Cry Me A River

Time to gather 'round the congregation

Photo by Michael Maasen on Unsplash

So people, your boy Gordon had a pretty shitty week last week; for the first time since I was 15, I find myself without a job (trust me, that’s a while). But, cry me a river (no, really, I would appreciate it). Anyway, since I’m not in the joking mood so much at the moment, I will take advantage of that melancholy disposition and write about something that is a bit of a divergence from the norm. If you don’t like it…I don’t want to hear about it.

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What would you answer if I asked you what is history’s most well-known song? The first ones to come to your mind might be something like Imagine (blech)? Stairway to Heaven (as we learned in Wayne’s World, don’t play the opening chords in a guitar store)? Something by Bob Dylan?

However, these answers all stem from recency bias. The most famous song in history has appeared on an estimated 11,000 albums and has been performed over 10 million times. Of course, I am talking about Amazing Grace (deal with it, atheists). More importantly, it is one of my favorite songs, and that’s really what you should care about.

My love for it goes back to the days of my youth when my Jewish Grandmother heard me singing it at their house and helpfully told me, “you know, that’s a Christian song.” Being a bad Jew was my lot in life, I guess.

If you’ve heard any less than 15,000 renditions of Amazing Grace, you’ve likely been living under a rock, but surprisingly few people know its backstory, so I’ve decided to help out with that because it will forever change how you listen to the song; at least it did for me.

It starts with a boy born in 1725 London named John Newton. Newton’s mother died when he was young, and after spending a few years at boarding school and with nothing else to do with him, his ship captain father had John accompany him on the high seas when he turned 11.

John Newton

At 18, Newton was forced into service for Britain’s Royal Navy, and after he was captured attempting to desert, he was, as tends to happen, put on board a slave ship and later became a full crew member. Why not, right?

Well, jokes on Newton because the crew of that slave ship so immensely abhorred him that he was abandoned in West Africa, where he, ironically, became a slave to an African royal.

H was finally saved in 1748, and on the trip back to England, his ship was nearly shipwrecked off the coast of Donegal, Ireland. During the terrifying storm, he prayed for G-d to spare him, and when he emerged unscathed, Newton slowly started the journey to rediscover his faith.

As you’d expect, his spiritual awakening led him to stop participating in the slave trade and live happily ever after.

Not quite. He captained three trips between Africa and the West Indies in the following decade. Eventually, the arduous life of putting people in chains and sailing them across the ocean caught up with Newton, so he retired to write a book about his grotesque adventures (with no XBox or Angry Birds to play, so what was there to do? It must have been torture for him after all).

An Authentic Narrative, John Newton’s memoirs about his time as a slave trader

Now out of the slaving game, religion played a more prominent role in Newton’s life. At 39, he became an Anglican Priest in the Church of England and moved to Olney, Buckinghamshire, to run the parish there. Finally, Newton had begun to reckon with what he had done in his previous life as a slaver and fully recognized the evil he contributed to the world and the harm he had done to so many people.

While in Olney, he became close friends with the poet William Cowper, and in 1779 they wrote the Olney Hymns together, though Newton was the primary author. One of the hymns Newton wrote was Faith’s Review and Expectations, to express his personal feelings about how G-d could forgive a man like him who had committed such grievously evil deeds.

Eventually, Faith’s Review and Expectations would go on to become more widely known by the first line of the hymn, Amazing Grace.

In 1780, Newton became the Rector of St Mary Woolnoth in London, and it was there that he met William Wilberforce, the man whose force of will would nearly single-handedly end the slave trade (the fact that Wilberforce is not among the most famous names in the history of the western world is proof of how poorly history is taught in schools). Newton became Wilberforce’s spiritual mentor and helped him find the British Anti-Slavery Society.

St. Mary Woolnoth

In 1787, Newton wrote Thoughts Upon the African Slave Trade, which was a confession of sorts about his involvement in the transatlantic slave trade and explained why he became an ardent supporter of abolishing it.

‘It will always be a subject of humiliating reflection to me, that I was, once, an active instrument, in a business at which my heart now shudders.’

-John Newton, Thoughts Upon the African Slave Trade

Eventually, his book would end up in the hands of every member of Parliament, and he would testify before hearings there, bearing witness to the evils he both observed and effectuated. Newton would live just long enough to see Britain pass The Slave Trade Act of 1807, which made the slave trade illegal throughout the British Empire.

Now that you know Newton’s brief biography re-read Amazing Grace’s lyrics through the eyes of someone whose religion transformed him from among the vilest of humans to a man who helped save an untold number of future lives:

Amazing grace how sweet the sound
That saved a wretch like me
I once was lost, but now I'm found
Was blind but now I see

'Twas grace that taught my heart to fear
And grace my fears relieved
How precious did that grace appear
The hour I first believed

Through many dangers, toils, and snares
I have already come
This grace that brought me safe thus far
And grace will lead me home

When we've been here ten thousand years
Bright, shining as the sun
We've no less days to sing God's praise
Than when we first begun

Amazing grace how sweet the sound
That saved a wretch like me
I once was lost, but now I'm found
Was blind but now I see

For one of my favorite renditions, listen to Il Divo. Wait for the bagpipes and baritone portion. Chills…

Anyway, since I’ve been feeling shitty, I figured I’d put something uplifting into the world for you all today. Don’t feel too bad for me; I’ll be back in form soon to slaughter your favorite sacred cows.

But until then…

_Comstock