If you go to church, it’s not unusual to sing a few songs during Sunday morning worship. The kind of music you’ll hear can range from the Psalms, to traditional hymns like “A Mighty Fortress” by Martin Luther or “Amazing Grace,” by John Newton. You can even find yourself singing reworked versions of classic hymns, such as Chris Tomlin’s “Amazing Grace (My Chains Are Gone);” or a modern hymn like “In Christ Alone” by Keith Getty. But don’t be surprised if you find yourself singing “Morning Has Broken” by Cat Stevens.
I was amazed to learn that “Morning Has Broken” actually is a Christian hymn! Cat Stevens included a version on his album, Teaser and the Firecat in 1972. The hymn originally appeared in the second edition of Songs of Praise in 1931. The editor approached the English poet and author Eleanor Farjeon with the need for a hymn to give thanks for each day and asked her to write a poem to fit the Scottish tune, “Bunessan.” In turn, “Bunessan” was first published (melody only) in 1888, as a setting for Mary MacDonald’s carol, “Child in a Manger” and named after her birthplace on the Isle of Mull, Scotland.
Mary MacDonald was a Gaelic poet born in the small crofting settlement of Ardtun, northeast of Bunessan in 1789. She married Neil MacDonald and settled down to the hard life of a crofter’s wife where she passed time at her spinning wheel by singing hymns and poems, some of her own composition. She died on May 21, 1872. When Lachan Macbean was doing research for his Songs and Hymns of the Scottish Highlands, he discovered Mary’s Gaelic hymn, Leanabh an Aigh, set to a traditional Scottish tune. He translated the title into English as “Child in the Manger” and named the tune to which it was sung “Bunessan”. There is a monument to Mary MacDonald erected beside the main road about two miles east of Bunessan, not far from the ruin of the croft in which she lived. The Full text of “Child in the Manger,” is as follows:
Child in the manger, infant of Mary;
outcast and stranger, Lord of all;
Child who inherits all our transgressions,
all our demerits on Him fall.Once the most holy Child of salvation
gently and lowly lived below;
now, as our glorious mighty Redeemer,
see Him victorious o’er each foe.Prophets foretold Him, infant of wonder;
angels behold Him on His throne;
worthy our Saviorm of all our praises;
happy forever are His own.
Sometime before 1927 Alexander Fraser heard the melody in the Scottish Highlands and wrote it down. From there it came to the attention of the editors of the hymn book, Songs of Praise, Percy Deamer, Ralph Vaughan Williams, and Martin Shaw. They asked Eleanor Farjeon to write a further hymn text to the melody of “Bunessan” and “Morning Has Broken” was born. The text of Farjeon’s hymn (and Stevens’s song) is as follows:
Morning has broken like the first morning
Blackbird has spoken like the first bird
Praise for the singing, praise for the morning
Praise for them springing fresh from the world
Sweet the rain’s new fall, sunlit from heaven
Like the first dewfall on the first grass
Praise for the sweetness of the wet garden
Sprung in completeness where his feet pass
Mine is the sunlight, mine is the morning
Born of the one light Eden saw play
Praise with elation, praise ev’ry morning
God’s recreation of the new day
Morning has broken like the first morning
Blackbird has spoken like the first bird
Praise for the singing, praise for the morning
Praise for them springing fresh from the world
The meandering journey of how a traditional Scottish melody made it to the number one song on the U.S. easy listening chart in 1972 and number six on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100 still had a few more religious surprises. The piano arrangement to Cat Stevens’ recording was composed and performed by Rick Wakeman, before he joined the rock band, Yes. Wakeman thought Stevens’s version of “Morning Has Broken” brought people closer to religious faith.
In December 1977 Cat Stevens converted to Islam and adopted the name Yusuf Islam in 1978. In 1979 he auctioned all his guitars for charity and left his musical career to devote himself to educational and philanthropic causes in the Muslim community. In 2006 he returned to pop music, dropping the surname “Islam” and began using the stage name Yusuf.
Farjeon was an acclaimed author of children’s books and plays. She converted to Roman Catholicism in 1951 and then received three major literary awards. In 1955 she received the Carnegie Medal for British children’s books and the inaugural Hans Christan Anderson Medal in 1956. In 1959 she received the Regina Medal from the U.S.-based Catholic Library Association for her “continued, distinguished contribution to children’s literature.” Yet her most widely published work is the hymn, “Morning Has Broken.”