The First Hymn

Name: The First Hymn
Duration: 1 h 27 min
Rating: 5

1hr 27m

1hr 27m
(1)

The First Hymn is a world first for music, faith and history, tracking the story of an ancient Christian hymn from its discovery in Egypt to its release as a… More Details »

Showtimes
Movie Details

Find Movie Theaters & Showtimes

for

near

We didn't find this title in your area

Browse Local Theaters

Videos & Photos

Movie Info & Cast

Release Date:

Mar 24, 2026

Runtime:

1hr 27m

Synopsis

The First Hymn is a world first for music, faith and history, tracking the story of an ancient Christian hymn from its discovery in Egypt to its release as a modern worship song.

Moviegoers are saying

This historical documentary follows theologian John Dickson's fascinating journey to resurrect an 1800-year-old Christian hymn discovered in Egypt, taking viewers from Cairo to Oxford to Nashville. While audiences are captivated by the rich historical content and diverse scholarly voices, many feel disappointed that the 'resurrection' results in a modern Chris Tomlin pop song rather than an authentic ancient sound.

Top Mentions

History-Deep-Dive

Faith-Journey

Musical-Archaeology

Ancient-Mysteries

Scholar-Led

Cross-Cultural

Summary generated from the text of Atom User reviews

Letterboxd User Reviews

N/A

RATINGS N/A FANS

Aug 6, 2025

Live laugh love John Dickson. This movie was super enjoyable and genuinely fascinating. Music, history, theology?? Doesn’t get much better than this. I really appreciated the effort to include such a diverse range of scholarly voices. I learned heaps and came away with a…

8 Likes

sienna_kate_

Sep 17, 2025

It’s a solid documentary. The history stuff is pretty interesting and I liked that part. But I feel like they could have cut down like 30 minutes of it. It does go on for a little bit too long. The song producing parts didn’t exactly feel needed. But I did like the shots of…

5 Likes

Does Movie Things Guy

Aug 6, 2025

John Dickson is one of my favourite theologians and Christian historians, so I jumped at the chance to check this out. Generally speaking, it's a very standard historical documentary that's presented really well. I especially liked the efforts to resurrect this hymn with a…

5 Likes

Mitch C
Apr 1, 2026

From Heritage Films & BMG-Global comes an interesting historical/musical documentary directed by John Dickson & Mark Hadley. It 🌟 s John Dickson Chris Tomlin & Ben Fielding. Fascinating look at lost history/music reclaimed & refashioned for the 21st century.

3 Likes

Gregory Wood

Mar 28, 2026

Hmmmm, a 'reconstruction' of the earliest known Christian hymn, which was part of the Nag Hammadi discovery in the 1940's. But, that's not really what it is. Through various steps of 'reconstruction' we get basically a modern pop song which would seem to be absolutely…

2 Likes

Joe

Aug 9, 2025

coulda been a 20min youtube vid tbh

4 Likes

Chloe Rogers
Mar 27, 2026

Imagine a 1800 year old Christian “hymn”, complete with musical notation, discovered in an Egyptian city site excavation. Follow the journey from Cairo to Oxford, England to Nashville as this song is revived for the modern era. Hosted by the convivial John Dickson who takes…

2 Likes

DocEarl

Aug 19, 2025

An amazing look at Christian history and how music doesn't just connect generations of believers, but millenia of believers!

3 Likes

AT645371

Jan 3, 2026

But they didn't really resurrect the ancient hymn. They just gave it a terrible Hillsong makeover. It was awful.

2 Likes

Ian Casocot