Metrical versions of passages from the scriptures sung to psalm tunes in the Church of Scotland.
The Scottish Psalter of 1575 contained in an appendix five paraphrases; the edition of 1595 contained ten and that of 1635 had 14. When the present psalter was published in 1650 these all disappeared, but it seems that the Church had intended to use paraphrases, for in 1647 the General Assembly had recommended that Zachary Boyd, minister at the Barony Parish Church, Glasgow, should ‘be at the paines to translate the other Scripturall Songs in meeter, and to report his travels also to the Commission of Assembly’. Nothing came of this because Boyd’s verses were doggerel. Other efforts were equally unsuccessful and interest in the matter was lost for nearly 100 years. In 1741 a committee was appointed to consider the possibility of paraphrases and in 1745 it produced 45 paraphrases of scripture. These were sent by the General Assembly for consideration by the presbyteries, but the 1745 rebellion proved too great a distraction and nothing was done. In 1775 another committee was appointed, enlarged in 1777, and in 1781 it submitted to the Assembly the Translations and Paraphrases in Verse, of Several Passages of Sacred Scripture. They were not formally authorized, but the Assembly allowed their temporary use, pending a final decision, in congregations where the minister might find them useful for instruction. Final approval was never given, but with tacit consent the custom arose of printing them with the metrical psalms and so they passed into use. They comprise the original 45 paraphrases of the 1745 edition, though much revised, along with 22 new ones. The main authors were John Morison, John Logan, Philip Doddridge, Isaac Watts, Nahum Tate and William Cameron, but the committee took great liberties in revision and in some cases left only fragments of the original versions.
Many of the paraphrases are now obsolete, although the 1929 edition of the Scottish Psalter recommended 42 as suitable for singing in public worship. The 1927 Revised Church Hymnary contains 13 paraphrases (numbered among the hymns) while The Church Hymnary: Third Edition (1973) contains 22. Some of the best-known paraphrases are found in the hymnbooks of other churches, including ‘O God of Bethel’ (Genesis xxviii.20–22), ‘While humble shepherds watched their flocks’ (Luke ii.8–15) and ‘I’m not ashamed to own my Lord’ (2 Timothy i.12). (D.J. Maclagan: The Scottish Paraphrases, Edinburgh, 1889)
See also Psalms, metrical, §IV, 1.
G.V.R. GRANT