13. Mennonite Hymnody.
Mennonites have made many contributions to society through their religious life and practices, but we have produced no important hymnody of our own. Throughout the four hundred years of our existence as a church, we have been a singing people, in times of persecution as well as in times of peace. Great emphasis has always been laid upon the importance of congregational singing in our worship services. Since the beginning of the 19th century the Mennonites of various branches, in America alone, have published over fifty hymnbooks. But an examination of these hymnbooks shows that we are heavily indebted to others. Instead of producing original hymns and tunes, we have borrowed, with minor exceptions, our entire repertory from other denominations. The wealth of verse and music produced by German and English writers throughout the centuries has been found to serve our needs adequately and well.
The churches in Europe used hymnbooks compiled from Lutheran and Reformed sources. Upon coming to the United States and Canada, they gradually adopted English and American hymns and in some sections of the church, the Gospel Songs came into wide use.
Our German collections of hymns have, until recently, been uniformly on a higher level, both as to music and poetry, than the collections used after the change was made to the English language. During the transition from the German to the English language, many churches, in their choice of their hymnbooks, sacrificed the fine chorales which had been a part of their religious heritage. This was due partly to the revivalistic influences of the times and partly to the fact that there were no good translations available of the German hymns which earlier were in use. The situation is gradually correcting itself. We are re-evaluating our hymnody, sifting the wheat from the chaff, and bringing back into our worship the rich treasure of song which had been used in the past. The Mennonite Hymnary is an effort in this direction.