Notes on the texts for the NCS concert in December 2015

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Here once again are some notes on the texts for our next concert. The main intended readership is members of NCS; I hope to clarify meanings and allusions and so forth.

Much of what I have to say is either too obvious or too obscure to be interesting. However, what’s too obvious and what’s too obscure may vary from one person to another. Just ignore anything that isn’t useful to you.

It’s probably safe to assume in cases of doubt that everything in here is wrong. (If you identify any specific errors, I am always happy to be corrected.) Translations are, without exception, written to shed light on the meaning of the original text and not to be singable or poetic English. If you want translations for any other purpose, don’t use these! I have made some slightly less literal translations that may be marginally more useful for some purposes.

Thanks to Colin Bell for digging up some helpful information I hadn’t known.

• anon arr. Willcocks: Of the Father’s heart begotten
• Byrd: Viderunt omnes
• Byrd: Dies sanctificatus
• Byrd: Tui sunt coeli
• Gibbons: This is the record of John
• Byrd: Viderunt omnes – Alleluia
• Byrd: O admirabile commercium
• Tallis: Videte miraculum
• Pearsall: In dulci jubilo
• anon arr. Willcocks: Unto us is born a Son
• Byrd: O O magnum misterium – Beata virgo
• Byrd: Ecce advenit dominator Dominus
• Gibbons: See, see, the Word is incarnate
• Byrd: Ab ortu solis – Venite comedite
• Byrd: Surge, illuminare, Jerusalem
• anon: Coventry Carol
• Ballet arr. Shaw: Lute-book lullaby
• anon arr. Willcocks: Good King Wenceslas

Of the Father’s heart begotten

Of the Father’s heart begotten
Ere the world from chaos rose,
He is Alpha: of that Fountain
All that is and hath been flows;
He is Omega, of all things
Yet to come the mystic Close,
Evermore and evermore.

By his word was all created,
He commanded, and ’twas done;
Earth and sky and boundless ocean,
Universe of three in one,
All that sees the sun’s soft radiance,
All that breathes beneath the sun,
Evermore and evermore.

He assumed this mortal body,
Frail and feeble, doomed to die,
That the race from dust created
Might not perish utterly,
Which the dreadful Law had sentenced
In the depths of hell to lie,
Evermore and evermore.

O how blest that wondrous birthday,
When the Maid the curse retrieved,
Brought to birth mankind’s salvation,
By the Holy Ghost conceived;
And the Babe, the world’s Redeemer,
In her loving arms received,
Evermore and evermore.

This is he, whom seer and sibyl
Sang in ages long gone by,
This is he, of old revealed
In the page of prophecy:
Lo, he comes, the promised Saviour,
Let the world his praises cry!
Evermore and evermore.

Sing, ye heights of heaven, his praises;
Angels and archangels, sing!
Wheresoe’er ye be, ye faithful,
Let your joyous anthems ring,
Every tongue his name confessing,
Countless voices answering,
Evermore and evermore.

This is a translation of an ancient Latin hymn.

Alpha ... Omega: first and last letters of the Greek alphabet, signifying that Christ is the beginning and the end of all things.

three in one: presumably a parallel is being drawn here with the Trinity – though it seems rather weak to me.

Which: refers back to “the race”, which is of course the human race.

Evermore and evermore: every other time these words occur they are qualifying the eternity of God’s creation or Christ’s eternity or something of the kind – but here in v3 they are describing the eternal damnation threatening the human race.

retrieved: I take it this here means something like “undid the damage wrought by”. I’m not sure this is a meaning the word can strictly speaking bear, but never mind.

Brought to birth mankind’s salvation: I think the ambiguity here is deliberate: (1) very literally, she gives birth to Christ, who is mankind’s salvation; (2) not so literally, in doing so she begins the process of salvation.

conceived: I venture to suggest that the semicolon after this word obscures the sense, which is that the Maid (i.e., the Virgin Mary) did three things: (1) retrieved the curse, (2) brought to birth mankind’s salvation, and (3) received the Babe in her loving arms.

seer and sibyl: It was thought in mediaeval times that Christ’s coming was prophesied not only by the Hebrew prophets of what we now call the Old Testament, but also by pagan prophets such as the Cumaean Sibyl. This is the same idea as in the Dies Irae: “teste David cum Sibylla”. Why the Cumaean Sibyl in particular? Because Virgil represents her as predicting the coming of a saviour, and Christians made the (to them) obvious guess as to who that might be. This is probably also a major reason why Virgil is Dante’s guide in the first two books of the Divina Commedia.

