That idea was taken up in the New Testament, emphasized by Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount, in which he enumerated all those who are worthy of being blessed, by beginning each condition with “blessed are…”Īnd blessings became a Christian thing. And, evolving further, blessings came to be regarded as all the good things God gave you. And as a father one of his attributes was that, like Isaac, he could bestow blessings on his children. As Judaism developed God became regarded as a father. The blessing later became associated with God. So a blessing was originally a ritual in which a dying man passed the baton on to his heir – his eldest son – who got his lands and property and flocks and concubines, in fact, everything, which he would, in turn, pass on to his first own son with his blessing. Selling one’s blessing for a mess of potage has become a metaphor for the utter stupidity of making a deal where the other person gets everything. It goes right back to Genesis where Isaac, wanting to bless his elder son, Esau, sends for him but Jacob’s mother, Rebekah, overhearing that, disguises Jacob so that the blind Isaac will think he is blessing his firstborn.Ī father’s blessing was of enormous value to a man, and that point is made here – that Esau, dying of hunger, was prepared to sell his father’s blessing for a mess of potage: it represents something unbelievable, even today. The blessing is an ancient concept, rooted in the stories of the Old Testament. And it became a major hit song by George Formby in 1940:Įven though the origin of the actual phrase may be obscure the idea of counting your blessings originates in Judaic teachings. But even by then, it was wide spread enough for it to be quoted in those two examples. It was used in a poem a decade before that by John Charles Earle. When you are discouraged, thinking all is lost,Īnd it will surprise you what the Lord has done. When upon life’s billows you are tempest tossed,
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‘Count your blessings’ is a phrase that has been used in hymns, notably one by Oatman and Excell, 1897: Nowhere near the idiom, or even the concept of counting one’s blessings. Lend me a heart replete with thankfulness!įor thou hast given me in this beauteous face
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The closest we can come to it in a Shakespeare text is in Henry VI Part 2 where King Henry prays in act 1, scene 1. Shakespeare does not actually use the phrase ‘count your blessings’.
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And indeed, one wonders what answer the quiz leader would accept because in spite of its widespread common use it’s one of those sayings where we have no idea of its origin, in precisely that wording, as an idiom. If any phrase like this were in a quiz and we guessed Shakespeare as its source we would often be right.īut in the case of ‘count your blessings’ we would be wrong. When confronted with the question, ‘where did this idiom come from?’ applied to any idiom – such as ‘count your blessings’ – our minds normally spring to Shakespeare.
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Each Shakespeare’s play name links to a range of resources about each play: Character summaries, plot outlines, example essays and famous quotes, soliloquies and monologues: All’s Well That Ends Well Antony and Cleopatra As You Like It The Comedy of Errors Coriolanus Cymbeline Hamlet Henry IV Part 1 Henry IV Part 2 Henry VIII Henry VI Part 1 Henry VI Part 2 Henry VI Part 3 Henry V Julius Caesar King John King Lear Loves Labour’s Lost Macbeth Measure for Measure The Merchant of Venice The Merry Wives of Windsor A Midsummer Night’s Dream Much Ado About Nothing Othello Pericles Richard II Richard III Romeo & Juliet The Taming of the Shrew The Tempest Timon of Athens Titus Andronicus Troilus & Cressida Twelfth Night The Two Gentlemen of Verona The Winter’s Tale This list of Shakespeare plays brings together all 38 plays in alphabetical order.