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HANNA RIJKEN, MARTIN J.M. HOONDERT, MARCEL BARNARD1

‘O Lord, Save the Queen… or the King?’ Beyond Vernacular in the Netherlands

SUMMARY In the Netherlands there is a popular practice of Anglican choral (outside the context of the Anglican ), organised either as worship, a concert or as worship and a concert at the same time. The evensongs are performed either completely in English or partly in English, partly in Dutch. In this article the authors will explore for what reasons the English language as non-vernacular is used. Which qualities do participants attribute to the English language in evensongs in the Netherlands and how should these qualities be interpreted? The use of language will be explored as a possible indicator of transformation of religiosity. The main conclusion is that the English language is used because of the beauty of its sound, the ritual quality of using a non-vernacular, and its power to evoke an experience of sacrality and contrast. Participants, it is found, are critical of the traditional Reformed emphasis on words, and refer instead to unarticulated transcendental experiences.

There is something remarkable going on in the Netherlands. Increasingly, choral evensongs that use the English language are organised outside of the context of the Anglican Church, as (mostly Reformed) worship, concert, or worship and a concert at the same time. The evensongs are performed conform to the text of the liturgical order of the (1662). In most situations all or nearly all elements are in English, even the remarks on the order of service (e.g. ‘all stand’), which is remarkable in a context of vernacular liturgy. These choral evensongs in English draw our attention and raise questions. Why do organisers choose English as the liturgical-ritual language in a Dutch context that, since the Reformation and the Second Vatican Council, has been characterised by vernacular liturgy? In the Anglican Church, the choral is a daily prayer service, celebrated in the late afternoon or evening, which was originally established in the sixteenth century during the . Following Martin ______1 The article is part of the PhD research project ‘“My Soul Doth Magnify”. The Appropriation of the Anglican Choral Evensong in the Dutch Context’ that is embedded in the research programme ‘Practices of faith in socio-cultural networks’ of the Protestant Theological University Amsterdam. The first author of the article is the main investigator of the project. She gathered the data and analysed them. The analysis of the data was inter-subjectively assessed by the co-authors, who are also the supervisors of the research project. www.ntt-online.nl NTT Journal for Theology and the Study of Religion 71/3, 2017, 227–241

Guest (guest) IP: 170.106.34.90 228 HANNA RIJKEN, MARTIN J.M. HOONDERT, MARCEL BARNARD

Luther, Archbishop introduced liturgy in the vernacular, so the Latin texts were translated into English. As a consequence, musicians had to put all the new liturgical texts to music again. In 1549 the first Book of Common Prayer was published, including an order for evensong; after some revisions in 1662 the final edition was established. Until today the language of the 1662 order is used in English cathedrals and thus also in Dutch contexts. The vernacular is a characteristic of the evensong in England. In the recent tradition of the evensong in the Netherlands, however, the non-vernacular is one of the characteristics. This interesting phenomenon is the subject of our article. The main question of this article is: Which qualities do participants attribute to the English language in evensongs in the Netherlands and how should these qualities be interpreted? We use the term ‘qualities’ in accordance with the definition formulated by Paul Post: ‘identity-determining characteristics, traits, dimensions or tendencies in a ritual repertoire’.2 In this article we will investigate the use of language in the choral evensongs as a possible indicator of transformation of religiosity. The aim is to gain an understanding of contemporary practices in the Netherlands, in relation to the ongoing process of transformation of religiosity in the post-secularised context. The article is structured as follows: we will first explore the key concept of ‘ritual language’ and build our theoretical framework. Secondly, we will elaborate on the qualitative empirical method used. We continue to our concrete case, exploring language in choral evensongs in the Netherlands, illustrating this with quotations from our fieldwork. Finally, we will evaluate language in choral evensongs in view of transformation of religiosity in the Netherlands. Theoretical Framework: Ritual Language Language, as a ‘fundamental form of human expression, is a central element in every religious tradition and can be examined from a variety of perspectives’.3 We will investigate the language in the evensong from the perspective of rituality and attempt to understand it as ‘ritual language’ — this means, as stated by the scholar of religious studies Richley Crapo, ‘the highly standardised spoken words that are predictable and spoken [or sung] in a more or less invariant way’.4 Roy Rappaport formulated five features of ritual and we use

______2 P. Post, ‘Introduction and Application: Feast as a Key Concept in a Liturgical Studies Research Design’, in P. Post, G. Rouwhorst, L. van Tongeren, A. Scheer (eds.), Christian Feast and : The Dynamics of Western Liturgy and Culture (Liturgia condenda 12), Leuven/Paris/Sterling 2001, 47–77, 58. 3 W.T. Wheelock, ‘Language: Sacred language’, in L. Jones (ed.), Encyclopedia of Religion 8. Second Edition, Detroit 2005, 5301–5304, 5301. 4 R.H. Crapo, Anthropology of Religion: The Unity and Diversity of Religions, New York 2003, 155.

