Saint Anne’s, Soho, the London church that rose from the ashes after the Blitz and lengthy closure

Saint Anne’s Church, Soho, and Saint Anne’s Gardens, a public park that opens onto the Shaftesbury Avenue end of Wardour Street, London (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Patrick Comerford

In my recent self-guided ‘church crawling’ tour of half a dozen or so churches and chapels in Bloomsbury, Fitzrovia, Soho and Mayfair, one of the churches I visited was Saint Anne’s Church in Soho, including the remaining tower of the original church facing onto Wardour Street and the modern church facing onto Dean Street.

Saint Anne’s was known in the past for its musical traditions and its literary associations with writers and poets, including Dorothy L Sayers, Rose Macaulay, Iris Murdoch, TS Eliot and John Betjeman. The church is also associated with the homeless charity Centrepoint and was known in the past for its radical and innovative priests, exemplified in the life and ministry of the late Kenneth Leech.

Although the church was destroyed during the Blitz in 1940, the church community survived through the post-war decades and the church was rebuilt in the 1990s. Parts of the churchyard around the west end with the surviving tower are Saint Anne’s Gardens, a public park that opens onto the Shaftesbury Avenue end of Wardour Street.

The first certain reference to the church is in the minutes of a meeting of the vestry of Saint Martin in the Fields, in August 1676. A few months earlier, in April, the foundation stone had been laid of a new church in the parish, which was in 1685 to become the church of the parish of Saint James, Westminster.

No grant of the site by the Crown to an individual or corporate body seems to be recorded and its appropriation to church use seems to have been effected simply by an Act of Parliament in 1678 that authorised the establishment of the parish and stated the boundaries of the church and churchyard site. Later, the parish would give rise to two new churches, dedicated to Saint Thomas and Saint Peter, but they became part of the same parish again in 1945.

Saint Anne’s Church, Soho, was consecrated by Bishop Henry Compton of London in 1686 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Saint Anne’s Church in Soho was consecrated on 21 March 1686, the Sunday before Lady Day, by Henry Compton, Bishop of London, as the parish church of the parish of Saint Anne Within the Liberty of Westminster, created from part of the parish of Saint Martin in the Fields. The ceremony was interrupted by dinner and was followed by the consecration of an additional cemetery for the parish of Saint Martin’s on the site of a former Greek church.

The parish was dedicated to Saint Anne because Compton had been tutor to Princess Anne, who later became Queen Anne. Construction began in 1677 on a plot that was then in the countryside and known as Soho Fields.

It seems the original church was designed by William Talman, an architect who worked under Sir Christopher Wren. Saint Anne’s was a basilica, having a nave of five bays terminated by an eastern apse, serving as a chancel, and flanked by north and south aisles containing galleries that were linked by a gallery across the west end of the nave.

The interior was 64 ft wide, the nave was 31 ft clear, and 78 ft long, excluding the chancel apse which added a further 18 ft. The chancel apse was flanked by vestibules with staircases to the galleries, that were also reached by open staircases at the west end of each aisle.

A square tower projected centrally from the west front, but the church remained without a spire for 32 years. The church tower was only completed in 1718, with the addition of a timber spire.

Saint Anne’s House at 57 Dean Street was first occupied ca 1705 by the parish watch-house, and later also by the parish fire-engine-house and vestry-room.

Inside the present modern chapel at Saint Anne’s Church in Soho (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

In its early years, the church had a fashionable congregation, including the Prince of Wales, later George II, and the actress Hester Davenport, who was buried in the churchyard in 1717.

The tower had become unstable by 1800 and the new tower was completed by 1801, its bell chamber’s Portland stonework by March 1803, and its copper cupola by May 1803. The tower’s ground floor room of the tower became the parish vestry room, and was later used as a robing room for the clergy.

Canon Nugent Wade (1809-1893), who was the Rector of Saint Anne’s in 1845-1891, was born in Dublin and educated at Trinity College Dublin and at Oxford, and was ordained deacon (1832) and priest (1833) in Saint Fethlimidh’s Cathedral, Kilmore, Co Cavan. Before coming to Soho, Wade was the Anglican chaplain in Elsinore.

AW Blomfield rearranged the interior for Wade in 1866. Although Wade faced opposition in Saint Anne’s for his ‘Puseyite’ sympathies, he made Saint Anne’s a gathering place for the new generation of Anglo-Catholics in central London. He founded the Saint Barnabas House of Charity in Soho, which ministered to prostitutes, and Saint Mary’s Crown Street, an Anglo-Catholic centre in a slum district within the parish of Soho.

The Revd Basil Graham Bourchier (1881-1934) was the Rector of Saint Anne’s in 1930-1933. During World War I, while he was a chaplain with the Red Cross in Belgium, he was arrested by the Germans as a spy. But his death sentence was commuted, he escaped, and became an army chaplain.

Bourchier was a flamboyant preacher and was satirised as the Revd Cyril Boom Bagshaw in ASM Hutchinson’s If winter comes (1921) and as a ‘totally preposterous parson in Evelyn Waugh’s A little learning (1964). He resigned before being enfolded in a major scandal about his sexuality and his inappropriate relationships with choirboys. Little Dean Street in Soho was renamed Bourchier Street in 1937.

The complex at Saint Anne’s has survived the Blitz and proposals for demolition (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

The Revd Gilbert Shuldham Shaw (1886-1967), who was the Vicar of Saint Anne’s from 1940, was another Dublin-born priest at Saint Anne’s. He had been baptised by his mother’s uncle, William Conyngham Plunket, Archbishop of Dublin. With his successor Patrick McLaughlin, he is thought to be part of the inspiration for Rose Macaulay’s character of Father Hugh Chantry-Pigg in The Towers of Trebizond (1956).

During World War II, the whole church, apart from the tower, was burned out in the Blitz on the night of 24 September 1940, and the tower was left derelict. Saint Thomas’s, Regent Street, and the adjoining Saint Anne’s House in the Upper Room, later known as the ‘Allen Room’, were used for worship from then on, although Saint Thomas’s has since been demolished.

After the war, Jacques Groag proposed in 1945 keeping the ruins as a war memorial, but by 1949 it was assumed that the church would not be rebuilt. The remains of the east wall were the only significant parts left standing, and they were demolished in 1953. The site was deconsecrated and prepared for sale, and the parish was amalgamated with those of Saint Thomas’s Church, Regent Street, and Saint Peter’s Church, Great Windmill Street, creating the Parish of Saint Anne with Saint Thomas and Saint Peter, centred on Saint Thomas’s.

Dorothy L Sayers was a longtime churchwarden of the parish … her ashes were buried at the base of the tower in 1957 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Despite having no building, from 1941 to 1958, the Saint Anne Society under Patrick McLaughlin encouraged links with the literary world, and the members included Father Gilbert Shaw, JC Winnington-Ingram, Charles Williams, Agatha Christie, TS Eliot, Father Max Petitpierre, Dom Gregory Dix, Arnold Bennett, CS Lewis, Rose Macaulay and Dorothy L Sayers. Others who contributed from time to time included John Betjeman, Iris Murdoch, Lord David Cecil, Rebecca West and Christopher Dawson.

Even when there was no church building, the church community remained active in those post-war years, and the tower was used as a chapel for a time in the 1950s. The novelist Dorothy L Sayers was a longtime churchwarden of the parish and member of the Saint Anne’s Society. Her ashes were buried in the base of the tower in 1957.

Father Patrick McLaughlin (1909-1988) was the Rector Saint Anne’s in 1953-1962. He introduced the ‘basilican mode’, in which the priest faces the congregation instead of facing the altar with his back to the congregation. This liturgical innovation was widely adopted in the Church of England some 20 years later. Patrick McLaughlin became a Roman Catholic in 1962.

Saint Anne’s has a long history of being socially inclusive and engaged, exemplified in the life and ministry of Kenneth Leech (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Saint Anne’s has a long history of being socially inclusive and engaged with its diverse and ever-changing community. The Revd Dr Kenneth Leech (1939-2015), who was a curate at Saint Anne’s in 1967-1971, was a priest in the Anglo-Catholic tradition and a socialist, and a leading advocate of contextual theology.

