Folklore: Amazing Grace. Should We Be Singing it??

Subject: RE: Folklore: Amazing Grace. Should We Be Singing it??
From: Little Hawk
Date: 10 Jan 08 - 03:19 PM

P-P-P-L-L-L-L-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-R-R-R-R-P-P-P-T-T-T-T-H!!!!!!!!!!!


(Just picture me putting my thumbs in my ears and sticking out my tongue now, and wiggling my fingeres, and I think you'll have it...)

(comment is directed at thread and its general premise)

Subject: RE: Folklore: Amazing Grace. Should We Be Singing it??
From: Dave'sWife
Date: 10 Jan 08 - 02:57 PM

GUEST,Steve Baughman - I'm glad you appreciated my comments for what they were. It's not wrong to revisit the past or to ask questions about widely held beliefs about the past, a historical figure and the prevailing opinion of that person.

Historical revisionism is certianly not without it's faults mind you. I come at this from a background in Anthropology. In my academic career, I saw more than a few lazy researchers choose to root through a past researchers work like a wild hog in a jerusalum artichoke patch rather than go into the field and do their own work. But then, there are those folks who dare us to take a second look at sainted figures such as Margaret Meade for example and face the facts that she embellished a lot of her informants' testimony or simply made it up as she went along to fit the view she had already decided upon. The damage she did is imeasurably.

ANother field that both suffers and gains from this is Biblical Archeology. An entire field of naysaying things like the Exodus, the existence of King David or Solomon has sprung up from revisionism and it isn't based on actual field data but rather some new wave interpretation of existing data. They clash with the religiously motivated literalists who see the Bible as an exact reference source. What got lost in all this was the more sensible middle road that used real physical finds to show that some of these events likely indeed took place.

So - sure - ask those questions. Ask them of yourself since you're the one who is trying to decide if you should sing it. But before you make up your mind, do the work necessary. It's not easy to know what that work is at first because of the legends and popular history tha gets repeated about the songs creation. Therefore you have to go to if not primary sources such as the writings of Wilberforce or Newton themselves, at least find good secondary sources or crtically well-received contemporary reviews of their lives and lifes works.

The movie I mentioned is a good start only because it's entertaining and it will introduce you to important players in the story that you may not have heard of before. it will give you a basic understanding of the times and what these men faced by way of opposition from the aristocracy and the Prince Regent.

After viewing the film and the extras on the DVD, you can then check out the wikipedia entries and see the suggested readings. That ought to be a good running start.

Good luck and let us know what you think after you've seen the film. I'd love to hear that!

And.. don't be a stranger here. This has been a good lively discussion

Subject: RE: Folklore: Amazing Grace. Should We Be Singing it??
From: GUEST,Steve Baughman
Date: 10 Jan 08 - 01:14 PM

Thanks, Dave's Wife. Good thoughts.
sb

Subject: RE: Folklore: Amazing Grace. Should We Be Singing it??
From: GUEST
Date: 10 Jan 08 - 01:11 PM

"think of how bad it would be if there were no Koran, and everyone was drunk all the time-- " False choice. How about no Koran and we're all compassionate atheists working for a better world, and only drunk some of the time, (and never when we're driving)? Sounds way better to me.

"This would be crippling to most of us non-saintly types" ooh, but Newton ought to have crippled himself. Right."          GUEST tda, you're being silly. I have gathered that you are clever enough to see differences of degree between earning lots of money from kidnap, murder and enslavement, on the one hand, and occasionally purchasing food and clothing that was produced by exploited people. Tell me you see that and that you were just not thinking straight in your last post. Or else I'll worry about you.

"So religion is to blame when religious people do wrong, and religion is also to blame when athiests do wrong(?) . . . . " Michael, I'm not sure I'm really blaming religion for very much. I am saying that it offers a convenient justification for self-interested behavior and that it has a very poor record of making people better people, (notwithdstanding some of the examples above. And even in those, one wonders whether it was the religious belief that caused the nice behavior. I do not know, for instance. if people were abolitionists BECAUSE they were Christians, or abolitionists who happened to be Christians.)

Subject: RE: Folklore: Amazing Grace. Should We Be Singing it??
From: Dave'sWife
Date: 10 Jan 08 - 12:55 PM

I made it 4/5s of the way thru this thread before i saw the same arguments being repated a few times.