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Guest (guest) IP: 170.106.34.90 ‘O LORD, SAVE THE QUEEN - … OR THE KING?’ 229 four of these features as characteristic of the ritual language in the evensong: ritual language is (1) encoded (by others than the performers), (2) formal, (3) performative and (4) invariable.5 We will add a fifth feature, namely (5) aesthetics.6 First of all, the term encoded is used to mark that the ritual language ‘was created by someone other than those who then participate in the rituals’.7 Most of the texts in the choral evensong are prescribed in the liturgical order for evensong in the Book of Common Prayer (1662, first edition 1549). Cranmer was the ‘principal architect’ of the book and he made use of ‘English translations of some of the Latin daily services which are already found in the Primers’.8 The ‘Word of God’ (, lessons and ) has a primary position in the evensong.9 The only ‘free’ words are the spoken prayers formulated by the minister or . The postmodern hankering after the non- vernacular and incomprehensible language contrasts with the original inten- tions of the Book of Common Prayer. Intelligibility was one of the motivations behind the newly created order: to ‘signal and spread the use of the vernacular’ and to make the liturgy understandable for everyone.10 As Wheelock explained in his article on language in the Encyclopedia of Religion: ‘Luther’s insistence on hearing and understanding (…) led to the protestant use of vernaculars.’11 For nearly four hundred years (with an interruption during the Commonwealth) liturgy in the Anglican Church was described by one encoded and unchanging text.12 When encoded liturgical text is fixed, after centuries it becomes a sacred language. As Crapo explained: ‘unlike those creators, who were innovators, participants in the liturgical orders view their role as one of perpetuating the ritual symbolism, which they view as sacred and therefore not to be changed’.13 Christine Mohrmann mentioned that in this encoded traditional language comprehensibility becomes less important: Within the framework of a definite tradition, an artificial, often archaizing, style or linguistic form is created which, in its isolated position, reduces the element of ______5 R.A. Rappaport, Ritual and Religion in the Making of Humanity, Cambridge 1999, 23–68. 6 E. Fischer-Lichte, The Transformative Power of Performance: A New Aesthetics, translated by Saskya Iris Jain, London/New York 2008, 181–207. 7 Crapo, Anthropology of Religion, 155. 8 G. Jeanes, ‘Cranmar and Common Prayer’, in C. Hefling, C. Shattuck (eds.), The Oxford Guide to the Book of Common Prayer: A Worldwide Survey, Oxford 2006, 21–38, 31. 9 M. Barnard, J. Cilliers and C. Wepener, Worship in the Network Culture: Liturgical Ritual Studies. Fields and Methods, Concepts and Metaphors, Leuven/Paris/Walpole MA 2014, 135. 10 K. Stevenson, ‘Worship by the Book’, in Hefling, Shattuck, (eds.) The Oxford Guide, 9–21, 9. 11 Wheelock, ‘Language: Sacred language’, 5303 12 Hefling and Shattuck, The Oxford Guide, 3. 13 Crapo, Anthropology of Religion, 155.

