So take my hands

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Melody based on Friedrich Silcher 1842
Julie Hausmann : So take my hands , original version 1862
Friedrich Silcher , melody in two-part movement for the children's night prayer by Agnes Franz , 1843

So take my hands is an evangelical spiritual song . The text by Julie Hausmann was first printed in 1862, the melody by Friedrich Silcher as early as 1843 with a different text. Today the ecumenical song is one of the few that is known beyond the Sunday church service. It is one of the most sung songs at funeral services .

Origin and reception

The German-Baltic woman Julie Hausmann (1826-1901) was of the Protestant revival marked. At first she wrote spiritual poems for herself only, but agreed to the anonymous publication by Gustav Knak under the title May flowers. Songs of a silent woman in the country 1862.

When exactly and under what circumstances So take my hands came about is unknown. It formulates an unconditional willingness to allow oneself to be guided by a “you”, also trusting “blindly” against experience, which in the first edition is called “I want to follow you wherever you go” ( Lk 9.57  LUT ) Jesus Christ is identified. It is a legend that the song was the reflex of a personal stroke of fate - Hausmann wanted to marry an Africa missionary but found him dead when she arrived at his place of work.

In the first edition, the poem comprises six stanzas of four alternating three and two lofty lines, the last stanza being the affirmative repetition of the first. The sophisticated form does not match any traditional hymn melody. When the stanzas, combined in pairs, were combined with the melody by Friedrich Silcher (1789–1860) is not documented. This appeared in his collection of Twelve Children's Songs for School and Home in 1843, composed in two, three and four parts with the text How can I sleep peacefully in a dark night when I, O God and Father, have not thought of you? , a night prayer for children by Agnes Franz . By 1870 Hausmann's text and Silcher's melody were already firmly connected. Its quieter character, which is urgent only in the fifth line due to upward intervals and modulation, fits in with Hausmann's childlike confession of trust as well as with Franz's original text.

The song's rapid and sustained popularity contrasts with its reluctant inclusion in official church hymn books. The German Evangelical Hymn book from 1915 and its regional church adaptations in the inter-war period assigned it to the “spiritual folk songs” that were not intended for church service. It is also missing in the main part of the Protestant church hymn book from 1950. Only in the Evangelical Hymn of 1993 is it included as a full-fledged hymn under the heading Faith - Love - Hope: Fear and Trust  - that is, not under dying and eternal life  (No. 376). In the Mennonite hymn book it can be found under No. 353 under the heading How God Strengthens Us - Security and Trust .

A curiosity is the earlier custom of singing the song at wedding ceremonies and referring to the shaking hands of the bride and groom.

The text in use today differs from Hausmann's original in only three words - except in stanzas and punctuation: Original stanza 3 "completely silent" instead of "finally silent"; Original verse 5 “feel nothing” instead of “feel nothing at all”; "You lead me" instead of "you bring me".

The song was u. a. by Herman H. Brueckner into English (Take Thou my hand, o Father) , French (Prends en ta main la mienne) , Italian (Mi prendi per la mano) , Dutch (Neem, Heer, mijn both handen) , Swedish (Så tag nu mina händer) and Czech (Ó ujmi ruku moji) translated.

Trivia

In the novel The Promise by Friedrich Dürrenmatt , Inspector Matthäi visits the village school where the murdered Gritli Moser went. He hears the chorale So take my hands being rehearsed for Gritli's funeral.

Translations

Translated into Danish: “Så tag mig da ved hånden, og led du mig…” in the Danish church hymn book Den Danske Salmebog , Copenhagen 1953, no. 543, adopted in Den Danske Salmebog , Copenhagen 2002, no. 611 (translated by Emil Clausen, 1876 ).

literature

Web links

Commons : So take my hands  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files
Wikisource: So take my hands  - sources and full texts

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ "The title of nobility" von Hausmann "only referred to her father and was not hereditary" (Herbst p. 60, note 1).
  2. ↑ Marti p. 262
  3. ↑ Hausmann's letter to Knak
  4. ↑ Marti p. 261
  5. ↑ Friedrich Silcher: Twelve children's songs for school and home, composed for two, three and four parts. Issue 3. Laupp, Tübingen 1843, p. 7 ( digitized in the Google book search).
  6. ↑ Unlike in Hausmann's text, only every second line rhymes here.
  7. ↑ Autumn, p. 60
  8. ↑ In the God's praise diocesan part for the ecclesiastical province of Hamburg it can be found under Trust and Consolation (No. 851), in the diocesan part Austria under No. 901.
  9. ↑ Autumn, p. 62
  10. ↑ https://hymnary.org/text/take_thou_my_hand_o_father
  11. ↑ Cf. Otto Holzapfel : Lied index: The older German-language popular song tradition ( online version on the Volksmusikarchiv homepage of the Upper Bavaria district ; in PDF format; ongoing updates) with further information.