GUEST,Steve Baughman - for an interesting take on newton's true influence on the Abolitionist movement in England - watch the admittedly "feel-good" movie called AMAZING GRACE (imagine that!) which is all about Wilberforce and his life's work. Newton may have taken some time to extricate himself from the business of transport of salves. However, his later life as a cleric and his profound influnce an a young William Wilberforce had a direct effect on the latter's tireless committment towards ending slavery in his lifetime.

The film simplifies things yes, but it shows you that it wasn't the writing of Amazing Grace or Newton's dramtaic conversion that led to sneaky round about manuvering that resulted in the defacto abolution of slave trading in the UK - it was his influence on a boy that did it. By the time Wilberforce grew up to get invloved in government, this influence led him to have his own moment ot or two of being so close to God he could feel it and what he grasped in those moments was that his life was to be given over to the work of abolishing the slave trade.

Whether slavery was right or wrong had not been widely and openly debated at that time. it was deemed an economic "necessity" and polite company didn't discuss it. Wilberforce and his colleagues (who were even more radical than he) spent over 20 years forcing the discussion to take place.   

I would suggest that to answer the question for yourself of whether or not Amazing Grace is a moral song necessitates you delving a little deeper into the events and personalities that led to the abolition of slavery within the UK and territories controlled by the UK . I say this because it is only through reading about Newton's relationship with Wilberforce and then about Wilberforces life and struggle to edn slavery that you can grasp the full impact that newton and his song had on the growing recognition that slavery was an evil that could no longer be tolerated.

Watch the movie first for a quick primer - you can get it from netlfix.

Then, choose a good book on Wilberforce and read it.

You won't be sorry - it's a wonderful story that will at times disgust you when you read who was for continuing the salve trade and why. However, it is thrilling because in the end it was the combination of sheer force of will (wilberforce) and political cunning (his allies) that got the deed done. it almost makes you believe that with the right people in office, our own generation can turn things around. (almost but not quite!)

Subject: RE: Folklore: Amazing Grace. Should We Be Singing it??
From: Goose Gander
Date: 10 Jan 08 - 12:24 PM

So religion is to blame when religious people do wrong, and religion is also to blame when athiests do wrong(?) . . . .

Subject: RE: Folklore: Amazing Grace. Should We Be Singing it??
From: GUEST,Neil D
Date: 10 Jan 08 - 11:55 AM

As to the Atheism of Stalin, George Bernard Shaw once said that Soviet style "communism" was not Atheistic. They had simply replaced Christianity and Judaism with a new religion he called Statism.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Amazing Grace. Should We Be Singing it??
From: GUEST,tda
Date: 10 Jan 08 - 04:56 AM

Arabia before Muhammad was in a horrible state, and one of the practices that Islam put a stop to was that of murdering your baby girl.

"This would be crippling to most of us non-saintly types" ooh, but Newton ought to have crippled himself. Right.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Amazing Grace. Should We Be Singing it??
From: Murray MacLeod
Date: 10 Jan 08 - 03:16 AM

right, that's enough of "Amazing Grace".

Let's discuss Steve Baughman's beautiful Orkney Tuning instead ...

Subject: RE: Folklore: Amazing Grace. Should We Be Singing
From: GUEST,David
Date: 10 Jan 08 - 12:59 AM

Many Jews that I know won't listen to Wagner because he was an anti-semite, and his music became hitler's favorite.    I have no great love for Wagnerian opera,   but the music, I believe, stands on its own.    I have no doubt that many of the world's historically great works of art and architecture were produced with the labor of people working under virtually slave-like conditions.    Should we reject their obvious beauty?

Subject: RE: Folklore: Amazing Grace. Should We Be Singing it??
From: M.Ted
Date: 09 Jan 08 - 11:25 PM

More thoughts on Steve's question--a cursory reading of the Old Testament seems to show that the children of Abraham were a pretty disorderly bunch until Moses got them into line with the laws and all. Since then, they've tended to be pretty straight up, so I am going to step up and say that Judaism has worked out pretty well--

As to the Arabs(also children of Abraham), you pretty much have to figure that, given that the laws in the Koran are so strict, they must have been really over the top for Allah to come down so hard on them. I know it looks bad in the Middle East now, but most Muslims keep themselves together pretty well--think of how bad it would be if there were no Koran, and everyone was drunk all the time--

Subject: RE: Folklore: Amazing Grace. Should We Be Singing it??
From: M.Ted
Date: 09 Jan 08 - 10:33 PM

And, by the way, we still live in "A time of pillories, flogging, public executions and other horrendous practices."