Byrd: Viderunt omnes – Alleluia

(Byrd’s Viderunt omnes without the Alleluia, which we are performing before the version with Alleluia, sets the first portion of this only.)

The text is another scriptural mashup. “All the ends of the earth shall see the salvation of our God” is from Isaiah 52:10. “Shout for joy to the Lord, all the earth” is Psalm 100:1 (but also echoes Isaiah 52:9). And the second half is more or less Psalm 98:2, which is also famously reprised in the “song of Simeon”, Luke 2:30-32.

finis: Although “ends” is the traditional translation here, it might be better to render it as something like “edges” or “boundaries”. I’m afraid a flat earth is pretty much being assumed here, in any case: God’s salvation is to be so clear that it can be seen all the way out to the edges.

salutare: can also mean health or wellbeing, but clearly “salvation” is right.

gentium: “nations” is the literal meaning but there’s a definite suggestion of “pagan nations”; or, in the original context of a psalm, “gentile nations”. (The term “gentile” just means “of the nations” and is derived from the Biblical use of “goyim”, the Hebrew equivalent, to mean all the nations other than Israel.)

justitiam: as in Ecce advenit dominator, this word has a broader meaning than “justice” in English, but in this particular context I think “justice” is fine.

Byrd: Dies sanctificatus

The text, as you might guess, is traditionally used for Christmas Day.

sanctificatus: “Sanctified” may be too, well, Latinate a translation. “Made holy” is the meaning; the translation at the end of our copies has “hallowed”, which is quite nice.

gentes: this may either simply mean “nations” or more specifically “gentile nations” or “pagan nations”.

Byrd: Tui sunt coeli

The text is taken from Psalm 89. The first two lines are verse 11; the third is verse 14. (At least that’s true in English Protestant bibles; I think in the Vulgate, from which this Latin text is taken, we’re looking at verses 12 and 15 of psalm 88. I confess I haven’t checked for other such discrepancies of numbering.

orbem terrarum: Thinking about the English word “orb”, I was all ready to remark that here (unlike in Viderunt omnes – Alleluia) we have a spherical earth. But it turns out that actually orbis usually means “circle” (or “ring”, “hoop”, etc.) so maybe the earth is flat here too.

justitia: as elsewhere, this word has a range of meanings; “righteousness” would do about as well as “justice”.

justicium: again, our copies have “justitia” instead and that may be an error. As in Ecce advenit dominator the right meaning here is probably something like “authority to judge”. So justitia et justicium together constitute the authority to judge, and getting it right when one does.

praeparatio: Our copies have “preparatio” but I think this may be an error. Anyway, in context this probably means “foundation”, calling back to the foundation of the earth and its fullness a few verses before.

sedis: Presumably the seat in question is God’s throne. It isn’t perfectly clear what it would mean for judgement and justice to be the foundations of a throne, but the general idea is clear enough.

Gibbons: This is the record of John

This is the record of John,
When the Jews sent priests and Levites from Jerusalem
to ask him: Who art thou?
And he confessed and denied not,
and said plainly: I am not the Christ.

And they asked him, What art thou then?
Art thou Elias? and he said, I am not.
Art thou the prophet? and he answered, No.

Then said they unto him: What art thou?
that we may give an answer unto them that sent us.
What sayest thou of thyself?
And he said, I am the voice of him
that crieth in the wilderness:
Make straight the way of the Lord.

The text is from John 1:19-23. The John spoken of in the text is of course John the Baptist, not the author of the gospel.

Levites: members of the tribe of Levi, traditionally appointed as assistants to the priests at the temple in Jerusalem. (In Handel’s Messiah, when you sing “And he shall purify the sons of Levi”, these are the people you’re singing about.)

