A Mighty Fortress Is Our God

Lore & Background

The hymn is one of the best known of the Lutheran tradition and among Protestants more generally. It has been called the "Battle Hymn of the Reformation" for the effect it had in increasing support for the Reformers' cause. John Julian records four theories of its origin: Heinrich Heine suggested it was sung by Luther and his companions as they entered Worms on 16 April 1521 for the Diet; K. F. T. Schneider thought it was a tribute to Luther's friend Leonhard Kaiser, executed on 16 August 1527; Jean-Henri Merle d'Aubigné believed it was sung by German Lutheran princes entering Augsburg for the Diet in 1530; and some scholars connect it with the Diet of Speyer (1529). Alternatively, John M. Merriman writes that the hymn "began as a martial song to inspire soldiers against the Ottoman forces."

The earliest extant hymnal in which it appears is that of Andrew Rauscher (1531). It is believed to have been included in Joseph Klug's Wittenberg hymnal of 1529, of which no copy remains, and before that in Hans Weiss Wittenberg's hymnal of 1528, also lost. This evidence supports Luther having written it between 1527 and 1529. Luther composed the melody, named Ein feste Burg from the text's first line, in meter 87.87.55.56.7. While 19th-century musicologists disputed Luther's authorship of the music, it is now the consensus view of musical scholars that Luther did compose the famous tune.

Reader's Guide

The hymn's significance extends beyond its religious use. Heinrich Heine called it the Marseillaise of the Reformation. In Germany, it was historically used as a patriotic paean, sung at nationalistic events such as the Wartburg Festival in 1817. The last line of the fourth stanza, "Das Reich muss uns doch bleiben," could be interpreted as referring to the Holy Roman Empire remaining with the Germans. The song is reported to have been used as a battle anthem during the Thirty Years War by forces under King Gustavus Adolphus, though no primary source supports this. In the late 19th century it became an anthem of the early Swedish socialist movement. It is now a suggested hymn for Catholic Masses in the U.S. and appears in the Canadian Catholic Book of Worship (1972). The hymn has been used by numerous composers, including Johann Sebastian Bach, Dieterich Buxtehude, Johann Pachelbel, George Frideric Handel, Georg Philipp Telemann, Felix Mendelssohn, Joachim Raff, Carl Reinecke, Giacomo Meyerbeer, Charles-Valentin Alkan, Richard Wagner, Max Reger, Claude Debussy, Alexander Glazunov, Ralph Vaughan Williams, Flor Peeters, and more recently by band composers and in an opera by Kari Tikka. African-American composer Julius Eastman used it in his 1979 work Gay Guerrilla.

Did You Know?

• The hymn has been translated into English at least seventy times.
• The first English translation was by Myles Coverdale in 1539 with the title 'Oure God is a defence and towre'.
• The earliest extant hymnal containing the hymn is that of Andrew Rauscher (1531).
• The hymn is reported to have been used as a battle anthem during the Thirty Years War by forces under King Gustavus Adolphus, though no primary source supports this.