I am delighted that “Come, Thou Fount of Every Blessing” is back in the hymnbook. But there is one part our congregations are singing incorrectly. In the second verse of the hymn, the narrator praises the redeeming power of the Atonement:
Here I raise my Ebenezer,
Hither by Thy help I’ve come;
and I hope by Thy good pleasure
Safely to arrive at home.
Such a pure, certain testimony of the redeeming power and love of Jesus Christ! Yet my ear grimaces every time I hear it because the way we sing “Eben[ee]zer,” with a long “e,” doesn’t rhyme with the short “e” sound of “pleasure.” How could the lyricist, Robert Robinson, have gotten the rhyme so wrong?
The answer is simple: He didn’t. It is our mistake. Over the years we have come to pronounce “Eben-ezer” incorrectly, the way we pronounce Ebenezer Scrooge.
The Correct Pronunciation
The words eben (stone) and ezer (support) are Hebrew, and all of the vowels in eben-ezer are pronounced the same way, with a short “e.” When pronounced correctly, “Eben-ezer” rhymes perfectly with “Thy good pleasure.”
The Beauty of the Word ‘Ezer’
The word ezer first appears in the Hebrew Bible when God creates Eve. In the King James Version He is quoted, “It is not good that the man should be alone. I will make an help meet for him” (Genesis 2:18). In Hebrew the phrase is ezer kenegdo, not “help meet,” and it means much more than an assistant; the word is associated with godly power and strength. It derives from the verb “azar,” which means “to succor, … to save from extremity, [and] to deliver from death.”1
When I sing the second verse of this hymn, I remember the empowering definition of woman made by God at the moment of Eve’s conception—the very idea of her. I am an ezer kenegdo, created by God to be a rescuer and power equal yet opposite to man.
In her book Lost Women of the Bible: Finding Strength and Significance through Their Stories, Carolyn Custis James proclaims, “Eve and all her daughters are ezers—strong warriors who stand alongside their brothers in the battle for God’s kingdom. … We do not have to wait until we’re grown to become ezers. The doctor who announces the birth of a girl might just as well exclaim, ‘It’s an ezer!’ for we are ezers from birth” (24).
Let us all raise our Eben-ezer in praise of the God who created us in His image, who supports us with His power, who expects the best from us, and who waits patiently to “seal [our] heart for [His] court above.” And may we also learn to sing “Come, Thou Fount of Every Blessing” in our congregations gloriously, with a short “e” sound, so that “Eben-ezer” once again rhymes with “pleasure,” as Robert Robinson intended it to do.
More articles recommended for you:
▶ ‘It was exhilarating’: YouTuber’s emotional reaction to Tabernacle Choir goes viral
▶ Watch: Adorable 11-year-old plays the organ for his ward
▶ The sweetest, shortest new hymn every child needs to hear
▶ The Hebrew word for joy you’ll wish you knew sooner
Notes:
1. Samuel Terrien, Till the Heart Sings: A Biblical Theology of Manhood and Womanhood (Fortress Press, 1985), p. 10