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Wo soll ich fliehen hin BWV 5 / BC A 145
Nineteenth Sunday after Trinity, October 15, 1724
This cantata belongs to Johann Sebastian Bach’s annual cycle of chorale cantatas, the second cycle of cantatas in his time in office in Leipzig. It was first performed on October 15, 1724. Its assignment to the nineteenth Sunday after Trinity has less to do with its connection to the Gospel reading for this Sunday (found in Matthew 9, the account of Jesus healing the man with palsy) and more to do with its use of the chorale Wo soll ich fliehen hin (Whither shall I flee), one of the more important hymns for the nineteenth Sunday after Trinity. Hymnaries of the eighteenth century group it among hymns of penance and confession (“Von der Buß und Beichte”) and occasionally beneath the heading “Trost-Gesänglein, darinnen ein betrübtes Herz alle seine Sünde mit wahrem Glauben auf Christum legt. Aus Taulero” (Little hymn of consolation, in which a troubled heart with true faith places all its sins upon Christ. From Tauler), thus emphasizing the relationship between the chorale texts of Johannes Heermann of 1630 and the ideas of the Christian mystic Johannes Tauler of the fourteenth century.As usual for Bach’s chorale cantatas, the chorale text is adopted literally in part and reshaped in part to accommodate the modern forms of recitative and aria. For our cantata, this approach means that the first, eleventh, and twelfth strophes of Heermann’s chorale text, without any changes, became the opening and closing movements of the cantata text, whereas the inner strophes—strophes 2 through 10—are more or less freely paraphrased. Hence the cantata text begins with Heermann’s opening strophe:
Wo soll ich fliehen hin,
Weil ich beschweret bin
Mit viel und großen Sünden?
Wo soll ich Rettung finden?
Wenn alle Welt herkäme,
Mein Angst sie nicht wegnähme.
Whither shall I flee,
For I am burdened
With many and great sins?
Where shall I find deliverance?
If all the world came here,
It would not take away my distress.
In accordance with the Gospel reading for the nineteenth Sunday after Trinity, the chorale strophes revolve around sin and forgiveness, in other words, salvation. In both the hymn and the cantata text based upon it, the blood of Christ plays a central role; only the cantata’s first and last movements do not mention it. As a mystical metaphor, it stands for redemption and Christ’s victory. In this regard, a recent study states the following:
The idea of washing and bathing in the blood of Christ is closely related with the mysteries of baptism and recalls the ritualistic rites of cleansing of most religions. In this figurative sense as theme of purification it is widely used in the religious poetry of the Baroque. There are also many examples in Bach’s texts: for ritualistic cleansing through Christ’s blood, on the one hand, only a single drop is sufficient; on the other, verbs of the mystical metaphors of eternity like “gush forth,” “surge,” “sprinkle,” “inundate,” “bathe” and “immerse in the ocean of blood” are very common.1
The first and last recitatives in our cantata’s libretto speak of the cleansing power of a single drop, and the metaphor of eternity characterizes the first aria, whose dactylic meter further intensifies the impression of superabundance:
Ergieße dich reichlich, du göttliche Quelle,
Ach walle mit blutigen Strömen auf mich.
Es fühlet mein Herze die tröstliche Stunde,
Nun sinken die drückenden Lasten zu Grunde,
Es wäschet die sündlichen Flecken von sich.
Gush forth abundantly, you divine spring,
Ah, surge with bloody streams over me.
My heart feels the comforting hour,
Now the oppressive burdens sink to the ground,
The sinful blemishes are washed away.
The strophe by Johannes Heermann, used as a model, is more modest and concentrated:
Durch dein unschuldig Blut,
Die schöne rote Flut,
Wasch ab all meine Sünde,
Mit Trost mein Herz verbinde,
Und ihr nicht mehr gedenke,
Ins Meer sie tief versenke.
Through your innocent blood,
The beautiful red flood,
Wash away all my sins.
With comfort bandage my heart,
And may I think of them no more.
Into the sea may I let them deeply sink.
