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Du Hirte Israel, Höre BWV 104 / BC A 65
Misericordias Domini, April 23, 1724
This cantata is for the second Sunday after Easter, also called Misericordias Domini. The Gospel reading for this Sunday comes from the tenth chapter of John, a chapter that is devoted in its entirety to the parable of the good shepherd and his sheep. From this, the following words of Jesus are assigned to Misericordias Domini:I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd gives his life for the sheep. The hireling, however, who is not a shepherd, of whom the sheep are not his own, sees the wolf come and leaves the sheep and flees; the wolf catches and destroys the sheep.
The hireling only flees, for he is a hireling and does not care for the sheep. I am the good shepherd and know those of mine and am known by those of mine, as my father knows me and I know the father. And I give my life for the sheep that are not of this stable, and those I must lead here, and they shall hear my voice, and there shall be one herd and one shepherd. (112–15)
Bach composed this cantata during his first year as cantor of St. Thomas School; he performed it on April 23, 1724, as shown by a printed text booklet to be used by the audience. The unknown author of the text hews closely to the Sunday Gospel reading, although he places a verse from Psalm 80 at the beginning: “Du Hirte Israel, höre, der du Joseph hütest wie der Schafe, erscheine, der du sitzest über Cherubim” (1; You shepherd of Israel, hear, you who leads Joseph like the sheep, appear, you who sits among cherubim). Also characteristic for this verse is the parallelism, which is found everywhere in the Psalter, expressed here in the two-part invocation “höre,” “erscheine” (listen, appear). The entreaty “erscheine” receives greater weight, because in the refrain of the psalm—a prayer for the preservation of Israel as the vine of God—it is repeated three times: “Gott Zebaoth, tröste uns, laß leuchten dein Antlitz; so genesen wir” (80:19; God Zebaoth, comfort us, appear, and we shall be saved).
The bucolic image of the shepherd and his flock remains present throughout the rest of the cantata text. In the movements that follow, the plea of the psalm verse is juxtaposed to the pledge of the Gospel reading and applied to Christian existence: certainty of faith is grounded in the assurance of redemption through the sacrifice of the good shepherd. The first recitative reads:
Der höchste Hirte sorgt für mich,
Was nützen meine Sorgen?
Es wird ja alle Morgen
Des Hirten Güte neu.
The highest shepherd cares for me,
Of what use are my sorrows?
Indeed, every morning
The shepherd’s goodness is made new.
The text of the ensuing aria is indebted to the classical search motive (Suchmotiv):
Verbirgt mein Hirte sich zu lange,
Macht mir die Wüste allzu bange,
Mein schwacher Schritt eilt dennoch fort.
If my shepherd is hidden too long,
If the wilderness makes me all too anxious,
My weak step still hurries on.
The image of the sheep gone astray must also be included; it is found at the end of the epistle for Misericordias Domini from 1 Peter 2:25: “Denn ihr waret wie die irrenden Schafe; aber ihr seid nun bekehrt zu dem Hirten und Bischof eurer Seelen” (For you were like the sheep gone astray; but you are now returned to the shepherd and bishop of your souls). In the second recitative of the cantata, the verses are in the same vein:
Ach, sammle nur, o guter Hirte,
Uns Arme und Verirrte;
Ach laß den Weg nur bald geendet sein
Und führe uns in deinen Schafstall ein!
Ah! Just gather, O good shepherd,
Us poor and straying ones;
Ah, only let the path be ended soon
And lead us into your sheepfold!
The metaphor of the sheepfold is taken, once again, from John 10, the beginning of which reads: “Wahrlich, wahrlich, ich sage euch: Wer nicht zur Tür hineingeht in den Schafstall, sondern steigt anderswo hinein, der ist ein Dieb und ein Mörder. Der aber zur Tür hineingeht, der ist ein Hirte der Schafe” (1; Truly, truly I say to you: Who goes into the sheep stall not by the door but climbs in somewhere else, he is a thief and a murderer. He, however, who enters through the door, he is a shepherd of the sheep). The word of Jesus follows a bit later: “Ich bin die Tür; so jemand durch mich eingeht, der wird selig werden und wird ein und aus gehen und Weide finden” (9; I am the door; whosoever enters through me, he will be blessed, will go in and out and will find pasture). The ensuing aria text takes this up:
Beglückte Herde, Jesu Schafe,
Die Welt ist euch ein Himmelreich.