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comprehensibility to a greater or lesser degree in favour of other elements preferred for their artistic or spiritual potentialities, and lying more in the domain of expression than that of communication.14 Crapo used the word ‘aura’ to describe the sacred dimension of the archaic liturgical language: ‘the archaic quality of an older translation may have to imbue it with an aura of venerableness that makes it seem more sacred (…)’.15 Mohrmann used the term ‘sens du sacré’ to mark the appreciation of the use of a liturgical language which was far removed from that of everyday life.16 According to Wheelock ‘the inclusion of (…) ancient and foreign-sounding elements (…) added an element of mystery and sense of connectedness to a religiously significant past’.17 Sometimes single words can produce a mystical experience and passages a ‘strangely moving power’.18 Marius van Leeuwen confirmed this: ‘Sometimes the religious feeling attaches itself so strongly to such words, that the sound itself raises an emotion, like a ray of light through a church window arouses a religious feeling.’19 Els Rose shows that Latin speakers in the fourth century, who were used to singing in the Greek language, were consoled by the sound of the words, although they did not understand the content.20 We will now discuss the second feature, formality, which can be divided into ‘formal language’ and ‘formality as decorum’. Rappaport wrote that the language in religious rituals is highly formalised: ‘almost all aspects of performances consisting of fixed sequences of stylised and stereotyped words and acts are rigidly specified’.21 Formal language can be seen as a restricted language ‘a use of language that involves relying heavily on standard idioms’.22 This contrasts with the de-formalizing reform in the sixties of the last century, which proclaimed that worship must be de-ritualised.23 ‘Language has to be the everyday type – prosaic, mundane and obvious – because what we have to say ______14 C. Mohrmann, Liturgical Latin: Its Origins and Character. Three Lectures, London 1957/1959, 6. 15 Crapo, Anthropology of Religion, 173. 16 Mohrmann, Liturgical Latin, 54. Mohrmann refers to the earliest liturgical Latin. 17 Wheelock, ‘Language: Sacred Language’, 5303. 18 W. James, Varieties of Religious Experience: A Study in Human Nature. Being the Gifford Lectures on natural religion delivered at Edinburgh in 1901–1902, New York, 1902, 373–374. 19 M. van Leeuwen, ‘De onalledaagse taal van de liturgie’, in M. Barnard, N. Schuman, Nieuwe wegen in de liturgie: De weg van de liturgie – een vervolg-, Zoetermeer 2002, 65–82, 67. 20 E. Rose, ‘Getroost door de klank van woorden: Het Latijn als sacrale taal van Ambrosiaster tot Alcuin’ in G. Rouwhorst, P. Versnel-Mergaerts (eds.), Taal waarin wij God verstaan: Over taal en vertaling van Schrift en traditie in de liturgie, Heeswijk 2015, 63–88, 83. 21 Rappaport, Ritual and Religion, 35. 22 Crapo, Anthropology of Religion, 156–157. 23 R. A. Leaver, ‘ as ’, in R.A. Leaver, J.A. Zimmermann (eds.), Liturgy and Music: Lifetime Learning, Collegeville, Minnesota 1998, 395–410, 396.

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Guest (guest) IP: 170.106.34.90 ‘O LORD, SAVE THE QUEEN - … OR THE KING?’ 231 has to be instantly comprehensible. Thus at the beginning of worship: “The Lord be with you” is replaced by “Good morning. How are you feeling today?”’24 ‘Formality as decorum’ is closely connected with the third feature of ritual language: performativity. The term ‘performativity’ was coined by the analytical philosopher John Austin analyzing the ‘performativity of language’, which means that ‘to say something is to do something.’25 According to him the words used in rituals do not describe the deed, but they are the deed, for instance when a priest says: ‘I baptise you…’.26 The decorum in which the words are spoken is important: the performativity of the language is conditioned, the words ‘work’ when spoken in a formal setting by authorised persons in proper circumstances. As Rappaport explained: ‘the formality of liturgical orders helps to insure that whatever performatives they incorporate are performed by authorised people with respect to eligible persons or entities under proper circumstances in accordance with proper procedures’.27Austin reasoned that performatives uttered under what he called false circumstances were ‘unhappy’ or ‘infelicitous’, for instance performative language in the theatre.28 However, the scholar of performance studies Richard Schechner criticised Austin’s position, stating that ‘what happens on stage has emotional and ideological consequences for both performers and spectators’.29 Furthermore, the ‘as if’ of theatre and concert-like evensongs provides ‘a time-space where reactions can be actual while the actions that elicit these reactions are fictional’.30 We can explain this by means of an example from our empirical research, which will be elaborated on in the next sections. In some cases, the respondents said that they prefer the ‘as if’ to the authority of the minister or another ecclesial authority; they also prefer the traditional formulas (e.g. the ) to be spoken by a member or other person with the best (native or semi-native) English pronunciation, rather than by a minister who is authorised but does not adjust him/herself to the performance of the choral evensong. Here we see the tension between authority and ‘as if’, ritual and play, regulations and experience. Another example, in some evensongs in the context ______24 Leaver, ‘Liturgical Music as Anamnesis’, 396. 25 J. L. Austin, How to Do Things with Words: The William James Lectures delivered at Harvard University in 1955, Cambridge 1965, 1975, 6. 26 Austin, How to Do Things with Words, 6. 27 Rappaport, Ritual and Religion, 116. 28 R. Schechner, Performance Studies: An Introduction. Second edition, New York and London 2006 (2003), 126. 29 Schechner, Performance Studies, 124. 30 Schechner, Performance Studies, 124.

