Music for Sixth Sunday after Pentecost

During communion today, we hear one of many well-beloved arias from Mendelssohn’s oratorio Elijah. Written on the heels of his successful revival of Bach’s passions according to St. John and St. Matthew in Leipzig and in England, this music was written near the end of Mendelssohn’s life in 1846 and commissioned for the Birmingham Festival in the U.K..

One cannot hear Elijah without drawing similarities to sacred Lutheran music of the 18^th century, namely the aforementioned passion oratorios. The libretto closely follows the biblical accounts, infusing the narrative with reflective moments in the forms of arias, which provide poetic commentary on the events happening – in this case, verses taken from a baroque chorale by Burmeister which paraphrases Elijah’s words in 1 Kings.

The context for this aria occurs towards the end of the oratorio, when Elijah despairs that his prophetic mission has failed. At first glance, the text seems rather miserable, asking for death and listing the misdeeds of the Israelites. To the contrary, I find Es ist genug to be a desperate plea for relief from the inherent difficulties of the human experience. Elijah’s prayer comes out of a moment devoid of hope, truth, and faith in humanity, a moment where he feels he has let down God by his shortcomings. He asks God to “take his soul” not out of self-despair, but out of a desire to return home.

In today’s Gospel, Jesus speaks about the flawed perspective that in many ways defines our human fallibility. Elijah’s words as a fallible human himself mirror many of Jesus’s prayers throughout the Gospels, asking the Father’s forgiveness and to be taken home. The resolution of this despair comes not only in the forgiveness of humanity but in the promise of eternal life; in the case of Elijah, his passage to heaven in a chariot of fire at the end of Mendelssohn’s oratorio.

Abraham Ross

Solemn Mass takes place at St. James’ Anglican Church, Vancouver at 10:30 am every Sunday.