Subject: RE: Folklore: Amazing Grace. Should We Be Singing it??
From: M.Ted
Date: 09 Jan 08 - 10:31 PM

Whether I understand or appreciate their standards is a moot point. I don't have to understand their standards in order to come to my own conclusions about what they did. I am entitled to do that, and, in fact, according to many schools of thought, I am obliged to do that.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Amazing Grace. Should We Be Singing it??
From: GUEST,Steve Baughman
Date: 09 Jan 08 - 10:20 PM

"BTW, what do you say about chocolate, as we need to practice what we preach, and not get upset over whether or not someone who died 200 years ago did."   Guest tda

Okay, I went to the chocolate site you mentioned. Interesting. I suppose the same reasons that lead one to quit chocolate should lead one to quit wearing Nike shoes, stop consuming fossil fuels, boycott nearly everything from Chinese factories, and assume a monastic existence off the grid with a small vegetable garden in the back. This would be crippling to most of us non-saintly types.

I think a more realistic goal is compassionate consumption with an awareness that our spending habits have worldwide implications, that "the personal really is political." This might mean shopping at a co-op run by politically minded folks who research the origins of the stuff they buy so that you don't have to, buying Green when possible, recycling, giving up meat, or at least substantially cutting back on it, not beating people up, and NEVER voting Republican. All of this can be realistically incorporated by each of us into our lives. If we do so, the world becomes a slightly better place, even if we continue occasionally to sin with the odd Hersheys Kiss.

On a separate note, damn!!! Michael, you sent your reply to my QUESTION just as I was writing my complaint about nobody replying to my QUESTION. So it looks like I was ignoring you. Good point about Christians and abolitionism.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Amazing Grace. Should We Be Singing it??
From: Slag
Date: 09 Jan 08 - 08:23 PM

M.Ted, Yes, you are making my point. I have studied Junipero Serra and have make a study of the California Indians, the Yokuts tribes in particular as they were native to my area and of Father Garcia who operated in my area. This was the time of the Inquisition. The views on individual lives didn't bode well for the temporal. What we see as twisted and tortured logic was straight and clear to those of the day. It IS hard to grasp what these people were thinking. A time of pillories, flogging, public executions and other horrendous practices. And if, in that day, you somehow saw things different from the norm you had best keep it to your self. The powers that were, were above reproach. Bold were those who pushed the Reformation. They weren't perfect either. When you read John Calvin's writings or Martin Luther, Zwingli, etc. you marvel at the venom and vitriol of persons and institutions with which they disagreed. You are doing exactly what I was trying to point out. You are judging these folks through your own standard of morality. You must understand THEIR standard before you can make a meaningful judgment.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Amazing Grace. Should We Be Singing it??
From: GUEST,tda
Date: 09 Jan 08 - 07:09 PM

Steve, the whole idea of a religion is that you are held accountable before your god for what you have done here. If you believe in an afterlife, you won't want to screw it up by your actions here. There are many bad Christians, Moslems, Jews, Buddhists, pagans, etc., who do not live their religion, even if they profess a fanatical adherence to certain aspects of it. There are plenty of atheists like that too, so really, we are talking about a flaw of human nature, not religion.

BTW, what do you say about chocolate, as we need to practice what we preach, and not get upset over whether or not someone who died 200 years ago did.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Amazing Grace. Should We Be Singing it??
From: GUEST,Steve Baughman
Date: 09 Jan 08 - 07:03 PM

Excellent points. But please read the question.

QUESTION: When has religious conviction ever substantially changed the behavior of a society for the better? When has it ever caused a society to forego empire, conquest, war, even though it believed that such actions would enhance their power?

Ted, you're right, lots of bad stuff NOT in the name of religion, in fact most of it in the last century, but that's probably cos the 20th was the first century when there actually were lots of non-religious people around, coupled with lots of revolutions. (Just ordered a book on the Christian origins of National Socialism, if I get it read before this thread dies I'll report).

In any event, I don't think a scorecard is helpful. I'm asking for evidence of religious principles causing a society at large to forgoe nasty stuff that it could otherwise do to advance its power interests.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Amazing Grace. Should We Be Singing it??
From: Goose Gander
Date: 09 Jan 08 - 06:41 PM

"When has religious conviction ever substantially changed the behavior of a society for the better?"