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Guest (guest) IP: 170.106.34.90 232 HANNA RIJKEN, MARTIN J.M. HOONDERT, MARCEL BARNARD of , is where the choir sings the ‘’ and afterwards the minister speaks the Adjutorium nostrum (‘Our help is in the Name of the Lord’). We propose to understand this phenomenon of a mixed authority structure in the framework of what is called the disenchantment of worship, that is to say: the loss of sung liturgy whose texts ‘are integral to the lex orandi’.31 Andrew Burnham pleads for a ‘re-enchantment’, the reinvention of all that can be sung, and to him this is visible in ‘the flourishing Anglican tradition of choral evensong, in cathedrals and college (…)’.32 Another consequence of the difference between the Anglican and the Reformed traditions is that in the Dutch Reformed evensongs there are few or no ritual acts of the congregation during the singing of texts (for instance standing during the canticles sung by the choir, kneeling during the prayers sung by minister and choir, bowing during the doxologies, and crossing oneself). According to Rappaport the active participation of the congregation marks the difference between ritual and theatre: ‘Those present at theatrical events include, on the one hand, performers and, on the other hand, audience.’33 The fourth feature, invariance, is also closely connected with formality. According to Rappaport, in events of greater formality ‘the invariant aspects of the event become dominant or, to put it a little differently, themselves become operative’.34 The invariance of the choral evensong concerns first and foremost the texts. As said, most of the texts in the evensong are fixed, and — in England — repeated every day, but the sound of the performance of the texts which are sung (e.g. preces and responses and the canticles) varies, because the text is performed in another musical setting written by another composer. ‘Composers over the centuries such as W. Byrd, T. Tallis (…) and countless others have written some of ’s finest liturgical music for the responses, canticles, and (from 1662) of the Prayer Book offices, which continue to be sung in cathedral, collegiate, and parish churches across the .’35 Although the musical compositions vary considerably, there is some structure, some invariance in the way composers deal with the texts. The , for instance, is exuberant most of the time and the is more quiet and silent. The words ‘to be a light’ in the Nunc dimittis are articulated in most compositions. The chanting of psalms on a harmonised melodic formula, normally repeated every one or two verses, is one of the peculiarities of the Anglican choral evensong. ______31 A. Burnham, Heaven & Earth in Little Space: The Re-enchantment of Liturgy, Norwich 2010, 129. 32 Burnham, Heaven & Earth in Little Space, 129. 33 Rappaport, Ritual and Religion, 39 (italics in the original). 34 Rappaport, Ritual and Religion, 34. 35 J. Gibaut, ‘The ’, in Hefling and Shattuck, The Oxford Guide, 451–460, 455.

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The fifth feature is the aesthetical dimension. Erika Fischer-Lichte speaks of the ‘aesthetic experience’, which leads to re-enchantment of the world.36 In linguistics it is conceptualised as phonaesthetics, referring to the aesthetic properties of sound. By phonaesthetics we mean the study of the aesthetic properties of sound,37 while euphony is a pleasant quality of sound and speech.38 According to Tom McArthur, ‘[the] perception of such quality is partly physiological (soft, flowing, blending sounds are generally considered pleasanter than harsh, jangling, discordant sounds) and partly cultural (…)’.39 Concerning the English language, ‘euphony is often associated with long vowels, the semi-vowels or glides (j, w), and the consonants (l, m, n, r)’.40 Vowel sounds are more euphonious, and the longer vowels are the most melodious. An adjacent topic may be connected to the discourse on silence in the choral evensong. The reverse of ‘language’ is ‘non-language’, the silence between and underneath the words. Marcel Barnard pleads for a silence in , ‘which often seems to equate Word-centeredness with being driven by words’.41 By silence he also means ‘that our words, when we use them, should carry the aura of silence (…)’.42 Respondents refer to this phenomenon, as we shall see further on. Empirical Research The methods we used to investigate the language in choral evensongs in the Netherlands are ethnographic in character: participant observation, analysis of liturgical orders (booklets) and programme notes, websites and interviews with key informants: singers, organists, conductors, participants and ministers in the evensongs. We investigated which languages in the evensongs were used both in the performance and in the booklets, and we tried to discover which qualities key informants attribute to the use of English in evensongs in the Netherlands. In the participant observation we tried to experience the effect of the language used. We carried out participant observation in choral evensongs in over twenty five different places, sung by thirty .43 Over twenty five interviews were held with key informants of the evensongs in the Netherlands. Transcriptions ______36 Fischer-Lichte, The Transformative Power of Performance, 181 and 190. 37 D. Crystal, A Dictionary of Linguistics and Phonetics. Sixth Edition, Oxford 2011. 38 T. McArthur, Oxford Concise Companion to the English Language, Oxford 2005, 243. 39 McArthur, Oxford Concise Companion, 243–244. 40 McArthur, Oxford Concise Companion, 243–244. 41 Barnard, Cilliers, Wepener, Worship in the Network Culture, 163. 42 Barnard, Cilliers, Wepener, Worship in the Network Culture, 164. 43 For a list of places and interviews and a more detailed description of the participant observation research, see: H. Rijken, M.J.M. Hoondert, M. Barnard, ‘Dress in Choral Evensongs in the Netherlands’, forthcoming.

