"O Lamm Gottes, unschuldig" | |
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Lutheran hymn | |
The hymn in Johann Spangenberg's Kirchengesenge Deudtsch, published in Magdeburg in 1545
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English | O Lamb of God, innocent |
Text | by Nikolaus Decius |
Language | German |
Based on | "Agnus Dei" |
Melody | by Decius on an older model |
Published | 1531 |
"O Lamm Gottes, unschuldig" (O Lamb of God, innocent) is an early Lutheran hymn, with text and melody attributed to Nikolaus Decius. Originally intended as a German hymn instead of the Latin Agnus Dei, it was used rather as a hymn for Passiontide. In both meanings, the hymn has often been set to music, prominently as the cantus firmus in the opening chorus of Bach's St Matthew Passion. It is included in most German hymnals, and was translated, for example by Catherine Winkworth.
Until the 18th century, the hymn "O Lamm Gottes, unschuldig" was printed in hymnals without mentioning an author. Philipp Julius Rehtmeyer presented in his historical Braunschweigische Kirchen-Historie a Latin report from 1600, which called Decius as the author of text and melody of ""O Lamm Gottes, unschuldig" and "Allein Gott in der Höh sei Ehr". A medieval melody may have been the model for the tune. The creation of hymns by Decius is dated 1522/23, in the early Reformation, before Martin Luther's first hymns, published in 1524 in the first Lutheran hymnal.
The song was first printed in Low German in Joachim Slüter 's Geystlyke leder in in 1531. The first print in High German appeared in a hymnal in Leipzig in 1539. It was distributed in German-speaking regions. The melody appeared with the text first in Johann Spangenberg s hymnal Kirchengesenge Deudtsch, published in Magdeburg in 1545, but it had appeared in a slightly different version a few years earlier in a Strasbourg hymnal.