37. At even, when the sun was set
Henry Twells, 1823-1900
This evening hymn, a prayer for the healing of our bodily as well as spiritual ills, has been translated into many foreign tongues, and is found in nearly all standard hymn books both in America and abroad. The original has eight stanzas. It is based on the touching evening scene described in Mark 1:32, “At even, when the sun was set, they brought unto him all that were sick.”
Henry Twells was ordained in 1849 in the Church of England. Among the parishes he served was Stratford-on-Avon, the birthplace of Shakespeare. At the time he wrote this hymn, he was headmaster of a large grammar school and penned the verses one afternoon while the boys were writing an examination.
MUSIC. The tune, ANGELUS, appeared in somewhat different form in Heilige Seelenlust, one of a series of Catholic collections of hymns in Germany, written in the vernacular, and edited by Johann Scheffler. The tune is credited to Georg Josephi, a German musician of whom little is known except that he was the musical editor of Heilige Seelenlust. It is a tune of rare beauty though its modulations into several different keys makes it more difficult to sing than some and gives it a sense of restlessness not found in other popular tunes.