.\u00a0 (I would really, really, really like to have a batch of Norwegian potato lefse<\/em>, too.\u00a0 But the making of it is so very messy and labor intensive that, for my wife, lefse<\/em> is simply and sadly a bridge too far.)<\/p>\n

One of my favorite Austrian Christmas carols is \u201cStill, Still, Still,\u201d which apparently comes from the area of Salzburg. \u00a0I like it in almost any form, but one of the ways in which I became familiar with it was in a recording by the late Peter Alexander.\u00a0 Some will perhaps dismiss it as kitschy, but it still affects me powerfully:<\/p>\n

\u201cStill, Still, Still\u201d<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

I remember very clearly when and where the marvelous carol \u201cEs ist ein Ros entsprungen\u201d (often called in English \u201cLo, How a Rose E\u2019er Blooming\u201d)<\/span>, which was given its classical form by the German composer Michael Praetorius in 1609 but which originated sometime before that, first hit me. \u00a0(I suppose that I had perhaps heard the carol before, but, if I had, it hadn\u2019t registered. \u00a0Not even slightly.)\u00a0 I was attending a Latter-day Saint sacrament meeting in Interlaken, Switzerland, shortly before Christmas 1973. \u00a0Curiously, I don\u2019t recall who sang it. \u00a0It may have been a branch or district choir.<\/p>\n

I was enraptured. \u00a0Riveted. \u00a0I had seldom heard anything so beautiful. \u00a0And it\u00a0still<\/em>\u00a0affects me that way.<\/p>\n

Es ist ein Ros entsprungen,<\/span><\/span><\/strong>
\naus einer Wurzel zart,<\/span><\/strong>
\nwie uns die Alten sungen,<\/span><\/strong>
\nvon Jesse kam die Art.<\/span><\/strong>
\nUnd hat ein Bl\u00fcmlein bracht<\/span><\/strong>
\nmitten im kalten Winter,<\/span><\/strong>
\nwohl zu der halben Nacht.<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

Das R\u00f6slein, das ich meine,<\/span><\/strong>
\ndavon Isaias sagt,<\/span><\/strong>
\nhat uns gebracht alleine<\/span><\/strong>
\nMarie, die reine Magd.<\/span><\/strong>
\nAus Gottes ew\u2019gem Rat<\/span><\/strong>
\nhat sie ein Kind geboren<\/span><\/strong>
\nwohl zu der halben Nacht.<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

Das Bl\u00fcmelein, so kleine,<\/span><\/strong>
\ndas duftet uns so s\u00fc\u00df,<\/span><\/strong>
\nmit seinem hellen Scheine<\/span><\/strong>
\nvertreibt\u2019s die Finsternis.<\/span><\/strong>
\nWahr Mensch und wahrer Gott<\/span><\/span><\/strong>
\nhilft uns aus allem Leide,<\/span><\/strong>
\nrettet von S\u00fcnd und Tod.<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

Here\u2019s a literal and quite unpoetic translation (partially my own):<\/p>\n

A rose has sprung up,<\/span><\/strong>
\nfrom a tender root,<\/span><\/strong>
\nAs the ancients\u00a0sang to us.<\/span><\/strong>
\nIts line\u00a0came from Jesse<\/span><\/strong>
\nAnd it has brought forth a\u00a0small flower<\/span><\/span><\/strong>
\nIn the middle of the cold winter,<\/span><\/strong>
\nIn\u00a0the middle of\u00a0the night.<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

The little rose that I mean,<\/span><\/strong>
\nOf which Isaiah told,<\/span><\/strong>
\nMary alone, the pure maid,<\/span><\/strong>
\nHas brought to us.<\/span><\/strong>
\nBy\u00a0God\u2019s eternal counsel<\/span><\/strong>
\nShe has borne a child<\/span><\/strong>
\nIn\u00a0the middle of\u00a0the night.<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

The tiny\u00a0flower, so small,<\/span><\/strong>
\nThat smells so sweet to us,<\/span><\/strong>
\nWith its bright gleam<\/span><\/strong>
\nDispels\u00a0the darkness<\/span><\/strong>
\n\u2013True man and true God\u2013<\/span><\/strong>
\nHelps us from all suffering,<\/span><\/strong>
\nSaves us from sin and death.<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

I\u2019ve always loved the German lyrics.\u00a0 (The English words just don\u2019t move me as much \u2014 and not merely in the literal and unpoetic version supplied above. \u00a0But the music is gorgeous in any language. \u00a0Here\u2019s one rendition that I like:<\/p>\n

\u201cEs ist ein Ros Entsprungen\u201d<\/span><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

