Silent Night, Holy Night

Joseph Mohr in the Silent Night Chapel in Oberndorf, Austria

Christmas is a time of singing. Almost as soon as Jesus started growing in the womb of the Virgin Mary she burst forth in song: “My soul doth magnify the Lord, and my spirit hath rejoiced in God my Savior” (Luke 1:46-47 KJV). Then, on the night of Jesus’ birth, angel hosts picked up the chorus. “Glory to God in the highest and on earth peace, good will toward men” (Luke 2:14 KJV). The music has never stopped.

Other seasons of the year have plenty of hymns to sing, but Christmas alone has the custom of caroling from house to house. Christmas songs dominate the radio and shopping malls from Thanksgiving to Christmas. Of all the songs written for specific days, the number of Christmas songs dwarfs any other day of the year. Yet even among such a vast selection, one hymn stands head and shoulders above the rest.

It’s a good bet that you could walk into any random church service tonight, in any denomination, throughout the world and hear the congregation singing “Silent Night, Holy Night.” It has been translated into at least 300 languages. Is there a single church in all of Wyoming that does not have it in the line-up?

Gruber window

As the uniform liturgies of Christendom have become fragmented and unrecognizable, this song is probably the last shared liturgy among all who consider themselves Christian. And today, December 24, 2018, is its 200th birthday!

You may have heard quaint tales about its origins. One story is that the hymn was hastily written after the pastor discovered church mice had nibbled holes in the organ bellows. Scholars have debunked this story, but it is not terribly far from the truth.

Franz Joseph Mohr was a young assistant pastor of St. Nicholas Church in Oberndorf, Austria. Situated on the Salzach river, it was prone to flooding. Indeed, as Christmas Eve approached in the year 1818, the organ was damaged by one such flood. But the new pastor had an idea.

Two years earlier Mohr had penned a six-verse Christmas poem. He had also received a strong musical education and was an accomplished musician on the newly invented six-string guitar. But he was not a composer.

On the morning of Christmas Eve, 1818, poem in hand, Mohr walked two miles to the neighboring town of Arnsdorf. There, above the school lived his friend Franz Xaver Gruber, who was both a teacher and musician. He asked Gruber to compose music for the poem that they could perform that evening at the midnight Mass.

So it was that a tune was born, dubbed “Stille Nacht.” At its debut performance a few hours later, Mohr played guitar and sang a duet with Gruber, while a four-part choir repeated the last line of each verse. Did anyone present have any idea that it would become a song for the world?

We still have the guitar. When Mohr was transferred from parish to parish, he kept his beloved guitar with him. Upon his death 20 years later, it was auctioned off with the rest of his meager estate. A young assistant teacher, Josef Felser, acquired it and carried it with him throughout his career until he retired in the town of Kuchl.

There it wound up hanging on a tavern wall where it remained for years after Felser’s death. Finally, in 1911, friends of Felix Gruber, the composer’s grandson, bought it and presented it him as a wedding present. In 1938 he, in turn, gave it to the town of Hallein as a part of the Gruber estate. There it sat in storage until 1952 when it was first displayed to the public. It can still be seen there today.

As for the song, both Mohr and Gruber carried it with them as their careers led them to other places, but its main promoter was a master organ builder, Karl Mauracher. When he was asked to come and repair the organ in Oberndorf, he found the song and took a copy of it home to the Ziller Valley.

There two travelling families of singers worked the song into their repertoire. During the 1830s it was performed in numerous places around Germany until it made its American debut at Trinity Church, New York City in 1839.

Franz Xaver Gruber

By the 1840s, the song was becoming famous throughout Europe, but its original author, Joseph Mohr, was dead and the organ builder who popularized it never knew the name of its composer, Gruber. Most assumed it was written by one of the big-name composers of the day: Hayden, Mozart or Beethoven. Gruber wrote to authorities in Berlin claiming himself as the composer.

Many disregarded his claims until 1994 when historians authenticated a copy of the song in Mohr’s own handwriting that said, “Melodie von Fr. Xav. Gruber.”  This copy also shows that our modern melody has been slightly altered from the original.

The words have also been pared down. Modern English versions of the hymn have three stanzas that were translated by John Young in 1863. 

“Silent night, holy night! All is calm, all is bright Round yon Virgin mother and child. Holy Infant so tender and mild, Sleep in heavenly peace, Sleep in heavenly peace!”

Oldest surviving copy in Mohr's handwriting

This translation differs somewhat from Mohr’s original focus on the “faithful holy pair,” and “lovely Boy with curly hair.” But the picture of light and calmness surrounding the Virgin mother has become as much a part of the hymn as anything.

The next English stanza is actually the sixth in the original. “Silent night, holy night! Shepherds quake at the sight; Glories stream from heaven afar, Heavenly hosts sing, ‘Alleluia, Christ the Savior is born! Christ the Savior is born!’"

Our final stanza goes, “Silent night, holy night! Son of God, love’s pure light. Radiance beams from Thy holy face With the dawn of redeeming grace, Jesus, Lord, at Thy birth, Jesus, Lord, at Thy birth!”

The original hymn by Joseph Mohr had an additional three stanzas. An English translation of these verses is as follows:

“Silent night! Holy night! Brought the world peace tonight, From the heavens' golden height Shows the grace of His holy might Jesus, as man on this earth! Jesus, as man on this earth!

“Silent night! Holy night! Where today all the might Of His fatherly love us graced And then Jesus, as brother embraced. All the peoples on earth! All the peoples on earth!

Joseph Mohr

“Silent night! Holy night! Long we hoped that He might, As our Lord, free us of wrath, Since times of our fathers He hath Promised to spare all mankind! Promised to spare all mankind!”

The English translation of these verses comes from an article by Bill Egan on Soundscapes.

This song was composed to by two obscure men who were brought together for two brief years in a small Austrian village. For a few hours 200 years ago, they collaborated on one song and never again produced any other musical compositions. Yet, this beloved song has become the world’s Christmas carol, above anything written by the most prolific or famous composers.

Tonight, the world celebrates how the universe was changed by a tiny Person born in obscurity. What better way to proclaim this news than to sing “Silent Night, Holy Night.”