# Amazing Grace, verse meaning? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [September 22, 2009, 1:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amazing-grace-verse-meaning/511074 "2009-09-22T13:31:48Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![An\_Gadai](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/d6d6ee/32.png) [@An\_Gadai](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/An_Gadai)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2009, 1:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amazing-grace-verse-meaning/511074/1 "2009-09-22T13:31:48Z")
“When we’ve been here ten thousand years Bright shining as the sun. We’ve no less days to sing God’s praise Than when we’ve first begun.” It seems to me the author is suggesting some posthuman future for humanity. ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Amazing](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6de8d8/32.png) [@Captain\_Amazing](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Amazing)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2009, 1:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amazing-grace-verse-meaning/511074/2 "2009-09-22T13:33:20Z")
He is. He’s saying that heaven is eternal, and even after 10,000 years in heaven, we’ll have no less time to praise God than when we started. ---
**Author:** ![Nars\_Glinley](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/nars_glinley/32/8177_2.png) [@Nars\_Glinley](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nars_Glinley)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2009, 1:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amazing-grace-verse-meaning/511074/3 "2009-09-22T13:51:13Z")
I don’t have my Methodist hymnal handy right now but I believe the first line is “When we’ve been _there_ ten thousand years”. There being heaven which is eternal as **Captain Amazing** points out. According to [this](http://www.wikichristian.org/index.php/Amazing_Grace_(song)) site, the original line was “a thousand years”. ---
**Author:** ![An\_Gadai](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/d6d6ee/32.png) [@An\_Gadai](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/An_Gadai)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2009, 2:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amazing-grace-verse-meaning/511074/4 "2009-09-22T14:27:07Z")
Ah yes “there” does change the meaning. I thought the here was of course on Earth. ---
**Author:** ![FriarTed](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/friarted/32/1052_2.png) [@FriarTed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FriarTed)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2009, 2:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amazing-grace-verse-meaning/511074/5 "2009-09-22T14:39:16Z")
> [@An\_Gadai](#): > > Ah yes “there” does change the meaning. I thought the here was of course on Earth. Well, technically, in Revelation 20-22, Heaven does come to a new/renewed Earth, so both would fit. ---
**Author:** ![Ronald\_C.Semone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/cc9497/32.png) [@Ronald\_C.Semone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ronald_C.Semone)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2009, 2:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amazing-grace-verse-meaning/511074/6 "2009-09-22T14:44:59Z")
I have also heard it “When we’ve been _dead_ ten thousand years…” ---
**Author:** ![gigi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/a587f6/32.png) [@gigi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gigi)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2009, 3:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amazing-grace-verse-meaning/511074/7 "2009-09-22T15:56:35Z")
That’s right up there with my favorite verses of any song. And yeah, with the “there” it means heaven is forever. ---
**Author:** ![Skammer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skammer/32/143_2.png) [@Skammer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skammer)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2009, 4:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amazing-grace-verse-meaning/511074/8 "2009-09-22T16:53:48Z")
> [@Ronald\_C.Semone](#): > > I have also heard it “When we’ve been _dead_ ten thousand years…” Frankly, that’s horrible. We’ll finally be truly alive! ---
**Author:** ![ElvisL1ves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2009, 5:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amazing-grace-verse-meaning/511074/9 "2009-09-22T17:14:10Z")
John Newton did not write that verse. It was borrowed from [“Jerusalem, My Happy Home”](http://www.anointedlinks.com/amazing_grace.html) by Harriet Beecher Stowe in the version she wrote down in _Uncle Tom’s Cabin_. ---
**Author:** ![janeslogin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/df788c/32.png) [@janeslogin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/janeslogin)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2009, 5:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amazing-grace-verse-meaning/511074/10 "2009-09-22T17:23:32Z")
That verse was the occasion for my epiphany. I was a grade school kid and heard that and said to my self that must be the most boring experience imaginable. I will have not part of Christianity. ---
**Author:** ![smiling\_bandit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e9a140/32.png) [@smiling\_bandit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/smiling_bandit)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2009, 7:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amazing-grace-verse-meaning/511074/11 "2009-09-22T19:19:59Z")
> [@janeslogin](#): > > That verse was the occasion for my epiphany. I was a grade school kid and heard that and said to my self that must be the most boring experience imaginable. I will have not part of Christianity. I won’t take it to the Pit of GD, but I always though this was one of the most facile and hilarious reasonings I’ve ever heard. I’ve never even found a serious atheist which actually adhered to it. It’s possibly individative of absurdly limited imagination, which cannot even remotely comprehend something different than its received experience. C’est la vie. Not that I meant to specifically mock or insult you, love. I just find humanity’s foibles hilarious. You decide you can’t imagine that this trange substance called “marinara” is not only better but fundamentally _different_ than watery tomato soup, and therefore pasta must be an impossible dream. 😃 Ah, but mankind so often does this. We are mostly bound to our limited expereince, and to step beyond even in the slightest ways are what make Newtons, Darwins, Archimedes’s (Archimedi? Archimedes?), and the Saints. ---
