from the Preface (pages xi-xv)
In the history of Western music, J. S. Bach is unsurpassed, perhaps unequaled,
in mastery of technique and profundity of thought. He was a
devout Lutheran whose knowledge of Scripture and theology was so
broad and deep that the eminent historian of theology Jaroslav Pelikan
wrote a book entitled Bach Among the Theologians. Given Bach’s combination
of musical prowess, personal devotion, and theological understanding,
it is not surprising that his music stands unexcelled among artistic expressions
of the Christian faith. At the center of his musical output stand
some two hundred cantatas along with four monumental works—theChristmas Oratorio, the two Passions according to St. Matthew and St. John,
and the Mass in B Minor. The four large works have long been heard fairly
regularly in concert and have also been quite readily available in recorded
form. The same cannot be said for the cantatas. But at least with regard to
recordings, the situation is changing. Although Bach’s cantatas are still
not as easily found in recorded form as, say, Beethoven’s symphonies or
Mozart’s operas, they are not difficult to obtain. The complete cantatas
have been recorded twice, once on the Hänssler label with Helmut Rilling
conducting, and once on Teldec with the conducting duties divided between
Nikolaus Harnoncourt and Gustav Leonhardt. Two more projects
to record them all are in progress—Ton Koopman’s performances are being
issued by Erato and Masaaki Suzuki’s by BIS. In addition, fine recordings
of individual cantatas have been made, and continue to be made, by
conductors such as John Eliot Gardiner, Philippe Herreweghe, Monica
Huggett, Joshua Rifkin, Jeffrey Thomas, and others.
I mention the increased availability of the cantatas on recordings because
I think that, given current options, they can best be listened to that
way. Normally the best way to listen to music is in live performance. The
best way to listen to Bach’s cantatas, Passions, and oratorios would be in
the kind of liturgical setting for which they were written. But it is a rare
church today that has both the musical resources and the desire to perform
these works. Those few that do seldom provide the liturgical and
theological context within which their full meaning can come through.
Concert performances are, of course, much further removed from the
proper context. Their trappings—tickets, performers on display on stage,
applause, and the like—are obstacles that can mightily hinder an understanding
of these works. Which is not to say that I frown on such performances.
Far from it. I would like to see more of Bach’s vocal works programmed
more regularly because, whatever the obstacles, something is
gained in live performance. But even though I admit that something is
gained when we listen to any music performed on the spot by live musicians,
I still think that the best substitute today for hearing Bach’s vocal
works in their proper liturgical surroundings is listening to them on recordings
as aids to personal devotions, provided the listener takes the
time to read the relevant Scripture passages and to obtain some guidance
in understanding the texts and the way the music illumines and interprets
them. The goal of this book is to provide some background and guidance
for the thoughtful listener who wants to use these works devotionally.
After an introduction that supplies some background about Bach,
his theological knowledge, his musical language, and the various genres of
sacred music in his output, the main part of the book provides guidance
through specific works that express, interpret, and vivify some of the principal
doctrines of the Christian faith. The principal doctrine expressed by
a given work is made clear by quotations from that simple, yet rich, exposition
of the Christian faith, the Heidelberg Catechism.
Anyone who is familiar with the Heidelberg Catechism will already
have caught my reference to it in both the title and subtitle of this book.
The title comes from the Catechism’s first question: “What is your only
comfort in life and in death?” The subtitle comes from the answer to the
second question: “What must I know to live and die in the joy of this comfort?”
The answer outlines the threefold division of the Catechism.
Three things:
first, how great my sins and misery are;
second, how I am set free from all my sins and misery;
third, how I am to thank God for such deliverance.
When I was learning the Catechism as a boy, we were given two alliterative
sets of words to help us remember the three main divisions—sin,
salvation, and service; guilt, grace, and gratitude. My subtitle provides a
third alliterative trio—death, deliverance, and discipleship—which says
pretty much the same thing as the other two but whose third word, discipleship,
fits particularly well with a pervasive theme in Bach’s works.