In the second cantata aria, model and paraphrase are not as distant from one another. In Heermann’s hymn, the eighth strophe reads:
In the aria text, the hymn strophe’s language, aimed at assurance of salvation, takes on a battle-ready manner, eager for confrontation:Und wenn des Satans Heer
Mir ganz entgegen wär,
Darf ich doch nicht verzagen,
Mit dir kann ich sie schlagen,
Dein Blut darf ich nur zeigen,
So muß ihr Trutz bald schweigen.
And if Satan’s army
Were all against me,
I need not despair.
With you I can defeat them,
Your blood I need only show them,
Then must their defiance soon fall silent.
The purification of sin through the blood of Christ, invoked multiple times, ultimately leads to the inheritance of heaven and union with Christ, as set forth in Heermann’s last strophe, which concludes the cantata:Verstumme, Höllenheer,
Du machst mich nicht verzagt.
Ich darf dies Blut dir zeigen,
So mußt du plötzlich schweigen,
Es ist in Gott gewagt.
Silence, host of hell,
You do not make me despair.
I can but show you this blood,
Then you must suddenly be silent.
In God’s name it is ventured.
In his composition of this cantata text, rich in tension and contrast despite its unity of content, Bach begins as expected with a large-scale concertante chorale setting. The melody Auf meinen lieben Gott (In my beloved God), found in the 1627 cantional for Thomaskantor Johann Hermann Schein, goes back to a secular song of the sixteenth century. It not only dominates as cantus firmus in large note values in the soprano, but with its characteristic head motive it also marks large sections of the contrapuntal texture of the other three choral voices and, in particular, the orchestral part. The head motive moves in both its original and its inverted form; with its variable Fortspinnung (spinning forth) that seems to “search for the way out,” so to speak, it makes omnipresent the ambivalent relationship between the textual statement “Wo soll ich fliehen hin, / Weil ich beschweret bin” (Whither shall I flee, / For I am burdened) and the melody “Auf meinen lieben Gott, / Trau ich in Angst und Not” (In my beloved God / I trust in anxiety and need). A brief recitative for bass is followed by the first aria for tenor and obbligato instrument—whether violin, viola, or violoncello piccolo remains unknown. In any case, the string instrument and voice compete in an expressive and vivid interpretation of the exuberant text “Ergieße dich reichlich, du göttliche Quelle.” With the general abundance in the text of gushing forth, streaming, welling up, and washing, the middle part of the aria avoids any attempt at contrast.Führ auch mein Herz und Sinn
Durch deinen Geist dahin,
Daß ich mög alles meiden,
Was mich und dich kann scheiden,
Und ich an deinem Leibe
Ein Gliedmaß ewig bleibe.
Lead also my heart and mind
Through your spirit, there,
That I may avoid everything
That can separate me and you,
And that I, of your body,
May forever remain a member.
The fourth movement sees the return of the tension between “Wo soll ich fliehen hin” and “Auf meinen lieben Gott” that characterized the first movement. The chorale melody, an untexted quotation in the oboe, joins the alto’s recitative lines, filled with confidence, whereby the noticeably higher register compared to the opening and concluding movements not only has a structural function but also enables pitch and key symbolism. In the second aria, the entire ensemble—oboes, strings, and a tromba da tirarsi, a slide trumpet in high register—is juxtaposed to the bass voice, clarifying the heroic affect of the movement with fanfare motives and brilliant passagework. The concluding four-part chorale has no trace of the concertante ambitions of the preceding movements.
About a decade after the initial performance in 1724, the cantor of St. Thomas School evidently offered the cantata Wo soll ich fliehen hin again; in contrast to the earlier occasion, the organ was not used in the recitatives and the tenor aria. There are no traces of any later performances, although they probably took place. After the death of Johann Sebastian Bach the widow, Anna Magdalena, inherited the performance materials, which she immediately donated to the St. Thomas School in Leipzig, where they reside today. The autograph score went to the oldest son, Wilhelm Friedemann Bach. It was probably sold in 1827 and, after passing through several hands, came into the possession of the famous violinist Joseph Joachim. In 1927 it entered the select autograph collection of Austrian novelist Stefan Zweig. Thought to be lost after his tragic suicide in exile in Brazil in 1942, the score nevertheless remained in possession of the family, who presented it to the British Library in London, where it can be found today.