At the heart of his faith was what he called ‘subversive orthodoxy’: the indissoluble union of contemplative spirituality, sacramental worship, orthodox doctrine and social action. He argued that this conjunction of faith and the quest for justice, which points to the coming of the Kingdom of God on earth, is the essential mark of the Christian life and underlies scripture, the teachings of the Church Fathers and the Christian mystical tradition.

He founded the homeless charity Centrepoint in the basement of Saint Anne’s House in December 1969, and it was based at the church until 2023.

The entrance to Saint Anne’s on Dean Street (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

After many years as a bomb site and car park, the present building was created in 1991 thanks to the tenacity of members of local community. By selling part of the site to build social housing and provide commercial properties, funds were raised to create the community hall and the simple but attractive chapel that extends into the hall on Sundays.

Princess Anne laid the foundation stone of the new complex on 12 March 1990, and it was opened and rededicated on Saint Anne’s Day, 26 July 1991. The new church complex is not an actual reconstruction of the old church and can be varied from a large to a small space. It is set within a community centre and is a community focus.

The tower, which had been partly restored in 1979 by the Soho Society, was fully restored when the whole church was rebuilt in 1990-1991 and is now a Grade II* listed building.

The prize-winning entrance was designed by Lina Viluma and Sherief al Rifa’i and was dedicated in 1996 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

To celebrate the 25th anniversary of the rebuilding of the church, a redesigned entrance on Dean Street, featuring the name of Saint Anne’s in neon lights, was dedicated by the Bishop of London in December 2016 and it ensures the church remains a visible presence in the community.

The new entrance was designed by two UAL London students, Lina Viluma and Sherief al Rifa’i. Their redesign of the entrance won the President’s Award for alterations to a church building in the 2017 Church Architecture Awards. The judges said their design made ‘a dynamic and inviting entrance to the church’.

Saint Anne’s is a thriving church community today and a venue for many local community and charitable events. It also houses the Soho Society, and the anti-homophobic bullying charity Diversity Role Models.

Saint Anne’s also has had its own community coffee shop, Sacred Grounds, since January 2024, on the very site where Centrepoint was founded in 1969.

A double espresso in Sacred Grounds, where Centrepoint was founded in 1969 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Saint Anne’s was once famous for its high musical standards. The church received an organ in 1699 from the Dowager-Queen’s Chapel in Saint James’s Palace. The first organist Dr William Croft wrote the tune ‘Saint Anne’ in 1708, a tune still used for the hymn ‘O God Our Help in Ages Past’.

During Wade’s half century at Saint Anne’s, the choir under Sir Joseph Barnby revived the interest in Bach in England, starting with the Christmas Oratorio and Crescendo to the Mathew Passion. Barnby, who was the organist in 1871-1888, introduced the first performance in Britain of Bach’s ‘Saint John Passion’. The first religious service with music broadcast by radio came from Saint Anne’s in the 1920s.

The churchyard, Saint Anne’s Gardens, was leased to Westminster City Council in 1894, having been closed to burials 40 years earlier. It is believed that up to 60,000 bodies are still buried there, and this explains why the ground is so high above the entrance on Wardour Street.

The curious monument to King Theodore of Corsica, who reigned for eight months in 1766 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

One of the few surviving monuments in the churchyard is a curious tablet to King Theodore of Corsica, who reigned briefly from March to November in 1766. It includes a crown in an oval panel above an inscription composed by Horace Walpole. The biography of the soi-disanting was published by Percy Fitzgerald in 1890.

King Theodore’s wife Catalina Sarsfield was the daughter of David Sarsfield of Kilmallock, Co Limerick, a younger brother of Dominick Sarsfield, 4th Viscount Sarsfield, and his French-born wife, Marie d’Athboy. She is sometimes mistakenly said to have been the daughter of Patrick Sarsfield, 1st Earl of Lucan, and Lady Honora Burke, but she was part of a different branch of the Sarsfield family.

Below this monument is a stone commemorating the burial in the churchyard of William Hazlitt (1830).

The Revd Simon Buckley has been the Rector of Saint Anne’s, Soho, since 2013, and is a former assistant priest. Previously, he was a professional puppeteer, and worked with the Muppets and the original Spitting Image. The Revd Martha Pennel has been the curate of Saint Anne’s since 2023

• The main service in Saint Anne’s is the Sunday Eucharist at 11am, celebrated with ‘a relaxed dignity’. The regular weekday services include Holy Communion on Tuesday at 1:05 pm and Morning Prayer on Tuesdays, Wednesday and Thursday at 8:30 am and Evening Prayer at 4:30 pm on Wednesdays. Other services range from Christmas Carol Services and the liturgies of Holy Week, to Prayers at Pride and Soho Parish Sundays.

‘Lord Have Mercy’ … time for prayer in Saint Anne’s (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2025)

Christmas reading with some Christmas, Byzantine and Greek thoughts and flavours

Manuel II Palaiologos on the cover of the Christmas edition of ‘History Today’ … his visit to England at Christmas 1400 ‘offers a window into a time when divisions between Eastern Orthodoxy and Western Catholicism’

Patrick Comerford

Books and journals are always welcome Christmas presents. And I have had extra time to catch up on my reading in recent weeks, with some long train journeys, a hospital visit and flights to Dublin since we got back from Kuching.

Over the next few days, I hope to become engrossed in some of those books, some other books I picked up in Oxford and Cambridge or have been asked to review, and on the bumper editions of favourite magazines, including New Statesman and Private Eye.

In recent days, I have been engrossed too in some papers and reviews published in the latest edition of History Today (volume 74 issue, December 2024). which, as you might expect, has some interesting Christmas reading, but also has papers with important findings in Greek and Byzantine studies.

Dr Katherine Kelaidis is a research fellow at the Institute for Orthodox Christian Studies in Cambridge and he Director of Research and Content at the National Hellenic Museum in Chicago. Her paper in the Christmas edition of History Today, ‘A Christmas to Save the Byzantine Empire’ (pp 28-39), recounts how the Byzantine emperor Manuel II Palaiologos was a guest of Henry IV in England at Christmas dinner at Eltham Palace, near Greenwich on Christmas Day 1400.

Although they were united by their Christian faith, these two monarchs were on separate sides of the East-West schism. So, she asks, ‘How did they celebrate?’

The embattled Byzantine emperor was on the final leg of a desperate tour across Europe in a last-ditch effort to encourage the powers of Western Christendom to come to the aid of his empire against the real threat of an Ottoman assault.

His father, John V, had visited Naples and Rome in 1369 in a failed attempt to end the schism between Western and Eastern Christianity. Otherwise, no Byzantine emperor had ever left the borders of his empire.

The mutual excommunications of Pope Leo IX and Patriarch Michael I in 1054 came to be viewed as the moment of final division between what would later become the Catholic west and the Orthodox west. However, as Dr Kelaidis points out, the idea of a ‘schism’ or even the use of the term did not appear with any regularity until the Reformation in the 16th century, and how the emperor and the king celebrated Christmas matters.

The division deepened in the 350 years between the initial schism in 1054 and Manuel’s tour in 1400. It seemed so deep as to be unbridgeable to the generations who came after the Ottoman conquest that Manuel had sought to prevent.

‘In reality, however, this was not the case’, she argues. ‘Indeed, the state of Eastern-Western ecclesiastical relations remained much more fluid than is commonly assumed.’ Manuel’s European tour and his Christmas in England reveals something often missed by historians: ‘the divisions and differences which split Christianity in the late medieval era were less real for those who lived through them.’

Manuel II Palaiologos meeting Henry IV, from the St Albans Chronicle, late 15th century (Lambeth Palace Library/Bridgeman Images)

Manuel’s entourage included a number of Orthodox priests, providing the emperor with spiritual and sacramental support. In Paris, they celebrated a public liturgy, perhaps at Sainte-Chapelle. A contemporary account says the Eastern rites were ‘unusual’ but that ‘everyone could attend’.

‘Differences in custom – perhaps even in theology – did not appear to stop a shared celebration of the Eucharist, the ultimate symbol of Christian unity,’ Dr Kelaidis notes.

