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Music

Sunday Singing: All Glory, Laud, and Honor

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I took a break from our Sunday Singing posts, partly because I went on vacation and decided not to work out Sunday posts for a few weeks, then because my work week or weekend was busy. I start back today and hope these posts will lift our heads to the Lord.

Today’s hymn, “All Glory, Laud, and Honor,” comes from the influential Bishop of Orléans Theodulf (760-821). He was an Italian in France serving under Charlemagne and afterward King Louis the Pious. He was a patron of the arts and had a chapel built in Germigny-des-Prés, now a testament to Carolingian architecture.

“He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. And the Lord God will give to him the throne of his father David, and he will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of his kingdom there will be no end.” (Luke 1:32–33 ESV)

1 All glory, laud, and honor
To Thee, Redeemer, King,
To whom the lips of children
Made sweet hosannas ring.
Thou art the King of Israel,
Thou David’s royal Son,
Who in the Lord’s name comest,
The King and Blessed One.

2 All glory, laud, and honor
To Thee, Redeemer, King,
To whom the lips of children
Made sweet hosannas ring.
The company of angels
Is praising Thee on high,
And mortal men and all things
Created make reply.

3 All glory, laud, and honor
To Thee, Redeemer, King,
To whom the lips of children
Made sweet hosannas ring.
The people of the Hebrews
With psalms before Thee went;
Our praise and prayer and anthems
Before Thee we present.

4 All glory, laud, and honor
To Thee, Redeemer, King,
To whom the lips of children
Made sweet hosannas ring.
To Thee, before Thy Passion,
They sang their hymns of praise;
To Thee, now high exalted,
Our melody we raise.

5 All glory, laud, and honor
To Thee, Redeemer, King,
To whom the lips of children
Made sweet hosannas ring.
Thou didst accept their praises;
Accept the prayers we bring,
Who in all good delightest,
Thou good and gracious King.

Blogs, Socials, Fiction

Rings of Power Have Returned to Assail Us All

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Season two of Rings of Power has begun on Amazon Prime, and I have no plans to watch it. The first season was enough. I didn’t dislike the first season from the start, but it wasn’t a Tolkien story as claimed. It was LOTR fan-fic and not a good one. It wasn’t good enough to give a boat the hope it needs to float, if you know what I mean.

The second season appears to be more of that and worse. Sauron was styled as a returning king to Mordor, but now he’s appealing to the orcs and their father-figure to accept him. The orcs are styled as misunderstood foreigners who just want to live free of tyranny. What?

Army of orcs outside Gondor. "Sire, the orcs are here," someone says. "Well, don't be racist. Let them in."

Erik Kain describes other story points like this: “We need Conflict Between Main Characters, after all, even if it doesn’t really make sense,” and “nothing here is even remotely based on Tolkien’s lore.”

Brett McCracken notes another common complaint. “The series feels bogged down by overwrought dialogue. Sometimes the dialogue is great; often it’s cringey.” Plus, there’s excessive exposition and many opportunities for viewers to ask how a character would have known whatever they just said.

You can get it a feel for Rings of Power season two in this mostly positive IGN review, which according to those who pay attention to IGN is remarkably critical. Don’t those rings look cheap?

And props to Echo Chamberlain for this video recap of the first two episodes that quotes several lines, because you can’t understand the fundamental nonsense of this show without hearing some of these lines. For example, “A rumor is like a songbird; it may sound filling from afar but up close it’s an empty feast.”

Novel Adaptions: Johnathan Boes writes about adapting Tolkien’s work with some remarkable specifics from the Rings of Power showrunners.

Reading into the Text: Ukrainians have long referred to Russian soldiers as orcs and apparently Soviet leaders did too. “Comparisons between Mordor and Russia go back to the Soviet era, when the regime considered Tolkien’s literature politically threatening. The USSR banned Tolkien’s books because they saw the orcs as an analogy for the Soviet people.”

(Photo by Marc Szeglat on Unsplash)

Fiction, Non-fiction

A Bad Star Wars Series Bites the Dust

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We learned this week The Acolyte, a Stars Wars television production, would not get a season two. The Telegraph claimed this shows the world is “bored” of Star Wars, noting fans had turned out for lousy movies in the past despite their later criticism. But there’s a big difference in The Rise of Skywalker (2019) making double its production budget in the US/Canada market and The Acolyte being a show fans refused to watch (if they had Disney+ subscriptions). That difference would be media context.

The Last Jedi (2017) was bad enough of a movie that I didn’t watch The Rise of Skywalker, but plenty of people did. It cost hundreds of thousands more to make and also earned double that in the US/Canada market. Fans hadn’t grown jaded, tired, wary–what’s the right word?–afraid that Disney-owned LucasFilms would deliver a sorry story. They learned to fear through years of disappointment with most of the TV series since. The Mandalorian began well-received, but someone took over season three and tanked it. Fans were hopeful for the 2022 series on Obi-Wan Kenobi and they were disappointed. (Earlier this year, news of the original concept came out and you have to wonder why such a good idea was ruined.) The Book of Boba Fett (2021) was dull. Ahsoka (2023) was poorly written. So it’s easy to understand how interested viewers may have little enthusiasm for The Acolyte before hearing reviews. They wouldn’t find their enthusiasm after hearing it was a such a bad show.

