While Shepherds Watched Their Flocks

This page includes a lyric video, a brief history, sheet music, and other resources for the Christmas hymn “While Shepherds Watched Their Flocks.” Enjoy!
While Shepherds Watched Their Flocks
Enjoy this You Tube video with lyrics of “While Shepherds Watched Their Flocks”:

History of “While Shepherds Watched Their Flocks”:

Nahum Tate, the author of  “While Shepherds Watched Their Flocks,” was the son of an Irish Protestant clergyman named, literally, Faithful Teate (Nahum altered his last name to Tate). Both of his grandfathers were clergymen as well. However, after graduating from Trinity College in Dublin in 1672, Tate decided to pursue a literary career. He moved to London and published his first book of poems in 1677. He began writing plays the following year. Though his first few plays were not successful, he found a treasure when he began reworking some of Shakespeare’s neglected plays. His version of King Lear, with a happy ending, was remarkably successful. For 150 years, audiences preferred Tate’s version to the original Shakespearean tragedy.

Tate continued to write plays and even wrote the words for a successful opera, Dido and Aeneas (1689). His contributions to the arts were so significant that in 1692, Tate was named poet laureate of England; he held this position for 22 years, serving during the dual reign of William and Mary (1689-1694), the sole reign of William (1694-1702) and the subsequent reign of Queen Anne (1702-1714).

Tate’s next major literary contribution was for the Church of England. In collaboration with Nicholas Brady, a high-profile clergyman and royal chaplain, Tate produced A New Version of the Psalms of David (1696). For over a hundred years, the Church of England had been exclusively singing psalms for corporate worship, and this “new version” made a freer paraphrase of the psalms. Despite the fact that the work was endorsed by church leaders, it proved to be controversial – often condemned for being too “gay and fashionable.” Regardless, with time, the new version came to be widely accepted, and Tate and Brady are credited with paving the way for men like Isaac Watts and Charles Wesley who introduced hymns for corporate worship.

With the hymn “While Shepherds Watched Their Flocks” (originally titled “Song of the Angels”), Tate paraphrased something other than a psalm; he paraphrased a passage from the Gospel of Luke (2:8-14). This new hymn was one of 16  that appeared in the 1700 Supplement to the New Version. It was the only Christmas hymn to gain official approval in the Church of England until Charles Wesley’s hymn “Hark the Herald Angels Sing” was added in a 1782 edition of the New Version.

Tate showed unique genius in writing the lyrics of his Christmas hymn. Not only did he carefully paraphrase the biblical narrative of the angelic appearance to shepherds, he demonstrated great insight in selecting the passage. The Church of his day was exclusively singing psalms of David. In a cautious attempt to introduce a New Testament hymn, Tate wisely chose a passage that drew a connection to David. Tate’s paraphrase of Luke 2:11 is: “To you in David’s town this day is born of David’s line the Savior who is Christ the Lord.” The long-awaited descendant of King David (Jesus) was born in the town of David (Bethlehem). Furthermore, Tate selected the biblical passage that recorded the first Christmas song in history — the “joyful song” sung by “angels praising God.” According the The New Oxford Book of Carols, Tate’s work is the first known and “one of the finest” hymnic descriptions of this great event.

“While Shepherds Watched Their Flocks By Night” was sung to a wide variety of tunes — over 100 have been identified in printed sources, and there were probably more.  In the U.S., the tune most widely paired with Tate’s words is one adapted from a melody in the opera Siroë, King of Persia, composed by George Frideric Handel (1685-1759) and first performed in 1728. No one is certain who married the words and the music, but the editors of The New Oxford Book of Carols suspect it was an American composer by the name of  Lowell Mason. Since the hymn beautifully retells the Gospel story about the first song to ever praise the birth of Christ, the tune is appropriately named “Christmas.”

For more intriguing history on “While Shepherds Watched Their Flocks” (and 19 other classic Christmas songs), you can purchase our Christmas Songs eBook (only $2.99; use code “celebrate20” for 20% off).

You can also download our free, complimentary Sheet Music for “While Shepherds Watched Their Flocks” (note that the sheet music uses a different translation for some of the verses than the lyric video).

For additional resources (like original sheet music), visit Hymns and Carols of Christmas or Net Hymnal.

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