Introduction

Biography

Josiah was the son of hym­nist Jo­seph Irons.

He gra­du­at­ed from Queens Col­lege, Ox­ford (BA 1833, DD 1854), and took Ho­ly Or­ders in 1835. He earned his Doc­tor of Di­vi­ni­ty de­gree in 1854.

Irons served as cur­ate of St. Mary, New­ing­ton (1835–37); in­cum­bent at St. Pe­ter’s, Wal­worth (1837); vi­car of Bark­way; in­cum­bent of Bromp­ton; rec­tor of Wad­ing­ham; and rec­tor of St. Ma­ry-Wool­noth and pre­ben­da­ry of St. Paul’s Ca­thed­ral (1872).

Works

Irons took part in the ec­cle­si­as­ti­cal con­tro­ver­sies of his day, and pub­lished ex­ten­sive­ly there­on in the form of ser­mons, let­ters, pamph­lets, etc. His 1870 Bamp­ton Lec­tures were on Chris­ti­a­ni­ty as Taught by St. Paul.

Irons’ hymn writ­ing and trans­lat­ing be­gan dur­ing his cur­a­cy at St. Ma­ry, New­ing­ton, and con­tin­ued un­til his death.

Many of his ef­forts were first print­ed as broad­sheets, and lat­er in­clud­ed in Hymns for the Christ­ian Sea­sons, by R. T. Lowe, rector of Lea, Lin­coln­shire (Gains­burgh: 1854), and in his own col­lect­ions, which in­clude:

• Metrical Psal­ter (Lon­don: 1855) (with Will­iam La­hee)
• Appendix to the Bromp­ton Me­tri­cal Psal­ter, 1861
• Hymns for use in Church, 1866
• Psalms and Hymns for the Church (first edi­tion 1873, se­cond edi­tion 1875, third edi­tion 1883)