Wikipedia:Today's featured article/February 3, 2014

"A Song for Simeon" is a 37-line poem written in 1928 by American-British poet T. S. Eliot (1888–1965). It is one of five poems that he contributed to the Ariel poems series of 38 illustrated pamphlets with holiday themes by several authors published by Faber and Gwyer and sent to the firm's clients and business acquaintances as Christmas greetings. Eliot had converted to Anglo-Catholicism in 1927 and his poetry, starting with the Ariel Poems (1927–31) and "Ash Wednesday" (1930), took on a decidedly religious character. The poem retells the story of Simeon from the Gospel of Luke. Simeon was a devout Jew told by the Holy Ghost that he would not die until he saw the Saviour of Israel. When he encounters Mary, Joseph and the infant Jesus entering the Temple of Jerusalem, he sees in the infant the Messiah promised by the Lord and asks God to permit him to "depart in peace." Eliot's poem employs references to the Nunc dimittis, a Christian liturgical prayer for Compline, and literary allusions to earlier writers Lancelot Andrewes, Dante Alighieri and St. John of the Cross. Critics have debated whether Eliot's depiction of Simeon is evidence of anti-Semitism on the poet's part. (Full article...)

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