Nunc dimittis

Then shall follow the psalms in order as they be appointed.

And at the end of every psalm throughout the year, and likewise in the end of Benedicite, Benedictus, Magnificat, and Nunc dimittis, shall be repeated, "Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Ghost." Answer, "As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end.

Amen." Then shall be read distinctly with an audible voice the first lesson taken out of the Old Testament as it is appointed in the calendar, except there be proper lessons assigned for that day.

He that readeth so standing and turning himself as he may be heard of all such as are present.

Amen.

Then a lesson of the New Testament, as it is appointed.

And after that Nunc Dimittis, or the Song of Simeon, in English, as followeth.

Nunc Dimittis, Saint Luke two, verse twenty-nine.

They were hastening to the land where their divine master had descended from his throne in heaven to take on himself the form of man, where for years the everlasting son of the Almighty Father had patiently toiled, healing the sick, comforting the afflicted, and raising the dead, until at length he carried his own cross up the height of Calvary, and having offered up his perfect sacrifice, put off the garments of his humiliation when the earthquake shattered the prison house of his sepulchre.

For them, the whole land had been rendered holy by the tread of his sacred feet, and the pilgrim who had traced the scenes of his life from his cradle at Bethlehem to the spot of his ascent from Olivet might sing the Nunc Dimittis as having with his own eyes seen the divine salvation.

Thus the crusade preached by Peter the Hermit and solemnly sanctioned by Pope Urban was rendered possible by the combination of papal authority with an irresistible popular conviction.

That papal authority was the necessary result of the old imperial tradition of Rome, the popular conviction was the growth of a tendency which had characterized every religion professed by Aryan or Semitic nations, and both these causes were wholly unconnected with the teaching of Christ.

They'll do words of institution and an exhortation to those who are gonna commune, followed by the distribution of the elements and another psalm sung with a prayer of thanksgiving.

They'll wrap it all up with singing the Nunc Dimittis from the Gospel of Luke, and then finally, a pastoral benediction.

So that's his Strasbourg liturgy, and this is important because we think that this is probably what Calvin would do in worship if there were no constraints whatsoever.

Now, when he's gonna go back to Geneva then, you're gonna notice that the liturgy is, for the most part, fairly similar with just a couple of little alterations there.

I think you said at the New Guilford Cathedral that it...

You didn't just do Magnificats and Nucleus, but you for a long time just did chant and hymns before they ever learned repertoire.

Well, they were new.

I mean, we only had six months.

End of poem This recording is in the public domain.

Nunc Dimittis by John Drinkwater.

Read for LibriVox.org.

I have seen the plover’s wing And the gray willow bough, The sandy bubbling spring, The hawk over the plough; And now, instructed so, I am content to go.

then shall follow the Psalms in order as they be appointed.

And at the end of every Psalm throughout the year, and likewise in the end of Benedictus Magnificat and Nunc Dimittis, shall be repeated, Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Ghost.

Answer, as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end.

Amen.

Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Ghost, as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end.

Amen.

Then a lesson of the New Testament as it is appointed, and after that Nunc Dimittis, or the Song of Simeon, in English, as followeth.

Nunc Dimittis, St. Luke, 2, verse 29.

He was there about 150 years before Mozart, with his earliest Italian works being written in Venice in 1611.

This is his setting of the Nunc Dimittis, or the Canticle of Simeon, from the Latin Bible.

Here is the group Vox Luminis, led by Lionel Meunier.

Thanks again for listening.

That was the hymnal of the Old Testament.

A hundred and fifty of them, one very long and one very short, and they sang then also canticles from the New Testament, the Magnificat, the Nunc Dimittis, and then new songs that were written.

So the role that these songs play in Sunday morning are hymns also that have been written since the New Testament, spiritual songs we might call them.

I would say above all else, proclaim Christ.

And so he began, during about an eighteen-month period of 1523 and '24, to feverishly compose hymns.

He wrote two-thirds of his lifetime output during this period, and he wrote examples of psalms, how you could sing a psalm in the form of a hymn.

He wrote canticles, uh, the Nunc Dimittis, for instance, how you can sing the Nunc Dimittis in the form of a hymn.

He wrote hymns for the church year, and, uh, these became models then for the future of hymn writing in the Lutheran church and in the Western church.