# LCMS Convention Proceedings_St. Louis Missouri_1935_S255
# Machine transcription, uncorrected — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

Ev, Luth. Synod ‘of Missouri, Ohio, and Other States. 1935. 248

meeting regularly ever since. A program of work was organized
and each field of hymnody pertinent to our task given over to special
subcommittees for study.

One of the first actions of the committee was to request, through
the church-papers, suggestions from our people with respect to hymns,
translations, tunes, etc. The response was very liberal and indicated
a wide-spread interest in our work, an interest that does not seem to
have abated up to the present writing.

The committee, at its organization, also laid down the following
basic principles, according to which it would guide itself in the task
assigned to it: —

1) Hymns: —

a) Must be of intrinsic value as to their contents.
b) Must be distinctively Christian.

2) Translations : —

a) Must be of good form.
b) Must be in idiomatic English.

3) Tunes: —

a) Must be suited to the text.

b) Must be good church music. (Exceptions may be made in
cases in- which the text and tune are associated so closely as
to be almost inseparable.)

One of the first tasks undertaken by the committee was to deter-
mine which hymns are in common use in the Lutheran Church in
America irrespective of origin. This was arrived at by a careful com-
parison of all English Lutheran hymnals. The result was a list of
several hundred hymns. ‘These were. then apportioned, according to
their class, to the various subcommittees for study and recommenda-
tion. From this beginning the work has naturally proceeded.

Many letters have come to us inquiring as to the method em-
ployed by the committee in its work on the hymns. This may be de-
scribed briefly. First of all, the question is decided as to whether
a hymn is worthy of inclusion in our hymn-book. Then an effort is
made to obtain the hymn in its original form, as it came from the
pen of the author. This form is then adopted unless there are poet-
ical, linguistic, or doctrinal reasons for making changes. It is sur-
prising what liberties hymn-book committees in all denominations
have taken with the texts of. our hymns. Sometimes the authors
themselves have made frequent changes. Sometimes parts of several
stanzas are combined. Sometimes expressions and figures of speech
are archaic. Sometimes the first reading leaves the meaning in doubt.
Sometimes statements are too realistic (Toplady’s “when my eye-
strings break in death”). Sometimes the author’s original was an in-
direct attack .on the Lutheran Church (Schefiter’ s.“Thee will. I Love,
My Strength, My Tower’).