Though dead, they speak.

FLUNG TO THE HEEDLESS WINDS

Flung to the heedless winds,
Or on the waters cast,
The martyrs’ ashes, watched,
Shall gathered be at last.

And from that scattered dust,
Around us and abroad,
Shall spring a plenteous seed,
Of witnesses for God.

The Father hath received,
Their latest living breath,
And vain is Satan’s boast,
Of victory in their death.

Still, still, though dead, they speak,
And, trumpet tongued, proclaim,
To many a wakening land,
The one availing Name.

–Martin Luther (1483 – 1546)

21 New Martyrs of Lybia, beheaded in 2015

6 thoughts on “Though dead, they speak.”

This was an interesting read. It struck me as not being ‘Luther-like,’ so I went on a little search. I found that two men were considered the first Lutheran martyrs. A Lutheran Council article goes on:

“When Luther heard about the executions, he wrote a comforting “Letter to the Christians in the Low Countries” and composed the hymn “Ein neues Lied wir heben an” (“A New Song Be By Us Begun”).

A paraphrase of a small portion of the song is known in English as “Flung to the Heedless Winds.”

I found at least three translators for this passage, which I’d never come across. The fact that it’s a paraphrase, and that I’d never sung it as a hymn, probably is why it didn’t seem Luther-ish to me.

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GretchenJoanna says:

February 17, 2024 at 8:07 am

Thank you so much, Linda. I had found it on a poem-collecting website and didn’t know enough to question the attribution. I will add a note based on your findings.

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Reply
1. shoreacres says:
  
  February 17, 2024 at 8:12 am
  
  It certainly brings home everything that’s been written about ‘voice,’ doesn’t it? After so many years of reading Luther, I guess I developed a sense of his voice. That’s quite interesting to me.
  
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2. GretchenJoanna says:
  
  February 18, 2024 at 12:01 pm
  
  Your mention of voice got me thinking about the challenge of translating poetry. It seems to me that every translation becomes essentially a new poem. Every poet-translator has a unique voice, which he tries nonetheless to match to that unique voice of the original poet, all the while trying to retain whatever meaning he derives from the poem and put the whole into a different language. Different human, different voice, different language. Doesn’t that seem much harder than writing one’s own poem in any language, native or familiar? Poets or hymn-writers must be happy to have their work sung in other tongues, even while understanding that unknown elements of their work will be lost.
  
  So after I added something about this one being a paraphrase, I removed the note again, having decided that the idea of paraphrasing didn’t apply to poetry in translation the way it does to texts like scripture or doctrine. I really appreciate your sharing your response and adding an important aspect to this conversation I’ve been having with myself for a while.
  
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