Glad you asked, Steve. Let's see, off the top of my head . . . I'd say that the largely Christian abolitionist movement certainly changed 'society' for the better.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Amazing Grace. Should We Be Singing it??
From: M.Ted
Date: 09 Jan 08 - 06:22 PM

Steve--Before you get too carried away with you anti-relgious rants, check Matthew White's 30 Worst Attrocities of the 20th Century. And check some of the website it is a part of--which provides information on all the war/genocide/democide(government caused deaths) of the 20th Century. You'll find that the Atheists are way ahead (though the Christians get credit for their still impressive work)--

Looking at the numbers, one suspects that, though human-kind was able to utilize religious institutions for the work of large scale murder, the elimination of religion )really opened the floodgates. One tends to think that religion may have at least moderated the tendency that we've acted out since the days of Cain and Abel--

Subject: RE: Folklore: Amazing Grace. Should We Be Singing it??
From: PoppaGator
Date: 09 Jan 08 - 06:03 PM

Steve, three words:

Martin Luther King.

Some religious folks, and even religious leaders, actually manage to practive what they preach ~ albeit not many. It's the exception rather than the rule, granted ~ maybe it's the exception the "proves" the rule.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Amazing Grace. Should We Be Singing it??
From: GUEST,Steve baughman
Date: 09 Jan 08 - 05:43 PM

I have long been convinced that religion serves largely to justify folks in the pursuit of self-interest. God wants you to have what you want. So going and getting it is good, even if that means killing natives, trading slaves, buying stock in chocolate companies, accumulating wealth while your neighbors suffer, etc etc. The "prosperity preachers" of today are the most obvious symbols of this, but the phenomenon is ubiquitous.

Let's face it, people create God in their own image. Conservative Christians love the death penalty, war in Iraq, discrimination against gays, etc etc etc, and. . . lo and behold, so does God. Conservative Muslims hate America, and . . . so does Allah. Southerners used the biblical "Sons of Ham" (as Neill notes) to justify extreme exploitation of black people. The list is endless.

QUESTION: When has religious conviction ever substantially changed the behavior of a society for the better? When has it ever caused a society to forego empire, conquest, war, even though it believed that such actions would enhance their power? The only place I can think of might be Tibet, which stuck and strikes me as full of people with more than a nominal commitment to sacrificing for principle.

All this talk about Christians being "forgiven" seems to me vapid. Perhaps fogiveness gets you some better treatment in the afterlife (though Christians only pretend to know that) but it sure doesn't seem to make much difference to pre-mortem behavior.

If we could all be atheists we'd start holding ourselves accountable for our actions. That's when moral progress might take off. (Yeah, Stalin, Pol Pot, etc, were atheists, but they were commited to a Higher Ideology of the sort that skeptical thinkers would not be likely to embrace.)

Wow! I didn't mention Amazing Grace in this entire message. Maybe I'm getting over it!

sb

Subject: RE: Folklore: Amazing Grace. Should We Be Singing it??
From: Goose Gander
Date: 09 Jan 08 - 02:21 PM

"Many actually believed that by capturing and Christianizing the African "heathens" they were saving their souls . . . ."

For the most part, slave-traders neither 'captured' slaves nor cared much about the condition of their captives' souls. It was a business, a rotten business, and one that enriched Europeans, Africans and Arabs. The anti-slavery sentiment that fortified the abolitionist movement was indeed something new under the sun.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Amazing Grace. Should We Be Singing it??
From: GUEST,Neil D
Date: 09 Jan 08 - 02:02 PM

This has been an interesting thread and I see validity in both sides of the issue. I'm not a Christian but I have always loved this hymn. At the graveside service for my brother I had my son take his boombox off into the woods and play a bagpipe recording of it from an unseen distance. I'm not sure if I would now, knowing what I know about the man who wrote it. Now I understand that in the 18th century being a pious Christian did not necessarily make you an abolishonist.
Many actually believed that by capturing and Christianizing the African "heathens" they were saving their souls, even as they enslaved their bodies. Some even pointed to a supposed biblical ordination of the enslavement of the black race: Gods imposition of that punishment on "the sons of Ham" after he derided his father Noah for his naked drunkenness. Hamite was a synonym for a black person well into the 19th century. That being said there does seem to be a certain amount of hypocrisy at play when a man speaks out publicly against an institution while profitting from it. He surely was aware of its brutality having been so closely involved with its practice.
    I find it hard to separate my personal feelings on a work of art from the integrity of its author. It's like when I discovered that Jack London was a racist. And I've never been able to enjoy the works of Wagner since learning of his anti-semitism, even if the conductor of the Israeli philharmonic has decided they're okay.(Beethoven is a different story. You can't fault him if some genocidal madman comes along well after his passing and enjoys his music.) Sometimes knowledge can be heartbreaking but it is still important to acquire it. Works of technology (i.e. driving your Volkswagon on the autobahn or DNA research in light of the recent racist propagandizing by James D. Watson) don't necessarily invoke the same feeling and it IS a personal feeling I'm describing. I certainly wouldn't try to stop anyone else from performing or enjoying "Amazing Grace". I'm just saying that I'll never hear it again without a certain reservation.
    On a lighter note I must disagree with artbrooks and Kim C. I've always thought "Amazing Grace" is the only song that SHOULD be allowed on the bagpipes, but don't tell my wife I said so. She loves the blasted instrument. ;^)
                           Neil