Elias: Elijah. There was some expectation that this great Old Testament prophet would return shortly before the arrival of the Messiah. Curiously, Matthew’s gospel has Jesus declaring that “Elijah has come already”, fairly clearly referring to John the Baptist. I suppose it all depends what the meaning of “art thou” is...

the prophet: Presumably this refers to some other speculation well known at the time of writing but not now. The obvious guess (though by no means the only one that’s been made) is the prophet “like Moses” predicted in Deuteronomy 18:15, and apparently there is material in the Dead Sea Scrolls that confirms that near the time of John the Baptist this was expected to be fulfilled around the time of the Messiah.

the voice ... the way of the Lord: John is here quoting from Isaiah 40:3.

Byrd: O admirabile commercium

The text is a standard antiphon for various dates in Advent.

commercium: our copies have “commertium” in both title and text, but this seems to be an error. (Though seeing both this and juditium/judicium earlier, I am wondering whether it’s some sort of dialectal diffference.) The word really does mean “commerce”; it also means communication, fellowship, having-to-do-with, treaty, sexual intercourse, and more. Here, I think it’s one of two things. Either (1) an exchange: God takes human form from the human race and in exchange gives us divinity. Or (2) something broader, like the use of “business” in “funny business”, “none of your business”, etc.

dignatus est: this always looks to me as if it ought to mean “is worthy” but actually it’s the other way around; something more like “considers it worthy”. The idea is that you’d expect being born of a virgin to be beneath God’s dignity but he goes ahead and does it anyway, not that being born of a virgin is a great honour that he was found worthy of.

sine semine: of course this qualified “procedens” rather than “homo”; no aspersion is being cast on Jesus’s fertility.

largitus: it may be easier to remember what this means if you think of the English word “largesse”. I think “large” actually meant “generous” before it meant “big”.

largitus est ... suam Deitatem: this can mean two things; either, more tamely, that God has lavished his deity upon us by, as it were, making himself available during the life of Christ; or, more boldly and I think more likely intended, that in some manner he has actually conferred his deity upon humanity by becoming briefly part of the human race. Eastern Orthodox theologians actually speak of “deification” or “divinization” (theosis) as a thing that happens to believers.

Tallis: Videte miraculum

The text is for the feast of the Purification of the Blessed Virgin Mary (after childbirth). I think we will only actually be using the first portion of it, because otherwise the piece becomes very long.

consortii: this can more generally mean something like “association”, but I think “partnership” must be the idea here. Of course one would never say “manly partnership” in ordinary English, but it’s much more natural in Latin.

quae: our copies have que, which is a mistake.

se nescit uxorem: our copies have extra hyphens making it look as if the first word is senescit which actually is a Latin word meaning “grows old”. That’s a mistake! It’s a curious phrase, this; Mary doesn’t know that she is a wife. Why say that when in fact she actually isn’t a wife? (Or, if you take it that being pregnant with a divine child makes you ipso facto God’s wife, maybe she is, but she also knows it.) I fear the answer is that the author really wanted that 3-way parallel of being unacquainted with male partners, happily knowing her own motherhood, and not knowing herself to be a wife, and forced it in even though the last one doesn’t quite make sense.

Haec ... hominum: The Latin word order here is really strange to English eyes. (Because Latin is a highly inflected language, with words having handy markers on them saying what grammatical role they play, its word order is much more flexible than that of English.) So let me unpick it. I am not certain that I’ve got it right. Haec ... forma: this figure. Subject of the sentence. Still referring to Mary. “forma” has a wide variety of meanings; I think what it means here is “beautiful person”. That sounds kinda outrageously sexist, except that we also have: speciosum: a beautiful man. Object of the sentence. Refers to Jesus. Actually “speciosum” is an adjective, but in Latin you can write an adjective without a noun for it to qualify, and the meaning is “someone/something beautiful”; you can tell it’s a man rather than a woman because it would be “speciosa” for a woman. prae filiis hominum: could actually mean either “beyond the sons of men” or “beyond the daughters of men”. In the latter case I suppose it would attach to “castis” but I think that’s a much less likely reading. castis visceribus: in her chaste/pure/spotless insides (usually rendered “womb” in contexts like this, but the actual meaning is much less specific). concepit: has conceived. So if we wanted an English-like word order it would need to be: Haec forma concepit castis visceribus speciosum prae filiis hominum. This fine figure of a woman has conceived in her pure, chaste womb one who is beautiful beyond all the sons of men.

visceribus: There is a really bad mistake in our copies at this point; they have miseribus which sounds quite similar but doesn’t make any sense.

