“For most of history, Anonymous was a woman.” – attributed to Virginia Woolf

I was flipping through the hymnal trying to get inspiration for today’s post, and I got the idea to look through the authors and composers section at the end. My plan was to find a composer I like, find a hymn by that composer, and then find an alternate text to that tune to share with everyone. But as I started, with the letter A, my eyes stopped at Anonymous.

I flipped through the hymns whose authors and composers were lost to time, and I found that some of my favorites were listed there. Many were either anonymous for the author but with a known composer, or anonymous for the composer but with a known author. Prayer of Thanksgiving, however, was anonymous for both. I wonder who wrote it. Did the same person write the words and the tune? What was her life like? The hymn was written in approximately 1625. I can’t imagine that 17th century life was easy. But even with a likely challenging life, she was thankful. Did she know we would still be singing her hymn 400 years later, in a different language?

We will likely never know the story of who wrote this hymn, but God knows. “Sing praises to His name; He forgets not His own.”