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501. Drop down, ye heavens, from above

Antiphon:
[Cantor] Drop down, ye heavens, from above,
[All] and let the skies pour down righteousness.

1 Be not wroth very sore, O Lord,
neither remember iniquity forever:
thy holy cities are a wilderness,
Sion is a wilderness, Jerusalem a desolation:
our holy and our beautiful house,
where our fathers praised thee. [Antiphon]

2 We have sinned, and are as an unclean thing,
and we all do fade as a leaf:
and our iniquities, like the wind,
have taken us away:
thou hast hid thy face from us:
and hast consumed us, because of our iniquites. [Antiphon]

3 Ye are my witnesses, saith the Lord,
and my servant whom I have chosen:
that ye may know me and believe me:
I, even I, am the Lord,
and beside me there is no Saviour:
and there is none that can deliver out of my hand. [Antiphon]

4 Comfort ye, comfort ye my people,
my salvation shall not tarry:
I have blotted out as a thick cloud
thy transgressions: Fear not, for I will save thee:
For I am the Lord thy God,
the Holy One of Israel, thy Redeemer. [Antiphon]

Text Information
First Line: Drop down, ye heavens, from above
Language: English
Publication Date: 1986
Topic: Advent Prose; The Christian Year: Advent
Tune Information
Name: RORATE CAELI
Key: c minor
Source: Mode i
Copyright: Arr. by permission of Oxford University Press (from "English Hymnal," 1933)



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