Pearsall: In dulci jubilo

This sort of text, switching repeatedly between languages, is called macaronic. Apparently it really is named after the pasta, or rather from a different food that was called by that name in the 14th century or thereabouts, a kind of dumpling.

The text we’re singing is a translation by Pearsall of an original that switches between German and Latin. The Latin is unaltered; the meaning of the English is often somewhat different from that of the German. A more literal translation of the first verse: “In dulci jubilo, now sing and be glad! Our hearts’ joy lies in praesepio; and shines like the sun Matris in gremio. Alpha es et O!”

Unto us is born a Son

Unto us is born a Son,
King of quires supernal:
See on earth his life begun,
Of lords the Lord eternal.

Christ, from heaven descending low,
Comes on earth a stranger;
Ox and ass their owner know,
Becradled in the manger.

This did Herod sore affray,
And grievously bewilder,
So he gave the word to slay,
And slew the little childer.

Of his love and mercy mild
This the Christmas story;
And O that Mary’s gentle Child
Might lead us up to glory!

O and A, and A and O,
Cum cantibus in choro,
Let our merry organ go,
Benedicamus Domino.

The text comes from Piae Cantiones, and is presumably roughly Elizabethan in date. The last verse, like In dulci jubilo, is macaronic.

quires: choirs.

supernal: divine, celestial, exalted, supernatural. Probably all these meanings are in view.

their owner know: there is, I think, a deliberate contrast here. Christ “comes on earth a stranger”, not only because he comes from somewhere other than the earth but also (looking forward many years from the infancy scene here!) because “he came to his own, and his own knew him not” – but, says the poet, the animals knew him for what he was. (So far as I can tell, this is pure fancy, as indeed are the ox and ass themselves, but no matter.)

This did Herod sore affray: it feels as if there is a missing verse or a reordering of the verses or something here. Presumably Herod was blithely untroubled by whatever the animals may have thought or done; but the birth of a “Lord of Lords” was another matter entirely.

affray: frighten. This verb is now practically unknown, but it survives in the word “afraid” which of course was originally “affrayed”.

childer: children. (The story goes that Herod was so worried about the birth of a “King of the Jews” that, in the hope of killing the child in question, he slaughtered every young child in Bethlehem.)

his love and mercy: Jesus’s, of course, not Herod’s. Again it feels as if the text is somehow out of order.

O and A: Omega and Alpha, as in “Of the Father’s heart begotten”.

Cum cantibus in choro: with songs in the choir.

Benedicamus domino: Let us bless the Lord.

O and A ... Domino: while the overall intention of the verse is clear enough (let choir and organ join together to bless the Lord who is Alpha and Omega), exactly how it fits together is less clear. Perhaps the idea is that while the choir is singing O and A the organ is blowing Benedicamus Domino; I wonder whether perhaps those sets of words had standard melodies attached to them when this was written, which could successfully be combined – but that’s pure speculation.

Byrd: O magnum misterium – Beata virgo

The first portion of the text (as far as “Dominum Christum”) is from the Matins of Christmas. It has been set to music many, many times. Byrd follows it with the opening portion of the Ave Maria, which is simply a fragment of Luke 1:28 with the name Maria inserted.

admirabile: Literally “fit to be wondered at”. This is of course the origin of the English word “admirable”, whose meaning has been rather attenuated over the years, and is related also to “miracle” (a thing fit for wondering at).

meruerunt: Byrd doesn’t actually set this word. Incidentally, if you were wondering how come it’s plural, the point is that viscera is plural – like “guts” or “innards” or “entrails”.

viscera: See previous paragraph. I’ll add that it’s a rather vague word, meaning something like “insides” or “internal organs”; it doesn’t specifically mean the womb.

Byrd: Ecce advenit Dominator Dominus

The text, an introit for Epiphany, is a sort of scriptural mishmash, derived from Malachi 3:1 (“Behold, I send my messenger...”), 1 Chronicles 29:12 (“In your hand of power and might”), and Psalm 72:1 (“Give to the king your justice, O God, and your righteousness to the royal son”).

dominator: means something quite close to what it looks like, but I think there’s more connotation of rightful domination than “the dominator” would have in English. (Though I understand that if you go far enough back etymologically, the underlying idea is simply that of conquest and subduing.)