She points out that while late mediaeval Christians, regardless of their divisions and loyalties, would have celebrated Easter in a largely similar fashion. However, the series of winter feast days between Christmas Day on 25 December and the Epiphany (or Theophany) on 6 January was a different story.

Christians had always celebrated the Resurrection, and Easter had been the central feast day in the Christian calendar from the earliest days. Christmas, however, was another matter, and celebrations associated with the winter solstice in northern Europe were transformed into the celebration of Christ’s birth. She argues, ‘It is for this reason that the Feast of the Nativity, the first of the 12 days of Christmas, celebrated on 25 December, is the only major Christian feast to have moved from West to East.’

She goes on to ask what Henry IV and Manuel II’s priests did regarding the celebration of the religious services that Christmas in 1400, including multiple Eucharistic services. There were significant differences between East and West in celebrating the Eucharist, including the Eastern use of leavened bread mixed into the chalice, and the Western use of unleavened bread and separate distribution of the wine and bread.

Dr Kelaidis notes how ‘later descriptions of the events – most of which are from the centuries after the Reformation, when the divisions within Christianity, and particularly divisions over the Eucharist and its proper form, were much more pronounced – tend to declare unquestioningly that neither the two rulers nor their priests would have celebrated together. This certainty is anachronistic at best.’

The Archangel Michael with Manuel II Palaiologos, 15th-century embroidery on silk (Bridgeman Images)

It is unclear whether there was a co-celebration or not, particularly since the English Church maintained a self-appointed autonomy from Rome, she argues. Both the English and the Byzantines saw the English Church as being semi-independent, and so not necessarily party to the growing division between Rome and Constantinople.

She notes, moreover, how there are plenty of instances, many well into the 18th century, of Eastern and Western priests co-celebrating the Eucharist when practical or political concerns were at play. English diplomats often received communion in Orthodox churches, both in Russia and in the Ottoman Empire, while Greek sailors aboard Spanish ships were communed by Catholic priests.

‘In the case of Christmas 1400, the question was not just of ceremonial importance. There were serious, worldly, concerns at stake. At the heart of Manuel’s pilgrimage to the West was a central premise: that the Christian Church, whatever conflicts or disagreements there might be, was still united and that Christian brothers ought to unite with one another against a common enemy. For this premise to hold, Manuel and his priests would have needed to emphasise the ways in which the Church of Christ remained united – or rather that they were still members of the One, Holy, True and Apostolic Church.’

Of course, she admits, ‘one might say that had such a momentous event as a co-celebration of the Eucharist occurred – had priests from Canterbury and priests from Constantinople celebrated the Eucharist together – there would most certainly have been some sort of record. But what if it was not as remarkable an occurrence as we, from our vantage point of 600 years, might think? In the four centuries between the so-called ‘Great Schism’ and Manuel’s arrival in England, relations between the Eastern and Western halves of the Christian world had ebbed and flowed. And co-celebration, if not common, was not unheard of. There is reason to think that it was possible – maybe even likely – that the priests of Henry’s court and those of Manuel’s celebrated together that Christmas.’

Beyond the immediate political concerns, she says, ‘this curious episode at Eltham Palace in 1400 offers a window into a time when divisions between Eastern Orthodoxy and Western Catholicism, though certainly present, had not yet hardened into the later, unbridgeable schisms that have come to define the received views of modern religious history.’

And that is food for ecumenical thinking at Christmas time.

Charles VI of France and Manuel II Palaiologos with delegations, from ‘The Travels of John Mandeville’, early 15th century (British Library/Bridgeman Images)

There are other Christmas and Greek themes in this delightful feast of history in the Christmas 2024 edition of History Today

The Greek themes are continued by Phiroze Vasunia, Professor of Greek at University College London, who looks at ‘How Ancient Greece Shaped the British Raj’ (pp 40-53). ‘British agents of empire saw their actions in India through the texts of their classical educations. They looked for Alexander, cast themselves as Aeneas and hoped to emulate Augustus.’

The Christmas themes continue with Matthew Lyons who questions the claims of William Strickland to have introduced the turkey to England. Strickland applied to have a turkey on his coat-of-arms in 1550. But his claim remains a puzzle to ponder over the Christmas dinner as the truth followed him to his grave when he died on 8 December 1598.

And, if you are enjoying the carols, the choirs and the church organs this Christmas, you might consider how the organ was a controversial instrument in many churches after the Reformation.

Anna Steppler is a junior research fellow in music at Peterhouse in Cambridge. In ‘Listen like a Lutheran’ (pp 62-71), she recalls that for much of the 200 years between Luther’s Reformation and Johann Sebastian Bach’s appointment to the Thomaskirche in Leipzig in 1723 ‘the instrument’s spiritual role was far from assured’ and in the debates between Calvinists and Lutherans, ‘the use of music in church was a particularly sensitive topic.’

Manuel II Palaiologos and Empress Helena crowned by the Virgin and Child with their sons, from a manuscript made in Constantinople, 1403-1405, presented by the emperor to the Abbey of St Denis following his tour (RMN-Grand Palais / Daniel Arnaudet/ Dist. Photo SCALA, Florence)

Daily prayer in Ordinary Time with French saints and writers 4: 6 February 2024

Albert Schweitzer received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1952

Patrick Comerford

We are in Ordinary Time, the time between Candlemas and the 40 days of Lent, which begins next week. The Calendar of the Church of England in Common Worship today recalls the Martyrs of Japan (1597).

Charlotte and I are travelling to Paris later today. So, in these 11 days in Ordinary Time, my reflections each morning are drawing on the lives of 11 French saints and spiritual writers.

As this series of reflections began, I admitted how I am often uncomfortable with many aspects of French spirituality, and how I need to broaden my reading in French spirituality. So, I have turned to 11 figures or writers you might not otherwise expect. They include men and women, Jews and Christians, immigrants and emigrants, monks and philosophers, Catholics and Protestants, and even a few Anglicans.

I am taking some quiet time early this morning for reflection, prayer and reading in these ways:

1, A reflection on a French saint or writer in spirituality;

2, today’s Gospel reading;

3, a prayer from the USPG prayer diary.

Albert Schweitzer is remembered for his work at the Hôpital Albert Schweitzer in Lambaréné in Gabon

French saints and writers: 4, Albert Schweitzer (1875-1965):

The Revd Dr Ludwig Philipp Albert Schweitzer (1875-1965) was a theologian, organist, musician, writer, philosopher, physician, Lutheran minister and Nobel laureate, and he challenged the traditional and historical views of Jesus and of Saint Paul.

Albert Schweitzer became the eighth French citizen to receive the Nobel Peace Prize in 1952, but is best remembered for his work at the Hôpital Albert Schweitzer in Lambaréné in French Equatorial Africa, now Gabon.

Albert Schweitzer was born on 14 January 1875 in Kaysersberg in Alsace. Until 1871, it had been part of France, and then became part of the German empire as part of the Imperial Territory of Alsace-Lorraine. He later became a French citizen after World War I when Alsace once again became French.

He was the son of Adèle (née Schillinger) and Louis Théophile Schweitzer. He grew up in Gunsbach in Alsace, where his father was the local Lutheran-Evangelical pastor. The Protestant and Catholic congregations shared mediaeval parish church in the village, with Sunday services in different areas at different times in a compromise dating from the Reformation and the Thirty Years’ War.

Schweitzer went to school in Mulhouse, where he also studied organ in 1885-1893 with Eugène Munch, who inspired him with an enthusiasm for the music of Richard Wagner. When he played at Saint-Sulpice in Paris in 1893 for Charles-Marie Widor, the French organist was deeply impressed and agreed to teach Schweitzer without fee.

Schweitzer studied theology in Strasbourg from 1893, and returned to Paris in 1898 to write a PhD dissertation on the religious philosophy of Kant at the Sorbonne, and to study with Widor.

Schweitzer became a deacon in Saint Nicholas Church, Strasbourg, in 1899. When he completed his licentiate in theology, he was ordained as a curate in 1900. He became Principal of the Theological College of Saint Thomas, from which he graduated, and the appointment was made permanent in 1903.