Subject: RE: Folklore: Amazing Grace. Should We Be Singing
From: Green Man
Date: 09 Jan 08 - 10:54 AM

Thi song should be 'Amazing Race' those of you who know me will know why.

;-)

GM

Subject: RE: Folklore: Amazing Grace. Should We Be Singing
From: MaineDog
Date: 09 Jan 08 - 10:08 AM

All Christians are black sinners before they get converted, and most do not get cleaned up right away.
The blackest sinner is the one who denies any sin.
God can use black sinners like us to get His message out. Do you think Newton is the only corrupt Christian that ever was?
The GOOD NEWS is that we can be saved, and imperfect people can help.
"Amazing Grace" is an important part of Christianity as well as folk music, so it will survive--forever.
MD

Subject: RE: Folklore: Amazing Grace. Should We Be Singing it??
From: M.Ted
Date: 09 Jan 08 - 09:44 AM

Slag--Here is a nice summary of the genocide that Junipero Serra supervised.Indian Country Diaries, California Genocide


I lifted this little comment, with a cited quote, from Lies I was Raised With--which is a long and meandering essay about the Native American Genocide written by an activist who once attended Junipero Serra Elementary School in Ventura--

>Serra's legacy was the death of at least half of California's native population, and a much >greater extermination rate in mission country, of around 90%.

>The authors of Indians, Franciscans, and Spanish Colonization stated,

>"Indian demographic collapse in the missions was not intended but intentional, since >Franciscan congregación [forcing the Indians into the missions and keeping them there under >force - Ed.] continued despite the negative impacts on Indians even though one civil official, >governor Diego de Borica in the 1790s, identified the problem and suggested solutions never i>mplemented by the Franciscans."[55] 

Whatever was in Father Serra's heart, it doesn't excuse genocide--and, even by the standards of his time, his treatment of the Native population wasn't simple a "human foible"---

Subject: RE: Folklore: Amazing Grace. Should We Be Singing it??
From: GUEST
Date: 09 Jan 08 - 07:46 AM

http://vision.ucsd.edu/~kbranson/stopchocolateslavery/
Are you willing to give it up on this basis?
If you are, then more power to you, but if you won't, when this is a very small thing, then it is ridiculous to expect Newton to have given up his entire wealth.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Amazing Grace. Should We Be Singing it??
From: Slag
Date: 09 Jan 08 - 12:05 AM

Sitz em leben.<(I hope that's right. It's been a while) It really is difficult to look back in time with 20th/21st century enlightenment. We somehow assume those people had our understanding, should have known our ethics (much of which is still disputed to this day in many sectors). Junipero Serra was on a mission from God, i.e. from the Holy Roman Church, from the Pope and right on down the hierarchy to what? Enslave the Indians? That may have been the effect but his mission was to teach them the enlightened way of the Europeans, the Christians. He would civilize them. His heart was right. Had he not had such a burden for the poor heathen he would have stayed home, taught college, designed flying machines or some other useful thing.

Have you ever noticed that after some time has lapsed after losing a loved one, in most cases, you tend to remember the good things about the person and not the really annoying or bad things? It just kind of happens. We want good things and good memories and we tend to remember and focus on the positive contributions of the departed. Well, unless they were really vile beings like the above stated A. Hitler. The negative instances become cautionary examples. A good historian tries for accuracy in ALL aspects of an event or era but as for evaluating the same he/we all should look for the positive contributions, don't you think? And not toss the good on the scrap heap because of some human foible which we are ALL susceptible .

