The Cyber Hymnal ‎#3244

3244. Jerusalem

1. And did those feet in ancient time
Walk upon England’s mountains green?
And was the Holy Lamb of God
On England’s pleasant pastures seen?
And did the countenance divine
Shine forth upon our clouded hills?
And was Jerusalem builded here
Among these dark satanic mills?

2. Bring me my bow of burning gold!
Bring me my arrows of desire!
Bring me my spear! O clouds, unfold!
Bring me my chariot of fire!
I will not cease from mental fight,
Nor shall my sword sleep in my hand,
Till we have built Jerusalem
In England’s green and pleasant land.

Text Information

• First Line: And did those feet in ancient time
• Title: Jerusalem
• Author: William Blake (ca. 1804)
• Author (1st two lines attributed to): John Milton
• Language: English
• Copyright: Public Domain
• Notes: Hav­ing be­gun work on his epic po­ems "Mil­ton, a Po­em in Two Books" and "Je­ru­sa­lem," on moving to Fel­pham, Sus­sex, in 1800, Blake com­plet­ed his "Pre­face to Milton" in 1804, ap­par­ent­ly while await­ing tri­al in Chi­ches­ter for high trea­son (he moved back to Lon­don af­ter be­ing ac­quit­ted). Charles Parry set Blake’s "Pre­face to Mil­ton" to mu­sic for a ral­ly of the "Fight for the Right" move­ment in Queen’s Hall. It be­came more gen­er­al­ly known as Je­ru­sa­lem when Par­ry con­duct­ed it in 1918 at a con­cert to mark the fi­nal stage in the Votes for Wo­men Cam­paign, af­ter which it was adopt­ed by the Na­tion­al Fed­er­a­tion of Wo­men’s In­sti­tutes (and is still sung at meet­ings of WI Groups all over Bri­tain). Ed­ward El­gar added an or­ches­tral score to Par­ry’s ra­ther som­ber tune in time for the Leeds Fes­ti­val of 1922, turn­ing it in­to a pop­ular na­tion­al hymn which tra­di­tion­al­ly ends the last night of the an­nu­al Sir Hen­ry Wood prom­en­ade con­certs at the Roy­al Al­bert Hall. This work al­so made an ap­pear­ance in the Acad­e­my Award win­ning mo­vie "Char­i­ots of Fire" (1981). The theme is unique­ly Eng­lish, and there is an un­der­tone of 19th Cen­tu­ry pol­i­tics. The lyr­ics may re­fer to folk­lore that says Je­sus vis­it­ed Bri­tain as a teen­ag­er with Jo­seph of Ar­i­ma­thea, who was said to be a dis­tant rel­a­tive and had a stake in Cor­nish tin mines. How­ev­er, there is no his­tor­ic­al da­ta sup­port­ing this sto­ry. This hymn was sung at the wed­ding of Bri­tain’s Prince Will­iam & Cath­er­ine Mid­dle­ton in West­min­ster Ab­bey, Lon­don, Ap­ril 29, 2011.

Tune Information

• Name: JERUSALEM (Parry)
• Composer: Charles Hubert Hastings Parry, 1848-1918 (1916)
• Key: D Major
• Copyright: Public Domain