As a musical scholar and organist, Schweitzer interpreted Bach’s music, drawing on his knowledge of theology and Lutheran hymns. Widor and Schweitzer were among the six musicians who founded the Paris Bach Society in 1905. A pamphlet in 1906 effectively launched the 20th century Orgelbewegung and a major reform in organ building.

Meanwhile Schweitzer first considered missionary work in 1905, but the Society of the Evangelical Missions of Paris was looking for a physician and also considered his Lutheran theology as ‘incorrect.’

His book Geschichte der Leben-Jesu-Forschung (History of Life-of-Jesus research) was published in 1906 and established his theological reputation. It was first published in English in 1910 as The Quest of the Historical Jesus. In The Quest of the Historical Jesus, Schweitzer argued that the life of Jesus must be interpreted in the light of Jesus’ own convictions, which reflected late Jewish eschatology and apocalypticism.

Schweitzer concluded his treatment of Jesus with what has been called the most He words of 20th century theology: ‘He comes to us as One unknown, without a name, as of old, by the lake-side, He came to those men who knew him not. He speaks to us the same word: 'Follow thou me' and sets us to the task which he has to fulfil for our time. He commands. And to those who obey him, whether they be wise or simple, he will reveal himself in the toils, the conflicts, the sufferings which they shall pass through in his fellowship, and as an ineffable mystery, they shall learn in their own experience who he is.’

He returned to university to study medicine in Strasbourg and meanwhile, in June 1912, he married Hélène Bresslau, municipal inspector for orphans and daughter of the Jewish German historian Harry Bresslau.

After receiving his MD degree, Schweitzer offered to work at his own expense as a physician in the Paris Missionary Society’s mission at Lambaréné on the Ogooué River, in what is now Gabon, then a French colony in West Africa. In early 1913, Albert and Helene Schweitzer left to establish the Hôpital Albert Schweitzer, and they had about 2,000 patients in the first nine months, some travelling many days and hundreds of kilometres to reach the hospital.

After World War I began in 1914, life became difficult for the Schweitzers as German citizens in a French colony. They were sent to Bordeaux in 1917 and not released until 1918, when they were transferred to Alsace. After World War I, his parents’ former French citizenship was reinstated and he became a French citizen.

He worked for a time as a medical assistant and assistant pastor in Strasbourg, gave organ recitals and was invited to lecture in the University of Oxford in 1922 on civilisation and ethics. He also spoke in Cambridge, London and Birmingham, where he played the organ to enthusiastic audiences.

Schweitzer returned to Africa in 1924, expanded the hospital wards, buildings and staff, and built a new hospital. He returned to Europe in 1927, but later returned again to Lambaréné and continued working there throughout World War II.

Meanwhile, his theological research, writing and publication continued. He published Mystik des Apostels Paulus (The Mysticism of Paul the Apostle) in 1931, in which he summarises Pauline mysticism as ‘being in Christ’ rather than ‘being in God.’ He argues that the experience of ‘being-in-Christ’ is not a ‘static partaking in the spiritual being of Christ, but as the real co-experiencing of his dying and rising again.’ The ‘realistic’ partaking in the mystery of Jesus is only possible within the solidarity of the Christian community.

Schweitzer argued that rather than reading justification by faith as the main topic of Pauline thought, as set out by Luther, Saint Paul’s emphasis was on the mystical union with God by ‘being in Christ’. After baptism, Christians are continually renewed throughout their lives by participation in the dying and rising with Christ, most notably through the Sacraments.

Unable to return to Europe during World War II, he stayed in Lambaréné from 1939 until 1948, when he returned to Europe for the first time.

After World II, Schweitzer’s practices, standards and attitudes in Lambaréné were criticised by many visitors, including journalists and writers, and he was accused of paternalism in his attitude towards Africans. But he continued to see his work as a medical missionary in Africa to be his response to Jesus’ call to become ‘fishers of men’ and he was a harsh critic of colonialism and ‘the crimes … committed under the pretext of justice.’

Schweitzer was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize of 1952, accepting the prize with the speech, ‘The Problem of Peace.’

He was awarded the Order of Merit in 1955 and honorary Doctorates by Cambridge, Oxford and Edinburgh. The philosopher Bertrand Russell, the composer Vaughan Williams and the painter Augustus John queued up to see him in the restaurant of his friend Emil Mettler in Petty France, London.

The keynote of Schweitzer’s personal philosophy was the idea of Reverence for Life (Ehrfurcht vor dem Leben). From 1952 until his death he worked against nuclear tests and nuclear weapons with Albert Einstein, Otto Hahn and Bertrand Russell. He was one of the founders of the Committee for a Sane Nuclear Policy in 1957.

In his ‘Declaration of Conscience’ speech in 1957, Schweitzer appealed for the abolition of nuclear weapons, concluding: ‘The end of further experiments with atom bombs would be like the early sunrays of hope which suffering humanity is longing for.’ His four speeches on Radio Oslo in 1957-1958 were published in Peace or Atomic War.

Albert Schweitzer died on 4 September 1965 at his hospital in Lambaréné. His grave, on the banks of the Ogooué River, is marked by a cross he made himself. His cousin Anne-Marie Schweitzer Sartre was the mother of Jean-Paul Sartre.

Albert Schweitzer at 21, when he was studying theology in Strasbourg and Paris

Mark 7: 1-13 (NRSVA):

7 Now when the Pharisees and some of the scribes who had come from Jerusalem gathered around him, 2 they noticed that some of his disciples were eating with defiled hands, that is, without washing them. 3 (For the Pharisees, and all the Jews, do not eat unless they thoroughly wash their hands, thus observing the tradition of the elders; 4 and they do not eat anything from the market unless they wash it; and there are also many other traditions that they observe, the washing of cups, pots, and bronze kettles.) 5 So the Pharisees and the scribes asked him, ‘Why do your disciples not live according to the tradition of the elders, but eat with defiled hands?’ 6 He said to them, ‘Isaiah prophesied rightly about you hypocrites, as it is written,

“This people honours me with their lips,
but their hearts are far from me;
7 in vain do they worship me,
teaching human precepts as doctrines.”

8 You abandon the commandment of God and hold to human tradition.’

9 Then he said to them, ‘You have a fine way of rejecting the commandment of God in order to keep your tradition! 10 For Moses said, “Honour your father and your mother”; and, “Whoever speaks evil of father or mother must surely die.” 11 But you say that if anyone tells father or mother, “Whatever support you might have had from me is Corban” (that is, an offering to God) – 12 then you no longer permit doing anything for a father or mother, 13 thus making void the word of God through your tradition that you have handed on. And you do many things like this.’

Albert Schweitzer receiving an honorary degree in Cambridge

Today’s Prayers (Tuesday 6 February 2024):

The theme this week in ‘Pray With the World Church,’ the Prayer Diary of the Anglican mission agency USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel), is ‘Gender Justice in Christ.’ This theme was introduced on Sunday by Ellen McMibanga, Zambia Anglican Council Outreach Programme.

The USPG Prayer Diary today (6 February 2024) invites us to pray reflecting on these words:

Blessed is she who had faith that the Lord’s promise would be fulfilled. All generations shall call her blessed (Luke 1:45).

The Collect:

Almighty God,
you have created the heavens and the earth
and made us in your own image:
teach us to discern your hand in all your works
and your likeness in all your children;
through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord,
who with you and the Holy Spirit reigns supreme over all things,
now and for ever.

The Post-Communion Prayer:

God our creator,
by your gift
the tree of life was set at the heart of the earthly paradise,
and the bread of life at the heart of your Church:
may we who have been nourished at your table on earth
be transformed by the glory of the Saviour’s cross
and enjoy the delights of eternity;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Additional Collect:

Almighty God,
give us reverence for all creation
and respect for every person,
that we may mirror your likeness
in Jesus Christ our Lord.

