Re: "Rock of Ages"?

[SamWeiss <SamWeiss...>]

At 12:13 PM 12/17/01, Robert Cohen wrote:
>Does anyone know who wrote the (English, obviously) words to "Rock of 
>Ages"?  When?

There's a little information on this subject in the last paragraph of the 
following brief article that I wrote a couple of years ago on Maoz Tzur 
(the text, that is, not the tune).
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The original Maoz Tzur, written by an anonymous 13th or 14th century 
Ashkenazic poet, consists of five stanzas, each containing four rhyming 
lines. (All we know of the author is his name, ?Mordechai,? from how he 
?signed the poem? by way of the first letter of each verse -- starting with 
the letter Mem in Maoz, and so on.) After the opening verse, four succinct 
paragraphs illustrate God?s constant involvement in our people?s destiny: 
in Egypt, in Babylonia and during the crises that are commemorated by Purim 
and Chanukah. A sixth stanza, apparently written during a similar crisis, 
was added sometime in the 15th century. It asks God to avenge the 
persecutions of the current evil regime.

Considering all the holidays that are mentioned, it is interesting that 
these verses would be used only on Chanukah. Indeed, some scholars think 
that the poem started out as a hymn for the festival of Shavuot. The later 
association with Chanukah may have have been due to the word Chanukat, 
?dedication,? in the first paragraph.

As a Chanukah poem, Maoz Tzur used to be sung only at home. It took several 
centuries for the hymn to make its way into the synagogue, and then into 
the Siddur. But you may not readily find the complete poem, since many 
modern Siddurim only print the opening stanza. Sometimes the fifth verse, 
the only one which refers specifically to the Hasmonean victory, is also 
added. (It begins with the word Yevanim, ?Greeks.?)
The first stanza of Maoz Tzur is translated in the ?Birnbaum Siddur? (p. 
710) as follows:

O God, my saving stronghold,
To praise Thee is a delight!
Restore my house of prayer,
Where I will offer Thee thanks.
When thou wilt prepare havoc
For the foe who maligns us,
I will gratify myself with a song at the altar.

While this is a fair translation of the original, it is not a very literal 
one.  Here is another version -- less ?politically correct,? and closer to 
the strict Hebrew meaning -- from the ?ArtScroll Siddur? (page 783):
Rocky Fortress of my salvation,
It is delightful to praise You.
Restore my House of Prayer,
And there we will give thanks with an offering.
When You have prepared the slaughter
For ["of"] the blaspheming foe,
Then I will complete with a hymn-song
The dedication of the Altar.

Chanukah, after all, does celebrate a torturous military victory.  So it 
should not surprise us to read these vehement lines penned in an era when 
daily Jewish survival was a constant burning concern.

Maoz Tzur, like many other medieval liturgical hymns, incorporates Biblical 
imagery and other ancient Jewish symbolic phraseology, so even the ?strict 
Hebrew meaning? is not always entirely clear. Nevertheless, in comparison 
with the above translations, the commonly sung English version is a clear 
departure from the original:
Rock of Ages let our song
Praise Thy saving power;
Thou amidst the raging foes
Wast our shelt'rng tower.
Furious they assailed us,
But Thine arm availed us,
And Thy word broke their sword
When our own strength failed us.

Indeed, this English verse (co-authored at the end of the 19th century by 
two American rabbis, Marcus Jastrow and Gustave Gottheil) is based not on 
the original Hebrew poem, but on a ?sanitized? German free adaptation of 
it. Although the Hebrew word Tzur does mean ?rock,? the word Maoz is 
derived from the word for ?power.? So the opening phrase ?Rock of Ages? 
intimates from the outset that we are not dealing with a straightforward 
translation. Also, as the opening phrase of a Jewish holiday hymn, the 
words ?Rock of Ages? unfortunately have misleading associations with a 
famous Christian hymn by that name. Finally, note that the second English 
verse (Children of the martyr-race ?) has absolutely no connection with the 
second Hebrew verse on that page, Yevanim Nikb?Tzu Alay (?Greeks gathered 
to attack me?).

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Cantor Sam Weiss === Jewish Community Center of Paramus, NJ