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Last Sunday night and this morning we sang ‘My Song Is Love Unknown’.

The hymn was written by Samuel Crossman. Crossman lived during the 1600s and was a clergyman with Puritan sympaties. When the Act of Uniformity ejected him, along with 2000 others, he recanted and was ordained into the Church of England. The song is interesting in that, in speaking of Christ and His saving work, it does so in highly stylised form. Consider these lines from verse 1: ‘O who am I, that for my sake My Lord should take frail flesh and die?’ and verse 6: ‘The Prince of life they slay, Yet cheerful He to suffering goes, That He His foes from thence might free’. Singing this gives us association with the expression of Christian faith as expressed by God’s people in ages past.
The tune ‘Love Unknown’ was written by John Ireland, who passed away in 1962.
The musical phrasing that causes a pausing reflection in the second last line of each verse draws the singer into the expression of the words.

The lyrics:
1.
My song is love unknown,
My Saviour’s love to me;
Love to the loveless shown,
That they might lovely be.
O who am I, that for my sake
My Lord should take frail flesh and die?
2.
He came from His blest throne
Salvation to bestow;
But men made strange, and none
The longed-for Christ would know:
But O! my Friend, my Friend indeed,
Who at my need His life did spend.
3.
Sometimes they strew His way,
And His sweet praises sing;
Resounding all the day
Hosannas to their King:
Then “Crucify!” is all their breath,
And for His death they thirst and cry.
4.
Why, what hath my Lord done?
What makes this rage and spite?
He made the lame to run,
He gave the blind their sight,
Sweet injuries! Yet they at these
Themselves displease, and ’gainst Him rise.
5.
They rise and needs will have
My dear Lord made away;
A murderer they save,
The Prince of life they slay,
Yet cheerful He to suffering goes,
That He His foes from thence might free.
6.
In life, no house, no home
My Lord on earth might have;
In death no friendly tomb
But what a stranger gave.
What may I say? Heav’n was His home;
But mine the tomb wherein He lay.
7.
Here might I stay and sing,
No story so divine;
Never was love, dear King!
Never was grief like Thine.
This is my Friend, in Whose sweet praise
I all my days could gladly spend.

The Rejoice! hymnbook version of the hymn has six verses. Verse 6 of the version above is omitted and minor alterations/modernisations are included. Verse 5 is substantially rewritten to emphasise the nature of Christ’s saving work:
With angry shouts they have
My dear Lord done away;
Murderers they save,
The Prince of Life they coldly slay!
Yet willingly He bears the shame
That through His Name all might be free.
As with many songs in Rejoice this is © Jubilate Hymns Ltd. I don’t understand the ethics of copyrighting minor revisions of public domain works. Less so in Christian praise.

The youtube is Dom Kelly on Songs of Praise 8th Feb 09. Dom is joined by Emily Ogilvie as they accompany the St Martins Church Choir, who sing “My Song Is Love Unknown”.