Yesterday’s Reflection (Eugénie Mouchon-Niboyet, 1796-1883)

Continued Tomorrow (Frederic Cardew, 1866-1942)

‘Life’ magazine announces the death of Albert Schweitzer in 1965

Scripture quotations are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible: Anglicised Edition copyright © 1989, 1995, National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide. http://nrsvbibles.org

Praying with the Psalms in Lent: 31 March 2022 (Psalms 51)

‘Wash me and I shall be whiter than snow’ (Psalm 51: 7) … snow at Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

I am still in the John Radcliffe Hospital in Oxford this morning after yesterday’s angiogram and other tests following my recent stroke. Later today (31 March 2022), I am retiring after five years as the Priest-in-Charge of the Rathkeale and Kilnaughtin Group of Parishes in the Diocese of Limerick, and as Canon Precentor of Saint Mary’s Cathedral, Limerick, Saint Flannan’s Cathedral, Killaloe, Co Clare, and Saint Brendan’s Cathedral, Clonfert, Co Galway.

But, before this day begins, I am taking some time early this morning for prayer, reflection and reading.

During Lent this year, in this Prayer Diary on my blog each morning, I am reflecting in these ways:

1, Short reflections on a psalm or psalms;

2, reading the psalm or psalms;

3, a prayer from the USPG prayer diary.

Psalm 51:

Psalm 51 is one of the penitential psalms. In Latin and in its many musical settings it is known as Miserere, and in Greek as Ἐλεήμων, from its opening words in Greek, ἐλέησόν με ὁ θεός, which is reflected in part of the Jesus Prayer.

In the slightly different numbering system in the Greek Septuagint and Latin Vulgate translations, this is Psalm 50.

The introduction to the text says this psalm it was composed by King David as a confession to God after he sinned with Bathsheba. Psalm 51 is based on an incident recalled in II Samuel 11-12. David’s confession is regarded as a model for repentance in both Judaism and Christianity.

The Midrash Tehillim says that one who acknowledges that he has sinned and is fearful and prays to God about it, as David did, will be forgiven. But one who tries to ignore his sin will be punished by God. The Talmud (Yoma 86b) cites verse 5 in the Hebrew version (verse 3 in English versions), ‘My sin is always before me,’ as a reminder to the penitent to maintain continual vigilance in the area in which he transgressed, even after he has confessed and been absolved.

In Patristic time, Saint Athanasius recommend some of his disciples to recite this psalm each night by some of his disciples. It is said both Thomas More and Lady Jane Grey recited this psalm at their executions. Charles Spurgeon calls Psalm 51 ‘The Sinner’s Guide’, as it shows the sinner how to return to God’s grace.

Verse 17 says: ‘The sacrifice acceptable to God is a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise.’ This verse (Verse 19 in the Hebrew) suggests that God desires a ‘broken and contrite heart’ more than he does sacrificial offerings.

The idea of using broken-heartedness as a way to reconnect to God was emphasised in many teachings by Rebbe Nachman of Breslov. In Sichot HaRan 41, he taught: ‘It would be very good to be broken-hearted all day. But for the average person, this can easily degenerate into depression. You should therefore set aside some time each day for heartbreak. You should isolate yourself with a broken heart before God for a given time. But the rest of the day you should be joyful.’

Several verses from Psalm 51 are regular parts of Jewish liturgy. Verses 3, 4, 9, 13, 19, 20 and 21 in the Hebrew numbering are said in Selichot. Verses 9, 12 and 19 are said during Tefillat Zakkah before the Kol Nidrei service on Yom Kippur eve. Verse 17 (verse 15 in English), ‘O Lord, open my lips,’ is recited as a preface to the Amidah in all prayer services. Verse 20 is said by Ashkenazi Jews before the removal of the Sefer Torah from the ark on Shabbat and on Yom Tov morning. It is also said in the Atah Horaisa (‘You have been shown’) prayer recited before opening the ark on Simchat Torah. In the Sephardi liturgy, Psalm 51 is one of the additional psalms recited on Yom Kippur night.

The entire psalm is part of Tikkun Chatzot. It is also recited as a prayer for forgiveness.

Verses 12-13 have been set to music as a popular Jewish inspirational song, Lev Tahor (‘A pure heart’), commonly sung at Seudah Shlishit, the third Shabbat meal.

This is the most frequently used psalm in the Orthodox Church, in which it is known in as ‘Ἥ Ἐλεήμων He Eleḯmon,’ and begins in Greek Ἐλέησόν με, ὁ Θεός (Eléïsón me, o Theós). This psalm is also used liturgically in Western Christianity, and the Miserere was a frequent text in Catholic liturgical music before the Second Vatican Council.

In Anglican liturgy, themes in this psalm are incorporated into the Versicles and Responses in Morning Prayer and Evening Prayer:

Show us your mercy,
O Lord, and grant us your salvation …

O God, make clean our hearts within us
and renew us by your Holy Spirit.

The mediaeval application of the concept of mercy in cathedral liturgy is also reflected the original mediaeval misericords or mercy seats in Saint Mary’s Cathedral, Limerick, where I retire as canon precentor today. These stalls were called misericords or mercy seats because each of the 23 seats had a ledge or lip that allowed the priest using it to tip up the seat and still rest on it, appearing to stand throughout lengthy choral services while still remaining seated.

These misericords are the only surviving examples in Ireland of this type of late mediaeval ecclesiastical furnishing. They were carved from oak from Cratloe in Co Clare, the same woods provided the oak beams for the roofs of both Westminster Hall and Saint Mary’s Cathedral.

In English Common Law, the Miserere was used for centuries as a judicial test of reading ability. This practice began as a way for a defendant to claim to be a clergyman, and so subject only to ecclesiastical courts and not to the power of civil courts. This was called pleading the benefit of clergy.

Psalm 51: 1 was traditionally used for the literacy test. An illiterate person who memorised this psalm could also claim the benefit of clergy, and Psalm 51 became known as the ‘neck-verse.’ Knowing it could save one’s neck by transferring a case from a secular court, where hanging was a likely sentence, to an ecclesiastical court, where trials and sentences were more lenient, with a sentence of penance instead of a death penalty.

At first, to claim the benefit of clergy, one had to appear before the court tonsured and wearing ecclesiastical dress. Over time, this proof was replaced by a literacy test: defendants showed their clerical status by reading from the Latin Bible. This opened the door to literate lay defendants also claiming the benefit of clergy.

Unofficially, the loophole was even larger, because the Biblical passage traditionally used for the literacy test was Psalm 51: 1, Miserere mei, Deus, secundum misericordiam tuam (‘Have mercy on me, O God, according to your abundant mercy).

During the reign of Edward III, this loophole was formalised in statute in 1351, and the benefit of clergy was extended to all who could read. The English dramatist Ben Jonson avoided hanging by pleading benefit of clergy in 1598 when charged with manslaughter.

Most settings of Psalm 51, often used at Tenebrae, are in a simple falsobordone style. Many composers wrote settings during the Renaissance. The earliest known polyphonic setting, probably dating from the 1480s, is by Johannes Martini, working in the Este court in Ferrara. The extended polyphonic setting by Josquin des Prez, written in Ferrara ca 1503-1504, may been inspired by the prison meditation Infelix ego by Girolamo Savonarola, who was burned at the stake five years earlier.

Later in the 16th century, Orlande de Lassus wrote an elaborate setting as part of his Penitential Psalms, and Palestrina, Andrea Gabrieli, Giovanni Gabrieli, and Carlo Gesualdo also wrote settings. Antonio Vivaldi may have written a setting or settings, but they have been lost.

One of the best-known settings of the Miserere is the 17th century version by Gregorio Allegri. It is said that at the age of 14 Mozart heard Allegri’s Misere performed once, on 11 April 1770, and after going back to his lodging for the night was able to write out the entire score from memory. He went back a day or two later with his draft to correct some errors. The final chorus has a ten-part harmony, showing how the young Mozart was a musical genius and prodigy.

Other settings have been written by Johann Sebastian Bach, Giovanni Battista Pergolesi and Arvo Pärt.

Allegri’s ‘Miserere’ advertised as an Easter Choral Concert at the Guards Chapel at Wellington Barracks, London (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Psalm 51 (NRSVA):

To the leader. A Psalm of David, when the prophet Nathan came to him, after he had gone in to Bathsheba.

1 Have mercy on me, O God,
according to your steadfast love;
according to your abundant mercy
blot out my transgressions.
2 Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity,
and cleanse me from my sin.