Hier schmeckt ihr Jesus Güte schon
Und hoffet noch des Glaubens Lohn
Nach einem sanften Todesschlafe.
Happy flock, Jesus’s sheep,
The world is to you a heavenly kingdom.
Here you taste Jesus’s goodness already
And still hope for faith’s reward
After a gentle sleep of death.
Having begun with a psalm, the cantata closes with one: the chorale strophe “Der Herr ist mein getreuer Hirt, dem ich mich ganz vertraue” (The Lord is my faithful shepherd, whom I trust completely). It belongs to a 1598 paraphrase of Psalm 23 by Cornelius Becker, Der Herr ist mein Hirte, mir wird nichts mangeln (The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want), and this psalm serves as a lesson on the Sunday of Misericordias Domini.
As might be expected, Bach’s composition understands the initial psalm passage to be the central statement and underscores its significance by clothing it in an expansively executed choral movement. In its dominating instrumental motives—the juxtaposition of energetic accents and hovering triplets—it is of course less indebted to pleading invocation than the balanced serenity of the pastorale milieu. The tranquil basses—remaining at one pitch level for as long as twelve
4 measures—serve the sense of the pastoral as much as the entry of an oboe trio, whereby it bears mentioning that at no point in the opening movement do the oboes take on a truly independent role. One might venture the possibility that the composer may initially have meant to keep the impression of the pastorale in check by avoiding the participation of the oboes as shepherds’ shawms. The opening movement consists of six sections; the first is reserved for the instruments, which introduce the main thematic material. The other sections alternate regularly between chordal or figural textures and fugue, so that the third and fifth fugal sections stand between nonfugal sections 2, 4, and 6. At first, Bach’s text underlay hews strictly to the wording of the psalm, but in the course of the movement it gives more weight to the invocation “erscheine” as opposed to “höre” at the beginning. According to an observation by Christoph Wetzel, “The second entreaty [is] . . . the more urgent by virtue of its greater number of repetitions as well as its twice-greater speed as compared to the first entreaty.”1 In accordance with principles of musical structure, the development that results from dealing with the text this way prevents Bach from taking up the initial “Du Hirte Israel, höre” again at the movement’s conclusion.
The relatively brief tenor recitative flows into an arioso near the end, serving, on the one hand, to strengthen the closing statement, “Gott ist getreu,” and, on the other, to draw attention to the quotation-like character of the passage by changing the manner of setting. “Gott ist getreu” is a biblical text taken from 1 Corinthians 10:13. Meditative and earnest, the tenor aria “Verbirgt mein Hirte sich zu lange” (If my shepherd hides too long) employs the two oboi d’amore not so much to represent the shepherd’s realm as the vox humana, the voice of humanity in general. The mood of tranquil and composed reflection is broken only twice in passing, when bitter chromaticism and alien progressions bring the phrase “macht mir die Wüste bange” vividly alive to us.
The bass aria “Beglückte Herde, Jesu Schafe,” which follows a brief recitative, is entirely different. Here the pastoral character predominates once again with tranquil basses and sweet harmonies filled with parallel thirds and sixths. The calm, as it were, perfect
8 meter concerns the shepherd’s milieu only indirectly; instead, it is meant symbolically here and embodies the “Himmelreich” (realm of heaven) referenced in the text. Consequently, the middle part of the aria, whose text promises “des Glaubens Lohn / Nach einem sanften Todesschlafe” (faith’s reward / After a gentle sleep of death), can offer little contrast; there is simply a modest modulation to a closely related key and a change from major to minor.
A four-part chorale on the melody Allein Gott in der Höh sei Ehr (Alone to God in the highest be glory) concludes the cantata. It is unusual that this movement is in A major, two progressions of the fifth from the cantata’s beginning in G major. This tonal ascent can hardly be coincidental; there is no musical need for it. Hence one must have faith in Bach’s intention and behold its grounding in the theological message of the text.
Footnotes
- “[Ist] der zweite Bittruf . . . durch die größere Anzahl sowie durch die gegenüber dem ersten Bittruf doppelt schnelle Ruffolge der dringlichere” (Wetzel 1985, 145).↵