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A number of legends circulate about why John Newton, a slave-trader-turned-minister, penned the hymn 'Amazing Grace.' Most attempt to explain the seemingly inexplicable: How could one who made his living trading in the misery of others have put into words such a powerful message of personal salvation? As is common with any number of music legends about particular songs, some will always look to events in the writers' lives that might have sparked such compositions. Thus are born tales of wild storms and pacts with God, as are stories about religious awakenings that prompted a slaver to set his cargo free. But the truth is far less poetic: 'Amazing Grace' is a song about salvation, but it wasn't composed until long after its writer had left his seafaring days behind him and become a minister. John Newton (1725-1807) first worked as a slave buyer in Africa and later moved on to the position of captain on slave ships. He continued to make his living in the slave trade after becoming a Christian at the age of 23 in 1748. A violent storm at sea brought about his commitment to Christianity, but it was escaping with his own life that inspired him to get religion, not guilt over enslaving others. (Though this event is often pointed to as the conversion, it really was only the first of many such pacts with the Almighty struck by Newton, each one brought about by his close shaves with death.) Newton quit the sea (and the slave trade) in 1754 or 1755. He did not free any of his merchandise on that 1748 trip, or on any others. Though he might have become a Christian, he did not yet allow it to interfere with his making a living. In 1754 or 1755, he became a Tides Surveyor in Liverpool (a form of Customs Officer charged with searching for contraband and paid with half the swag taken from others). It was at this point Newton first began to express an interest in the ministry, but at the time was unable to decide between the Methodist and Anglican faiths. He was ultimately ordained as a priest in the Church of England in 1764. Newton most likely composed 'Amazing Grace' in 1772, although there is no clear agreement on the date. According to one biographer, the hymn was penned along with a great many others during an informal hymn-writing competition he was having with William Cowper, another noted hymn writer. If so, that casts doubt upon this particular composition's being solely a cathartic outpouring of wonder over the Lord's mercy — there are, after all, only so many themes that can be expounded upon in a hymn, and personal salvation is one of them. Newton began to express regrets about his part in the slave trade only in 1780, thirty-two years after his conversion, and eight years after he wrote 'Amazing Grace.' In 1785 he began to fight against slavery by speaking out against it, and he continued to do so until his death in 1807. Thus, the bare bones of the story are true: a former slave trader did compose one of the most moving hymns of our times. But the meat of the claim — that a horrific event spurred a sinner to immediately repent his evil ways, penning 'Amazing Grace' as an expression of his repentance — fails on the facts. Newton's storm-driven adoption of Christianity didn't change him all that much; he continued to make his living from the slave trade for many years afterward and only left the trade when his wife insisted upon their living a settled life in England. (Indeed, less than a year after his storm-driven conversion, Newton was back in Africa, brokering the purchase of newly-captured blacks and taking yet another African wife while there. He was hardly the poster boy for the truly penitent, at least at that point in his life.) Newton did eventually grow into his conversion so that by the end of his days he actually was the godly man one would expect to have penned 'Amazing Grace.' But it was a slow process affected over the passage of decades, not something that happened with a clap of thunder and a flash of lightning. In Newton's case, the amazing grace he wrote of might well have referred to God's unending patience with him. Still, Newton's story gives us all hope — even the greatest of sinners can ultimately and meaningfully repent, and even the most half-hearted of conversions can overtime work its magic. Sightings: A January 2004 New York Times article about President George W. Bush's State of the Union Address said, Some listeners detected an allusion to a passage in 'Amazing Grace,' the hymn written by a slave trader turned minister and abolitionist, John Newton, after he survived an Atlantic storm. Additional information: Cowper and Newton Museum
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