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Advent Hymnals

The Advent Hymnals Companion

A close reading of the hymns, the way a poetry scholar reads a poem: who is speaking and to whom, the scene and its time, the meter and rhyme, the Scripture behind each line, what the words meant when they were written, and the common misreadings answered from the text itself.

How each hymn is read

  1. Text and sources: who wrote it and when, the version read, how it was altered.
  2. The dramatic situation: who speaks, to whom, where and when.
  3. Structure and argument: how the thought moves from verse to verse.
  4. Prosody: meter, stresses, rhyme and stanza form.
  5. Figures of speech and imagery: metaphor, apostrophe, personification and the rest, line by line.
  6. Scripture and allusion: the Bible behind the words.
  7. Diction and tone: word choice, register, and old words explained.
  8. Theology: what the text teaches, kept apart from the literary reading.
  9. Words and music: how the tune carries the words.
  10. Readings and misreadings: the objections people raise, and what the text itself shows.

Every claim points to the line it rests on, facts are kept apart from interpretation, fair counter-readings are answered, and nothing is published until it has been reviewed.

Hymns with a commentary 0

The first commentaries are being written and reviewed.