“This Little Light of Mine” is an American gospel song that took shape in the 1920s, sung in churches and elsewhere. Its origins are unclear; the evangelist Harry Dixon Loes is often named, though scholars have found no firm evidence he wrote it, and he is better credited with a popular arrangement made in the 1940s.
The song builds on the Gospel image of a lamp that must not be hidden under a bushel. The singer vows to let a small light shine — everywhere, every day, against anyone who would put it out — the light standing for faith carried openly into the world.
Sung widely in churches and later in the civil rights movement, the song passed easily into bluegrass gospel.
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