Justin Appel

Dear Friends in Christ,

Today’s Gospel lesson comes from the very beginning of the Gospel of Mark, in which John the Baptist is identified as the one about whom Isaiah had prophesied, ‘The voice of him that cryeth in the wilderness: prepare ye the way of the Lord’ (Mark 1:3).

This story brings me to a parallel passage, in the beginning of the Gospel of John, in which the priests and Levites from Jerusalem come to John and ask him if he is the Christ.

This latter passage forms the basis of a well-known verse anthem by Orlando Gibbons (1583-1625), an organist, singer, and composer who served in the Chapel Royal and at Westminster Abby. The verse anthem was, as Andrew Gant reminds us, a type of composition that incorporated a soloist with accompaniment (here the organ or a ‘consort’ of viols) and interspersed with parts sung by a chorus. In Gibbons’ anthem This is the record of John, the chorus repeats bits of the text sung previously by the soloists, as if to underscore and assimilate the message of the soloist—very much like the chorus in a Classical play.

This lovely verse anthem emphasizes the notion that John understood himself to be a ‘forerunner’ who’s place was to announce the coming of the Messiah. It also sits squarely in the English repertoire of great Advent music.

Yours in Christ,
Justin

This is the record of John, Orlando Gibbons

This is the record of John,
when the Jews sent priests and Levites from Jerusalem to ask him,
Who art thou?
And he confessed and denied not, and said plainly,
I am not the Christ.

And they asked him, What art thou then? Art thou Elias?
And he said, I am not.
Art thou the prophet?
And he answered, No.

Then said they unto him,
What art thou? that we may give an answer unto them that sent us.
What sayest thou of thyself?
And he said, I am the voice of him that crieth in the wilderness,
Make straight the way of the Lord.
- John 1:19-23