“Question & Answer”

Question:

What favorite hymn of the Middle Ages was based on Zephaniah in the Old Testament?

Answer:
Thomas of Celano’s “Dies Irae,” many times translated into English. One translation begins:
“Day of wrath, O dreadful day,
When this world shall pass away.“

“Dies irae” is a Latin sequence attributed to either Thomas of Celano of the Franciscans (1200–1265) or to Latino Malabranca Orsini (d. 1294), lector at the Dominican studium at Santa Sabina, the forerunner of the Pontifical University of Saint Thomas Aquinas

(the Angelicum) in Rome.

{Zephaniah was a prophet in Judah who preached a message of God’s coming judgment and the need for repentance. He was a descendant of Hezekiah, who may have been the same person as King Hezekiah, a righteous ruler who reformed the worship of God. He lived during the reign of King Josiah, who also initiated religious reform, but also saw the destruction of Jerusalem and the end of the kingdom of Judah. He reflected the writings of earlier prophets like Isaiah and Amos, and was followed by Jeremiah. He also spoke against the idolatry and wickedness of the surrounding nations, especially the Philistines.}