I Lift Up Mine Eyes to the Mountains

Author: Henry Zylstra

Henry Zylstra (b. Platte, SD, 1909; d. Amsterdam, the Netherlands, 1956) earned an undergraduate degree at Calvin College, Grand Rapids, Michigan; studied German literature at Iowa State University; and received his Ph.D. in compara­tive literature from Harvard University. From 1943 to 1956 he taught in the English department at Calvin College. His tenure there was interrupted by service in the United States Navy (1943-1945), during which he received the Bronze Star for "unusu­ally meritorious service." He was studying under a Fulbright professorship at the Free University of Amsterdam when he died of a heart attack in 1956. A founder of Reformed Journal, Zylstra was a greatly esteemed teacher and leader at Calvin College and in the Chris… Go to person page >

Scripture References:
st. 1 = Ps. 121:1-2
st. 2 = Ps. 121:3-4
st. 3 = Ps. 121:5-6
st. 4 = Ps. 121:7-8

Written by Henry Zylstra (PHH 82) in 1953, this text is a versification of Psalm 121. It was first published in the 1959 Psalter Hymnal and is one of the few texts in that hymnal in amphibrachic meter. (For other settings of Psalm 121 see 121 and 180; for further analysis of the text see PHH 121.)

Liturgical Use:
See comments at PHH 121.

--Psalter Hymnal Handbook