"Away in a Manger" is a

Christmas carol A Christmas carol is a carol (a song or hymn) on the theme of Christmas, traditionally sung at Christmas itself or during the surrounding Christmas holiday season. The term noel has sometimes been used, especially for carols of French or ...

first published in the late nineteenth century and used widely throughout the English-speaking world. In Britain, it is one of the most popular carols; a 1996

Gallup Poll Gallup, Inc. is an American analytics and advisory company based in Washington, D.C. Founded by George Gallup in 1935, the company became known for its public opinion polls conducted worldwide. Starting in the 1980s, Gallup transitioned its ...

ranked it joint second. Although it was long claimed to be the work of German religious reformer

Martin Luther Martin Luther (; ; 10 November 1483 – 18 February 1546) was a German priest, theologian, author, hymnwriter, and professor, and Augustinian friar. He is the seminal figure of the Protestant Reformation and the namesake of Lutherani ...

, the carol is now thought to be wholly American in origin. The two most common musical settings are by William J. Kirkpatrick (1895) and

James Ramsey Murray James Ramsey Murray (1841–1905) was an American composer and author including of songbooks. His work includes hymns and Christmas music and was published by Root & Cady The popularity of the carol has led to many variants in the words, which are discussed in detail below. The following are taken from Kirkpatrick (1895):

Variants

Almost every line in the carol has recorded variants. The most significant include the following: * Verse 1, line 1: The earliest sources have "no crib for his bed". "No crib for a bed" is found in Murray (1887). * Verse 1, line 2: The earliest sources have "lay down his sweet head." "Laid" is first found in "Little Children's Book" (1885) – see lie/lay distinction. * Verse 1, line 2: Some sources, from as early as 1900, have "his wee head" instead of "his sweet head." * Verse 1, line 3: The earliest sources have " e stars in the sky looked down where he lay", leading to this line having only ten syllables as opposed to the eleven of the other lines of the verse (unless "looked" is pronounced as two syllables, as is done in some musical settings). Herbert (1891) substituted "stars in the heaven", and Gabriel (1892) "stars in the heavens" to regularize the meter. Kirkpatrick (1895) may have been the first to use "stars in the bright sky". * Verse 1, line 4: The earliest sources have "asleep in the hay." Murray (1887) changes this to "on the hay." * Verse 2, line 1: The earliest sources have "the poor baby wakes". "The baby awakes" is found in Herbert (1891). * Verse 2, line 3: Some sources have "look down from on high". * Verse 2, line 4: This line has a multitude of variants: ** "And stay by my crib watching my lullaby" (''Christian Cynosure'', 1882) ** "And stay by my crib to watch lullaby" (''Seamen's Magazine'', 1883) ** "And stay by my cradle to watch lullaby" (Murray, 1887) ** "And watch by me always, and ever be nigh" (1890) ** "And stay by my cradle till morning is nigh" (Herbert, 1891) ** "And watch o'er my bed while in slumber I lie" (1893) ** "And stay by my side until morning is nigh" (1905) * Verse 3 is absent from the earliest publications. It first appears in ''Gabriel's Vineyard Songs'' (1892). * Verse 3, line 4: Instead of "take us to heaven", one popular variant found from 1899 has "fit us for heaven".

History

First and second verses

The origin of the words is obscure. An early appearance was on 2 March 1882, in the "Childrens' Corner" section of the anti-Masonic journal ''The Christian Cynosure''. Under the heading "Luther's Cradle Song", an anonymous author contributed the first two verses, writing: A near-identical article appeared in the November 1883 issue of ''The Sailors' Magazine and Seamen's Friend''. Another early version was published in ''Little Pilgrim Songs'', a book of Christian music for young children, whose preface is dated 10 November 1883. ''Little Pilgrim Songs'' includes a similar claim that the song was written "by Martin Luther for his own children". An article in the May 1884 issue of ''The Myrtle'', a periodical of the Universalist Publishing House in

Boston Boston (), officially the City of Boston, is the state capital and most populous city of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, as well as the cultural and financial center of the New England region of the United States. It is the 24th- mo ...

, also included the carol, stating: All four sources include almost-identical text of the first two verses, with no music. ''Little Pilgrim Songs'' and ''The Myrtle'' both suggest the melody of ''

Home! Sweet Home! "Home, Sweet Home" is a song adapted from American actor and dramatist John Howard Payne's 1823 opera ''Clari, or the Maid of Milan'', the song's melody was composed by Englishman Sir Henry Bishop with lyrics by Payne. Bishop had earlier pub ...