As far as the English elements go, it\u2019s probably an appropriate time for me to share with you a favorite poem by Sir John Betjeman, who served as poet laureate of England from 1972 until his death in 1984:<\/p>\n

\u201cChristmas\u201d<\/span><\/strong><\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
The bells of waiting Advent ring,<\/span><\/strong>
\nThe Tortoise stove is lit again<\/span><\/strong>
\nAnd lamp-oil light across the night<\/span><\/strong>
\nHas caught the streaks of winter rain<\/span><\/strong>
\nIn many a stained-glass window sheen<\/span><\/strong>
\nFrom Crimson Lake to Hookers Green.The holly in the windy hedge<\/span><\/strong>
\nAnd round the Manor House the yew<\/span><\/strong>
\nWill soon be stripped to deck the ledge,<\/span><\/strong>
\nThe altar, font and arch and pew,<\/span><\/strong>
\nSo that the villagers can say<\/span><\/strong>
\n\u2018The church looks nice\u2019 on Christmas Day.Provincial Public Houses blaze,<\/span><\/strong>
\nCorporation tramcars clang,<\/span><\/strong>
\nOn lighted tenements I gaze,<\/span><\/strong>
\nWhere paper decorations hang,<\/span><\/strong>
\nAnd bunting in the red Town Hall<\/span><\/strong>
\nSays \u2018Merry Christmas to you all\u2019.<\/span>And London shops on Christmas Eve<\/span><\/strong>
\nAre strung with silver bells and flowers<\/span><\/strong>
\nAs hurrying clerks the City leave<\/span><\/strong>
\nTo pigeon-haunted classic towers,<\/span><\/strong>
\nAnd marbled clouds go scudding by<\/span><\/strong>
\nThe many-steepled London sky.<\/span><\/strong>And girls in slacks remember Dad,<\/span><\/strong>
\nAnd oafish louts remember Mum,<\/span><\/strong>
\nAnd sleepless children\u2019s hearts are glad.<\/span><\/strong>
\nAnd Christmas-morning bells say \u2018Come!\u2019<\/span><\/strong>
\nEven to shining ones who dwell<\/span><\/strong>
\nSafe in the Dorchester Hotel.<\/span><\/strong>And is it true,<\/span><\/strong>
\nThis most tremendous tale of all,<\/span><\/strong>
\nSeen in a stained-glass window\u2019s hue,<\/span><\/strong>
\nA Baby in an ox\u2019s stall ?<\/span><\/strong>
\nThe Maker of the stars and sea<\/span><\/strong>
\nBecome a Child on earth for me ?<\/span><\/strong>And is it true? For if it is,<\/span><\/strong>
\nNo loving fingers tying strings<\/span><\/strong>
\nAround those tissued fripperies,<\/span><\/strong>
\nThe sweet and silly Christmas things,<\/span><\/strong>
\nBath salts and inexpensive scent<\/span><\/strong>
\nAnd hideous tie so kindly meant,<\/span><\/strong>No love that in a family dwells,<\/span><\/strong>
\nNo carolling in frosty air,<\/span><\/strong>
\nNor all the steeple-shaking bells<\/span><\/strong>
\nCan with this single Truth compare \u2013<\/span><\/strong>
\nThat God was man in Palestine<\/span><\/strong>
\nAnd lives today in Bread and Wine.<\/span><\/strong><\/div>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

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\u00a0 \u00a0 For the past several years, Jeri Covey and her husband, Stephen M. R. Covey, have invited us to the annual Christmas dinner and musical event that they put on at their home.\u00a0 We were there again last night.\u00a0 For this year, along with a wonderful spread of food, they had a BYU faculty\/staff […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1019,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[2126,7260,27323,20508,24337,2514,20011,32682,32685,22004,32691,32694,3019,26963,26960,2128,32673,20341,32700,12800,7072,7179,7075,32688,32679,32697,2173,28641,32676,28638,28644],"class_list":["post-97851","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-berner-oberland","tag-betjeman","tag-britain-covey","tag-charles-dickens","tag-covey","tag-dickens","tag-es-ist-ein-ros-entsprungen","tag-fleischvogel","tag-fondue","tag-g-f-handel","tag-hallelujah","tag-hallelujah-chorus","tag-handel","tag-haslital","tag-innertkirchen","tag-interlaken","tag-jeri-covey","tag-john-betjeman","tag-john-rutter","tag-lefse","tag-lo-how-a-rose-eer-blooming","tag-messiah","tag-michael-praetorius","tag-raclette","tag-rouladen","tag-rutter","tag-schubert","tag-stephen-covey","tag-stephen-m-r-covey","tag-stephen-r-covey","tag-steve-covey"],"yoast_head":"\n"This single truth"<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"    For the past several years, Jeri Covey and her husband, Stephen M. 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