3 For I know my transgressions,
and my sin is ever before me.
4 Against you, you alone, have I sinned,
and done what is evil in your sight,
so that you are justified in your sentence
and blameless when you pass judgement.
5 Indeed, I was born guilty,
a sinner when my mother conceived me.

6 You desire truth in the inward being;
therefore teach me wisdom in my secret heart.
7 Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean;
wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow.
8 Let me hear joy and gladness;
let the bones that you have crushed rejoice.
9 Hide your face from my sins,
and blot out all my iniquities.

10 Create in me a clean heart, O God,
and put a new and right spirit within me.
11 Do not cast me away from your presence,
and do not take your holy spirit from me.
12 Restore to me the joy of your salvation,
and sustain in me a willing spirit.

13 Then I will teach transgressors your ways,
and sinners will return to you.
14 Deliver me from bloodshed, O God,
O God of my salvation,
and my tongue will sing aloud of your deliverance.

15 O Lord, open my lips,
and my mouth will declare your praise.
16 For you have no delight in sacrifice;
if I were to give a burnt-offering, you would not be pleased.
17 The sacrifice acceptable to God is a broken spirit;
a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise.

18 Do good to Zion in your good pleasure;
rebuild the walls of Jerusalem,
19 then you will delight in right sacrifices,
in burnt-offerings and whole burnt-offerings;
then bulls will be offered on your altar.

Today’s Prayer:

The USPG Prayer Diary this week, under the heading ‘Let my people go,’ focuses on the approximately 230 million Dalits living in India. Considered outcasts, these communities suffer systematic exclusion and discrimination under the caste system, a system of social stratification. The USPG Prayer Diary this morning (31 March 2022) invites us to pray:

We pray for the Church of North India’s ‘Let My People Go’ programme. May the programme participants be liberated from discrimination and oppression.

Yesterday’s reflection

Continued tomorrow

The carved wyvern biting his tail under the seat in the precentor’s stall in Saint Mary’s Cathedral, Limerick … one of mediaeval ‘misericords’ or ‘mercy seats’ (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Scripture quotations are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible: Anglicised Edition copyright © 1989, 1995, National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide. http://nrsvbibles.org

Praying with the Psalms in Lent: 27 March 2022 (Psalms 47)

A mid-18th century Shofar or ram’s horn in the Jewish Museum in Vienna … Psalm 47 is associated with blowing the Shofar on Rosh Hashanah (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

This morning is the Fourth Sunday in Lent (Lent IV), and today is also Mothering Sunday. The Fourth Sunday in Lent is also known as Laetare Sunday and, traditionally, this Sunday has been a day of celebration, within Lent. Laetare Sunday gets its name from the first few words or incipit of the traditional Latin liturgical entrance (Introit) on this Sunday: Laetare Jerusalem, ‘Rejoice, O Jerusalem’ (see Isaiah 66: 10).

I am still in Milton Keynes University Hospital since I had a stroke on 18 March, and this is probably the first time in about half a century that I have not been to Church on two successive Sundays, one after another. But, before this day begins, I am taking some time early this morning (27 March 2022) for prayer, reflection and reading.

We are at the halfway point in Lent. During Lent this year, in this Prayer Diary on my blog each morning, I am reflecting in these ways:

1, Short reflections on a psalm or psalms;

2, reading the psalm or psalms;

3, a prayer from the USPG prayer diary.

Psalm 47:

Psalm 47 is known by its opening words in Latin, Omnes gentes plaudite minibus, and in the translation in the Authorised or King James Version, opens with the words: ‘O clap your hands.’ In the slightly different numbering system in the Greek Septuagint and Latin Vulgate, this is Psalm 46.

Psalm 47 is one of 12 psalms attributed to the sons of Korah, and one of 55 psalms addressed to the ‘Chief Musician’ or ‘Conductor.’

This psalm is part of the ‘Elohistic Psalter’ (Psalms 42-83), which includes psalms referring to God as Elohim rather than YHWH. Psalm 47 is also grouped with other psalms that declare God’s kingship (see verse 7).

Psalm 47 is one of seven ‘enthronement psalms’ that refer to the crowning of God as king at a festive occasion. It has also been suggested that the theme of Psalm 47 is ‘universal rejoicing for God's universal reign.’

The phrase ‘God has gone up with a shout’ (verse 5) indicates that the psalm was written when King David brought the Ark of the Covenant to Mount Zion. Alternatively, some Christian scholars understand this as an allusion to the Ascension of Christ.

This psalm is an expansion of the underlying thought in the previous psalm: ‘Be still, and know that I am God! I am exalted among the nations, I am exalted in the earth’ (Psalm 46: 10).

Jewish tradition sees in Psalm 47 allusions to Rosh Hashanah, the day of judgment in Judaism, and references to the shofar blown on Rosh Hashanah: ‘God has gone up with a shout, the Lord with the sound of a trumpet,’ or ‘Elohim ascends amidst shouting, YHWH to the blast of the shofar’ (Psalm 47: 5). This is seen as further hints at God ascending his thrones of judgment and mercy, themes that resonate with the day of judgment.

The Midrash says that God ascends to sit on the throne of judgment to render strict justice, and when God sits on the throne of mercy, God is filled with mercy and transforms justice into mercy for their sake (Leviticus Rabbah 29: 3).

Psalm 47 is recited seven times before the shofar is blown on Rosh Hashanah. These seven repetitions correspond to the seven mentions of Elohim (God) in this psalm, and also allude to the seven heavens God has created.

Verse 5 is one of the 10 verses included in the grouping known as Shofrot (verses related to shofar-blowing), recited during the Mussaf prayer on both days of Rosh Hashanah, and Psalm 47 is recited as the Song of the Day on the second day of Rosh Hashanah.

There are settings of Psalm 47 by Orlando Gibbons, Heinrich Schütz, Marc-Antoine Charpentier and by Johann Sebastian Bach, who began a cantata for the Ascension with three verses from the psalm, Gott fähret auf mit Jauchzen BWV 43, first performed in 1726.

Ralph Vaughan Williams set the psalm in English in 1920 as ‘O clap your hands’, a motet for chorus and orchestra. John Rutter set verses 1 to 7, ‘O clap your hands’, for choir and organ or orchestra in 1973.

A small Shofar on the bimah or reading desk in the Beth El synagogue near Bunclody, Co Wexford (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Psalm 47 (NRSVA):

To the leader. Of the Korahites. A Psalm.

1 Clap your hands, all you peoples;
shout to God with loud songs of joy.
2 For the Lord, the Most High, is awesome,
a great king over all the earth.
3 He subdued peoples under us,
and nations under our feet.
4 He chose our heritage for us,
the pride of Jacob whom he loves.
Selah

5 God has gone up with a shout,
the Lord with the sound of a trumpet.
6 Sing praises to God, sing praises;
sing praises to our King, sing praises.
7 For God is the king of all the earth;
sing praises with a psalm.

8 God is king over the nations;
God sits on his holy throne.
9 The princes of the peoples gather
as the people of the God of Abraham.
For the shields of the earth belong to God;
he is highly exalted.

Today’s Prayer:

The USPG Prayer Diary this week, under the heading ‘Let my people go,’ focuses on the approximately 230 million Dalits living in India. Considered outcasts, these communities suffer systematic exclusion and discrimination under the caste system, a system of social stratification. The USPG Prayer Diary this morning (27 March 2022, Lent IV) invites us to pray:

‘Happy are those whose transgression is forgiven’.
Merciful God,
may we forgive those who have wronged us
and ask for forgiveness from those we have wronged.

Laetare Jerusalem et conventum facite omnes qui diligitis eam; gaudete cum laetitia, qui in tristitia fuistis, ut exsultetis et satiemini ab uberibus consolationis vestrae.

Psalm: Laetatus sum in his quae dicta sunt mihi: in domum Domini ibimus.

