Fair Shines the Morning Star!

Top Media Text Author Text Info Notes Tune Timeline Page Scans Instances

Fair shines the morning star

Author: James Montgomery
Tune: BROOKLYN (Zundel)
Published in 47 hymnals

Printable scores: PDF, Noteworthy Composer
Audio files: MIDI

Representative Text

Fair shines the morning star;
The silver trumpets sound,
Their notes re-echoing far,
While dawns the day around:
Joy to the slave; the slave is free;
It is the year of Jubilee.

Prisoners of hope, in gloom
And silence left to die,
With Christ's unfolding tomb,
Your portals open fly;
270
Rise with your Lord;--He sets you free;
It is the year of Jubilee.

Ye, who have sold for naught
The land your Fathers won,
Behold, how God hath wrought
Redemption through His Son;
Your heritage again is free;
It is the year of Jubilee.

Ye, who yourselves have sold
For debts to Justice due,
Ransom'd, but not with gold,
He gave Himself for you!
The blood of Christ hath made you free:
It is the year of Jubilee.

Captives of sin and shame,
O'er earth and ocean, hear
An angel's voice proclaim
The Lord's accepted year:
Let Jacob rise, be Israel free;
It is the year of Jubilee.

Sacred Poems and Hymns

All representative texts • Compare texts ^ top

Author: James Montgomery

James Montgomery (b. Irvine, Ayrshire, Scotland, 1771; d. Sheffield, Yorkshire, England, 1854), the son of Moravian parents who died on a West Indies mission field while he was in boarding school, Montgomery inherited a strong religious bent, a passion for missions, and an independent mind. He was editor of the Sheffield Iris (1796-1827), a newspaper that sometimes espoused radical causes. Montgomery was imprisoned briefly when he printed a song that celebrated the fall of the Bastille and again when he described a riot in Sheffield that reflected unfavorably on a military commander. He also protested against slavery, the lot of boy chimney sweeps, and lotteries. Associated with Christians of various persuasions, Montgomery supported missio… Go to person page >

^ top

Text Information

Text Information

First Line:	Fair shines the morning star
Title:	Fair Shines the Morning Star!
Author:	James Montgomery
Meter:	6.6.6.6.8.8
Language:	English
Copyright:	Public Domain

^ top

Notes

Fair shines the morning star. J. Montgomery. [Year of Jubilee.] Appeared in his Christian Psalmist, 1825, No. 556, in 5 stanzas of 6 lines, and in his Original Hymns, 1853, No. 263, the title in each case being "The Year of Jubilee." In 1836 J. Conder adopted it for the Congregational Hymn Book, and others have followed, both in Great Britain and America: but its use is not so extensive as many of Montgomery's hymns. In the New York Church Praise Book, 1882, No. 227, is a cento beginning with stanza i. of this hymn, and stanzas ii.-iv. from C. Wesley's "Blow ye the trumpet, blow " (q.v.).

--John Julian, Dictionary of Hymnology (1907)

^ top