Only the briefest mention can be made of other German Lutheran hymn-writers of this period. One of these, Johan Rist, pastor in Wedel, was crowned poet laureate of Germany by Emperor Ferdinand III in 1644, and nine years later was raised to the nobility. Rist wrote some 680 hymns, but all are not of uniform excellence. Among those in common use to-day are “Arise, the kingdom is at hand,” “Help us, O Lord, behold we enter,” “Rise, O Salem, rise and shine,” “O Living Bread from heaven,” “O Jesus Christ, Thou Bread of Life,” “Father, merciful and holy,” which has also been translated “Soul of mine, to God awaking,” “O darkest woe,” and “Arise, arise ye Christians.”
Georg Neumark, court poet and secretary of archives under Duke Wilhelm II of Saxe-Weimar, has left us the hymn of trust in God: “Let, O my soul, thy God direct thee,” which is also known by the English translation, “If thou but suffer God to guide thee.” The hymn was written in 1641, at Kiel, when, after being robbed of practically all he possessed except his prayer-book, Neumark succeeded in obtaining employment as tutor in a wealthy family. He was a destitute student at the time.
Michael Schirmer, an educator and poet who lived in Berlin during the Thirty Years’ War and for two decades after its close, is the author of a number of beautiful hymns, among them the Pentecost hymn, “O Holy Spirit, enter in.” Because of poverty and afflictions suffered during a period of war and pestilence, he has been called “the German Job.”
Ahasuerus Fritsch, chancellor and president of the Consistory of Rudolstadt, is credited with the authorship of “Jesus is my Joy, my All,” a hymn that reflects the spirit of true evangelical piety. He died in 1701.
Caspar Neumann, another of Gerhardt’s contemporaries, has bequeathed to the Church the sublime hymn, “God of Ages, all transcending,” the last stanza of which is unusually striking in language:
Say Amen, O God our Father,
To the praise we offer Thee;
Now, to laud Thy name we gather;
Let this to Thy glory be.
Fill us with Thy love and grace,