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Guest (guest) IP: 170.106.34.90 234 HANNA RIJKEN, MARTIN J.M. HOONDERT, MARCEL BARNARD of the interviews were made and the analysis of the data was started. During the first and second coding cycles we used the following coding methods: descriptive coding and in vivo coding,44 focused coding and theoretical coding.45 Based on the analysis of the fieldwork we found four main categories (qualities) referring to the use of the language: (1) beauty of sound, (2) rituality, (3) sacrality and (4) contrast. Within the categories we found subcategories partly derived from our theoretical exploration. In the next section we will present some of the findings of the empirical research. Empirical data Twenty of the thirty evensongs investigated were performed completely in English, and in ten there was a mixture of English and Dutch. In all evensongs the Magnificat, Nunc dimittis and the were in English, and the texts of the Book of Common Prayer were followed to a certain extent. In a few places the introduction with of sins and general absolution was also spoken (in English). There was a , held after the Nunc dimittis, in only three of the thirty situations. In some places the prayer for the Queen was sung unchanged, although the Netherlands are reigned by a King. Standardly praying in the Netherlands for the Queen of England is a new phenomenon — hence the title of this article, ‘O Lord, Save the Queen … or the King?’ In other places the text was changed into ‘Lord, Save the King’. In places where the texts were translated, there was a wide variety in translations, in most cases contemporary translations were used, for instance the Nieuwe Bijbelvertaling (2004). Regarding the Creed, a fixed part of choral evensong in England, a conductor of a boys’ choir explained: ‘We don’t say the Creed either. I don’t want people having to pronounce that, while they don’t actually attend church for that reason.’46 In some concert-like evensongs, however, there was a spoken Creed. This raises the exciting question of what happens in a concert-like context the moment the audience stands up and speaks the Creed aloud.47 In some contexts a welcome and musical or theological explanation was given at the beginning of the evensong. Sometimes ministers added additional words to the fixed phrases: the traditional ecclesial authority interrupts the religious play. Bilingual sentences also occur: ‘De first lesson is uit het boek Jesaja’ (‘The first lesson is from the book of Isaiah’).48

______44 These codes were derived literally from the language of participants, for example: ‘beauty of sound’ and ‘contrast’. 45 J. Saldaňa, The Coding Manual for Qualitative Researches, London 2009, 70–77, 151. 46 Interview conductor, 12–04–2012. 47 We will elaborate on this in a following article. 48 Evensong 7–02–2016.

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We will now elaborate on the four categories: (1) beauty of sound, (2) rituality, (3) sacrality and (4) contrast. Regarding the first category, beauty of sound, interviewees explained that the English language is a beautiful language that adds value to the evensong: ‘In English some words are so much more beautiful than in Dutch. Yes, and that partly depends on the sound of the words as well.’49 An organist described the Dutch language as ‘more flat’ and as an impoverishment in comparison with the English language: Have you ever accompanied the psalms in Dutch? Not psalms. Or, well, sometimes, in another setting. To me, it is really a kind of impoverishment then. It becomes a bit more flat. More flat? Yes. More flat. Just in the sound. In the language.50 A conductor made particular mention that chanting the psalms in English is more beautiful than chanting in Dutch. According to him, the English language helps to sing more legato: ‘When you do the chanting of psalms in Dutch (…) it is like a stop and start affair… Whereas it has to be sung as a beautiful legato. The language helps to do that. The English language is a bit more suitable for that.’51 He explained that he started an English boys’ choir outside the context of the church because of the language: Did you consider making a connection with the church? No! We deliberately didn’t, because that will conflict with the Dutch liturgy, I deliberately wanted English. To get that sound! Because of the language! Because the English language is a melodious language (… ). Now [naʊ] and [ðaʊ] and How [haʊ]. Right!52 Another conductor agreed with this: ‘English is a more melodious language anyway. Dutch is harsher. When you have a lecture from the Bible in Dutch or a , well, that is less bad than the psalms (….).’53 Her colleague was not positive either about singing the psalms in Dutch, referring to the introduction of the vernacular in the Roman Church after the Second Vatican Council (1962–1965): ‘Ha ha, yes it is possible, but I am not going to do it. (…) If you sing the psalms in Dutch, it would feel really less like an evensong to me, but why this is? I always get a ‘Huub Oosterhuis’ feeling.’54 A director of ______49 Interview singer, 12–03–2015. 50 Interview organist, 13–10–2015. 51 Interview conductor, 12–04–2012. 52 Interview conductor, 12–04–2012. 53 Interview conductor (a), 11–10–2015. 54 Interview conductor (b), 11–10–2015. Huub Oosterhuis was one of the renewers of Roman Catholic liturgy in the Netherlands after the Second Vatican Council.