I do not know whether Bach knew the Heidelberg Catechism, the
most widely used catechism to come out of the Calvinist tradition. I
know of no evidence that points to his acquaintance with it. His staunch
adherence to orthodox Lutheran teaching is well known, and given the
time and place in which he lived, he probably harbored some strong
anti-Calvinist feelings. Indeed, one of the books he owned had the titleAnti-Calvinismus, which ends by saying, “We have shown that the ‘reformed’
doctrine overthrows the foundation of belief and therefore deserves
to be condemned” (quoted from Herz, “Bach’s Religion,” 131). It
was written by August Pfeiffer (1640-1698), who served as an archdeacon
at the St. Thomas Kirche in Leipzig from 1681 to 1689, a generation
before Bach went to work there. Bach also owned two other volumes by
Pfeiffer, Evangelische Christen-Schule and Antimelancholicus, and he combined
the titles of his three books by Pfeiffer into a cryptic inscription
for the title page of the little clavier book he put together in 1722 for his
second wife, Anna Magdalena: “Ante (sic) Calvinismus und Christenschule
item Anti Melancholicus von D. Pfeifern.”
So why use the Heidelberg Catechism as the framework for a book
on Bach? I wanted to write a small book that would serve as an introductory
guide to Bach’s text-related works, especially for listeners who would
like to use them devotionally. I wanted to discuss specific works rather
than make generalizations about the works as a whole, and I wanted to select
and organize those works according to some theological basis. The
Heidelberg Catechism is the theological compendium I know best. It was
the basis for my theological instruction as a boy, and I have heard it
preached all my life. But over the years I have also spent a good amount of
time listening to Bach’s musical “sermons.” And, far from experiencing
dissonance between Calvinist preaching based on the Heidelberg Catechism
and the Lutheran preaching of Bach, I found them very much in accord.
The preaching I heard in the Calvinist churches I attended and the
music of Bach I listened to at home still seem to me to be very much in
harmony.
I am not suggesting that the reason for the harmony I perceive is
that there are no important differences between Lutherans and Calvinists,
nor am I suggesting that behind a Lutheran facade there lurked a Calvinist
Bach. I do not intend my approach to Bach via the Heidelberg Catechism
to make any particular historical or theological point; but if the
harmony I hear between the two is real, I think it can be explained in two
ways.
First, although the Heidelberg Catechism is a thoroughly Calvinist
document, it is not narrowly so. From its inception there was a certain ecumenicity
about it. To be sure, it arose because Frederick III of the Palatinate
felt “the need for a new catechism to replace those of Luther and
Brenz” (Klooster, 822). But it was mainly differences concerning the
Lord’s Supper that gave rise to that need. So while the Heidelberg Catechism
is clearly a Calvinist document in “distancing itself from the ubiquity
doctrine of Lutheranism and from other Protestant and Roman
Catholic views of the sacraments,” in every other way it “reflects the rich,
ripe fruit of the entire Reformation.”
The Heidelberg Catechism expresses much that was common to all
branches of the Reformation. Members of the team project had first-hand
acquaintance with Luther, Melanchthon, Heinrich Bullinger, John
Calvin, and Théodore de Bèze, as well as numerous earlier catechisms.
Its authors have been likened to bees flitting from flower to flower to
gather honey. (Klooster, 823)
Second, I am convinced that what C. S. Lewis called “mere Christianity”
is a reality, and it is not as negligible and watered-down as the adjective
“mere” might suggest. What unites the various branches of the Christian
faith is far more extensive and runs far more deeply than the history
of our divisions, quarrels, and animosities would indicate. Furthermore,
that unity cuts across the boundaries of time and place. Eric Chafe, for example,
found that Father Raymond Brown’s commentary on the Gospel
of John could illuminate Bach’s St. John Passion. If a Bible commentary by a
twentieth-century Catholic can illuminate the work of an eighteenth-century
Lutheran, why not as well a catechism by two sixteenth-century
Calvinists? Lewis made the point that it “is at [the Church’s] centre, where
her truest children dwell, that each communion is really closest to every
other in spirit, if not in doctrine” (Mere Christianity, viii). Therefore,
throughout the many years that I have been listening to Bach, I have not
been surprised to find that his music, so deeply imbued with Lutheran
theology and spirit, resonates so harmoniously with the Calvinist theology
and spirit of the Heidelberg Catechism that has instructed and nourished
me from my youth.
For each work discussed, I have provided relevant quotations from
the Heidelberg Catechism. When the work in question is a cantata, I have
also provided the Epistle and Gospel lessons (in translation from the New
International Version) that were read in the service for which the cantata
was written. This gives the reader immediate access to the Scripture lessons
on which both the sermon and the cantata for the day were based.
Then follows the complete text of the work in its original German along
with a very literal line-by-line translation. Finally there is commentary,
both textual and musical, that I hope will contribute to a more perceptive
and devotional listening to the work.
