Home Listening Week of 11 March 2008 (NOT REQUIRED reading)

Songs Week of 11 March 2008
(Home Listening)

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"We're Gonna Movie" (click here to hear) is from Elvis Presley's first film, Love Me Tender (1956). It's adapted from an older Gospel song called "There's a Leak in This Old Building," which uses the metaphor (image) of a dying body/house in the final chapter of Ecclesisates ("Remember your Creator in the days of your youth, before the days of trouble come"), with the reminder that "man goes to his eternal home" (12:5) "and the spirit returns to God who gave it" (12:7). However, in Ecclesiastes there's no hint of an afterlife, as in the song's Christian hope that "we're gonna move to a better home," a hope that developed later in Jewish thought (the book of Daniel, etc.). Though Elvis was a great Gospel singer (inducted into the Gospel Hall of Fame) note his playful phrasing at the end of each verse  (as in "where it drops right out again").

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WE'RE GONNA MOVE

Well there's a leak in this old building Yes, there's a leak in this old building Well there's a leak in this old building We're gonna move to a better home. We got no pane in this old window We got no pane in this old window We got no pane in this old window We're gonna move to a better home. Well there's a hole in the roof where the rain pours in A hole in the floor where it drops right out again Well there's a leak in this old building Well there's a leak in this old building Well there's a leak in this old building We're gonna move to a better home Well there's a crack across the ceiling Yes there's a crack across the ceiling Well there's a crack across the ceiling We're gonna find us a better home We've gotta stove without a chimney We've gotta stove without a chimney What good's a stove without a chimney We're gonna move to a better home
Pulling down window shades is no use at all The kids and the neighbor can peep right through the wall Well there's a leak in this old building
Well there's a leak in this old building Well there's a leak in this old building We're gonna move to a better, move to a better Move to a better home.

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THIS OLE HOUSE
By Stuart Hamblin, this song, a 1954 #1 hit for pop singer Rosemary Clooney (George Clooney's aunt) echoes Ecclesiastes ("he trembles in the darkness"). (Click here to hear). As in "We're Gonna Move," the song is based on the Christian hope of an etenal home. (The "saints" refer to observant Christians.)

This old house once knew his children This old house once knew his wife
This old house was home and comfort As they fought the storms of life This old house once rang with laughter This old house heard many shouts Now he trembles in the darkness When the lightnin' walks about
    CHORUS: Ain't a-gonna need this house no longer Ain't a-gonna need this house no more Ain't got time to fix the shingles Ain't got time to fix the floor Ain't got time to oil the hinges Nor to mend the windowpane
Ain't a-gonna need this house no longer He's a-gettin' ready to meet the saints
    This old house is a-gettin' shaky This ole house is a-gettin' old This old house lets in the rain This old house lets in the cold Oh his knees are gettin' chilly But he feels no fear nor pain 'Cause he sees an angel peekin' Through a broken windowpane CHORUS
    This old house is afraid of thunder This ole house is afraid of storms This old house just groans and trembles When the night wind flings its arms This old house is gettin' feeble This old house is needin' paint Just like him it's tuckered out But he's a-gettin' ready to meet the saints CHORUS

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THE GREAT SPECKLED BIRD

"Has not my inheritance become to me like a speckled bird of prey that other bids of prey surround and attack? Jeremiah 12:9
Jeremiah compares God's Chosen People to a speckled bird, a metaphor now used for the Christian church (the "new Israel"), persecuted by enemies (that is, secularists and non-believers). As a country Gospel song, it reached #1 on the Country charts. To hear the song, click here.

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What a beautiful thought I am thinking, Concerning a great speckled bird. And to know that my name is recorded on the pages of God's Holy Word. Desiring to lower her standard, They watch every move that she makes They long to find fault with her teachings, But really she makes no mistakes. I am glad I have learned of her meekness.I am proud that my name is on her book, For I want to be one never fearing the face of my Savior to look. When He cometh descending from heaven, On a cloud like He writes in His Word, I'll be joyfully carried to meet Him On the wings of that great speckled bird.

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MARCHING TO ZION

"There will be a day when watchmen cry out on the hills of Ephraim [Israel], 'Come, let us go up to Zion, to the Lord our God.'" Jeremiah 31.6

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A Black choir sings this song here. Part of this song can be heard in Cantonese here.

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Come, we that love the Lord, And let our joys be known; Join in a song with sweet accord, Join in a song with sweet accord And thus surround the throne, And thus surround the throne.
    Refrain: We’re marching to Zion, Beautiful, beautiful Zion; We’re marching upward to Zion, The beautiful city of God. The hill of Zion yields A thousand sacred sweets Before we reach the heav’nly fields, Before we reach the heav’nly fields, Or walk the golden streets, Or walk the golden streets. Then let our songs abound, And every tear be dry; We’re marching through Immanuel’s ground, We’re marching through Immanuel’s ground, To fairer worlds on high, To fairer worlds on high. (Refrain)

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GREAT IS THY FAITHFULNESS

"Because of the Lord's great love we are not consumed, for his compassions never fail. They are new every morning; great is your faithfulness." LAMENTATIONS 3:22
"Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom can be no variation, nor turning shadow." (JAMES 1:17)

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Aaliyah sings the first verse of this famous hymn (click here). A Black choir sings the hymn here.

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Great is Thy faithfulness O Thou my Father. There is no shadow of turning with Thee. Thou changest not Thy compassions, they fail not. As Thou hast been, Thou forever wilt be. Great is Thy faithfulness, great is Thy faithfulness,  morning by morning new mercies I see. All I have needed, Thy hand hath provided, great is Thy faithfulness Lord unto me.

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The Suffering Servant
from Handel's MESSIAH

The following verses from the Old Testament, set to music by Handel (click here to hear), are all read "Christologically," that is, as Messianic verses predicting the life, Passion, and divinity of Jesus (see Psalm 16:10 in Christian translations).
    As can be seen in the verses below, the book of Lamentations is read by Christians as an allegory of Jesus' suffering. That is, the personification of Israel as a woman is read literally, now to refer to the man Jesus. Hence the importance of the book of Lamentations during Christian Holy Week (the week before Easter).
    The Suffering Servant texts from Isaiah are also used for this purpose. Jews read the Suffering Servant texts in Isaiah to refer either to Isaiah himself (Isaiah 20:3) or to Israel (Isaiah 41:8-9: "But thou, Israel, art my servant"; compare 42:1).
    A verse from Psalm 16, one of the greatest Trust Psalms, is read to refer to Jesus' Resurrection.
    NOTE: Rene Girard, a major figure in 20th century critical theory, has observed that Jewish biblical texts introduced, for the first time in history, the idea of the "scapegoat," or sacrificed victim, not as guilty, but as innocent (see especially the Psalms, Job, the Suffering Servant verses in Isaiah, and the Passion of Jesus). Hence the importance of these texts from an anthropological perspective (that is, from the point of view of understanding cultural history). Girard converted to Christiantiy.

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    (Recitative) Thy rebuke hath broken his heart. He is full of heaviness, he is full of heaviness. Thy rebuke hath broken his heart. He looked for a man to have pity on him but there was no man to comfort. He looketh for some to have pity on him but there was no man, neither found He any to comfort him. (Psalm 69:20)
    (Air) Behold and see, behold and see if there be any sorrow like unto his sorrow. (Lamentations 1:12)
    (Recitative) He was cut off out of the land of the living; for the transgression of Thy people was He sticken. (Isaiah 53:8)
    (Air) But Thou didst not leave His soul in hell; nor didst thou suffer Thy Holy One to see corruption. (Psalm 16:10)

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