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Wednesday, December 19, 2018

What If I’m Not a Merry Gentleman?


One of the blessings of holiday season is the opportunity to sing Christmas carols. Each year we dust off many of the old favorites and, for several weeks, get to sing with friends and family. Part of the charm that accompanies these songs is the archaic language. Like a unique and obscure feature of an old house, sometimes these words blend in and go unnoticed. Other times, something grabs our attention, and we stop to ask, What is this doing here?

Recently I asked this question about the hymn “God Rest Ye Merry, Gentlemen.” I have used four out of five of these words fairly regularly in the last year, and I’m reasonably confident I understand what the fifth means (who would’ve guessed “gentlemen” would be a controversial or archaic term?).

I’m not ashamed to admit I was a bit unsure of their meaning when considering them as arranged in the song. This is not entirely surprising. The song is estimated to be older than the United States. It seems to have gained traction in the mid-18th century (and may even date back to the Reformation era). It was further popularized by its inclusion in Charles Dickens’s classic A Christmas Carol. Upon hearing the first lines of the song, Scrooge responds with an intimidating level of intolerance. He had no patience for the song.

What does it mean? How are we to understand this song and its title? Is the song addressed to merry gentlemen? Or is the word merry connected to God’s action? Is this a petition for God to make people merry? Read More

Illustration by Arthur Rackham from A Christmas Carol (1915)

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