Dominus: Of course it’s not a coincidence that “dominator” and “dominus” are such similar words.

imperium: you might think this means “empire” and in fact it does; but it also means command, authority, dominion, sovereignty, and various other such things. “Dominion” seems to be the usual translation, perhaps out of a sense that with all those “domin-” words earlier there really should be some “domin-” word in the English!)

judicium: Our copies have “juditium” but I think that’s a mistake (whether Byrd’s or some copyist’s, I don’t know). Anyway, it probably means judgement in the sense of the right to pronounce judgement rather than asking God to pronounce a favourable judgement on the king.

justitiam: this word and its rough equivalents in Greek and Hebrew have an interesting range of meanings and have given rise to much theological controversy in the context of St Paul’s writings. The meaning is somewhere in the space spanned by these three ideas: (1) make him just – i.e., fair, honest, etc. – as you are; (2) give judgement in his favour, proclaiming him to be righteous; (3) make him actually righteous (i.e., having the quality that would entitle him to judgement in his favour).

filio regis: First we have a king, now we have a king’s son. Is one the son of the other? Probably not. These words originally come from Psalm 72, headed “Of Solomon”, who of course was both a king and the son of an (even more famous) king. And here they’re being applied to Christ, of whom much the same could be said.

et nunc et semper: This very standard doxology is often rendered in English liturgy as “... as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, ...”. This is not, I think, a good translation of the Latin (though of course Anglicans may offer whatever prayers they please, however much they may differ from their predecessors!). Rather, the et ... et construction means “both ... and”, and the nunc and semper are not as parallel to the in principio as one might expect. “Glory be to X and Y and Z both now and for ever, as it previously was in the beginning”.

in saecula saeculorum: a “saeculum” is a generation, lifetime, age, etc., so a saecula saeculorum is something made of ages as an age is made of (say) years. The usual English translation “world without end” is mystifying mostly because it’s using a long-obsolete meaning of “world”. (One English hymn renders it “while unending ages run”, which manages to get basically the right idea while also rhyming with “Son”.)

Gibbons: See, see, the Word is incarnate

See, see, the Word is incarnate;
God is made man in the womb of a virgin,
Shepherds rejoice, wise men adore and angels sing:
Glory be to God on high, peace on earth, good will towards men.
The Law is cancelled, Jews and gentiles all converted
by the preaching of glad tidings of salvation.
The blind have sight and cripples have their motion;
diseases cured, the dead are raised,
and miracles are wrought.
Let us welcome such a guest with Hosanna.
The Paschal Lamb is offered,
Christ Jesus made a sacrifice for sin.
The earth quakes, the sun is darkened,
the powers of hell are shaken,
and lo, he is risen up in victory.
Sing Alleluia.
See, O see, the fresh wounds, the gorèd blood,
the pricks of thorns, the print of nails;
and in the sight of multitudes,
a glorious ascension.
Where now he sits on God’s right hand,
where all the choir of heaven all jointly sing:
Glory to the Lamb that sitteth on the throne.
Let us continue our wonted note with Hosanna:
Blessed be he that cometh in the name of the Lord;
with Alleluia we triumph in victory:
the serpent’s head bruised,
Christ’s kingdom exalted,
and heaven laid open to sinners.
Amen.

The text is by Godfrey Goodman, then Dean of Rochester and later Bishop of Gloucester. As you can see, it sketches more or less the whole narrative of the New Testament.

(The italics on the brief full-choir interjections are mine; so far as I know they don’t correspond to anything in the original text, but I think they help to clarify the structure.)

Most of the text is just “telling the story”, which is probably familiar to anyone reading this, so I’ll just point out a few details that may be less familiar.

the Law is cancelled: this is an idea found in some of St Paul’s writings: the divinely given law, so highly praised in the Old Testament, has the effect of condemning everyone since no one follows it perfectly; therefore salvation requires that the law be done away with. See, e.g., Colossians 2:13-14 or Galatians 3:25.

