{"id":48072,"date":"2022-07-21T19:50:39","date_gmt":"2022-07-21T17:50:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/?p=48072"},"modified":"2026-07-21T00:25:01","modified_gmt":"2026-07-20T22:25:01","slug":"the-wayfaring-stranger-the-story-of-the-beautiful-christian-song-from-the-movie-1917","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/2022\/07\/21\/the-wayfaring-stranger-the-story-of-the-beautiful-christian-song-from-the-movie-1917\/","title":{"rendered":"'The Wayfaring Stranger', the story of the beautiful Christian song from the movie '1917'"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The film \"1917\", set in the First World War and released two years ago, is a masterpiece of war cinema. It has really great scenes.<!--more--><\/p>\n<p><rel><a href=\"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/2022\/07\/06\/hej-sokoly-the-beautiful-and-nostalgic-love-song-that-unites-ukrainians-and-poles\/\">'Hej Soko\u0142y', the beautiful and nostalgic love song that unites Ukrainians and Poles<\/a><\/rel><br \/>\n<rel><a href=\"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/2021\/05\/10\/zog-nit-kein-mol-a-beautiful-song-full-of-hope-arising-from-the-horror-of-the-holocaust\/\">'Zog nit kein mol': a beautiful song full of hope arising from the horror of the Holocaust<\/a><\/rel><\/p>\n<p>One of them appears towards the end of the film, when the protagonist, a young British soldier, arrives at a grove where <strong>there is a group of soldiers listening, in respectful silence, to one of them who sings a beautiful song.<\/strong> The song in question is known as \"The Wayfaring Stranger\", and has a very appropriate lyrics for the story that tells the movie (you can read it at the end of this post). <strong>This is the studio version of that song released by Sony after the film was released<\/strong>, and sung by Jos Slovick, the same actor who played it in the film:<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Jos Slovick - I Am a Poor Wayfaring Stranger (from 1917) - Official Video\" width=\"665\" height=\"374\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/fp7mdSMNQB0?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>I recently came across <strong>a version performed by Canadian singer Rachel Hardy<\/strong>, which I thought was really excellent:<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Wayfaring Stranger (from 1917) - cover by Rachel Hardy x Kaiser Cat Cinema\" width=\"665\" height=\"374\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/8oVGk3KzzY4?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>Curiously, this song, with a clearly Christian content, <strong>has its origin in a German Christian song, \"Ich bin ja nur ein Gast auf Erden\"<\/strong> (I am only a guest on earth), written by Isaac Niswander in 1816 and with lyrics very similar to the English version. <strong>Here you can listen to the original German song:<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Ich bin ja nur ein Gast auf Erden\" width=\"665\" height=\"374\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/SeGm6e3Npuo?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>Decades after the appearance of this German song, <strong>in 1858 the first English version appeared in print in the United States<\/strong>, in a Christian songbook that collected popular songs of that time. Three years later the American Civil War broke out, and during the war this song became very popular among the long-suffering soldiers. At the end of the day, <strong>the song is about a lonely wayfarer going through the hardships of this world, hoping to get to heaven<\/strong>, the place where his loved ones already are. The song mentions the Jordan River, because it was the waterway through which the Jewish people reached the promised land.<\/p>\n<p>Over the years, <strong>the song has had different lyrics and various titles:<\/strong> \"My Glory Land\", \"Over Jordan\", \"I Am a Poor Wayfaring Stranger\", \"Judgement\", \"Wayfaring Pilgrim\" and \"Wayfaring Stranger\", among others. <strong>Johnny Cash was one of the musicians who recorded a version of the song<\/strong>, with a country style:<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Johnny Cash - Wayfaring Stranger\" width=\"665\" height=\"499\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/gIlbZAP8ASQ?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p><strong>Here are the lyrics to the song as it appeared in \"1917\":<\/strong><\/p>\n<blockquote><p><em>I am a poor wayfaring stranger,<br \/>\nI'm travelling through this world of woe,<br \/>\nYet there's no sickness, toil nor danger<br \/>\nIn that bright land to which I go.<\/p>\n<p>I'm going there to see my father,<br \/>\nI'm going there, no more to roam.<br \/>\nI'm only going over Jordan,<br \/>\nI'm only going over home.<\/p>\n<p>I know dark clouds will gather round me,<br \/>\nI know my way is rough and steep.<br \/>\nBut golden fields lie just before me<br \/>\nWhere God's redeemed shall ever sleep.<\/p>\n<p>I'm going home to see my mother,<br \/>\nAnd all my loved ones who've gone on.<br \/>\nI'm only going over Jordan,<br \/>\nI'm only going over home.<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><strong>Usually, the song adds one more verse:<\/strong><\/p>\n<blockquote><p><em>\"I\u2019m going there to see my Savior<br \/>\nTo sing His praise forever more.<br \/>\nI\u2019m just a going over Jordan<br \/>\nI\u2019m only going over home\".<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The film \u00ab1917\u00bb, set in the First World War and released two years ago, is a masterpiece of war cinema. It has really great scenes.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[19536,11348],"tags":[10721,17063,17064,15298],"class_list":["post-48072","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-we-said-yesterday","category-music","tag-american-civil-war","tag-johnny-cash","tag-jos-slovick","tag-world-war-i"],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-08-12 02:18:01","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48072","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=48072"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48072\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=48072"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=48072"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=48072"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}