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Guest (guest) IP: 170.106.34.90 236 HANNA RIJKEN, MARTIN J.M. HOONDERT, MARCEL BARNARD music explained that in the evensongs of her choir there is freedom to choose which language they use. Personally she prefers the English language ‘because, yes, that language has more of a singing quality. The English chants are more often melodious’.55 The second category was rituality. The use of the English language as non- vernacular enhances the feeling of ritual and mystery, according to the interviewees: The effect of the Dutch language (…) is just a little less of a ritual. Yes. The Lord’s Prayer, when you pray it like this [praying in Dutch]: ‘Onze Vaderdieinde- hemelenzijt’… or when you pray: Our Father who art in heaven’. It is another language… it gets something like… [a] magical saying… and thus… it is more ritual (… ). And also mystery.56 Another interviewee marked the non-native command of the English language as a quality: ‘For people who are not connected to a church, it is more distanced, and because of that it feels more comfortable.’57 Singers explained that comprehensibility is not very important: ‘Sometimes we say to each other: O, if we are going to translate what we are now singing (…). In particular the , which are sometimes very much outdated.’58 An organist also explained that the comprehensibility, one of the characteristics of Reformed liturgy, is not important: I really think that comprehensibility is totally unimportant. Look at those hymns. The texts are sometimes really terrible (…), very mealy-mouthed: Jesus this… and Jesus that. If you sing that in Dutch, you will chase away a lot of people, who feel so happy about the evensong. When you do it in English, it doesn’t matter one hoot.59 He makes the connection with the Genevan metrical psalms in the so-called ‘Oude Berijming’, the translation of 1773. As a child he had to learn the stanzas and didn’t understand the texts, for instance: ‘Bewaar m’als d’appel van uw (sic) oog’ [‘Keep me as the apple of your eye’].60 He explained: ‘As a child you don’t understand anything of it. But it sounds beautiful. And then it comes to

______55 Interview conductor, 27–04–2011. 56 Interview organist, 13–10–2015. 57 Interview conductor, 11–10–2015. 58 Interview singer, 3–12–2008. 59 Interview organist, 13–10–2015. 60 Interview organist, 13–10–2015, referring to psalm 17,4.

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Guest (guest) IP: 170.106.34.90 ‘O LORD, SAVE THE QUEEN - … OR THE KING?’ 237 life (…). You don’t have to understand it.’61 According to him the Reformation was the beginning of the end, ‘this total axing that took place at the time’.62 The restricted language in the evensong is also seen as a quality. According to the interviewees the silence in the evensong contrasts with the talkee–talkee in the Sunday morning services: ‘What I miss in our Sunday morning services is silence. There are a lot of noisy people who are chattering away.’63 It is not only the people who ‘waffle’, but the ministers as well, according to the interviewees: ‘Look, then [at the evensongs] those people [who normally don’t attend church] now come to the church again. When there is no sermon! Because the chattering from the pulpit, that is over. We no longer want to listen to that! Right! And that is not present in the evensong!’64 A director of music marked the importance of silence ‘under the words’ in the evensong: ‘To me, that is so special, when you can achieve that, in the evensong… then… there is silence under the text and music.’65 The encoded language as well as the tradition is also mentioned as a quality, as an organist explained: ‘It has a calming effect on me (...). It is because it has an elaborate shape. And as it has been performed for five hundred years like this, it cannot be anything else but right.’66 The formality is seen as a quality which works ‘in a purifying way’.67 The performativity of language is also mentioned as a quality. The chairlady of a choir explained that there is a difference between an evensong choir and a concert choir. To illustrate this she referred to the piece The Lord bless you and keep you of . She explained that the words of this piece in an evensong have more impact on her than during a concert.68 The third category, sacrality, is closely connected with the beauty of sound, the rituality and the otherness of the form and language. A conductor explained that the non-native command of the English language is a quality leading to openness for religion or religious-like experiences: ‘Faith is an emotion, a lot of people somehow have a past with it. When you hear it in another language, the barrier is lower. It is less overwhelming. Like it feels that you may take small steps. Like being allowed to sit down and experience the beauty.’69 An organist described the sacral feeling as ‘being touched… and seized… and

______61 Interview organist, 13–10–2015. 62 Interview organist, 13–10–2015. 63 Interview singer, 3–12–2008. 64 Interview conductor, 12–04–2012. 65 Interview conductor , 27–04–2011. 66 Interview organist, 13–10–2015. 67 Interview organist, 13–10–2015. 68 Interview singer, 3–12–2008. 69 Interview conductor (a), 11–10–2015.