Paschal: having to do with Easter. The name is derived from the Hebrew pesach meaning the festival normally called “Passover” in English. (The events of Easter are said to have happened at around the time of Passover and there are many parallels between them.)

wonted: usual, accustomed. Here I think it means the hosannas and alleluias and whatnot that have been scattered through the earlier part of the text.

the serpent’s head bruised: see Genesis 3:15. The serpent in Eden has commonly been taken by Christians to signify the devil.

Byrd: Ab ortu solis – Venite comedite

As you may guess, this is a eucharistic text. Its first part is taken from Malachi 1:11. The second part (from “Come, eat my bread with me”) is taken from Proverbs 9:5.

gentibus: this term is frequently ambiguous between “nations” (the literal meaning), “gentiles” (often the meaning in biblical context) and “pagans” (often how the same idea has been applied by Christians). In Malachi, the meaning is definitely the gentiles (the prophet represents God as complaining that Israel is “offering polluted food on my altar” and saying that everyone else is doing better than they are); in its use here, I suggest that simply “nations” is intended. Perhaps even specifically Christian nations.)

Venite ... vobis: The original context for this isn’t (of course) eucharistic at all, though it’s not a bad match. “Wisdom has built herself a house, killed her sacrificial animals and mixed her wine. She has sent out maids to invite the children and the unwise, saying: Eat my bread and drink my wine; forsake childishness, and live prudently.” I think a feast is in view here rather than an exclusively religious ceremony. A Christian application of this inevitably has echoes of all the fictional and metaphorical feasts of the New Testament – the Prodigal Son, the chap whose guests won’t come to his wedding and who invites everyone in the area, etc. – or, more accurately, those are (in part) echoes of this text.

miscui: It was commonplace in the ancient world for wine to be mixed with water before drinking, but I’m told by someone who knows more about this stuff than I do that here it’s more likely to be a matter of adding spices, sweeteners and the like. So yes, this Christmas we are singing about mulled wine.

Byrd: Surge, illuminare, Jerusalem

The text is Isaiah 60:1, except that the word “Jerusalem” (fairly clearly intended but not made explicit in the Biblical text) has been inserted. You may well recognize it from O thou that tellest good tidings to Zion in Handel’s Messiah – where the librettist’s juxtaposition of two passages has garbled the meaning a bit by suggesting that it’s the messenger rather than Zion that should be arising and shining.

super te orta est: The image is of course of a sunrise.

Coventry Carol

Lullay, lulla, thou little tiny child,
By, by, lully lullay.
O sisters too,
how may we do
for to preserve this day
this poor youngling, for whom we do sing
“By by, lully lullay”?
Lullay, lulla, thou little tiny child,
By, by, lully lullay.
Herod the king,
in his raging,
charged he hath this day
his men of might
in his own sight
all young children to slay.
Lullay, lulla, thou little tiny child,
By, by, lully lullay.
That woe is me,
poor child, for thee,
and ever morn and day,
for thy parting
neither say nor sing
“By by, lully lullay”!

The text is from a Coventry mystery play, the Pageant of the Shearmen and Tailors. (A shearman is someone whose job is to cut woollen cloth.) It is sung by the women of Bethlehem just before Herod’s men enter to slaughter the children there.

By by, lully lullay: this is, of course, a lullaby. It seems to be addressed to one particular child; perhaps some single doomed inhabitant of Bethlehem – or perhaps here we’re addressing the infant Jesus before his family flees from Bethlehem. In the latter case it would be a bit strange to be lamenting the woes of the one child born there who isn’t about to get murdered by Herod’s soldiers, but of course there’s an even nastier death in store for him later on.

O sisters too: It seems like this ought to follow an earlier verse. I think I have even seen one, beginning “O brothers, tell / What ill befell / Bethlehem’s town this day ...”, but if so it certainly isn’t from the text we have of the Shearmen and Tailors’ pageant, which begins with the sisters.

how may we do: nowadays we would say “what may we do”, though actually I think the meaning is nearer to “how may we act”. The tragic answer, of course, is that there is nothing we or they can do.

charged ...: the word order is a bit odd. I’m not aware of any tradition that Herod himself was present for the massacre, so presumably the meaning is: “Herod, in his anger, summoned his soldiers into his presence and ordered them to slay all the young children”. So, certainly no breath after “day” but you could make a case for breathing after “sight” and maybe also after “might”. (I forget what Graham has actually asked for!)

