O Thou, Before the World Began

Prior to the publication of the 1985 hymnal, an ambitious effort was made by editors to correct errors found in previous editions. However, a few misattributions of authorship remain. Perhaps the most egregious error in the current Latter-day Saint hymnal can be found under hymn no. 189, “O Thou, Before the World Began.” This hymn was first included in the official Latter-day Saint hymnal in 1927. In this book, and in subsequent editions published in 1948 and 1950, the text was ascribed to “W. B. Turton.” When the 1985 hymnal was published, however, the author’s name was changed to “William H. Turton.” This change was necessitated by a new feature of the 1985 hymnal: the inclusion of author and composer birth and death dates. When no information could be found concerning a W. B. Turton, hymnal editors instead gave credit to the similarly named William H. Turton (1856-1938).

“The identity of William Turton is a matter of some confusion,” acknowledges Latter-day Saint hymnologist Karen Lynn Davidson. “Our hymn book lists him as a Latter-day Saint contributor but gives the dates of an English military man, William Henry Turton, who wrote many hymn texts and scholarly works and was not a Latter-day Saint.” (Davidson, 452.) One of the reasons for listing Turton as a Latter-day Saint contributor, according to Davidson, is because “the text has a distinct Latter-day Saint flavor.” But hymnal editors failed to notice clues that might have suggested the text was not of Latter-day Saint origin. One line, in particular, stands out: “And view thee bleeding on the tree” (the fifth line from the third stanza). This is not common Latter-day Saint phraseology.

Perhaps members of the General Music Committee, in their efforts to ensure the author and composer credits in their new hymnal were correct, should have consulted standard reference works such as John Julian’s Dictionary of Hymnology when preparing the 1985 hymnal; but they did not, as evidenced by the attribution of this hymn to Turton. Even a cursory search would have revealed that “O Thou, Before the World Began” was written by prolific hymnist Charles Wesley, altered from his original “O Thou Eternal Victim Slain.” This hymn, in its original form, was first published in Wesley’s Hymns on the Lord’s Supper (1745). The altered version, as found in the Latter-day Saint hymnal, dates from as early as 1857.

How William Turton’s name became associated with Charles Wesley’s hymn is a matter of conjecture, but the likely source of this mistake is the 1924 edition of Hymns Ancient and Modern, where “O thou before the world began,” by Wesley, is printed opposite the hymn “O Thou, Who at Thy Eucharist didst pray,” by W. H. Turton.

Hymns Ancient and Modern (1924)

Perhaps the editor confused the two similarly-titled hymns, listing W. H. Turton as author instead of Wesley, which then became W. B. Turton through a typographical error. The original mistake from 1927 is forgivable; that Turton, more than ninety years later, is still listed as author of this well-known hymn is inexcusable, particularly in the internet age.

 

Notes:
Further evidence that basic hymnological sources were not utilized when preparing the 1985 hymnal: Julian also has an entry on Thomas Kelly’s “As the Dew from Heaven Distilling,” which was erroneously credited to Parley P. Pratt in the first printings of the 1985 hymnal (see Julian, 85). This error was only corrected when independent researcher Bruce David Maxwell discovered “As the Dew from Heaven Distilling” in a collection of Kelly’s hymns published in 1806 (see Davidson, 174). “As the Dew from Heaven Distilling” was first published in Kelly’s A Collection of Psalms and Hymns, Extracted From Various Authors (1802), and was included in the first edition of Kelly’s Hymns on Various Passages of Scripture (1804).

Sources:
Karen Lynn Davidson, Our Latter-day Hymns: the Stories and the Messages (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 1988), 452; John Julian, A Dictionary of Hymnology (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1892), 850; Hymns Ancient and Modern for use in the Services of the Church with Accompanying Tunes (London: William Clowes and Sons, Limited, 1924), 480-481.