''.

Third verse

The third stanza, "Be near me, Lord Jesus", is absent from the known early sources. Its first known appearance was in ''Gabriel's Vineyard Songs'' (1892), where it was set to a melody by Charles H. Gabriel (simply marked "C"). Gabriel credited the entire text to Luther and gave it the title "Cradle Song". Decades later, a story was published attributing the third verse to John T. MacFarland: Since this story dates the composition of the stanza to 1904–1908, over a decade after its first known appearance, Hill judges that "the 1892 publication f ''Gabriel's Vineyard Songs''renders the Bishop's story suspect, and additional evidence must be found before McFarland can be safely credited with the writing of the third stanza." It has been suggested that Gabriel may have written the third stanza himself and attributed it to Luther.

Popularity

By Christmas of 1883, "Luther's Cradle Song" was already being performed as a recitation as part of a Sunday School celebration in a church in

Nashville Nashville is the capital city of the U.S. state of Tennessee and the seat of Davidson County. With a population of 689,447 at the 2020 U.S. census, Nashville is the most populous city in the state, 21st most-populous city in the U.S., and th ...

. The early popularity of the hymn may also be reflected in a report (published in 1885, but covering the year 1884) from an American mission in

Maharashtra Maharashtra (; , abbr. MH or Maha) is a state in the western peninsular region of India occupying a substantial portion of the Deccan Plateau. Maharashtra is the second-most populous state in India and the second-most populous country subdi ...

, India, stating: By 1891, Hill writes, "the carol was sweeping the country

he United States He or HE may refer to: Language * He (pronoun), an English pronoun * He (kana), the romanization of the Japanese kana へ * He (letter), the fifth letter of many Semitic alphabets * He (Cyrillic), a letter of the Cyrillic script called ''He'' ...

, with at least four musical settings published that year.

Spurious attribution to Luther

The great majority of early publications ascribe the words to German Protestant reformer

. Many go so far as to title the carol "Luther's Cradle Song" or "Luther's Cradle Hymn", to describe the English words as having been ''translated'' from Luther, or to speak of its alleged popularity in Germany. The claim of Luther's authorship continued to be made well into the 20th century, but it is now rejected as spurious for the following reasons: * No text in Luther's known writings corresponds to the carol. * No German text for the carol has been found from earlier than 1934, more than 50 years after the first English publication. That German text reads awkwardly, and appears to be a result of a translation from the English original. * The unadorned narrative style of the carol is atypical of Luther, who, Hill states, "could never throw off his role of educator and doctrinarian." * When some earlier 19th-century sources do mention a carol written by Luther for his son Hans, they are referring to a different text: "

Vom Himmel hoch, da komm ich her "" ("From Heaven Above to Earth I Come") is a hymn text relating to the Nativity of Jesus, written by Martin Luther in 1534. The hymn is most often sung to the melody, Zahn No. 346, which first appeared in a 1539 songbook and was probably al ...

". Richard Hill, in a comprehensive study of the carol written in 1945, suggested that "Away in a Manger" might have originated in "a little play for children to act or a story about Luther celebrating Christmas with his children", likely connected with the 400th anniversary of the reformer's birth in 1883.

Theological ambiguity

In the second verse, the line "no crying he makes" is considered by some to fall into the

heresy Heresy is any belief or theory that is strongly at variance with established beliefs or customs, in particular the accepted beliefs of a church or religious organization. The term is usually used in reference to violations of important relig ...

of docetism, with the line's implication that, by not crying, Jesus could not have been fully human as is taught by orthodox Christian doctrine. However, as the first two lines of that verse make clear, the context is that of a newborn having fallen asleep sometime after birth (see last line of v.1), and being later awakened by the lowing of nearby cattle. Some infants when napping usually do so and others wake and lie quietly (unless hungry, wet, or otherwise distressed), so there is nothing "not fully human" about Jesus' behavior.

Music

"Mueller"

\new Staff << \autoBeamOff \time 3/4 \key f \major \partial 4 \relative c'' \addlyrics >> \layout \midi The most popular musical setting in the United States is commonly known as "Mueller". The melody was first published, under the title "Luther's Cradle Hymn", by James R. Murray in his collection ''Dainty Songs for Little Lads and Lasses'' (1887). Murray included a claim that the hymn was " mposed by Martin Luther for his children". Hill writes: As a result of this "tactical mistake", Murray's melody appeared, without credit, in several subsequent publications. By 1914, the melody was attributed to "Carl Mueller", and this attribution was repeated several times in other publications. The identity of "Carl Mueller" is unknown, but the tune is widely known as "Mueller" as a result.

