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1 Hark, a voice saith, all are mortal,
Yea, all flesh must fade as grass;
Only through a death-rent portal
To a better world ye pass;
Dust to dust must sink inglorious
Ere this body rise victorious
To the realms of life and light,
Won for saints thro' Jesus' might.
2 Therefore, when my Father chooses,
Willingly my life I'll yield;
He but gains, nay, never loses,
Who with Jesus quits the field;
For in my Redeemer's merit
Peace has found my troubled spirit,
And in death my comfort this:
Jesus' death assures me bliss.
3 In those bright celestial regions
All is life and peace and joy;
Souls are there in countless legions,
Happy in the Lord's employ.
There the Seraphim are dwelling
Who, in holiness excelling,
Praise with heaven's mighty host
Father, Son and Holy Ghost.
4 There the patriarchs are living,
There the prophets all abide,
There th'apostles, homage giving,
Ever dwell at Jesus' side.
There the Lord's whole congregation
Has its place of habitation;
There, to honor God, their King,
All their hallelujahs sing.
5 O blest city of the sainted,
Wondrous fair Jerusalem,
How thy beauty, pure, unattained,
Sparkles like a precious gem!
What sweet voices there are sounding,
And what joys are there abounding!
Night shall never follow day,
Light from God will shine for aye.
Source: American Lutheran Hymnal #305
First Line: | Hark! a voice saith, All are mortal |
German Title: | Alle Menschen müssen sterben |
Author: | Johann Georg Albinus (1652) |
Translator: | Catherine Winkworth (1863) |
Language: | English |
Copyright: | Public Domain |
i. Alle Menschen mussen sterben. [For the Dying.] This hymn, which Koch, iii. 397, calls "his best known hymn, and a pearl in the Evangelical Treasury of Song," was written for the funeral of Paul von Henssberg, a Leipzig merchant, and was thus sung, from broadsheets, June 1, 1652. It was given in Niedling's Wasserquelle, Altenburg, 1663, and gradually came into universal use, passing through Freylinghausen's Gesang-Buch, 1704, into most subsequent collections, as in the Unverfalschter Liedersegen, 1851, No. 804, in 8 stanzas of 8 lines. It was a great favourite of P. J. Spener, who sang it regularly on Sunday afternoons; of J. F. Hochstetter, Prelate of Murrhardt, and many others (Koch, viii. 628-631).
In the Blatter fur Hymnologie, 1884, pp. 55-58, the text is quoted in full from the original broadsheet [Ducal Library, Gotha], the title of which ends "Mit seiner Poesie und Musick erweisen wollen Johannes Rosenmuller." Rosenmuller is not, however, known as a hymn-writer, and this statement is hardly sufficient to overthrow the traditional ascription to Albinus.
The translations in common use are:—
2. Hark! a voice saith, all are mortal. A good translation omitting stanzas v., viii., as No. 196 by Miss Winkworth in her Chorale Book for England, 1863, and with a translation of stanza v. added as No. 429 in the Ohio Luth. Hymnal, 1880.
-John Julian, Dictionary of Hymnology (1907)