It will be a while before I can make a full report of my first ever visit to a Mormon SM and GP class.

During SM we sang hymn # 111, Rock of Ages. This old hymn was very familiar to me from my childhood. So when we got to the second verse, I got tripped up by how they've changed the words.

Where the original hymn says "Not the labor of my hands can fulfill the law's demands" the modified version says "Not the labor of my hands can fill all thy law's demands."

In the One True Church I grew up in, not Mormonism, but one of the many other OTCs, they did the same sort of thing. They adopted hymns from classic Christianity, but changed a few words here and there to match the local doctrine.

It took me until adulthood to figure out that little trick, but it was among the list of things to ponder that helped me see that I was in a form of Christianity that was non-standard to say the least.

SURELY I AM NOT THE FIRST PERSON HERE TO CATCH ON TO THIS. Did the hymns give you any clues that you had grown up in, or converted to, something out of the mainstream? Any related thoughts whatsoever?

JAR

P.S. Full report coming later, but same day service not guaranteed.

I didn't know that LDS hymns were different until I went to a non-denominational memorial service. They were singing familiar hymns, but the words were all different.

At the time, I wasn't quite sure what to make of that.

"Hail to the Man" and |"If I could Hie to Kolob" would be the first indication of weirdness in LDS Inc. Faves of a good friend of mine.

' Praise to the Man' is a very weird hymn...we are supposed to ' have no other gods before me, saith the Lord'...paraphrased from the 10 Commandments. Yet here is a whole 4 verses of making a man a God.

Most of the well known christmas carols that are in the LDS hymnbook are butchered with verses left out or words/sentences changed.

I was surprised to hear "Jesus Wants me for a Sunbeam" not sung by an LDS person on a movie once. I learned that it was not just an LDS Primary song.
I always thought it was funny that other Christian churches were not good enough for Joseph Smith, but apparently their songs are(and some with changes).

"Praise to the Man"- don't get me started on that one. When someone tells me that they don't worship Joseph Smith, I ask why there is a whole praise song devoted to him in their hymnal.

The Mormon version of Martin Luther's most famous hymn, "A Mighty Fortress" is very different from what Luther wrote. It always kind of pissed me off, having been raised Lutheran.

Not to mention, the attribution of the music solely to Luther is disingenuous--the harmonization that appears in the Hymnal 1985 is from Bach's Cantata 80. Also, Luther wrote four stanzas, and several more have been added by various other denominations, but the Mormons must doctrinally object to all but the one.

I'm still mad about 'Scotland the Brave'......

So I console myself with this version of 'Praise to the Man':

http://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=scotland+the+brave+pipes+rock+roll&FORM=VIRE7#view=detail&mid=9ECB632B2E3176FF62E29ECB632B2E3176FF62E2

OP wrote:

"During SM we sang hymn # 111, Rock of Ages."

Yeah! Def Leppard!!!

Sorry, but that is the only "Rock of Ages" that I really care to remember. But wouldn't it be quite a kick if they sang that version in S/M Meeting?

For the longest time Mormons didn't have "How great thou art" in their hymn book. They were looked down on by other Christian religions for that.

It wasn't that long ago they finally added it in. They did change the words though.

I don't know that we teach that.

I hated all primary songs - and they bored me as I remember. I loved to sing but my parents were great music lovers. And had all from the"forbidden" music like Kiss, Led Zepplin, Stones,Bowie (Mom was a Bowie fanatic) all this weird 70's and 80's stuff. I could sing along them with 3 years and refused to sing Primary songs.
I still can't stand hymns, the music is awful and played on an organ along with singers who couldnt hit a single note makes my ears bleed. When our RS is singing and you hear it from the outside you can't help but have to think of the gremlinschristmascaroling in that movie.

However I like some lyrics. My favorite is "A poor wayfaring man of grief" . With other settings some of them are actually really nice.
Some of the weirdest ones sadly never made it to the german issue. Some maybe because they were too odd (kolob) - and some got a total new meaning by translation. Maybe just because it would have been very odd and awkward when Germans sing songs like Hail or praise to the man.