**Author:** ![Wargamer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/df705f/32.png) [@Wargamer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wargamer)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2009, 8:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amazing-grace-verse-meaning/511074/12 "2009-09-22T20:35:29Z")
Being a literal 9 year old, I took that verse to mean that we’d only get 20,000 years in Heaven. Being there 10k years, then having no less days etc etc. I think metaphor wasn’t taught in Language Arts until I was 13. ---
**Author:** ![Skammer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skammer/32/143_2.png) [@Skammer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skammer)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2009, 8:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amazing-grace-verse-meaning/511074/13 "2009-09-22T20:55:12Z")
> [@Wargamer](#): > > Being a literal 9 year old, I took that verse to mean that we’d only get 20,000 years in Heaven. Being there 10k years, then having no less days etc etc. > > I think metaphor wasn’t taught in Language Arts until I was 13. It’s not a metaphor; you just didn’t follow the logic. After 10,000 years, we’ve “no less days” left then when we’d started. If we were only going to have 20,000 years, or any finite number of years, we’d have 10,000 years fewer at that point. Since after 10,000 years the number of days left to us has not dwindled, we’re in for eternity. Shouldn’t is be “no _fewer_ days to sing God’s praise”? That’s gonna bug me now. ---
**Author:** ![Apollyon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/apollyon/32/4238_2.png) [@Apollyon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Apollyon)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2009, 11:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amazing-grace-verse-meaning/511074/14 "2009-09-22T23:00:59Z")
> [@Skammer](#): > > IShouldn’t is be “no _fewer_ days to sing God’s praise”? That’s gonna bug me now. “Fewer” wouldn’t scan – poetic license wins. Express checkout signs don’t have that excuse or get a pass. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Johnny\_Q](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/898d66/32.png) [@Johnny\_Q](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_Q)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2009, 11:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amazing-grace-verse-meaning/511074/15 "2009-09-22T23:44:58Z")
What they were trying to say was said much better by Mssrs. Gaiman and Pratchett in Good Omens: > [@](#): > > On Eternity: > I mean, d’you know what eternity is? There’s this big mountain, see, a mile high, at the end of the universe, and once every thousand years there’s this little bird-" > “What little bird?” said Aziraphale suspiciously. > “This little bird I’m talking about. And every thousand years-” > “The same bird every thousand years?” > Crowley hesitated. “Yeah,” he said. > “Bloody ancient bird, then.” > “Okay. And every thousand years this bird flies-” > “-limps-” > “flies all the way to this mountain and sharpens its beak-” > “Hold on. You can’t do that. Between here and the end of the universe there’s loads of-” The angel waved a hand expansively, if a little unsteadily. “Loads of buggerall, dear boy.” > “But it gets there anyway,” Crowley persevered. > “How?” > “It doesn’t matter!” > “It could use a space ship,” said the angel. > Crowley subsided a bit. “Yeah,” he said. “If you like. Anyway, this bird-” > “Only it is the end of the universe we’re talking about,” said Aziraphale. “So it’d have to be one of those space ships where your descendants are the ones who get out at the other end. You have to tell your descendants, you say, When you get to the Mountain, you’ve got to-” He hesitated. “What have > they got to do?” > “Sharpen its beak on the mountain,” said Crowley. “And then it flies back-” > “-in the space ship-” > “And after a thousand years it goes and does it all again,” said Crowley quickly. > There was a moment of drunken silence, > “Seems a lot of effort just to sharpen a beak,” mused Aziraphale. > “Listen,” said Crowley urgently, “the point is that when the bird has worn the mountain down to nothing, right, then-” > Aziraphale opened his mouth. Crowley just knew he was going to make some point about the relative hardness of birds’ beaks and granite mountains, and plunged on quickly. > “-then you still won’t have finished watching The Sound of Music.” > Aziraphale froze. THAT is what the verse means. ---
**Author:** ![An\_Gadai](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/d6d6ee/32.png) [@An\_Gadai](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/An_Gadai)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2009, 4:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amazing-grace-verse-meaning/511074/16 "2009-09-23T04:11:07Z")
> [@Johnny\_Q](#): > > What they were trying to say was said much better by Mssrs. Gaiman and Pratchett in Good Omens: > > THAT is what the verse means. TLDR ---
**Author:** ![kaylasdad99](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kaylasdad99/32/3398_2.png) [@kaylasdad99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kaylasdad99)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2009, 4:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amazing-grace-verse-meaning/511074/17 "2009-09-23T04:16:44Z")
Your loss. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![dropzone](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dropzone/32/7515_2.png) [@dropzone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dropzone)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2009, 4:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amazing-grace-verse-meaning/511074/18 "2009-09-23T04:25:54Z")
It’s metaphorical, an attempt to frame eternity in words the listeners could wrap their brains around. I doubt that many of the Elect will mark off the days on their bedroom walls. :rolleyes ---
**Author:** ![dropzone](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dropzone/32/7515_2.png) [@dropzone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dropzone)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2009, 4:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amazing-grace-verse-meaning/511074/19 "2009-09-23T04:28:50Z")
> [@Johnny\_Q](#): > > What they were trying to say was said much better by Mssrs. Gaiman and Pratchett in Good Omens: > > THAT is what the verse means. I gotta read that book. Assuming neither author has pissed me off with their earlier works. Which, unfortunately, they have. ☹ ---
**Author:** ![An\_Gadai](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/d6d6ee/32.png) [@An\_Gadai](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/An_Gadai)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2009, 4:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amazing-grace-verse-meaning/511074/20 "2009-09-23T04:29:05Z")
> [@kaylasdad99](#): > > Your loss. 😃 Actually that passage encapsulates why I don’t like most of TP’s ouevre. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amazing-grace-verse-meaning/511074.md?page=2)