Scripture Verse

The martyrs of Jesus. Revelation 17:6

Introduction

portrait
Martin Luther (1483–1546)

Words: Mar­tin Lu­ther, 1523 (Ein Neu­es Lied Wir He­ben An). This Eng­lish ver­sion ap­peared in a trans­la­tion of D’Au­big­nés His­to­ry of the Re­for­ma­tion (Phi­la­del­phia, Penn­syl­van­ia: 1843), where it was said to have been trans­lat­ed for that work by John A. Mes­sen­ger.

Music: Ib­stone Ma­ria Tid­de­man, 1875 (🔊 pdf nwc).

If you know where to get a good pic­ture of Mes­sen­ger or Tid­de­man (head & shoul­ders, at least 200×300 pix­els),

On June 23, 1523, two young Au­gus­ti­ni­an monks, Hein­rich Voes and Joh­ann Esch, from An­twerp, had been, af­ter ex­am­in­ation by the Co­logne In­quis­i­tor, Ja­cob von Hog­stra­ten, and at the in­sti­ga­tion of the Lou­vain pro­fess­ors, con­demned to death and burnt at the stake in Brus­sels.

On re­ceipt of the news of this first mar­tyr­dom for the Ev­an­ge­li­cal cause Lu­ther’s spi­rit was fired, and he wrote this spi­rit­ed nar­ra­tive, end­ing with the pro­phet­ic words [trans­lat­ed by Richard Mas­sie, 1854]:

Summer is ev­en at our door,
The win­ter now hath van­ished,
The ten­der flow­er­ets spring once more,
And He, who win­ter ban­ished,
Will send a hap­py Sum­mer.

Julian, p. 326

Lyrics

Flung to the heed­less winds,
Or on the wa­ters cast,
The mar­tyrs’ ashes, watched,
Shall ga­thered be at last.

And from that scat­tered dust,
Around us and abroad,
Shall spring a plen­te­ous seed,
Of wit­ness­es for God.

The Fa­ther hath re­ceived,
Their lat­est liv­ing breath,
And vain is Sa­tan’s boast,
Of vic­to­ry in their death.

Still, still, though dead, they speak,
And, trum­pet tongued, pro­claim,
To ma­ny a wak­en­ing land,
The one avail­ing name.