Subject: RE: Folklore: Amazing Grace. Should We Be Singing it??
From: M.Ted
Date: 08 Jan 08 - 11:03 PM

It is always good to find out more about what has happened in history, and what historical figures have done--

In the course of this discussion, I've gotten to know more about Newton than I did-- (apart from details on his slaving, which I'd known about, I've learned about his relationships with Wilberforce and Cowper, and about his evangelical work, etc) I have also learned more about how the commerce in slavery operated(particularly about how the trading of arms fit into it), and I have read some first person accounts of the massacre of Indians and Chinese in California, and refreshed my memory on Junipero Serra---

All in all, a curious, but worthwhile excercise in revulsion.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Amazing Grace. Should We Be Singing it??
From: GUEST
Date: 08 Jan 08 - 11:03 PM

"Steve Baughman, do you drink coffee or eat chocolate? "

Umm. . . . no to coffee, kind of to chocolate. I'm scared that this is a trap.   Getting worried.   Go easy on me.

sb

Subject: RE: Folklore: Amazing Grace. Should We Be Singing it??
From: GUEST,TJ in San Diego
Date: 08 Jan 08 - 07:39 PM

Not to oversimplify what has become a multi-faceted and somewhat convoluted, not to say occasionally arcane discussion on the merits of this particular piece, I only have two small points to make.

1. It rarely serves any useful purpose to offer ex post facto
      criticism when we cannot truly know the mind of the author,
      despite the historic tidbits we have, nor can we truly
      know the harsher realities of the world in which he lived.

2. Can the music stand on its own merits and is it widely used and
      revered? If yes, then one may like or dislike the piece, but
      it seems to have stood the test of time - and of its origins.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Amazing Grace. Should We Be Singing
From: GUEST,Peter T
Date: 08 Jan 08 - 06:56 PM

"Should we be singing this song??? Or should we leave it for the Klan? I'd sure be curious what folks think about this. "

I'm sure the original poster was wholly in earnest in posing the question. Try reversing the question. Would anyone suggest that we should sing nonsensical, unattractive doggerel because the saintliness of its composer demanded it?

Amazing Grace is probably sufficiently remote from its long-dead writer to be pretty-much value-free save for the words, tune and type of person singing it these days. Part of my rather limited guitar repertoire, I'm afraid, so it gets played willy-nilly. The folk process transmits and handles stuff, just like evolution.

"my lefty folky friends" - would they recognise themselves from that description? Thought the split these days was meant to be Libertarian/Communitarian, anyway.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Amazing Grace. Should We Be Singing it??
From: Don Firth
Date: 08 Jan 08 - 06:54 PM

"Exactly. Tongue was firmly in cheek, if that wasn't obvious."

My apologies, GUEST,tda. But as you have undoubtedly noted, when it comes to "things PC," often beliefs are so extreme that one may attempt to indulge in a little humorous hyperbola, only to discover there are people who will actually believe something that you thought was a gross exaggeration. In that light, I mistakenly thought you might be serious. Again, sorry!

Curious, but the human being is a strange breed of monkey.

Don Firth

Subject: RE: Folklore: Amazing Grace. Should We Be Singing it??
From: GUEST,Steve Baughman
Date: 08 Jan 08 - 06:35 PM

Ted, the issues you raise are indeed FAR more important than whether folkies in the US sing Amazing Grace or not. Kudos to you for bringing them up. They are all the more important given that our personal consumption practices in the US have an effect on such things as slave labor in the diamond and silver mines and in Chinese prisons. And Lord knows how our voting practices bear on those issues. Would that we were all as passionate about these issues as we have been about John Newton's greatest hit.   

I trust you will agree with me, however, that since more knowledge is usually better than less we are better off knowing more about Newton than knowing less about him.

That being said, I'm ready to stop talking about Amazing Grace, unless, of course, another interesting comment comes up :-)

Subject: RE: Folklore: Amazing Grace. Should We Be Singing it??
From: GUEST,vetoda
Date: 08 Jan 08 - 06:33 PM

Steve Baughman, do you drink coffee or eat chocolate?

Subject: RE: Folklore: Amazing Grace. Should We Be Singing it??
From: M.Ted
Date: 08 Jan 08 - 06:16 PM

Having been raised in a strict Calvinist environment, I never let anyone off easily. I do prioritize my indignation, however.

