Christ the Lord Is Risen Today
200

Text: Charles Wesley (1707–1788)
Music: Anonymous, Lyra Davidica (1708)
Tune name: EASTER HYMN

One of the best- loved of all Easter hymns, “Christ the Lord Is Risen Today” proclaims the great, central miracle of Christianity: that Jesus Christ, though dead, arose from the tomb, and that through this resurrection he conquered death on behalf of all mankind.

The original hymn text, published in 1739, had no “alleluias”; they were added later with the use of this tune, EASTER HYMN. Alleluia, a transcription of a Hebrew word meaning “praise ye the Lord,” or “praise ye Jehovah,” is a joyful exclamation that is clearly appropriate to the triumphant message of this hymn.

The original hymn was eleven stanzas long. Lines three and four of the second verse, as printed in our hymnal, are altered from Charles Wesley’s original lines: “Lo! the sun’s eclipse is o’er; / Lo! he sets in blood no more.”

Other verses sometimes included in Christian hymnals include these:

Vain the stone, the watch, the seal,
Christ hath burst the gates of hell:
Death in vain forbids his rise;
Christ hath opened paradise.

Soar we now where Christ has led,
Following our exalted Head;
Made like him, like him we rise,
Ours the cross, the grave, the skies!

“Christ the Lord Is Risen Today” is probably the most popular of all Easter hymns among Latter- day Saints. It is interesting to note that although Emma Smith included this text in her 1841 hymnal, for some reason it was dropped from Latter- day Saint hymnody until the 1948 hymnbook.