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From:  "Tako Oda" <toda@m...>
"Tako Oda" <toda@m...>
Date:  Sat May 26, 2001  4:56 pm
Subject:  Re: What does it mean?


Karen Mercedes <dalila@R...> wrote:
Karen Mercedes <dalila@R...> wrote:

The tricky thing is that what the original psalm means may be
different from 1) what a Jewish scholar would think, 2) what a
Christian theologist would think 3) what Handel's librettist thought
it meant, at least for the purposes of "Messiah" 4) how Handel chose
to interpret it (which in some cases did not match the librettists
ideas - the librettist was not perfectly happy with Handel's handling
of the words)

I think for 2-4, "Thou" is Jesus, whose "gifts" were those of heaven
for his disciples. He went up on "high" as in to 7th prayer meditation
plane and God (metaphorically), or to heaven as in where people go
when they die (literally). In both cases, they would be the keys to
the salvation of his people. As for 1), a Jewish scholar would clearly
have a different opinion on the text than a Christian one! :-)

I would go with what the librettist/composer took the text to
mean...It's basically part of the larger "Easter" section of Messiah.
IMO, the alto part is the most Marian perspective of all the soloists.
Deeply grateful and tragic, with muted joy. FWIW...

Tako



  Replies Name/Email Yahoo! ID Date Size
12183 Re: What does it mean? Addendum Tako Oda   Sat  5/26/2001   2 KB
12184 Re: What does it mean? Karen Mercedes   Sat  5/26/2001   4 KB

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