Genocide gets a lot of it, (and we've had lots of genocide in the last hundred or so years to be indignant about)--as does the ongoing traffic in slavery. We, with nudging from the likes of Wilberforce and Newton, stopped buying slaves long ago, but the Africans who sold them to us, among others, continue to sell them, and we mostly ignore it, and often patronize those who buy and use them--

I am also very concerned about the traffic in human organs in China, where it seems that untold thousands of political prisoners, regular convicts, and Falun Gong practitioners, have been and continue to be executed on payment of cash, so that their organs can be harvested for transplant--

And so it goes...

Subject: RE: Folklore: Amazing Grace. Should We Be Singing it??
From: GUEST,tda
Date: 08 Jan 08 - 06:03 PM

Exactly. Tongue was firmly in cheek, if that wasn't obvious.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Amazing Grace. Should We Be Singing it??
From: Don Firth
Date: 08 Jan 08 - 04:42 PM

"But what if driving down that thing you think my, what an amazing person must've built such an infrastructure?"

GUEST,Ida, not even a ripple in the grand scheme of things. It only indicates that the person who thinks that is an ignorarmus about history, and that in no way "glorifies" the builder.

Don Firth

Subject: RE: Folklore: Amazing Grace. Should We Be Singing it??
From: GUEST,IRTWM
Date: 08 Jan 08 - 04:10 PM

That is valid only if it were written for the tune, which it wasn't.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Amazing Grace. Should We Be Singing it??
From: Slag
Date: 08 Jan 08 - 03:56 PM

What if Amazing Grace was written by someone of a different religion or movement? You might have "Amazing Enlightenment" or "Amazing Jihad" or "Amazing Non-being"! How about "Amazing Humans"? Verses are already coming to mind, some unprintable (to me)! Would we still sing it? The melody stays the same. There is no such thing as a right tune or a wrong tune. The words determine whether the music is appropriate or not. I was really shocked when I learned that the stereotypical circus tune was entitled "Enter the Gladiator"! To me it just does not fit. But, Hey! That's just my opinion. Attack the message, not the mortal frame that bears it.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Amazing Grace. Should We Be Singing it??
From: GUEST,Steve Baughman
Date: 08 Jan 08 - 03:55 PM

Here is the source for my claim that Newton continued to invest in the slave trade long after his retirmenent. It's the BBC. http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/h2g2/A22084599

Ted, I think my only disagreement with you is that I think you're letting Newton off easy. But your points are well taken. Michael, yours also. Perhaps there are not many who think much about Newton when singing Amazing Grace.

Sad to say, there may be more of them after this long thread.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Amazing Grace. Should We Be Singing it??
From: Goose Gander
Date: 08 Jan 08 - 02:44 PM

"By contrast, I think singers of Amazing Grace are misled about Newton's nature."

I'm pretty sure that most people who sing Amazing Grace do so because it is a nice song, an expression of faith, or both. I can't imagine too many people who sing it are getting warm and fuzzy over Newton, if they even know who he is.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Amazing Grace. Should We Be Singing it??
From: M.Ted
Date: 08 Jan 08 - 02:32 PM

Steve--

As I occasionally have to point out, my comments are intended to be taken l with the lilting irony that we can excercise when we are so removed from events as to be unable to impact them.

In this spirit, I'll point out that Newton has been dead for about two hundred years, so he is not able to comply with any request that you've made, no matter how reasonable it may seem to you.

As to your claim that history is full of people who have forsaken ill-gotten wealth--I'll grant that there have been some--but most kept the ill-gotten wealth--often with the assistance of those sworn to uphold the law--and neither spoke nor speak any regrets.

From the bits of Newton's writing that I have seen, he seemed a particularly stringent and unyielding Calvinist(as if there were any other kind!)--which I respect--and I think he had sincere regrets.

When it comes down to it, you are also stringent and unyielding about your principles, which I do respect--despite appearances to the contrary.

Given all that, I am not about to review the lives of all the lyricists I know of, with a view toward expunging the works of hypocrites and rascals from my repertoire.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Amazing Grace. Should We Be Singing it??
From: GUEST,tda
Date: 08 Jan 08 - 02:11 PM

"Nobody thinks driving the Autobahn says anything about your views of Hitler. By contrast, I think singers of Amazing Grace are misled about Newton's nature."

But what if driving down that thing you think my, what an amazing person must've built such an infrastructure?