Now, some people are worried the show will be pulled from Disney+ all together.

In other news …

Non-fiction recs: Historian Thomas Kidd has top non-fiction and history books of the twenty-first century. Here’s just one interesting title.

Crisis of Doubt: Honest Faith in Nineteenth-Century England, by Timothy Larsen. “Those who lose their faith (then and now) get the headlines, but Larsen delightfully shows how common it was for English skeptics and freethinkers to come to orthodox Christian faith.”

Poetry: War poetry ‘Some Could, Some Could Not, Shake Off Misery’

Leaf art: Take a minute to browse the images this artist shares of his paper cutting designs applied to leaves. Lito’s (リト) work is incredible.

Blogs, Socials, Non-fiction

The Scotch-Irish Led the Colonies to Freedom

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While Lars is off celebrating the history of one people, let me offer you some history of another people. One tenth of American colonists were from Scottish families who had moved to northern Ireland as pioneer farmers under the British Crown, an effort to quell “the wild Irish.” That effort worked, and Scottish Presbyterians found a measure of freedom and productivity they enjoyed. Then, as Britain has a tendency to do, the ruling class ruined it by raising taxes and trying to quell the Irish even more. The pioneer farmers felt the pressure from these measures and came to America, a place that many were told was free and like paradise.

They came to Pennsylvania first and later to all of the colonies, coloring the culture everywhere. Dr. James G. Leyburn writes, “In many ways the Scotch-Irish pioneers were indeed an augury of Americans-to-be. They were probably the first settlers to identify themselves as Americans—not as Pennsylvanians or Virginians” or any ethnic group. As such, these were colonists most vigorously in favor of rebelling against the British Crown.

“A Hessian captain wrote in 1778, ‘Call this war by whatever name you may, only call it not an American rebellion; it is nothing more or less than a Scotch Irish Presbyterian rebellion.’ King George was reported to have characterized the Revolution as ‘a Presbyterian war’ …” Leyburn says. These British officials saw the American Revolution as a Scottish Presbyterian uprising, which is not one of many characterizations of it, according to Leyburn. No other group of immigrants was accused of fueling the war like these Ulstermen.

Maybe these characterizations were made because it put the American conflict in familiar British terms. England had wrestled against Scottish and Irish independence for generations. Scottish Presbyterians, in particular, had been a torn beneath the crown for a long time because they wouldn’t conform to Anglican unification efforts.

But maybe Leyburn’s depiction of Scotch-Irish influence in America is accurate. He says, “Their daily experience of living on the outer fringe of settlement, of making small farms in the forests, of facing the danger of Indian attack and fighting back, called for qualities of self-reliance, ingenuity, and improvisation that Americans have ranked high as virtues. They were inaugurators of the heroic myth of the winning of the West that was to dominate our nineteenth century history.” They blended with another immigrants, pushing everyone into losing their immigrant labels and becoming simply American. Those labels would return 50-100 years later as people tried to distinguish themselves from new immigrants.

There’s a lot more to the story, which you can read in this American Heritage article taken from Leyburn’s book on the topic.

In other news . . .

Movie Adaptations: Joel Miller talks about The Children of Men as a book and a movie. “We sometimes forget how radically books and movies differ as media. Jumping from one to the other requires significant adjustment. Narration and character development must change, same with the amount of material capable of inclusion.”

YouTube Reaction: How much of YouTube content is reacting to other YouTube content, generating a new form of reality show? Call me Chato, a former TV exec, talks about it.

Make your own art: How to draw a sunset by Matthew Matthysen

Non-fiction, Uncategorized

What To Do with a Dragon Hoard?

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With all the dragons in new fantasy stories today, I hope young readers haven’t been shielded from their traditional setting. The picture of a dragon hoarding treasure under a mountain is a classic depiction of greed.

The beast is at the top of the food chain. It can destroy whole kingdoms if it wanted to. If two dragons were to fight each other, the disaster to their field of battle would be apocalyptic. But a defining quality of a dragon is its hoard. Why does it sleep on a mountain of gold? Why did Smaug care that Bilbo took a cup, and how could he have noticed one cup missing from his trove of treasure? Because that’s what dragons are about. They want all the wealth for themselves, and they are powerful and conceited enough to refuse to allow anyone to slight them.

I was thinking this morning about how some of us tend to use what we have and some of us tend to keep it unused. I’m a keeper. I’ve had my favorite t-shirt for over 20 years because I don’t wear it often. When people ask, “What would you do if we gave you $1000 today,” my first thought is to put it in the bank for the future. Of course, there will be a time to use it, but not today, because if I use it now, I may not have it tomorrow.

