HOTC #29: LSB 461, I Know That My Redeemer Lives

One of the most popular Easter hymns (and often heard at funerals, it seems), this English hymn is nearly ubiquitous across Chistendom, appearing in some 462 hymnals (per Hymnary.org).

The Author

After an apprenticeship with an oilman in the City of London and a stint in the Royal Navy (from which he was discharged after nearly losing a leg at the Battle of Lagos in 1759), Samuel Medley became a schoolmaster and eventually a Baptist preacher.

His hymnwriting activities were extensive, coming to well over 100 in all, though this is his only contribution to Lutheran Service Book.

Medley passed away on July 17, 1799, after a “long and painful illness.”

The Text

The hymn opens with the famous words from the 19th Chapter of the Book of Job: “I know that my Redeemer lives.” Every remaining line of poetry until the final two lines of the hymn will begin with “He lives…”

Proclamations of the resurrection fill this hymn. He lives “triumphant from the grave,” “my hungry soul to feed;” “to silence all my fears;” just to note a few. Most stunning, and perhaps the source of the hymn’s popularity in many funerals are the very personal descriptions of the nature of the risen Christ: He lives “…to wipe away my tears;” “…my mansion to prepare;” etc. Indeed the first-person nature of the this hymn is one of the things (along with the tune) that I think endears it to people.

The Tune

The tune is a classic of Georgian English hymntunes. It was published anonymously in Selection Collection of Psalm and Hymn Tunes in 1793, but by 1805 was credited to one William Hatton by 1805. Almost nothing is known about Hatton other than anecdotal evidence that he lived on Duke Street, St. Helen’s near Liverpool in England, from which the tune derives its name.

The tune itself is quite simple, as tunes from this era tend to be, consisting of a truncated ascending D major scale (it’s missing the second note, E, but is otherwise just a simple ascending major scale), followed by a truncated descending D major scale (the phrase ends on an E, harmonized on the dominant chord), then a series of ascending arpeggios and scalar passages until the final cadence. This gives rise to a harmony that is also not terribly complicated, and which indeed comes to Lutheran Service Book virtually unchanged from its publication in 1805. Indeed, the simplest and seemingly most ubiquitous descant for this tune consists of simply transferring the alto line up an octave.

The tune is extremely popular, appearing in some 1,227 hymnals (surely one of the highest totals in the Hymnary.com database), and twice in Lutheran Service Book (the other usage sets Isaac Watts’ “Jesus Shall Reign,” LSB #832).

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