"GIMME THAT OLD TIME RELIGION"
William A. Wisdom

Just a few miles west of where it crosses U.S. Route 202 south of West Chester, PA, Route 926 leads incongruously toward two centers of the most earnest activity. One is the Birmingham Friends Meeting, where twice a month Bill and sometimes his wife Fritzi Wisdom get together with some fifteen or twenty or twenty-five other vocalists to sing shape-note hymns from The Sacred Harp. Just a little farther on, 926 takes you toward the office of the Freethought Society of Greater Philadelphia (FSGP), where on the average perhaps once a month, Bill and sometimes Fritzi get together with President Margaret and others to help with office work. It may be a fifteen or twenty minute walk from one focus of (dis)belief to the other.

I am going to bypass issues about the FSGP, since they can be addressed at monthly meetings or in the newsletter or on the website <http://fsgp.org/>. This article addresses primarily two questions: (a) what is shape-note singing? and (b) why th'hell do two dedicated atheists find it so attractive? This latter question seems an urgent one because the lyrics of so many of the songs in The Sacred Harp represent the old-time low-church religion of late eighteenth and early nineteenth century America--often with a Calvinist twist.

The single best source of information about shape-note singing is this website. This conveys information about the songs and meetings, but conveys little about the feelings associated with the music. You can hear an example of the singing here.

I'll quote from two typical shape-note songs.


IDUMEA (Charles Wesley, 1763)

And am I born to die? To lay this body down!
And must my trembling spirit fly Into a world unknown?

A land of deepest shade, Unpierced by human thought;
The dreary regions of the dead, Where all things are forgot!

Soon as from earth I go, What will become of me?
Eternal happiness or woe Must then my portion be!

Waked by the trumpet sound, I from the grave shall rise;
And see the Judge with glory crowned, And see the flaming skies!


If that's not grim enough, how about this?


MEAR (Isaac Watts, 1719)

Will God forever cast us off? His wrath forever smoke
Against the people of His love, His little chosen flock?

Think of the tribes so dearly bought With the Redeemer's blood,
Nor let thy Zion be forgot, Where once Thy glory stood.

Where once Thy churches prayed and sang, Thy foes profanely rage;
Amid Thy gates their ensigns hang, And there their hosts engage.

And still to heighten our distress, Thy presence is withdrawn;
Thy wonted signs of pow'r and grace, Thy pow'r and grace are gone.

No prophet speaks to calm our grief, But all in silence mourn;
Nor know the hour of our relief The hour of Thy return.


Not all the shape-note songs are this gloomy. One, at least, is positively erotic:


RESTORATION (Robert Robertson, 1758)

V. 1
Come, thou fount of every blessing, Tune my heart to sing they grace;
Streams of mercy, never ceasing, Call for songs of loudest praise.

Chorus
I will rise and go to Jesus, He'll embrace me in His arms;
In the arms of my dear Savior, O there are ten thousand charms.

V. 2
Teach me some melodious sonnet, Sung by flaming tongues above;
Praise the mount -- O fix me on it -- Mount of God's unchanging love.

Chorus


The Birmingham sing is a very democratic one: each person there gets a chance to call for a tune. (If that person doesn't lead, someone else will.) The leader of each song sets the tempo, and decides which verses the group will sing. On a recent Monday, the head of the sing gasped audibly when I said: "We'll sing all five verses of Mear." That sort of thing just isn't done, since Mear is sung slowly, and hence takes up a lot of time. But I knew that there'd still be enough time for each person to choose a tune, so I led them through the entire dismal dirge.

After we finished, I briefly explained why Mear is such a favorite of mine: "Just down the road from here is the headquarters of the Freethought Society of Greater Philadelphia, of which I'm an officer. This is the principal association of atheists, secular humanists, and other religious disbelievers in the Philadelphia area. Mear, on the other hand, is a classic expression of the old-time religion, including an angry God against whom the hosts of Satan are violently arrayed. Who knows the outcome of this titanic struggle...and in particular what will become of me in the long run? This story is patently absurd. But the sound is beautiful--a gorgeous a cappella song in archaic four-part harmony. So I'm simultaneously drawn by the sound of it, and by the text as well--which words make it particularly easy to be an atheist."

When the evening was over, one of the best singers in the group approached me and said that she agreed 100%, and had never believed a word of the text, though she thoroughly enjoyed the singing. She preferred to consider herself a humanist rather than an atheist, but she as fully rejected the messages of The Sacred Harp as I did. I felt somewhat relieved by her comments, since I feared that I had risked ostracism by my brief and largely irrelevant remarks. So I've got at least one theological ally in the group, and I suspect that there are more non-theists in the group.

Finally, I'd like to urge any of you who enjoy a cappella harmony singing to try shape-note singing twice a month on Monday evenings at the Birmingham meeting. No experience with shape notes is necessary. You'll find the group a friendly, supportive, and encouraging one.

Incidentally, if anyone would like to see The Sacred Harp, I'd be glad to bring a copy to a monthly meeting for you to look over. Just contact me at <wawisdom at temple dot edu>.

Copyright © 2005, William A. Wisdom