O God of Bethel, by Whose hand

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O God of Bethel, by Whose hand

Author: Philip Doddridge (1736)
Published in 374 hymnals

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Representative Text

1 O God of Bethel, by whose hand
thy people still are fed,
who through this weary pilgrimage
hast all our fathers led;

2 Our vows, our prayers, we now present
before thy throne of grace;
God of our fathers, be the God
of their succeeding race.

3 Through each perplexing path of life
our wandering footsteps guide;
give us each day our daily bread,
and raiment fit provide.

4 O spread thy covering wings around
till all our wanderings cease,
and at our Father's loved abode
our souls arrive in peace.

Source: Ancient and Modern: hymns and songs for refreshing worship #744a

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Author: Philip Doddridge

Philip Doddridge (b. London, England, 1702; d. Lisbon, Portugal, 1751) belonged to the Non-conformist Church (not associated with the Church of England). Its members were frequently the focus of discrimination. Offered an education by a rich patron to prepare him for ordination in the Church of England, Doddridge chose instead to remain in the Non-conformist Church. For twenty years he pastored a poor parish in Northampton, where he opened an academy for training Non-conformist ministers and taught most of the subjects himself. Doddridge suffered from tuberculosis, and when Lady Huntington, one of his patrons, offered to finance a trip to Lisbon for his health, he is reputed to have said, "I can as well go to heaven from Lisbon as from Nort… Go to person page >

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Related Texts

First Line:	O God of Bethel, by Whose hand
Author:	Philip Doddridge (1736)
Meter:	8.6.8.6
Language:	English
Copyright:	Public Domain

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Notes

O God of Bethel, by Whose hand, p. 832, i,, iii. E. Darracott's version of this hymn was included in The Star of the West, being Memoirs of the Life of the late Bisdon Darracott, London, 1813, pp. 40,41, as a hymn written after his marriage, which took place in Dec. 1741. Hence has arisen the modern claim for Darracott as the author of the hymn, as against the claims of Doddridge. The Darracott version, as the editor of the Memoirs remarks, excites "no high idea of his poetic genius." Besides rewriting the hymn to adapt it to his circumstances in 1741, Darracott added the following concluding stanza:—

"For if, O Lord,
Thou ours wilt be,
We can give up the rest,
Our souls possess'd alone of Thee,
Are infinitely blest."

[Rev. James Mearns, M.A.]

--John Julian, Dictionary of Hymnology, New Supplement (1907)

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Tune

DUNDEE (Ravenscroft)

DUNDEE first appeared in the 1615 edition of the Scottish Psalter published in Edinburgh by Andro Hart. Called a "French" tune (thus it also goes by the name of FRENCH), DUNDEE was one of that hymnal's twelve "common tunes"; that is, it was not associated with a specific psalm. In the Psalter Hymnal…

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SALZBURG (Haydn)

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