The well-known English Christian hymn O come, O come, Emmanuel is in fact a translation of the original Latin, Veni, Veni, Emmanuel, and translations into other modern languages (particularly German) are also in widespread use. The 1861 translation is by far, the most prominent in the English-speaking world, but other English translations also exist.

The great hymn writer, Isaac Watts (1674-1748) introduced the concept of paraphrasing the Bible into texts for hymns. In 1719, Joy to the World, based on Psalm 98:4, was included in a collection of Psalms of David that he had transformed into hymns and originally titled Messiah’s Coming and Kingdom. From a very young age, Isaac Watts sought to improve on the lifeless congregational singing in the church where his father was a deacon in Southampton, England. When his father challenged him to provide better hymns for them to sing, he did. The melody for Joy to the World came from American composer, Lowell Mason (1830) who apparently felt the need to credit Frederick Handel as the co-composer, possibly for musical phrases that Mason borrowed or simply out of respect for Handel’s influence.

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