Yesterday’s reflection

Continued tomorrow

‘God is king over the nations; God sits on his holy throne’ (Psalm 47: 8) … a carved throne in the shape of a hand in Cashel, Co Tipperary (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Scripture quotations are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible: Anglicised Edition copyright © 1989, 1995, National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide. http://nrsvbibles.org

Praying with the Psalms in Lent: 26 March 2022 (Psalms 46)

The Fortezza in Rethymnon in Crete … Psalm 46 inspired Luther’s hymn ‘A Mighty Fortress Is Our God’ (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

i am stil in hospital in Milton Keynes this weekend after suffering a stroke a week ago. These days have provided additional time for thinking, and before this day begins I am taking some time early this morning (26 March 2022) for prayer, reflection and reading.

During Lent this year, in this Prayer Diary on my blog each morning, I am reflecting in these ways:

1, Short reflections on a psalm or psalms;

2, reading the psalm or psalms;

3, a prayer from the USPG prayer diary.

Psalm 46:

Psalm 46 is known for its opening words in the English of the King James Version, ‘God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble,’ and known by its opening words in Latin, Deus noster refugium et virtus. It is also known as ‘Luther’s Psalm’ and has settings by Bach, Mozart and Pachabel.

Psalm 46 praises God for being a source of power and salvation in times of trouble. In the slightly different numbering in the Greek Septuagint and Latin Vulgate, this is Psalm 45.

This psalm is attributed to the sons of Korah, and the superscript reads: ‘To the leader. Of the Korahites. According to Alamoth. A Song.

The description in the superscript or verse 1 in the Hebrew version, calling for the psalm to be played on alamot (Hebrew, עלמות), could denote either a high-pitched musical instrument or the soprano voices of young girls who went out to dance in celebration of David’s victory over the Philistines. The Jerusalem Bible renders the word alamotas an oboe. The Midrash Tehillim, however, says the word alamot refers to the ‘hidden things’ that God does for his people.

Some commentators suggest this psalm may have been composed after David defeated the enemies of ancient Israel from surrounding lands. The text is divided into three sections, each ending with a Selah, after verses 3, 7 and 11 in the NRSVA (verses 4, 8 and 12 in the Hebrew verse numbering).

Scholars differ as to which river the psalm refers to in verse 4, the ‘river whose streams make glad the city of God, the holy habitation of the Most High.’ The Jordan is 32 km north-east of Jerusalem, assuming that the ‘city of God’ is a reference to Jerusalem. But Ezekiel describes a river the will run from beneath the Temple in Jerusalem eastward to the Dead Sea (see Ezekiel 47).

The reference in verse 5 to ‘when the morning dawns’ has been read by one commentator as an allusion to to Abraham, who would rise at daybreak to pray to God.

Verse 10 reads: ‘Be still, and know that I am God! I am exalted among the nations, I am exalted in the earth.’ This verse is further developed in Psalm 47, which opens an address to all the nations with the words ‘Clap your hands, all you peoples; shout to God with loud songs of joy’ (Psalm 47: 1).

Portions of Psalm 46 are used or referenced in several Jewish prayers, and verse 12 in the Hebrew numbering is part of the Havdalah ceremony, marking the end of Shabbat and ushering in the new week. This psalm is recited as a prayer for the end of all wars.

Psalm 46 is also known as ‘Luther’s Psalm’, as Martin Luther wrote his popular hymn ‘Ein feste Burg ist unser Gott’ (‘A Mighty Fortress Is Our God’), based on Psalm 46. Luther's hymn was called ‘the Marseillaise of the Reformation.’ has been quoted in many musical works, both religious and secular.

Johann Sebastian Bach based his chorale cantata, Ein feste Burg ist unser Gott (BWV 80), on Luther’s hymn.

In the 17th century, Johann Pachelbel composed a motet setting of Psalm 46, Gott ist unser Zuversicht und Stärke, and Michel-Richard Delalande based a grand motet on the psalm. Marc-Antoine Charpentier used Psalm 46 for Deus noster refugium (H. 218), written for soloists, chorus, two treble instruments and continuo. As a child Mozart wrote a short motet to the text of the first verse as a gift to the British Museum and as an homage to 16th century English composers such as Thomas Tallis.

For several decades, some theorists have suggested that William Shakespeare placed his mark on the version of Psalm 46 that appears in the Authorised ot King James Version, although most scholars view this as unlikely.

According to this theory, Shakespeare was 46 years old in 1611 when the Authorised Version was completed. Shakespeare’s signature has a few variants, and on at least one occasion he signed himself ‘Shakspeare’, which divides into four and six letters, ‘46’. The 46th word from the beginning of Psalm 46 is ‘shake’ and the 46th word from the end (omitting the liturgical mark ‘Selah’) is ‘spear’ (‘speare’ in the original spelling).

Decorative spice-boxes in the Jewish Museum in Bratislava … portions of Psalm 46 are part of the Havdalah ceremony (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Psalm 46 (NRSVA):

To the leader. Of the Korahites. According to Alamoth. A Song.

1 God is our refuge and strength,
a very present help in trouble.
2 Therefore we will not fear, though the earth should change,
though the mountains shake in the heart of the sea;
3 though its waters roar and foam,
though the mountains tremble with its tumult.
Selah

4 There is a river whose streams make glad the city of God,
the holy habitation of the Most High.
5 God is in the midst of the city; it shall not be moved;
God will help it when the morning dawns.
6 The nations are in an uproar, the kingdoms totter;
he utters his voice, the earth melts.
7 The Lord of hosts is with us;
the God of Jacob is our refuge.
Selah

8 Come, behold the works of the Lord;
see what desolations he has brought on the earth.
9 He makes wars cease to the end of the earth;
he breaks the bow, and shatters the spear;
he burns the shields with fire.
10 ‘Be still, and know that I am God!
I am exalted among the nations,
I am exalted in the earth.’
11 The Lord of hosts is with us;
the God of Jacob is our refuge.
Selah

Today’s Prayer:

The USPG Prayer Diary this week has a particular focus on ‘Lingering Legacies’ and remembering the victims of slavery and the transatlantic slave trade. The Prayer in the USPG Prayer Diary this morning (26 March 2022) concludes this theme, inviting us to pray:

Let us pray with Michol Thompson, a 14-year-old from Jamaica, as he remembers all Black people who were taken from their homes and forced to work for strangers.

Yesterday’s reflection

Continued tomorrow

Shakespeare’s memorial in Southwark Cathedral … did Shakespeare leave his mark on Psalm 46 in the Authorised Version? (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Scripture quotations are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible: Anglicised Edition copyright © 1989, 1995, National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide. http://nrsvbibles.org

Tales of the Viennese Jews: 10, Ludwig Wittgenstein and his Jewish grandparents

Ludwig Wittgenstein (1889-1951) … born in Vienna, three of his four grandparents were Jewish

Patrick Comerford

The Tales from the Vienna Woods is a waltz by the composer Johann Strauss II (1825-1899), written just over a century and a half ago, in 1868. Although Strauss was baptised in the Roman Catholic Church, he was born into a prominent Jewish family. Because the Nazis had a particular penchant for Strauss’s music, they tried to conceal and even deny the Jewish identity of the Strauss family.

However, the stories of Vienna’s Jews cannot be hidden, and many of those stories from Vienna are told in the exhibits in the Jewish Museum in its two locations, at the Palais Eskeles on Dorotheergasse and in the Misrachi-Haus in Judenplatz.

Rather than describe both museums in detail in one or two blog postings, I have decided since my visit to Vienna last month to post occasional blog postings that re-tell some of these stories, celebrating a culture and a community whose stories should never be forgotten.

A plaque at the Ashling Hotel in Parkgate Street, Dublin, recalls Wittgenstein’s time as a guest (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

The Viennese-born Cambridge philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein (1889-1951) taught at the University of Cambridge from 1929 to 1947. His Philosophical Investigations (1953) was published posthumously but has become one of the most important works of 20th century philosophy. His mentor Bertrand Russell described him as ‘perhaps the most perfect example I have ever known of genius as traditionally conceived; passionate, profound, intense, and dominating.’

Ludwig Wittgenstein was born in Vienna in 1889. A family tree shows his paternal great-great-grandfather was Moses Meier, a Jewish land agent who lived with his wife Brendel Simon in Bad Laasphe in the Principality of Wittgenstein, Westphalia. Napoleon decreed in 1808 that everyone, including Jews, must adopt an inheritable family surname. Moses Meier’s son, also Moses, became Moses Meier Wittgenstein.