I wonder if the idea of a dragon hoard would apply well to those of us who keep to ourselves and take comfort in what we could do tomorrow if the need arose. Maybe all we’re doing is holding on to our wealth, not out of greed but out of pride, fear, and personal comfort.

What else do we have today?

Moon Caves: In the Sea of Tranquility or Mare Tranquillitatis, there’s a 200-foot pit, one of many spotted by satellites orbiting the Moon. Scientists studying the photographs have reason to believe this pit has a cave. Why we aren’t sending people to the Moon by now is likely a political question. The current NASA plan appears to be sending a team around the Moon.

In related news, Space X has been sending astronauts to the International Space Station for a few years. They have a team, Crew-8, at the station now and will send Crew-9 in mid-August.

Photo by Jonathan Kemper on Unsplash

Music

Sunday Singing: How Great Thou Art

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One of the greatest hymns of the 20th century was written by poet and member of the Swedish parliament Carl Gustav Boberg (1859 – 1940). A member of the Mission Covenant Church of Sweden, he wrote “O store Gud” in 1885 in response to church bells and the beauty of a summer evening. Englishman Stuart K. Hine translated and arranged the text to a Swedish folk melody in 1949. The great George Beverly Shea sings with a choir in the recording above.

“I will give thanks to the LORD with my whole heart;
I will recount all of your wonderful deeds.
I will be glad and exult in you;
I will sing praise to your name, O Most High.” (Psalm 9:1–2 ESV)

Authors, Blogs, Socials, Non-fiction, Poetry

Travels to Worlds Unknown (Maybe Fictious)

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It’s been a full week and will continue to be so for rest of the month. I feel a deadline pressing upon me, so let me move quickly to these links.

Poetry: “While Observing A Summer Storm” by Joshua Alan Sturgill. “these I take as pathfinders and guides”

Art: Swiss painter Arnold Böcklin (1827-1901) painted moody mythological scenes, like Isle of the Dead (which you’ve likely seen whether you knew what it was).

Chariots of Fire: The story of Eric Liddell’s race in the classic movie Chariots of Fire took place at the 1924 Olympics in Paris. The Scottish runner won gold in the 400-meter, breaking Olympic and world records with 47.6 seconds. World’s Paul Butler talked about it on Friday’s podcast of The World and Everything in It. I listened to a tape of the movie soundtrack during my fruitful, cassette-tape-buying years. Here’s a nice tribute to the movie and music.

The Facts Fudged: Bill Steigerwald talks about the work he put into his book dividing fact from fiction in John Steinbeck’s Travels with Charley. “Taking on the great Steinbeck and challenging the existing narrative about his iconic book was no big deal. I was used to being an outsider, whether it was when covering a KKK cross-burning or attending a conference of public transit officials. The process of reporting and researching Steinbeck’s travels and book was no different from what I had done in a hundred big Sunday newspaper features, just a lot bigger and on my own dime.”

Photo: Elks Lodge, Tacoma, Washington. John Margolies Roadside America photograph archive (1972-2008), Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division.

Music

Sunday Singing: How Firm a Foundation

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“A wind has wrapped them in its wings,
and they shall be ashamed because of their sacrifices”
(Hosea 4:19 ESV).

We don’t recognize how we undermine our foundations with today’s sacrifices. We assume our wealth, privilege, and security will continue. We redefine the terms of the sacrifice God asks for us and pronounce it good. We chip away at our foundations, thinking they will never crumble.

But if Christ is our foundation, we will continue to stand. We will not sow to the wind as Ephraim did in Hosea 4. We will sow to fields that will turn a harvest as the Lord wills it.

The author of today’s hymn, “How Firm a Foundation,” was not identified in the 1787 publication in which the song first appears. It is believed to be Robert Keen of Carter Lane Baptist Church in London. The tune sung in the video above is an American one, published in 1832.

1 How firm a foundation, you saints of the Lord,
is laid for your faith in his excellent Word!
What more can he say than to you he has said,
to you who for refuge to Jesus have fled?

2 “Fear not, I am with you, O be not dismayed;
for I am your God, and will still give you aid;
I’ll strengthen you, help you, and cause you to stand,
upheld by my righteous, omnipotent hand.

3 “When through the deep waters I call you to go,
the rivers of sorrow shall not overflow;
for I will be with you, your troubles to bless,
and sanctify to you your deepest distress.

4 “When through fiery trials your pathway shall lie,
my grace, all-sufficient, shall be your supply;
the flame shall not hurt you; I only design
your dross to consume and your gold to refine.

5 “E’en down to old age all my people shall prove
my sovereign, eternal, unchangeable love;
and when hoary hairs shall their temples adorn,
like lambs they shall still in my bosom be borne.

6 “The soul that on Jesus has leaned for repose,
I will not, I will not desert to his foes;
that soul, though all hell should endeavor to shake,
I’ll never, no never, no never forsake.”