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Guest (guest) IP: 170.106.34.90 238 HANNA RIJKEN, MARTIN J.M. HOONDERT, MARCEL BARNARD experiencing it!’70 A conductor explained that he has a sacral experience in the evensong and he described this feeling as a glass dome around the participant’s body: When you participate in an evensong, then a kind of dome is hanging around you (…). The noise of the city is gone. That is so special to me. (…) You are taken up, as it were, in everything that happens; wonderful music and texts and everything that comes with it. The elements of tradition, style, the sublime, the quality. Everything is right.71 According to one conductor the liturgical setting leads to an experience of transcendence. She explained that the people in the church listen in another way; not as a concert visitor, but with commitment and open to whatever experience.72 The spiritual context is mentioned as one of the strengths of an evensong choir: You also have this [spiritual] dimension, which is different from a chamber choir — there some people are interested and others are not — … but here… all those people… they all want it. They don’t come for the ecclesial, they come for the spiritual. And then everyone can experience it in his or her own way (…). We don’t have to talk about it either.73 The last category is contrast. Nearly all interviewees describe the contrast in language with the use of language in the Reformed worship. A minister compared the language in the choral evensong with a life buoy for the Protestants in the Netherlands: The Netherlands have become very small, on account of the Reformed orthodoxy. People have become tired of ecclesial quibbling. They are now presented with a language that connects them intuitively with a large organic past. It is a kind of life buoy for them to see that Christianity is bigger than the Netherlands. I see that it works. (…) People regain pride in the Christian message, through the outside perspective of the language.74 An interviewee described the rich traditional language and the high musical quality of the evensong as a contrast with the Reformed situation: ‘I grew up in a (strict) Reformed Liberated Protestant setting. If you look closely, you notice enormous cultural poverty there.’75 ______70 Interview organist, 27–11–2008. 71 Interview conductor (b), 11–10–2015 72 Interview conductor, 27–04–2011. 73 Interview conductor, 27–04–2011. 74 Interview minister, 11–10–2015. 75 Interview conductor (a), 11–10–2015.

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Also, the contrast with England is described: is performing evensong in English typically English or not? A conductor said: ‘Of course, what we do is a bit contradictory, since the entire Anglican in English broke with the Roman Catholic Church by introducing the vernacular. And what do we do? Ha ha ha. (…) There is friction in that respect. But it has tremendous appeal!’76 According to an organist, performing choral evensong in the Netherlands is ‘playing England’: ‘Look, when we perform evensong here in Holland, it is actually not right (…) We are actually re-enacting something (…). In a way, in the Netherlands it is even more theatrical than it is in England. We are actors who don’t have proper control of the tricks of the trade.’77 Pieter Oussoren mentioned that it is actually very un-English to sing or speak English in a Dutch evensong. He explained: By using more and more English in the Janskerk-Evensong, we have made it more of a concert in terms of Evensong-criteria than a real Evensong. At least it has become a kind of concert performance of an English Evensong. Does it matter? Obviously, something like this is appreciated in the Netherlands: so, why not? What is against it?78 Discussion and Conclusions In this final section we will answer the question as formulated in the introduction and draw conclusions. Which qualities do participants attribute to the English language in evensongs in the Netherlands and how should these qualities be interpreted? We noticed that the qualities that participants in the choral evensong attribute to the use of the English language were beauty of sound, rituality, sacrality and contrast. How do these four categories of quality relate to the five features of ritual language as formulated in the theoretical framework? The quality of ‘beauty of sound’ is closely related to the aesthetical feature. The euphony and especially the long vowels of the English language are mentioned by the interviewees. The ‘aesthetic experience’ mentioned by Fisher-Lichte79 is described by nearly all interviewees. ‘Re-enchantment’ of the liturgy plays an important part in this.80 The second quality, rituality, is closely related to the features of encoding, formality and invariance. The non-native command of the English language as encoded, non-vernacular and archaic language enhances the feeling of ritual, mystery and sacrality, which is the third