His son, Hermann Christian Wittgenstein (1802-1878), took the middle name Christian to distance himself from his Jewish background. He married Franziska (Fanny) Figdor (1814-1890), who was also Jewish and a first cousin of the violinist Joseph Joachim (1831-1907), who worked closely with Brahms. They both became Protestants before they married, and the couple began a successful wool trading business trading in Leipzig.

Their 11 children included the philosopher’s father, Karl Otto Clemens Wittgenstein (1847-1913), who became an industrial tycoon. By the late 1880s, he had an effective monopoly on Austria’s steel cartel and was one of the richest men in Europe. The Wittgensteins became one of the wealthiest families in the Austro-Hungarian Empire, second only to the Rothschilds.

Karl Wittgenstein married Leopoldine ‘Poldie’ Maria Josefa Kalmus in 1873. Her father, Jakob Maximilian Kalmus (1814-1870) was a Bohemian Jew from Prague; her mother, Marie Stallner (1825-1921) was a German-speaking Catholic born in Sevnica in present-day Slovenia, and was Ludwig Wittgenstein’s only non-Jewish grandparent.

Ludwig Wittgenstein was born in Vienna on 26 April 1889 in the ‘Wittgenstein Palace’ at Alleegasse 16, now the Argentinierstrasse, near the Karlskirche. He was one of nine children who were all baptised as Catholics and received formal Catholic teaching. Gustav Klimt painted Ludwig’s sister for her wedding portrait, and Johannes Brahms and Gustav Mahler gave regular concerts in the family’s many music rooms.

In an interview, his sister Gretl Stonborough-Wittgenstein said their grandfather's ‘strong, severe, partly ascetic Christianity’ was a strong influence on all the Wittgenstein children.

While Ludwig Wittgenstein was at school at the Realschule, he decided he had lost his faith in God and became an atheist. But his religious faith and his relationship with Christianity and religion in general would change over time. He resisted formal religion, saying it was hard for him to ‘bend the knee,’ although he once said, ‘I cannot help seeing every problem from a religious point of view.

With age, his personal spirituality deepened, and he wrestled with language problems in religion. At a time when he was finding it difficult to work, he wrote in 1947, ‘I have had a letter from an old friend in Austria, a priest. In it he says that he hopes my work will go well, if it should be God’s will. Now that is all I want: if it should be God’s will.’

In Culture and Value, Wittgenstein asks, ‘Is what I am doing really worth the effort? Yes, but only if a light shines on it from above.’ His close friend Norman Malcolm later wrote, ‘Wittgenstein’s mature life was strongly marked by religious thought and feeling. I am inclined to think that he was more deeply religious than are many people who correctly regard themselves as religious believers.’

Wittgenstein visited his Irish friend, the psychiatrist Dr Maurice O’Connor (‘Con’) Drury (1907-1976) in Dublin in August 1947, and when he returned to Cambridge he resigned his professorship, planning to move to Dublin. He lived for some months in 1948-1949 at the Ashling Hotel in Dublin, but returned again to Cambridge.

Wittgenstein became very ill in Cambridge on the evening of 27 April 1951. When his doctor told him he might live only a few days, he reportedly replied, ‘Good!’

Four of his former students arrived at his bedside – Ben Richards, the Limerick-born philosopher Elizabeth Anscombe, Yorick Smythies, and Con Drury, once an Anglican ordinand at Westcott House, Cambridge, and later a regular communicant at Christ Church Cathedral, Dublin.

Anscombe and Smythies were both Roman Catholics. At their request, the Dominican friar and founding warden of the Dominican retreat centre at Spode House near Rugeley, Father Conrad Pepler (1908-1993), also attended. Wittgenstein had asked for a ‘priest who was not a philosopher’ and had met Father Conrad several times before his death.

His friends were unsure at first what Wittgenstein would have wanted. But they remembered he had said he hoped his Catholic friends would pray for him, so they did, and he was pronounced dead shortly afterwards. He was given a Catholic burial in Cambridge.

A plaque in the chapel of Trinity College Cambridge recalls Witthenstein’s time as a fellow and professor (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

On his religious views, Wittgenstein was said to be greatly interested in Catholicism and was sympathetic to it. However, he did not consider himself a Catholic. According to Norman Malcolm, Wittgenstein saw Catholicism as a way of life rather than as a set of beliefs he personally held.

So, did Wittgenstein see himself as Jewish?

Wittgenstein wrote repeatedly about Jews and Judaism in the 1930s, and many biographical studies present that his writings about Jewishness as a way in which he thought about the kind of person he was and the nature of his philosophical work.

On the other hand, as David Stern points out, many philosophers regard Wittgenstein’s thoughts about Jews as relatively unimportant, and many studies of his philosophy do not even mention the topic.

Yet, some writers have referred to Wittgenstein as a ‘rabbinical thinker’ and a far-sighted critic of anti-Semitism.

There is much debate about the extent to which Wittgenstein and his siblings, who were of three-quarters Jewish descent, saw themselves as Jews. The 1935 Nuremberg laws in 1935 defined as Jewish someone with three or four Jewish grandparents.

In a diary entry shortly after the German-Austrian Anschluss, he described the prospect of holding a German Judenpass or Jewish identity papers as an ‘extraordinarily difficult situation’ and compared it to hot iron that would burn his pocket.

In his writings, Wittgenstein frequently referred to himself as Jewish, at times as part of an apparent self-flagellation. For example, while berating himself for being a ‘reproductive’ as opposed to ‘productive’ thinker, he attributed this to his own Jewish sense of identity.

He wrote, ‘The saint is the only Jewish genius. Even the greatest Jewish thinker is no more than talented. (Myself for instance).’

While Wittgenstein would later claim that ‘my thoughts are 100% Hebraic,’ as Professor Hans Sluga has argued, if so, ‘His was a self-doubting Judaism, which had always the possibility of collapsing into a destructive self-hatred (as it did in [Otto] Weinberger’s case) but which also held an immense promise of innovation and genius.’

Wittgenstein once wrote, ‘Bach wrote on the title page of his Orgelbüchlein, “To the glory of the most high God, and that my neighbour may be benefited thereby.” That is what I would have liked to say about my work.’

In a letter to Bertrand Russell in 1912, he said Mozart and Beethoven were the actual sons of God – both composers died in Vienna.

Although I could find no exhibits relating to Wittgenstein in the Jewish Museum at the Palais Eskeles on Dorotheergasse last month, across the street from the Museum there are frosted portraits of Mozart and Beethoven in the window of Vienna’s best-known music shop, the Musikhaus Doblinger at Dorotheergasse 10.

Mozart and Beethoven in the window of Vienna’s best-known music shop, the Musikhaus Doblinger on Dorotheergasse (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2019)
Other postings in this series:

1, the chief rabbi and a French artist’s ‘pogrom’

2, a ‘positively rabbinic’ portrait of an Anglican dean

3, portraits of two imperial court financiers

4, portrait of Sigmund Freud, founder of psychoanalysis

5, Lily Renée, from Holocaust Survivor to Escape Artist

6, Sir Moses Montefiore and a decorative Torah Mantle

7, Theodor Herzl and the cycle of contradictions

8, Simon Wiesenthal and the café in Mauthausen

9, Leonard Cohen and ‘The Spice-Box of Earth’

10, Ludwig Wittgenstein and his Jewish grandparents

11, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and his Jewish librettist

12, Salomon Mayer von Rothschild and the railways in Vienna

13, Gustav Mahler and the ‘thrice homeless’ Jew

14, Beethoven at 250 and his Jewish connections in Vienna

15, Martin Buber and the idea of the ‘I-Thou’ relationship

16, Three Holocaust survivors who lived in Northern Ireland.

17, Schubert’s setting of Psalm 92 for the synagogue.

18, Bert Linder and his campaign against the Swiss banks.

19, Adele Bloch-Bauer and Gustav Klimt’s ‘Lady in Gold’.

20, Max Perutz, Nobel laureate and ‘the godfather of molecular biology’.