Ach Gott, vom Himmel sieh darein

Oh God, from heaven look into it is a Lutheran chorale of Martin Luther, which he created in the late 1523.

The chorale of Luther

At the turn of 1523/24 Luther dealt with the creation of Psalm songs in German language for the celebration of worship - a programmatic orientation that he had developed in his Formula Missae in 1523 and in a letter to Georg Spalatin. The songs should grasp the meaning of the Psalm exactly and reproduce in a simple language, without being exact. He created seven Psalmlieder, of which he kept his Germanization of Psalm 130 Out of the depths for LUT particularly exemplary. Oh God, from heaven look into it is Luther's interpretation of Psalm 12 LUT in the numbering of the Vulgate Psalm 11 At that time known by its Latin opening words Salvum me fac, it is a lament and song of trust; his title in the King James Bible of 1912 reads: complaint about the power of evil in the translation unit, the falsity of the people - the faithfulness of God.

The song was first published as a broadsheet on a now lost Wittenberg Three Songs leaf and a little later in the night songbook and achieved by the inclusion in collections of songs such as the Erfurt Enchiridion and hymnals, for example, by Johann Walter ( 1524), fast wide dissemination. At the beginning of the song different melodies have been assigned, the now common, traditionally described as hypophrygisch modal melody is first found in the Erfurt Enchiridion. It is attributed in this form Luther himself, who thereby partially from a pre-Reformation secular melody ( Begirlich in the Hertzen min, 1410) has drawn inspiration.

The formal transfer of Luther follows the Psalm; two psalm verses are transmitted in a 1:1 ratio, then two in a 2:1 ratio. Content, it has, however, beyond the psalm text and places it in a new, decidedly Christian- Reformation context: its that time. He used the psalm to indicate its location and the Reformation in a personal, passionate way and that as a need of God's word, his gospel probation, " it wants to be tried by the cross ... "

Reformation fight song

The song was understood soon after its first publication as a reformatory commitment song and used. In 1527 it voted in Braunschweig followers of the Reformation, as a Council fetched from Magdeburg the Catholics preacher gave a sermon on good works, and brought him to silence. Similar evidence is available from Lübeck, where it came to a confrontation after the enforced expulsion by the Council of the Reformed preacher Johann Walhoff and Andreas Wilms, which was known in the Reformation historiography as Singe war. On December 5, 1529, the eve of Saint Nicholas Day, started Protestant minded citizens, the Catholic masses by the loud singing of Psalm Reformation songs, in particular Oh God, look down from heaven into it to break. A traditional in Lübeck story says that there were " two little boys ", which thus began in the Church of St. James, and that citizens " diligently matched ". Thus, O God, from heaven look into it for the first psalm song that was sung in Lübeck publicly in a church. The growing agitation and unrest in the city first reached the recall of the two preachers and finally two years later, the introduction of the Reformation church order by Johannes Bugenhagen. Also in Basel and Frankfurt am Main it was 1525/26 come to such actions.

Numerous parodies from the Roman Catholic point of view, such as in Hymns of Johann Leisentrit, show how widespread identity- forming for the Protestants and challenging the song was now become for Catholics.

The Bach Cantata

In the era of Johann Sebastian Bach chorale was the main song for the 2nd Sunday after Trinity, because he on the subject as otherwise provided in the lectionary readings: 1 Jn 3.13 to 18 LUT as the Epistle and Luke 14:16-24 LUT, the parable the Great Supper fit as gospel for the day. For the corresponding Sunday, June 18, 1724 Bach created his eponymous Choralkantate Oh God, look down from heaven into it, BWV 2

Aftermath

The chorale has been cited diverse in the history of music; is known primarily for the singing of the armed men from Mozart's Magic Flute.

Oh God in heaven look down into it, or (O) God in heaven, look into it as are fragments of text in a variety of contexts, however, been mostly quoted aware Protestant or national undertone. So it uses Ernst Moritz Arndt in the last stanza of The German Fatherland, "O God of heaven, look into it, and give us the right German courage that we love faithful and good! That it should be! That it should be! Throughout Germany it should be! " Louise Otto-Peters made ​​God in heaven look into it! to the title of a directed against the Jesuits in Switzerland polemical poem.

The chorale Luther continues to be found in Protestant hymnal (EC 273), but is rarely sung.