Subject: RE: Folklore: Amazing Grace. Should We Be Singing it??
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 08 Jan 08 - 02:01 PM

Guest, go piss somewhere else.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Amazing Grace. Should We Be Singing it??
From: GUEST,Steve Baughman
Date: 08 Jan 08 - 01:53 PM

Ted, just re read your post. Last week I wrote a check for $1500 to a client for something that I did about ten years ago that has been bugging me. Client never asked for the money and we've been out of touch for a decade. I could have just written a song for him.

Maybe that's why I'm pissed at Newton.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Amazing Grace. Should We Be Singing it??
From: GUEST,Steve Baughman
Date: 08 Jan 08 - 01:47 PM

This from the Cowper and Newton Museum, per my inquiry.

Newton captained 3 voyages:

Aug 1750 - Oct 1751 Duke of Argyle
Jun 1752 - Aug 1753 African
Oct 1753 - Aug 1754 African

Note, he's still going strong six years after his conversion in 1748.

As for disgorging ill gotten wealth, I do not agree with Ted, and in fact am surprised to hear him say so forcefully, that it is "a ridiculous idea." Hey, you steal, feel bad about it later, give the stolen stuff back. You kidnap, murder, etc etc, make a bundle, if you feel bad about that then disgorge that profit also. Not a radical idea. Unless, of course, you aren't fully repentant, just in need of some device to feel good about yourself again, in which case platitudes will do and no need to do anything that will affect your pocketbook. In consumer law it's common to make the bad guy disgorge ill gotten gains. Sure, it's a lot to ask of Newton, but is failure to do so is informative. Again, he made money on a deadly and unspeakably cruel practice (and, yes, the slave trade was controversial in England even during his time, it was abolished the year he died) later felt bad about it but not bad enough to suffer a little in the money department. Instead he took the easy way to a clean conscience, wrote nice songs and urged other people to stop doing what he made money doing. Sorry, that's not admirable, it's hypocritical. (History is full of people who renounced evil in toto, and then went from riches to rags because of a principle they believed in. It's not like we're asking Newton to be the first.)

As for Michael's Autobahn issue, I am not sure the analogy applies. Nobody thinks driving the Autobahn says anything about your views of Hitler. By contrast, I think singers of Amazing Grace are misled about Newton's nature. So, yes, drive the Autobahn and sing Amazing Grace, but recognize the nasty stuff that went into their making. And if the public begins to view your participating in those actions as an endorsement of their creators, then maybe you should consider abstaining.

Ted, I'll try to find that investment info for you. I read it at some seemingly reputable site.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Amazing Grace. Should We Be Singing it??
From: Goose Gander
Date: 08 Jan 08 - 01:02 PM

I'm still wondering if we should avoid driving on the autobahn, or using any infastructure that was built using exploited labor, for that matter.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Amazing Grace. Should We Be Singing it??
From: M.Ted
Date: 08 Jan 08 - 11:16 AM

I apologize for having deserted this most enjoyable thread--I had more important (but less interesting) things to do--

Having plundered the web of it's Newtononia, the next steps required real investment--contacting the museum folks and buying the books-and that would have, by the present standard, been investing in slavery--which would have been wrong;-)

At any rate, I am curious about the source Steve's oft sited information on Newton's investments and holdings--my admittedly cursory searches found nothing on that--

Also, there is a sort of hobgoblin that keeps appearing, to the effect that if Newton had been sincere, he would have forsaken his ill-gotten gains--I think this a ridiculous idea--

There are many and high-minded and benificent people, from Gates to Soros,and various Rockefellers, down to the present company--all with some measure of wealth that they can dispense--and some of that is ill-gotten wealth--(in fact, there is a somewhat popular theory that all wealth is ill-gotten)--and yet there are few, no matter how goodhearted, who have forsaken their wealth out of regard for it's source.

My thought is that it is unreasonable to expect Newton to have done something that no one else, even in our "enlightened" times, does.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Amazing Grace. Should We Be Singing it??
From: Don Firth
Date: 07 Jan 08 - 02:21 PM

Yes, Booth is known to have quoted it a lot and many folk associated with the Salvation Army insist that he was the first to say it. But the comment was around long before Booth.

Consensus seems to be that it actually was John Wesley—or more probably, Charles Wesley—who was the main hymn writer in the family. Lutherans, however, are prone to insist it was Martin Luther. But the hymns Luther wrote tended to follow the usual patterns or liturgical music of his day (somewhat four-square and ponderous, e.g., "A Mighty Fortress is Our God," later tidied up and arranged by Johann Sebastian Bach, who was Lutheran).

Don Firth