That woe is me: I think the initial “That” is just there to make the metre work.

and ever ... lullay: i.e., “on account of your death I will no longer sing any lullabies”.

Ballet arr. Shaw: Lute-book lullaby

Sweet was the song the Virgin sang
When she to Bethlem Juda came
And was delivered of a son,
That blessed Jesus hath to name:
Lulla, lulla, lulla, lullaby,
Sweet babe, sang she, My son
And eke a Saviour born,
Who hast vouchsafed from on high
To visit us that were forlorn:
Lalula, lalula, lalulaby,
sweet babe, sang she,
And rocked him sweetly on her knee.

The text and melody are from a seventeenth-century lute book by William Ballet.

Bethlem Juda: = Bethlehem in Judah.

to name: for his name.

eke: also.

lalula, lalulaby: I assume the vowel in the middle of “lalula” is roughly the same as in “boot”, in which case presumably “lalulaby” matches it rather than ending with something sounding like “lullaby”.

vouchsafed: roughly equivalent to “deigned”.

from on high: does this attach to “vouchsafed” or to “to visit us”? I think to both. Literally, of course, it has to be the latter. But to vouchsafe or deign is to condescend, to lower oneself.

forlorn: these days this word often just means something like “in a sorry state”, but the original meaning is “lost”. I suggest that all of the following meanings are in view here: morally depraved; separated from God having wandered away from his path; doomed to destruction; abandoned by God.

rocked him sweetly on her knee: suddenly, after two lines of large-scale theology, we’re brought right down to earth with Mary dandling her infant son on her knee. I think the sense of anticlimax is entirely deliberate. What a come-down. Well, yes, that’s exactly the point.

Good King Wenceslas

Good King Wenceslas looked out
On the feast of Stephen,
When the snow lay round about,
Deep and crisp and even:
    Brightly shone the moon that night,
    Though the frost was cruel,
    When a poor man came in sight,
    Gathering winter fuel.

“Hither, page, and stand by me,
If thou know’st it, telling,
Yonder peasant, who is he?
Where and what his dwelling?”
    “Sire, he lives a good league hence,
    Underneath the mountain,
    Right against the forest fence,
    By Saint Agnes’ fountain.”

“Bring me flesh, and bring me wine,
Bring me pine-logs hither:
Thou and I will see him dine
When we bear them thither.”
    Page and monarch, forth they went,
    Forth they went together,
    Through the rude wind’s wild lament
    And the bitter weather.

“Sire, the night is darker now,
And the wind grows stronger;
Fails my heart, I know not how;
I can go no longer.”
    “Mark my footsteps, good my page,
    Tread thou in them boldly:
    Thou shalt find the winter’s rage
    Freeze thy blood less coldly.”

In his master“s steps he trod,
Where the snow lay dinted;
Heat was in the very sod
Which the saint had printed.
    Therefore, Christian men, be sure,
    Wealth or rank possessing,
    Ye that now will bless the poor
    Shall yourselves find blessing.

The text is by J M Neale; it is not generally considered one of his better compositions. He set it to the tune we still use (taken from Piae Cantiones where it was used for a spring carol) and published it in a book of Christmas carols in 1853.

The Wenceslaus (= Vaclav, as in Vaclav Havel) commemorated here is Wenceslaus I, Duke of Bohemia. He was killed by his brother Boleslaus (= Boleslav), probably in the year 935, and seems immediately to have been celebrated as a saintly martyr. I can’t help suspecting that his reputation may owe as much to subsequent Bohemian politicking by opponents of his brother as to actual saintliness; but it’s hard to tell so many centuries later.

King: So, if he was only a duke, why call him King? Because the Holy Roman Emperor Otto I posthumously gave him that title.

Wenceslas: not a form of his name anyone would have used in his lifetime, especially not with a “W” rather than “V” sound at the start. Never mind.

feast of Stephen: December 26.

league: about three miles. (The exact distance denoted by this word has been different at different times and places.)

St Agnes’ fountain: Apparently there is a St Agnes’ Well in Prague. It is named after a Bohemian saint who lived about 300 years after Wenceslaus I. I know of no more plausible thing that these words might refer to.

dinted: = dented.

sod: piece of earth with grass growing on it.

printed: marked with his footprint.

heat ... printed: I suppose this is supposed to be miraculous.