______76 Interview conductor (b), 11–10–2015. 77 Interview conductor (b), 11–10–2015. 78 P. Oussoren, ‘Ter inleiding. ‘ op z’n Engels’: bezinning op een vrijage’ in G. Oost, ‘My soul doth magnify the Lord’. Over het zingen van Engelse Evensongs in Nederland, Publikatie ter gelegenheid van het 10-jarig bestaan van de Schola Davidica Utrecht, Zoetermeer 1994, 6–11, 10. The Janskerk in the city of Utrecht is one of the first places where the choral evensong was performed on a regular basis. 79 Fischer-Lichte, The Transformative Power of Performance, 181 and 190. 80 Burnham, Heaven & Earth in Little Space, 129. www.ntt-online.nl NTT Journal for Theology and the Study of Religion 71/3, 2017, 227–241

Guest (guest) IP: 170.106.34.90 240 HANNA RIJKEN, MARTIN J.M. HOONDERT, MARCEL BARNARD quality. The fourth quality, contrast, relates to all five features of ritual language, as we will explain in our conclusions. Taking everything together, we can formulate four conclusions. Firstly, we notice a considerable contrast with the language used in Sunday morning services of mainly Reformed Protestant churches: non-vernacular instead of vernacular, English instead of Dutch, traditional (archaic) language instead of modern translations, encoded language instead of dominantly free choice, restricted language instead of mainly unrestricted, sung liturgical language instead of spoken liturgical language. Furthermore, instead of a focus on comprehensibility of words and approachability, we notice in the evensongs a hankering after beauty of sound and a longing for mystery. Secondly, closely connected to the experience of language contrast is the experience of sacrality. In the experience of a non-native language, sung and spoken, participants find a transcendental experience. The description of this experience seems to be related to the ‘sens du sacré’81 which Mohrmann mentioned. However, we notice that there is a difference between Latin as a liturgical language, and archaic English, which is less incomprehensible to Dutch people. But neither language is the vernacular and their attractiveness lies in their ‘otherness’. The sacrality is partly determined by the frame in which the language is heard. Rappaport uses the term ‘framing’: ‘The ritual form (…) adds something to the substance of ritual, something that the symbolically encoded substance by itself cannot express.’82 Thirdly, the experience of ‘otherness’ lies in the non-native command of the language, but we noticed that it is not an articulated otherness. Due to the use of the English language as a non-native language the content seems to be less articulated, and the semantics appear to be less important. Marcel Gauchet mentions this as ‘focus on a transcendental and heteronomous source, but without claims for a power and truth monopoly’, and according to him this is characteristic of new forms of religiosity.83 The unarticulated ‘sens du sacré’ is evoked by the language, the distance, the experience of contrast and the framing. Fourthly, we notice that there is a contrast between the language used in evensong concerts and common choral concerts: a ritualisation of the concert is observed. In the evensong concerts the ritual language of the Book of Common Prayer is used, including readings from the Bible, spoken prayers and

______81 Mohrmann, Liturgical Latin, 54. 82 Rappaport, Ritual and Religion, 31. 83 As quoted in W. van de Donk, P. Jonkers, Geloven in het publieke domein: Verkenningen van een dubbele transformatie (WRR verkenningen 13), Amsterdam 2006, 31.

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Guest (guest) IP: 170.106.34.90 ‘O LORD, SAVE THE QUEEN - … OR THE KING?’ 241 participation of the audience in singing the hymns. These concert-like evensongs take place in both secular and orthodox Reformed contexts. Willem Frijhoff mentioned this ‘transfer of sacredness’; ‘he widening of the use of religious and sacral categories in the domain outside the church.’84 Concert and worship merge, which may be understood as a new form of religiosity. All in all, the data of the fieldwork disclose that language in evensongs in the Netherlands reveals tendencies of a changing religiosity. A new phenomenon arises: vernacular as liturgical language in the Netherlands is no longer self-evident. Participants in the evensong are longing for transcendental experiences, which are found in a non-vernacular, archaic, incomprehensible and beautiful language.

Hanna Rijken, MA, MMus, is a PhD student at the Protestant Theological University Amsterdam, P.O. Box 7161, 1007 MC Amsterdam, [email protected]/ [email protected].

Dr. Martin J.M. Hoondert is Assistant Professor of Music, Religion and Ritual at the Tilburg School of Humanities. P.O. Box 90153, 5000 LE Tilburg, [email protected].

Prof. Marcel Barnard is Professor of Practical Theology/Liturgical Studies at the Protestant Theological University Amsterdam, VU University Amsterdam and Stellenbosch University. P.O. Box 7161, 1007 MC Amsterdam, [email protected].

______84 W. Frijhoff, Heiligen, idolen, iconen, Nijmegen 1998, 37. www.ntt-online.nl NTT Journal for Theology and the Study of Religion 71/3, 2017, 227–241

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