"Cradle Song"

\new Staff << \autoBeamOff \time 3/4 \key f \major \partial 4 \relative c' \addlyrics >> \layout \midi The standard melody in Britain and Ireland is "Cradle Song". The tune, written by the American composer William J. Kirkpatrick, was first published as part of the collection ''Around the World with Christmas'' (1895), a "Christmas Exercise" for schools featuring material representing various countries: "Away in a Manger" was included, under the title "Luther's Cradle Hymn", as a representative of "The German Fatherland". Kirkpatrick's melody was later published in numerous hymnbooks, and was the setting that, in Hill's words, "first carried the words beyond the confines of the United States", being included in collections such as Carey Bonner's ''Sunday School Hymnary'' (1905). It remains the most popular musical setting of "Away in a Manger" outside the United States.

Other musical settings

In his article "Not So Far Away in a Manger; Forty-One Settings of an American Carol", published in the ''Music Library Association Notes'' (second series) III, no. 1, for December 1945, Richard Hill treated 41 of the nearly 200 different musical settings of this text. The first music mentioned in connection with "Away in a Manger" was a pre-existing composition: ''

'' (also known as "There's No Place Like Home"). This was suggested as a musical setting in ''Little Pilgrim Songs'' (1883) and ''The Myrtle'' (1884), and continued to be mentioned as an appropriate melody for decades to come. A musical arrangement was published in the early 1920s. The first known musical setting specifically published with the words appeared in an

Evangelical Lutheran Lutheranism is one of the largest branches of Protestantism, identifying primarily with the theology of Martin Luther, the 16th-century German monk and reformer whose efforts to reform the theology and practice of the Catholic Church launched ...

Sunday School A Sunday school is an educational institution, usually (but not always) Christian in character. Other religions including Buddhism, Islam, and Judaism have also organised Sunday schools in their temples and mosques, particularly in the West. ...

collection, ''Little Children's Book for Schools and Families'' (1885; preface dated Christmas 1884), where it simply bore the title "Away in a Manger". It was set to a tune called "St. Kilda", credited to J.E. Clark. The tune, according to Hill, "gives every appearance of being a standard melody used elsewhere for other hymns", but Hill adds that "no information on J. E. Clark or any other printing of his tune, previous or later, has been located." This publication is also notable for refraining from attributing the carol to Luther. The melody by John Bunyan Herbert, reproduced in Hill (first published in 1891), is identified by Hill as among the most popular. Like Murray's, Herbert's setting was often republished without credit to the original composer, with the melody sometimes even being misattributed to Luther himself. Charles H. Gabriel, already mentioned as being the first to publish the third verse in 1892, is also notable for having published more different musical arrangements of the hymn than any other known composer. His 1896 setting, reprinted in many different collections, is based on his 1892 melody but adds a chorus at the end of each verse, with the word "asleep" sung antiphonally. Another popular arrangement, found at least as early as 1897, sets the words to Jonathan E. Spilman's 1838 melody "Flow Gently, Sweet Afton". Hill, writing in 1941, found Spilman's musical setting to be the second-most published, after Murray's. An arrangement dating from 1911 sets the words to an "old Normandy Carol". This melody was subsequently published in

Carols for Choirs ''Carols for Choirs'' is a collection of choral scores, predominantly of Christmas carols and hymns, first published in 1961 by Oxford University Press. It was edited by Sir David Willcocks and Reginald Jacques, and is a widely used source o ...

, arranged by Reginald Jacques. An arrangement by Christopher Erskine combines the two most popular tunes for the hymn, from Kirkpatrick and Murray. Erskine's arrangement was first performed in 1996 at the annual pair of joint Carol Services in Manuka,

Canberra Canberra ( ) is the capital city of Australia. Founded following the federation of the colonies of Australia as the seat of government for the new nation, it is Australia's largest inland city and the eighth-largest city overall. The ci ...

, sung by the choirs of St Paul's Church (Anglican) and St Christopher's Cathedral (Roman Catholic). In this version, the Kirkpatrick setting is sung by one choir, and the Murray setting by the other choir, alternating through the first two verses. Both settings are sung together for the third verse.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Away in a Manger 1882 songs Christmas carols American Christian hymns Glen Campbell songs Songs about Jesus English children's songs 19th-century hymns