"Song of Joy" redirects here. For the album by Captain & Tennille, see Song of Joy (album).
"Ode to Joy" (German: "An die Freude"[andiːˈfʁɔʏdə]) is an ode written in the summer of 1785 by German poet, playwright, and historian Friedrich Schiller. It was published the following year in the German magazine Thalia. In 1808, a slightly revised version changed two lines of the first stanza and omitted last stanza.
Schiller wrote the first version of the poem when he was staying in Gohlis, Leipzig. In 1785, from the beginning of May till mid-September, he stayed with his publisher, Georg Joachim Göschen, in Leipzig and wrote "An die Freude" along with his play Don Carlos.[2]
Schiller later made some revisions to the poem, which was then republished posthumously in 1808, and it was this latter version that forms the basis for Beethoven's setting. Despite the lasting popularity of the ode, Schiller himself regarded it as a failure later in his life, going so far as to call it "detached from reality" and "of value maybe for us two, but not for the world, nor for the art of poetry" in an 1800 letter to his longtime friend and patron Christian Gottfried Körner (whose friendship had originally inspired him to write the ode).[3]
Lyrics
An die Freude
Freude, schöner Götterfunken,
Tochter aus Elysium,
Wir betreten feuertrunken,
Himmlische, dein Heiligtum!
Deine Zauber binden wieder
Was die Mode streng geteilt;*
Alle Menschen werden Brüder*
Wo dein sanfter Flügel weilt.
Wem der große Wurf gelungen
Eines Freundes Freund zu sein;
Wer ein holdes Weib errungen
Mische seinen Jubel ein!
Ja, wer auch nur eine Seele
Sein nennt auf dem Erdenrund!
Und wer's nie gekonnt, der stehle
Weinend sich aus diesem Bund!
Freude trinken alle Wesen
An den Brüsten der Natur;
Alle Guten, alle Bösen
Folgen ihrer Rosenspur.
Küsse gab sie uns und Reben,
Einen Freund, geprüft im Tod;
Wollust ward dem Wurm gegeben
und der Cherub steht vor Gott.
Froh, wie seine Sonnen fliegen
Durch des Himmels prächt'gen Plan
Laufet, Brüder, eure Bahn,
Freudig, wie ein Held zum Siegen.
Seid umschlungen, Millionen!
Diesen Kuß der ganzen Welt!
Brüder, über'm Sternenzelt
Muß ein lieber Vater wohnen.
Ihr stürzt nieder, Millionen?
Ahnest du den Schöpfer, Welt?
Such' ihn über'm Sternenzelt!
Über Sternen muß er wohnen!
Ode to Joy
Joy, thou shining spark of God,
Daughter of Elysium,
With fiery rapture, goddess,
We approach thy shrine!
Your magic reunites those
Whom stern custom has parted;*
All men will become brothers*
Under your protective wing.
Let the man who has had the fortune
To be a helper to his friend,
And the man who has won a noble woman,
Join in our chorus of jubilation!
Yes, even if he holds but one soul
As his own in all the world!
But let the man who knows nothing of this
Steal away alone and in sorrow.
All the world's creatures draw
Draughts of joy from nature;
Both the just and the unjust
Follow in her gentle footsteps.
She gave us kisses and wine
And a friend loyal unto death;
She gave the joy of life to the lowliest,
And to the angels who dwell with God.
Joyous, as His suns speed
Through the glorious order of Heaven,
Hasten, brothers, on your way
Exultant as a knight victorious.
Be embraced, all ye millions!
With a kiss for all the world!
Brothers, beyond the stars
Surely dwells a loving Father.
Do you kneel before Him, oh millions?
Do you feel the Creator's presence?
Seek Him beyond the stars!
He must dwell beyond the stars.[4]
Revisions
The lines marked with * were revised in the posthumous 1808 edition as follows:
More information Original, Revised ...
Original
Revised
Translation of original
Translation of revision
Comment
was der Mode Schwerd geteilt
Was die Mode streng geteilt
what the sword of custom divided
What custom strictly divided
The original meaning of Mode was "custom, contemporary taste".[5]
Bettler werden Fürstenbrüder
Alle Menschen werden Brüder
beggars become princes' brothers
All people become brothers
Close
The original, later eliminated last stanza reads
Rettung von Tirannenketten,
Großmut auch dem Bösewicht,
Hoffnung auf den Sterbebetten,
Gnade auf dem Hochgericht!
Auch die Toden sollen leben!
Brüder trinkt und stimmet ein,
Allen Sündern soll vergeben,
und die Hölle nicht mehr seyn.
Rescue from the chains of tyrants,
Magnanimity to the villain too,
Hope on the deathbed,
Mercy in the high (law) court,
Even the dead shall live!
Brothers, drink and join
That all sinners shall be forgiven
And hell shall be no more.
Ode to Freedom
Academic speculation remains as to whether Schiller originally wrote an "Ode to Freedom" (An die Freiheit) and changed it to "To Joy".[6][7]Thayer wrote in his biography of Beethoven, "the thought lies near that it was the early form of the poem, when it was still an 'Ode to Freedom' (not 'to Joy'), which first aroused enthusiastic admiration for it in Beethoven's mind".[8] The musicologist Alexander Rehding points out that even Bernstein, who used "Freiheit" in two performances in 1989, called it conjecture whether Schiller used "joy" as code for "freedom" and that scholarly consensus holds that there is no factual basis for this myth.[9]
It was performed (conducted by Leonard Bernstein) on Christmas Day after the fall of the Berlin Wall replacing "Freude" (joy) with "Freiheit" (freedom), and at Daiku (Number Nine) concerts in Japan every December and after the 2011 tsunami.[11]
It has recently inspired impromptu performances at public spaces by musicians in many countries worldwide, including Choir Without Borders' 2009 performance at a railway station[12] in Leipzig, to mark the 20th and 25th anniversary of the Fall of the Berlin Wall, Hong Kong Festival Orchestra's 2013 performance at a Hong Kong mall, and performance in Sabadell, Spain.[13]
A 2013 documentary, Following the Ninth, directed by Kerry Candaele, follows its continuing popularity.[11][14]
The BBC Proms Youth Choir performed the piece alongside Georg Solti's UNESCO World Orchestra for Peace at the Royal Albert Hall during the 2018 Proms at Prom 9, titled "War & Peace" as a commemoration to the centenary of the end of World War One.[16]
The alleged Christian context of the song was one of the main reasons given by Nichiren Shoshu priests for expelling the Soka Gakkai International on 28 November 1991 due to the song being performed at SGI meetings, which was deemed by some priests as both syncretism and heresy.[17]
Schiller, Friedrich (21 October 1800). "[Untitled letter]". wissen-im-netz.info (in German). Archived from the original on 4 March 2016. Retrieved 29 May 2019.
Duden – Das Herkunftswörterbuch. Mannheim: Bibliographisches Institut. 1963. p.446. ISBN3-411-00907-1. The word was derived via French from ultimately Latin modus. Duden cites as first meanings "Brauch, Sitte, Tages-, Zeitgeschmack". The primary modern meaning has shifted more towards "fashion".
Schubert's "An die Freude" on YouTube, Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau, Gerald Moore
