Ein für allemal

Author: Philip P. Bliss

Philip P. Bliss (b. Clearfield County, PA, 1838; d. Ashtabula, OH, 1876) left home as a young boy to make a living by working on farms and in lumber camps, all while trying to continue his schooling. He was converted at a revival meeting at age twelve. Bliss became an itinerant music teacher, making house calls on horseback during the winter, and during the summer attending the Normal Academy of Music in Genesco, New York. His first song was published in 1864, and in 1868 Dwight L. Moody advised him to become a singing evangelist. For the last two years of his life Bliss traveled with Major D. W. Whittle and led the music at revival meetings in the Midwest and Southern United States. Bliss and Ira D. Sankey published a popular series of hym… Go to person page >

Translator: E. Gebhardt

Ernst (Heinrich) Gebhardt (1832-1899), a Methodist minister of Germany, spent some time in South America and North America and England accompanying R. Pearsail Smith as song leader at his evangelistic meetings. Gebhardt wrote many original hymns and translated over 50 Gospel hymns from English into German, most of them Moody and Sankey songs. They appeared in his Frohe Botschaft and Evangeliums-Lieder (C. F. Spittler, Basel), which were distributed in Europe and America in innumerable volumes. He was the compiler and editor of many other songbooks. Gebhardt's translations of such songs as "Rock of Ages"—"Fels des Heils," and "Oh, Have You Not Heard"—"Ich weiss einen Strom" seem to have more poetic quality than the English. His contri… Go to person page >