Let all mortal flesh keep silence, and with fear and trembling stand

Let all mortal flesh keep silence, and with fear and trembling stand. Greek, probably 4th century, translated by Gerard Moultrie* (1829-1885). This hymn is based on the ‘Cherubic Hymn’, sung before the ‘Great Entrance’ of the bread and wine in the Liturgy of St James, one of the earliest extant liturgies of the church, used on the Sunday following Christmas Day, and on some other occasions. A prose translation was made by Thomas Rattray, an 18th-century bishop of Dunkeld, Scotland, upon which Moultrie’s metrical version is based. Moultrie’s hymn was first published in the Second Edition of Orby Shipley*’s Lyra Eucharistica (1864). It became well known after its printing in EH to the tune...